< Isaiah 16 >
1 Send a lamb [to] the ruler of the land, From Selah in the wilderness, To the mountain of the daughter of Zion.
2 And it has come to pass, As a wandering bird, cast out of a nest, Are daughters of Moab, [at] fords of Arnon.
3 Bring in counsel, do judgment, Make your shadow as night in the midst of noon, Hide outcasts, do not reveal the wanderer.
4 My outcasts sojourn in you, O Moab, Be a secret hiding place for them, From the face of a destroyer, For the extortioner has ceased, Devastation has been finished, The tramplers are consumed out of the land.
5 And the throne is established in kindness, And [One] has sat on it in truth, in the tent of David, Judging and seeking judgment, and hastening righteousness.
6 We have heard of the pride of Moab—very proud, His pride, and his arrogance, and his wrath—his boastings [are] not right.
7 Therefore Moab howls for Moab, all of it howls, It meditates for the grape-cakes of Kir-Hareseth, They are surely struck.
8 Because fields of Heshbon languish, The vine of Sibmah, Lords of nations beat her choice vines, They have come to Jazer, They have wandered in a wilderness, Her plants have spread themselves, They have passed over a sea.
9 Therefore I weep with the weeping of Jazer, The vine of Sibmah, I water you [with] my tear, O Heshbon and Elealeh, For—for your summer fruits, and for your harvest, The shouting has fallen.
10 And gladness and joy have been removed from the fruitful field, And they do not sing in vineyards, nor shout, The treader does not tread wine in the presses, I have caused shouting to cease.
11 Therefore my bowels sound as a harp for Moab, And my inward parts for Kir-Haresh.
12 And it has come to pass, when it has been seen, That Moab has been weary on the high place, And he has come to his sanctuary to pray, And is not able.
13 This [is] the word that YHWH has spoken to Moab from that time,
14 And now YHWH has spoken, saying, “In three years, as years of a hired worker, The glory of Moab is lightly esteemed, With all the great multitude, And the remnant [is] little, small, not mighty!”
