(39) They shall howl, saying, How is it broken down!--Better, taking the words in the Hebrew order, How is she broken down! How do they howl! In the word "derision" we have the emphatic iteration of the term that had been pointedly used in Jeremiah 48:26; Jeremiah 48:2. At this stage the parallelism with Isaiah 15, 16 ceases, and the prediction has a more independent character.
48:14-47. 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.
They shall howl, saying, how is it broken down?.... Or, "how is it broken" or "thrown into consternation (p)? they howl"; that is, they howl out these words, or, while they are howling, say, how is Kirheres or Moab broken all to pieces; their strength, power, and glory; their cities, and their mighty men; and are in the utmost fright and confusion? Jarchi takes it to be an imperative, and paraphrases it,
"howl ye over her (q), and say, how is it broken!''
Kimchi says it may be taken either as in the past or in the imperative;
how hath Moab turned the back with shame? not being able to look their enemies in the face, but obliged to flee before them;
so shall Moab be a derision and a dismaying to all them about him; a derision to some, to their enemies, as Israel had been to them, and so they are paid in their own coin; and a consternation to others, their friends, who would fear sharing the same fate, at the hands of the Chaldeans.
"howl ye over her (q), and say, how is it broken!''
Kimchi says it may be taken either as in the past or in the imperative;
how hath Moab turned the back with shame? not being able to look their enemies in the face, but obliged to flee before them;
so shall Moab be a derision and a dismaying to all them about him; a derision to some, to their enemies, as Israel had been to them, and so they are paid in their own coin; and a consternation to others, their friends, who would fear sharing the same fate, at the hands of the Chaldeans.
(p) "quomodo consternata est", Piscator, Schmidt. (q) "ululate", Munster, Piscator; "ejulate", Junius & Tremellius.