CHAPTER 49 Aug. 27 
God's Message for Ammon
Of the children of Ammon. Thus says Yahweh: Has Israel no sons? Has he no heir? why then does Malcam possess Gad, and his people dwell in its cities? 2Therefore behold, the days come, says Yahweh, that I will cause an alarm of war to be heard against Rabbah of the children of Ammon; and it shall become a desolate heap, and her daughters shall be burned with fire: then shall Israel possess those who possessed him, says Yahweh. 3Wail, Heshbon, for Ai is laid waste; cry, you daughters of Rabbah, clothe yourself in sackcloth: lament, and run back and forth among the fences; for Malcam shall go into captivity, his priests and his princes together. 4Why do you glory in the valleys, your flowing valley, backsliding daughter? Who trusted in her treasures, saying, who shall come to me? 5Behold, I will bring a fear on you, says the Lord, Yahweh of Armies, from all who are around you; and you shall be driven out every man right forth, and there shall be none to gather together the fugitives. 6But afterwards I will revive the fortunes of the children of Ammon, says Yahweh.
God's Message for Edom
7Of Edom. Thus says Yahweh of Armies: Is wisdom no more in Teman? Is counsel perished from the prudent? Has their wisdom vanished? 8Flee, turn back, dwell in the depths, inhabitants of Dedan; for I will bring the calamity of Esau on him, the time that I shall visit him. 9If grape gatherers came to you, would they not leave some gleaning grapes? If thieves by night, wouldn’t they steal until they had enough? 10But I have made Esau bare, I have uncovered his secret places, and he shall not be able to hide himself: his seed is destroyed, and his brothers, and his neighbours; and he is no more. 11Leave your fatherless children, I will preserve them alive; and let your widows trust in Me. 12For thus says Yahweh: Behold, they to whom it didn’t pertain to drink of the cup shall certainly drink; and are you he who shall altogether go unpunished? You shall not go unpunished, but you shall surely drink. 13For I have sworn by Myself, says Yahweh, that Bozrah shall become an astonishment, a reproach, a waste, and a curse; and all its cities shall be perpetual wastes. 14I have heard news from Yahweh, and an ambassador is sent among the nations saying, Gather yourselves together, and come against her, and rise up to the battle. 15For, behold, I have made you small among the nations, and despised among men. 16As for your terror, the pride of your heart has deceived you, O you who dwell in the clefts of the rock, who hold the height of the hill: though you should make your nest as high as the eagle, I will bring you down from there, says Yahweh. 17Edom shall become an astonishment: each one who passes by it shall be astonished, and shall hiss at all its plagues. 18As in the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah and their neighbouring cities, says Yahweh, no man shall dwell there, neither shall any son of man live therein. 19Behold, he shall come up like a lion from the pride of the Jordan against the strong habitation: for I will suddenly make them run away from it; and whoever is chosen, him will I appoint over it: for who is like Me? And who will appoint Me a time? And who is the shepherd who will stand before Me? 20Therefore hear the counsel of Yahweh that He has taken against Edom; and His purposes, that He has purposed against the inhabitants of Teman: Surely they shall drag them away, the little ones of the flock; surely he shall make their habitation desolate over them. 21The earth trembles at the noise of their fall; there is a cry, the noise which is heard in the Red Sea. 22Behold, he shall come up and fly as the eagle, and spread out his wings against Bozrah: and the heart of the mighty men of Edom at that day shall be as the heart of a woman in her pangs.
God's Message for Damascus
 23Of Damascus. Hamath is confounded, and Arpad; for they have heard evil news, they are melted away: there is sorrow on the sea; it can’t be quiet. 24Damascus has grown feeble, she turns herself to flee, and trembling has seized on her: anguish and sorrows have taken hold of her, as of a woman in travail. 25How is the city of praise not forsaken, the city of My joy! 26Therefore her young men shall fall in her streets, and all the men of war shall be brought to silence in that day, says Yahweh of Armies. 27I will kindle a fire in the wall of Damascus, and it shall devour the palaces of Ben Hadad.
