Howl, Heshbon! for Ai is laid waste; cry, daughters of Rabbah, gird you with sackcloth, lament and run to and fro within the enclosures for Malcam shall go into captivity, his priests and his princes together.
Jeremiah 49:3 belongs to a short message against the Ammonites. They lived east of the Jordan, and they had moved into land God gave to Israel's tribe of Gad. The verse orders towns to mourn in public, and it names what goes into exile first: not the treasure, but the god.
Heshbon heads the list. It had changed hands more than once, and it had once been Israel's own:
Chief city of Sihon king of the Amorites. Lying east of the Jordan, it was the first city of importance that fell into the hands of the Israelites... Heshbon was later assigned to Reuben, but became a city of the Levites connected with Gad... After the captivity it fell into the hands of the Moabites, and it is denounced in the prophets. Isaiah 15:4; Jeremiah 48:2, 34, 45; Jeremiah 49:3.
Heshbon is told to wail because Ai lies in ruins. No one today can locate that town:
City of the Ammonites, unknown. Jeremiah 49:3.
The verse also calls on the daughters of Rabbah. Rabbah was the Ammonite capital, and it had been beaten down once and had climbed back:
The fortified capital of the Ammonites... Joab attacked it, and during the siege Uriah, at David's urging, lost his life. The city was eventually taken and destroyed... Later, when the strength of Israel was broken, it appears to have recovered itself, for we find its doom announced in the prophets. Jeremiah 49:2-3; Ezekiel 21:20; Ezekiel 25:5; Amos 1:14. Identified with Amman.
That capital is the city of Amman today. The charge behind the judgment is theft of land. God asks what claim Ammon had on land that belonged to Gad. Then He says where the war will fall:
Jehovah demands what right they had to the land of Gad. For this was one of their sins, as we see in Amos — a violent raid on Gilead and possession of the land and cities for a season. But here they are shown something else. However safe they thought they were, their own capital would hear the alarm of war. Their daughters would share its destruction, when Israel becomes heir to those who were his heirs.
Older translations read "their king shall go into captivity"; ESV names him — Milcom. He was no man, but Ammon's idol, and Israel's own history had already been damaged by him:
Milcom and Molech were the gods of the Ammonites, and Solomon's foreign wives seduced him into worshipping them. 1 Kings 11:5, 7.
One writer draws out the thinking behind that name:
In Ammon he is Moloch — that is, "king" — in fact, whether or not by right. Instead, fact is right. It is not that God is King, reigning because He is divine. It is that the king is God, and is divine because he reigns. And this is nothing strange among men.
The priests and the officials go into exile with him. A god who is only power has nothing left when the power fails.
The message to Ammon runs from verse 1 to verse 6. One writer reads the whole of it as a picture of the flesh — human nature apart from God:
Fear, a characteristic of the flesh, is to take them (v. 5), just as it came upon Moab. They are to be judged with consuming fire (v. 2)... They must learn, like Moab, not to trust in their treasures (v. 4), and like him they shall eventually know deliverance (v. 6).
One writer places the blow in the days of Nebuchadnezzar, and asks whether the mourning of this verse will be heard again:
This desolation fell on Moab, Ammon and the rest in the day of Nebuchadnezzar, I suppose, because they tied their fortunes to Egypt. Possibly the howling, the lamentation and the panic described in verses 3-5 may also come before their captivity is brought back in the last days. Their mourning is all the more pitiful because of the self-confidence and boasting that went before.
Another writer asks where Ammon is now, and answers from the promise rather than the map:
Ammon was the younger brother of Moab, and like the Moabites the Ammonites were a wicked people... The predicted judgment has come. Where is Ammon today? In what tribe or nation is a remnant preserved? Only the all-knowing One knows. But their captivity, like Moab's, will be brought back again in the days when Israel becomes the head of the nations.
- Seizure. Ammon seized land God had given to Gad. God asks by what right, and that theft is why the alarm sounds.
