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13 Thus says the Lord:
For three transgressions of the Ammonites,
    and for four, I will not revoke the punishment,[a]
because they have ripped open pregnant women in Gilead
    in order to enlarge their territory.(A)

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Footnotes

  1. 1.13 Heb cause it to return

16 [a]Samaria shall bear her guilt
    because she has rebelled against her God;
they shall fall by the sword;
    their little ones shall be dashed in pieces,
    and their pregnant women ripped open.(A)

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Footnotes

  1. 13.16 14.1 in Heb

Mortal, set your face toward the Ammonites and prophesy against them.(A) Say to the Ammonites: Hear the word of the Lord God: Thus says the Lord God: Because you said, “Aha!” over my sanctuary when it was profaned and over the land of Israel when it was made desolate and over the house of Judah when it went into exile,(B) therefore I am handing you over to the people of the East for a possession. They shall set their encampments among you and pitch their tents in your midst; they shall eat your fruit, and they shall drink your milk. I will make Rabbah a pasture for camels and Ammon a fold for flocks. Then you shall know that I am the Lord.(C) For thus says the Lord God: Because you have clapped your hands and stamped your feet and rejoiced with all the malice within you against the land of Israel,(D) therefore I have stretched out my hand against you and will hand you over as plunder to the nations. I will cut you off from the peoples and will make you perish out of the countries; I will destroy you. Then you shall know that I am the Lord.(E)

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Judgment on the Ammonites

49 Concerning the Ammonites.

Thus says the Lord:

Has Israel no sons?
    Has he no heir?
Why then has Milcom[a] dispossessed Gad
    and his people settled in its towns?(A)
Therefore, the time is surely coming,
    says the Lord,
when I will sound the battle alarm
    against Rabbah of the Ammonites;
it shall become a desolate mound,
    and its villages shall be burned with fire;
then Israel shall dispossess those who dispossessed him,
    says the Lord.(B)

Wail, O Heshbon, for Ai is laid waste!
    Cry out, O daughters[b] of Rabbah!
Put on sackcloth,
    lament, and slash yourselves with whips![c]
For Milcom[d] shall go into exile,
    with his priests and his attendants.(C)
Why do you boast in your strength?
    Your strength is ebbing,
O faithless daughter.
    Who trusted in her treasures, saying,[e]
    “Who will attack me?”(D)
I am going to bring terror upon you,
    says the Lord God of hosts,
    from all your neighbors,
and you will be scattered, each headlong,
    with no one to gather the fugitives.(E)

But afterward I will restore the fortunes of the Ammonites, says the Lord.(F)

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Footnotes

  1. 49.1 Gk Vg Syr: Heb their king
  2. 49.3 Or villages
  3. 49.3 Cn: Meaning of Heb uncertain
  4. 49.3 Gk Vg Syr: Heb their king
  5. 49.4 Gk: Heb lacks saying

I have heard the taunts of Moab
    and the revilings of the Ammonites,
how they have taunted my people
    and made boasts against their territory.(A)
Therefore, as I live, says the Lord of hosts,
    the God of Israel,
Moab shall become like Sodom
    and the Ammonites like Gomorrah,
a land possessed by nettles and salt pits
    and a waste forever.
The remnant of my people shall plunder them,
    and the survivors of my nation shall possess them.(B)

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10 Because you said, “These two nations and these two countries shall be mine, and we will take possession of them”—although the Lord was there(A)

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Social Injustice Denounced

Woe to those who join house to house,
    who add field to field,
until there is room for no one,
    and you are left to live alone
    in the midst of the land!(A)

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Moreover, wealth[a] is treacherous;
    the arrogant do not endure.
They open their throats wide as Sheol;
    like Death they never have enough.
They gather all nations for themselves
    and collect all peoples as their own.(A)

The Woes of the Wicked

Shall not everyone taunt such people and, with mocking riddles, say about them,

“Alas for you who heap up what is not your own!”
    How long will you load yourselves with goods taken in pledge?(B)

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Footnotes

  1. 2.5 Q mss: MT wine

Thus says the Lord:
For three transgressions of Damascus,
    and for four, I will not revoke the punishment,[a]
because they have threshed Gilead
    with threshing sledges of iron.(A)