God's Message for Kedar, Hazor and Elam
28Of Kedar, and of the kingdoms of Hazor, which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon struck. Thus says Yahweh: Arise, go up to Kedar, and destroy the children of the east. 29Their tents and their flocks shall they take; they shall carry away for themselves their curtains, and all their vessels, and their camels; and they shall cry to them, Terror on every side! 30Flee, wander far off, dwell in the depths, you inhabitants of Hazor, says Yahweh; for Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has taken counsel against you, and has conceived a purpose against you. 31Arise, go up to a nation that is at ease, that dwells without care, says Yahweh; that have neither gates nor bars, that dwell alone. 32Their camels shall be a booty, and the multitude of their livestock a spoil: and I will scatter to all winds those who have the corners of their beards cut off; and I will bring their calamity on them from every side, says Yahweh. 33Hazor shall be a dwelling place of jackals, a desolation forever: no man shall dwell there, neither shall any son of man live therein. 34The word of Yahweh that came to Jeremiah the prophet concerning Elam, in the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, saying, 35Thus says Yahweh of Armies: Behold, I will break the bow of Elam, the chief of their might. 36On Elam will I bring the four winds from the four quarters of the sky, and will scatter them towards all those winds; and there shall be no nation where the outcasts of Elam shall not come. 37I will cause Elam to be dismayed before their enemies, and before those who seek their life; and I will bring evil on them, even My fierce anger, says Yahweh; and I will send the sword after them, until I have consumed them; 38and I will set My throne in Elam, and will destroy from there king and princes, says Yahweh. 39But it shall happen in the latter days, that I will restore the fortunes of Elam, says Yahweh.

Commentary

49:1 Why then does Malcam possess Gad- It was Ammon who had gone over their border to possess the land intended for the Israelite tribe of Gad; hence the reference to Israel repossessing their own land from Ammon in :2. But Malcam, the god of Ammon, is spoken of here as if it was Ammon (as in :3). A people are identified with the name of their god, in that those who worship idols become like them (Ps. 115:8). Israel were unusual in that they had a national God, Yahweh, but they didn’t totally identify with Him because they also worshipped gods like Malcam whom the surrounding nations worshipped. By baptism into the Lord’s Name and becoming the spiritual people of Abraham (Gal. 3:27-29) we are to be totally identified with our God.
49:9 If thieves by night, wouldn’t they steal until they had enough?- This recalls how Prov. 6:30 says that we don’t despise a thief who steals because he is hungry. Although all sin is sin, it seems that there are degrees of sin, hence the varying degrees of sacrifice required under the Law of Moses for different sins. God is particularly angry with those who revel in sin as Edom had done, for they as it were sinned for the pleasure of it rather than because human weakness pushed them into the sinful situation (not that sin in any form can be justified). We should bear this in mind when responding to others’ failures.
49:11 Let your widows trust in Me- As in all these prophecies there is an appeal for these enemies of God’s people to repent. The widows of the soldiers whom God had slain are asked to turn to God and trust Him; again we see that the ultimate intention of judgment is to bring people to God and finally bring about the establishment of His Kingdom.
49:16 God wanted to bring down the pride of Edom. They were not His people, they were one of many Gentile nations. Yet God observed their pride and how they trusted in their mountain strongholds. His colossal perception of the attitudes of every human being on earth is perhaps beyond our full appreciation. If He looks with such detail upon the hearts of those who don’t know Him, how much does He look upon us, and also knows the hearts of all those who intersect with us His children.
49:25 How is the city of praise not forsaken, the city of My joy!- This could be the stubborn denial of the king of Damascus. Yet Jerusalem is the city of praise that shall not be forsaken eternally, and which shall be the eternal joy of God’s people when it is declared the capital of the future Kingdom of God on earth (Ps. 9:14; 102:21; Is. 62:12; 65:18). So it seems that God and Jeremiah interject in the midst of these woeful prophecies of the destruction of Gentile cities like Damascus, to reflect that ultimately Jerusalem will not be destroyed like they shall be. This encourages us to see the predictions of Jerusalem or Zion’s eternal presence and joy as having a literal dimension to their fulfilment; the Jerusalem which we can locate on a map, view photographs of or visit shall indeed be the eternal capital city of God’s Kingdom on earth, in the same way as Christ shall reign eternally on David’s throne / place of kingship, which was in Jerusalem (Lk. 1:31-35).
49:28 Which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon struck- The destruction of all these nations is prophesied as a warning to Judah not to make allegiance with them in the hope they would stave off the Babylonian invasion. The lesson is so repeated- that all human strength is not going to work out, the only way of escape from the consequences of sin is by listening to God’s prophetic word.
49:30 Has conceived a purpose against you- But :31 explains that God had commanded Nebuchadnezzar to attack these nations. God is therefore shown to be capable of putting thoughts and ideas in the minds of wicked Gentiles, even though they of their own freewill conceive the plans themselves. We’re unable to exactly understand this process nor the ethics of it all, but the fact is that it happens. The encouragement is that if God does this kind of thing to wicked people, He is likewise able to work upon the weak hearts of those of us who do love Him in weakness and who eagerly invite Him to put good rather than evil in our hearts because we feel so weak in our own mental strength.