- Security. Rabbah was a fortified capital that had once climbed back from ruin. It felt safe. The alarm of war reached it anyway.
- Sackcloth. Heshbon and the daughters of Rabbah must wail in public. Ai lies waste, and the grief cannot be hidden.
- Milcom. Their god's name means "king." He goes into exile with his priests and officials. A god who is only power falls when the power falls.
- Sequel. The ruin is not the end. Ammon's captivity will be reversed when Israel becomes head of the nations, so the judgment is real but not final.
Wherefore gloriest thou in the valleys? Thy valley shall flow down, O backsliding daughter, that trusteth in her treasures, [saying,] Who shall come against me?
Ammon moved into Gad's land after Israel went into exile, and boasted of a rich valley, full treasuries, and the belief that no one could reach them. The question is why God treats that sense of safety as the very thing He must break.
Ammon's judgment does not stand alone. Chapters 46 to 49 name one neighbour after another, and the list follows a pattern.
In Jeremiah 46 we have the sentence against Egypt, where these foolish Jews had fled for safety, and then the sentence against Philistia in Jeremiah 47. Moab comes next (Jer. 48) — because all these countries were places the Jews looked to for security. In Jeremiah 49 comes the judgment of the Ammonites, along with Damascus and others, even Elam.
Ammon had taken the land of Gad by force. God's reply names what will happen to the place they felt safest.
God demands what right they had to the land of Gad. For this was one of their sins as we see in Amos — a violent raid on Gilead, and possession of the land and cities for a season. But God shows them here that, secure as they thought themselves, their own capital would know the alarm of war. Their daughters would share its destruction, when Israel would be heir to those who had been his heirs.
God judged Moab, Ammon's neighbour, one chapter earlier. One writer names where Moab's trust really lay, and why it failed.
They made human strength their arm and trusted in man, turning away in heart from God. But wings are not enough to escape with, when God directs the blow.
"Who will come against me?" is the calm of someone whose future feels covered. One writer explains what a hoard does to the mind.
The man who hoards up is virtually making a god of his hoard. Thinking of his hoard puts his mind at ease about the future, for if he did not have that hoard he would be uneasy. It is enough to put a natural man completely out of his senses to give him nothing but God to depend on. Anything but that, for him.
The boast does not last. One writer sets the panic of verses 3 to 5 beside what God still intends for Ammon.
The howling, grief and panic described in verses 3-5 are all the more pitiful because of the self-satisfaction and boasting that went before. They may also come before the return of their captivity in the last days.
Some writers read Ammon as a picture of the flesh — human nature as it is in itself. On that reading, Ammon's lesson about treasure belongs to the believer too.
They must learn, like Moab, not to trust in their treasures (v. 4), and like him they will eventually know deliverance (v. 6)... The flesh, as such, can have no standing in Christ. Yet those who were once in sin, and who now know Him as their Saviour, Lord and Deliverer, are "in Christ" where there is a new creation.
Commentators differ here. Some keep to the history of the nations. Others draw out this moral picture.
The judgment is real, but for Ammon it is not the last word. Verse 6 promises their fortunes restored, and not every nation here gets that promise.
These nations were all to fall under the power of Nebuchadnezzar; but some of them are to be restored in the latter day. Among these nations will be Elam, Egypt, Moab and Ammon, but not Philistia, not Damascus, not Hazor, and above all not Babylon.
- Boast — Ammon glories in a rich valley and a full treasury, on land it seized and never owned.
- Trust — the hoard does the work God should do. It quiets the mind, until having only God to lean on feels unbearable.
- Reach — wealth is no shelter when God directs the blow. The city they felt safest in hears the alarm of war first.
- Reversal — the louder the boasting, the more pitiful the panic that follows it.
- Mercy — God turns Ammon's captivity back afterwards, a mercy not given to every nation in this chapter.
