The LORD summons the whole earth to listen to His judgment.
1 Come near, you nations, to hear! Listen, you peoples. Let the earth and all it contains hear, the world, and everything that comes from it.
The nations and heavenly host are portrayed under cosmic judgment.
2 For Yahweh is enraged against all the nations, and angry with all their armies. He has utterly destroyed them. He has given them over for slaughter.
3 Their slain will also be cast out, and the stench of their dead bodies will come up. The mountains will melt in their blood.
4 All of the army of the sky will be dissolved. The sky will be rolled up like a scroll, and all its armies will fade away, as a leaf fades from off a vine or a fig tree.
Edom is judged with sacrificial slaughter imagery as the LORD’s sword acts.
5 For my sword has drunk its fill in the sky. Behold, it will come down on Edom, and on the people of my curse, for judgment.
6 Yahweh’s sword is filled with blood. It is covered with fat, with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams; for Yahweh has a sacrifice in Bozrah, And a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
7 The wild oxen will come down with them, and the young bulls with the mighty bulls; and their land will be drunken with blood, and their dust made greasy with fat.
The judgment is identified as recompense for Zion’s cause.
8 For Yahweh has a day of vengeance, a year of recompense for the cause of Zion.
Edom’s streams, dust, and land are transformed into symbols of enduring judgment.
9 Its streams will be turned into pitch, its dust into sulfur, And its land will become burning pitch.
10 It won’t be quenched night nor day. Its smoke will go up forever. From generation to generation, it will lie waste. No one will pass through it forever and ever.
Edom’s human order collapses into measured desolation occupied by wilderness creatures.
11 But the pelican and the porcupine will possess it. The owl and the raven will dwell in it. He will stretch the line of confusion over it, and the plumb line of emptiness.
12 They shall call its nobles to the kingdom, but none shall be there; and all its princes shall be nothing.
13 Thorns will come up in its palaces, nettles and thistles in its fortresses; and it will be a habitation of jackals, a court for ostriches.
14 The wild animals of the desert will meet with the wolves, and the wild goat will cry to his fellow. Yes, the night creature shall settle there, and shall find herself a place of rest.
15 The arrow snake will make her nest there, and lay, hatch, and gather under her shade. Yes, the kites will be gathered there, every one with her mate.
The LORD’s written word guarantees that His judgment will be fulfilled precisely.
16 Search in the book of Yahweh, and read: not one of these will be missing. None will lack her mate. For my mouth has commanded, and his Spirit has gathered them.
17 He has cast the lot for them, and his hand has divided it to them with a measuring line. They shall possess it forever. From generation to generation they will dwell in it.