I will drive out before the Israelites all who live in the hill country from Lebanon to Misrephoth Maim, ¹  all the Sidonians; you be sure to parcel it out to Israel as I instructed you.” ² 

They found among the inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead four hundred young girls who were virgins – they had never had sexual relations with a male. ¹  They brought them back to the camp at Shiloh in the land of Canaan.

He is the one who sits on the earth’s horizon; ¹  its inhabitants are like grasshoppers before him. ²  He is the one who stretches out the sky like a thin curtain, ³  and spreads it out ⁴  like a pitched tent. ⁵ 

Like a lion that has come up from its lair ¹  the one who destroys nations has set out from his home base. ²  He is coming out to lay your land waste. Your cities will become ruins and lie uninhabited.

“I, the Lord, say: ¹  ‘You and your people are saying ²  about this place, “It lies in ruins. There are no people or animals in it.” That is true. The towns of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem ³  will soon be desolate, uninhabited either by people or by animals. But happy sounds will again be heard in these places.

But the one who will rescue them ¹  is strong. He is known as the Lord who rules over all. ²  He will strongly ³  champion their cause. As a result ⁴  he will bring peace and rest to the earth, but trouble and turmoil ⁵  to the people who inhabit Babylonia. ⁶ 

to loot and plunder, to attack ¹  the inhabited ruins and the people gathered from the nations, who are acquiring cattle and goods, who live at the center ²  of the earth.”

The inhabitants ¹  of Samaria will lament ²  over the calf idol ³  of Beth Aven. ⁴  Its people will mourn over it; its idolatrous priests will wail ⁵  over it, ⁶  because its splendor will be taken from them ⁷  into exile.

Indeed, I will no longer have compassion on the people of the land,” says the Lord, “but instead I will turn every last person over to his neighbor and his king. They will devastate the land, and I will not deliver it from them.”

On that day the Lord himself will defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the weakest among them will be like mighty David, and the dynasty of David will be like God, like the angel of the Lord before them. ¹ 

then they will tell it to the inhabitants ¹  of this land. They have heard that you, Lord, are among this people, that you, Lord, are seen face to face, ²  that your cloud stands over them, and that you go before them by day in a pillar of cloud and in a pillar of fire by night.

So I, the Lord, affirm that ¹  I will send for all the peoples of the north ²  and my servant, ³  King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants and all the nations that surround it. I will utterly destroy ⁴  this land, its inhabitants, and all the nations that surround it ⁵  and make them everlasting ruins. ⁶  I will make them objects of horror and hissing scorn. ⁷ 

The men of Judah went with their brothers the men of Simeon ¹  and defeated the Canaanites living in Zephath. They wiped out Zephath. ²  So people now call the city Hormah. ³ 

The residents of Jebus said to David, “You cannot invade this place!” But David captured the fortress of Zion (that is, the City of David).

The Lord who commands armies told me this: ¹  “Many houses will certainly become desolate, large, impressive houses will have no one living in them. ² 

Sing to the Lord a brand new song! Praise him ¹  from the horizon of the earth, you who go down to the sea, and everything that lives in it, ²  you coastlands ³  and those who live there!

Yes, your land lies in ruins; it is desolate and devastated. ¹  But now you will be too small to hold your residents, and those who devoured you will be far away.

They will be like a shrub ¹  in the desert. They will not experience good things even when they happen. It will be as though they were growing in the desert, in a salt land where no one can live.

Leave your towns, you inhabitants of Moab. Go and live in the cliffs. Be like a dove that makes its nest high on the sides of a ravine. ¹ 

“Speak to the Israelites and tell them, ‘When you enter the land where you are to live, ¹  which I am giving you, ²