Behold, I will bring a fear upon thee, saith the Lord Jehovah of hosts, from all that are about thee; and ye shall be driven out every man right forth; and none shall assemble the fugitives.
Ammon had settled into land that belonged to Israel, boasting of a rich valley and asking who would dare attack. God's answer is terror on every side — so why is fear itself the punishment, and why is no one left to gather those who flee?
Ammon's confidence rested on treasures and on a capital city they thought no army could reach. One commentator sets the two side by side: the security they imagined, and the alarm that came:
But here they learn the truth. They thought themselves secure, yet their own capital would hear the alarm of war. Their daughters would share its destruction, when Israel becomes heir to those who had been his heirs.
The terror is not random. Ammon had taken land God gave to Israel, and seemed to have got away with it:
Ammon had escaped; the enemy of God's people had gone free... This is always the work of the enemy of our souls — not just to win a victory over the people of God, but to take from them the very portion God has given them... But God's eye is on it, and Ammon is not to escape. Ammon misjudges the work of God completely, as the enemy always misjudges it, and so brings on himself the wrath he is rejoicing over when it falls on others.
The threat comes from every side, and it matches the crime. Ammon grabbed land he could never truly hold, so God hands the raider over to raiders:
He covets the land for himself, though he can really take possession of nothing. He is only the nomad raider that everything shows him to be. Rabbah is his one city. The word can be read as "many" — the hold of a mixed crowd, as it were, but the stronghold of a desert people who live by wandering. The judgment that falls on it matches this in every way. In the fitting ways of God, He gives up the land of Ammon to raiders like themselves, "the sons of the East"... men whose hand was against everyone, and everyone's hand against them.
The weapon God names is not a sword but dread. One writer links this fear to the flesh, and to the treasures Ammon trusted:
Fear, a characteristic of the flesh, is to take them (v. 5), just as it came on Moab (Jer. 48:43)... They must learn, like Moab, not to trust in their treasures (v. 4), and like him they will eventually know deliverance (v. 6)... We have not received a spirit of fear, but the Holy Spirit, by whom we cry, Abba, Father.
Each man runs straight ahead, and nobody rallies the scattered. One commentator asks where Ammon can be found today:
The predicted judgment has come. Where is Ammon today? In what tribe or nation is a remnant preserved? Only the Omniscient One knows. But their captivity, like Moab's, will be brought back again in the days when Israel becomes the head of the nations.
Verse 6 turns the whole message around. One writer takes the fulfilment under Nebuchadnezzar as the fact, and leaves a later application open as well:
Desolation came on Moab, Ammon, and the rest in the day of Nebuchadnezzar, because they tied their fortunes to Egypt, the great southern rival of Babylon. That, I suppose, is the fact. The howling and lamentation and panic described in verses 3-5 are all the more pitiful because of the earlier self-satisfaction and boasting. They may also come just before the return of their captivity in the last days.
This mercy is not promised to every nation in the chapter:
These nations were all to fall under the power of Nebuchadnezzar; but some of them are to be restored in the latter day. Among these nations will be Elam, Egypt, Moab and Ammon, but not Philistia, not Damascus, not Hazor, and above all not Babylon.
- Grab — The root offence: Ammon took from God's people the very portion God had given them, then gloated when judgment fell on them.
- Boast — Trusting treasures and a stronghold, Ammon asked, "Who will come against me?" That safety was only in their own thinking. Their capital would hear the alarm of war.
- Blowback — Ammon misjudged God's work, as the enemy always does. The wrath he enjoyed watching fall on others now falls on him. God hands the raider over to raiders.
- Fear — The punishment is dread from every side. One writer calls fear a mark of the flesh. Believers have received the Spirit instead, and by Him they cry "Abba, Father."
- Afterward — Ammon was scattered with no one to gather them, and vanishes from history. Yet verse 6 promises their captivity brought back — a mercy not promised to Philistia, Damascus, Hazor or Babylon.