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Footnotes

  1. 1.3 Heb cause it to return

28 As for you, mortal, prophesy, and say: Thus says the Lord God concerning the Ammonites and concerning their reproach; say:

A sword, a sword! Drawn for slaughter,
    polished to consume,[a] to flash like lightning.(A)

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Footnotes

  1. 21.28 Cn: Heb to contain

Gebal and Ammon and Amalek,
    Philistia with the inhabitants of Tyre;

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[a]But when Sanballat and Tobiah and the Arabs and the Ammonites and the Ashdodites heard that the repairing of the walls of Jerusalem was going forward and the gaps were beginning to be closed, they were very angry(A) and all plotted together to come and fight against Jerusalem and to cause confusion in it. So we prayed to our God and set a guard as a protection against them day and night.(B)

10 But Judah said, “The strength of the burden bearers is failing, and there is too much rubbish so that we are unable to work on the wall.” 11 And our enemies said, “They will not know or see anything before we come upon them and kill them and stop the work.” 12 When the Jews who lived near them came, they said to us ten times, “From all the places where they live[b] they will come up against us.”[c] 13 So in the lowest parts of the space behind the wall, in open places, I stationed the people according to their families,[d] with their swords, their spears, and their bows.(C) 14 After I looked these things over, I stood up and said to the nobles and the officials and the rest of the people, “Do not be afraid of them. Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome, and fight for your kin, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your households.”(D)

15 When our enemies heard that their plot was known to us and that God had frustrated it, we all returned to the wall, each to his work.(E) 16 From that day on, half of my servants worked on construction, and half held the spears, shields, bows, and body-armor, and the leaders posted themselves behind the whole house of Judah 17 who were building the wall. The burden bearers carried their loads in such a way that each labored on the work with one hand and with the other held a weapon. 18 And each of the builders had his sword strapped at his side while he built. The man who sounded the trumpet was beside me. 19 And I said to the nobles, the officials, and the rest of the people, “The work is great and widely spread out, and we are separated far from one another on the wall. 20 Rally to us wherever you hear the sound of the trumpet. Our God will fight for us.”(F)

21 So we labored at the work, and half of them held the spears from break of dawn until the stars came out. 22 I also said to the people at that time, “Let every man and his servant pass the night inside Jerusalem, so that they may be a guard for us by night and may labor by day.” 23 So neither I nor my brothers nor my servants nor the men of the guard who followed me ever took off our clothes; each kept his weapon in his right hand.[e]

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Footnotes

  1. 4.7 4.1 in Heb
  2. 4.12 Cn: Heb you return
  3. 4.12 Compare Gk Syr: Meaning of Heb uncertain
  4. 4.13 Meaning of Heb uncertain
  5. 4.23 Cn: Heb each his weapon the water

19 But when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite official[a] and Geshem the Arab heard of it, they mocked and ridiculed us, saying, “What is this that you are doing? Are you rebelling against the king?”(A)

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Footnotes

  1. 2.19 Heb servant

10 See now, the people of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Seir, whom you would not let Israel invade when they came from the land of Egypt and whom they avoided and did not destroy,(A)

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Invasion from the East

20 After this the Moabites and Ammonites, and with them some of the Meunites,[a] came against Jehoshaphat for battle.

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Footnotes

  1. 20.1 Heb Ammonites

He[a] sent against him bands of the Chaldeans, bands of the Arameans, bands of the Moabites, and bands of the Ammonites; he sent them against Judah to destroy it, according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by his servants the prophets.(A)

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Footnotes

  1. 24.2 Gk: Heb the Lord

The Ammonites and Arameans Are Defeated

10 Some time afterward, the king of the Ammonites died, and his son Hanun succeeded him.(A) David said, “I will deal loyally with Hanun son of Nahash, just as his father dealt loyally with me.” So David sent envoys to console him concerning his father. When David’s envoys came into the land of the Ammonites, the princes of the Ammonites said to their lord Hanun, “Do you really think that David is honoring your father just because he has sent messengers with condolences to you? Has not David sent his envoys to you to search the city, to spy it out, and to overthrow it?” So Hanun seized David’s envoys, shaved off half the beard of each, cut off their garments in the middle at their waists, and sent them away.(B) When David was told, he sent to meet them, for the men were greatly ashamed. The king said, “Remain at Jericho until your beards have grown and then return.”

