15
The Burden against Moab
(Jeremiah 48:1–47)
 
This is the burden against Moab:
 
Ar in Moab is ruined,
destroyed in a night!
Kir in Moab is devastated,
destroyed in a night!
Dibon goes up to its temple
to weep at its high places.
Moab wails over Nebo,
as well as over Medeba.
 
Every head is shaved,
every beard is cut off.
In its streets they wear sackcloth;
on the rooftops and in the public squares
they all wail, falling down weeping.
Heshbon and Elealeh cry out;
their voices are heard as far as Jahaz.
Therefore the soldiers of Moab cry out;
their souls tremble within.
 
My heart cries out over Moab;
her fugitives flee as far as Zoar,
as far as Eglath-shelishiyah.*
With weeping they ascend the slope of Luhith;
they lament their destruction on the road to Horonaim.
The waters of Nimrim are dried up,
and the grass is withered;
the vegetation is gone,
and the greenery is no more.
So they carry their wealth and belongings
over the Brook of the Willows.
 
For their outcry echoes to the border of Moab.
Their wailing reaches Eglaim;
it is heard in Beer-elim.
The waters of Dimon are full of blood,
but I will bring more upon Dimon
a lion upon the fugitives of Moab
and upon the remnant of the land.
* 15:5 Or Zoar, like a heifer three years of age. 15:7 Or Poplars 15:9 MT, twice in this verse; DSS and Vulgate Dibon; Dimon, a wordplay on Dibon (see verse 2), sounds like the Hebrew for blood.