Jeremiah 48:31

Therefore will I howl for Moab, and I will cry out for all Moab; mine heart shall mourn for the men of Kirheres. I WILL CRY OUT FOR ... MOAB - not that it deserves pity, but the prophet's "crying" for it vividly represents the greatness of the calamity. KIR-HERES - Kir-hareseth, in , see note there. It means the city of potters, or else the city of the sun (Grotius). Here "the men of Kir-heres" are substituted for "the foundations of Kir-hareseth" in . The change answers probably to the different bearing of the disaster under Nebuchadnezzar, as compared with that former one spoken of in Isaiah under Shalmaneser....

Some think the last word to be a proper name, though, according to etymology, it is “the city of potsherd.” They therefore give this rendering, “the strong city.” But Isaiah calls it “Kir-hareseth,” קיר-הרשת; he extends the word by adding a syllable to it; but the word, however, is the same. Then he says, _I will think of the men of Kir-cheres _The word הגה,_ege_, is properly to complain, to whisper, to murmur; and hence some render the words not improperly, “I will mutter to the men of the city of potsherd.” (17) The Prophet does not relate here what he would do, as I have before reminded you; but that he might represent to the life the ruin of Moab, he mentions their howling, crying, and complaints. He then says, I will howl, cry aloud, and with a trembling voice complain, as those who are grievously oppressed with evils; at one time they complain, cry aloud, an

14-47. The destruction of Moab is further prophesied, to awaken them by national repentance and reformation to prevent the trouble, or by a personal repentance and reformation to prepare for it. In reading this long roll of threatenings, and mediating on the terror, it will be of more use to us to keep in view the power of God's anger and the terror of his judgments, and to have our hearts possessed with a holy awe of God and of his wrath, than to search into all the figures and expressions here used. Yet it is not perpetual destruction. The chapter ends with a promise of their return out of captivity in the latter days. Even with Moabites God will not contend for ever, nor be always wroth. The Jews refer it to the days of the Messiah; then the captives of the Gentiles, under the yoke of sin and Satan, shall be brought back by Divine grace, which shall make them free indeed....

MINE HEART ... - Rather, “there shall be mourning for” etc....

EXPOSITION This prophecy is so full of repetitions that the question has naturally arisen whether the most prominent of these may not be due to interpolation. For instance: 1.Jeremiah 48:29-24 recur in Isaiah 16:6; Isaiah 15:4, Isaiah 15:5, Isaiah 15:6; Isaiah 16:12, Isaiah 16:11;...

THEREFORE WILL I HOWL FOR MOAB,.... The prophet, being as a man affected with the miseries of a people very wicked, and so deserving of them; though indeed by this he does not so much design to express the affections of his own heart, as to show what reason the Moabites would have to howl for the calamities of their country; for, as Kimchi observes, the prophet here speaks in the person of the people of Moab; see Isaiah 16:7; AND I WILL CRY OUT FOR ALL MOAB; the whole country of Moab, which should become desolate: [MINE HEART] SHALL MOURN FOR THE MEN OF KIRHERES; the same with Kirhareseth, a city of Moab, Isaiah 16:7; whose foundations should be sapped, the city taken, and the men of it put to the sword, or caused to flee; and their case being deplorable, the prophet says h

CHAPTER 48 Concerning Moab _ 1. The overthrow of Moab (Jeremiah 48:1) _ 2. The humiliation of Moab (Jeremiah 48:11) 3. Reaping what they sowed (Jeremiah 48:20) 4. Destroyed on account of its pride (Jeremiah 48:29) With these divisions the chapter may be studied in detail. Moab was of incestuous off spring Genesis 19:37. Israel is now exhorted to flee and save itself because Moab is to be destroyed. Moab's national deity was Chemosh, who was also worshipped by the sister nation, the

Moab's pride is without foundation, doomed to a fall which the prophet laments; comparing the past glory with the far-reaching tendrils of a choice vine (Jeremiah 48:32). There is no longer the joy of the ingathering; the shout of battle replaces that of the vintage (Jeremiah 48:33). The beginning of Jeremiah 48:34 is corrupt and yields no sense, but the general meaning is that there shall be widespread ruin. The _worship of the land is brought_ to an end (Jeremiah 48:35). Hence the prophet's sorrow for Moab, a land filled with mourning (Je

MINE HEART SHALL MOURN. must one mourn. So the St. Petersburg Codex (A.D. 916), with note that the Eastern Massorites read "I shall mourn". KIR-HERES. Now _Kerak,_ the fortified town east of southern end of the Dead Sea....

See introd. summary to the ch. The passage may contain some Jeremianic matter, but on the whole is late (see also on Jeremiah 48:37) and borrowed to a large extent from Is. 15., 16. (chs. which are perhaps earlier than Isaiah's time and republished by him. See Skinner, C.B. _ad loc_.)....