When the Ammonites saw that they had become odious to David, the Ammonites sent and hired the Arameans of Beth-rehob and the Arameans of Zobah, twenty thousand foot soldiers, as well as the king of Maacah, one thousand men, and the men of Tob, twelve thousand men.(C) When David heard of it, he sent Joab and all the army of the warriors. The Ammonites came out and drew up in battle array at the entrance of the gate, but the Arameans of Zobah and of Rehob and the men of Tob and Maacah were by themselves in the open country.(D)

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Saul Defeats the Ammonites

11 About a month later,[a] Nahash the Ammonite went up and besieged Jabesh-gilead, and all the men of Jabesh said to Nahash, “Make a treaty with us, and we will serve you.”(A) But Nahash the Ammonite said to them, “On this condition I will make a treaty with you, namely, that I gouge out everyone’s right eye and thus put disgrace upon all Israel.”(B)

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Footnotes

  1. 11.1 Q ms Gk: MT lacks About a month later

15 and said to him, “Thus says Jephthah: Israel did not take away the land of Moab or the land of the Ammonites,(A) 16 but when they came up from Egypt, Israel went through the wilderness to the Red Sea[a] and came to Kadesh.(B) 17 Israel then sent messengers to the king of Edom, saying, ‘Let us pass through your land,’ but the king of Edom would not listen. They also sent to the king of Moab, but he would not consent. So Israel remained at Kadesh. 18 Then they journeyed through the wilderness, went around the land of Edom and the land of Moab, arrived on the east side of the land of Moab, and camped on the other side of the Arnon. They did not enter the territory of Moab, for the Arnon was the boundary of Moab.(C) 19 Israel then sent messengers to King Sihon of the Amorites, king of Heshbon, and Israel said to him, ‘Let us pass through your land to our country.’(D) 20 But Sihon did not trust Israel to pass through his territory, so Sihon gathered all his people together and encamped at Jahaz and fought with Israel.(E) 21 Then the Lord, the God of Israel, gave Sihon and all his people into the hand of Israel, and they defeated them, so Israel occupied all the land of the Amorites, who inhabited that country.(F) 22 They occupied all the territory of the Amorites from the Arnon to the Jabbok and from the wilderness to the Jordan.(G) 23 So now the Lord, the God of Israel, has conquered the Amorites for the benefit of his people Israel. Do you intend to take their place? 24 Should you not possess what your god Chemosh gives you to possess? And should we not be the ones to possess everything that the Lord our God has conquered for our benefit?(H) 25 Now are you any better than King Balak son of Zippor of Moab? Did he ever enter into conflict with Israel, or did he ever go to war with them?(I) 26 While Israel lived in Heshbon and its villages, and in Aroer and its villages, and in all the towns that are along the Arnon, three hundred years, why did you not recover them within that time?(J) 27 It is not I who have sinned against you, but you are the one who does me wrong by making war on me. Let the Lord, who is judge, decide today for the Israelites or for the Ammonites.”(K) 28 But the king of the Ammonites did not heed the message that Jephthah sent him.

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Footnotes

  1. 11.16 Or Sea of Reeds

So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he sold them into the hand of the Philistines and into the hand of the Ammonites,(A) and they crushed and oppressed the Israelites that year. For eighteen years they oppressed all the Israelites who were beyond the Jordan in the land of the Amorites, which is in Gilead. The Ammonites also crossed the Jordan to fight against Judah and against Benjamin and against the house of Ephraim, so that Israel was greatly distressed.

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“No Ammonite or Moabite shall come into the assembly of the Lord even to the tenth generation. None of their descendants shall come into the assembly of the Lord forever, because they did not meet you with food and water on your journey out of Egypt and because they hired against you Balaam son of Beor, from Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse you.

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19 When you approach the frontier of the Ammonites, do not harass them or engage them in battle, for I will not give the land of the Ammonites to you as a possession, because I have given it to the descendants of Lot.’(A)

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