49:7 The Lord who rules over all spoke about Edom. “Is wisdom no longer to be found in Teman? Can Edom’s counselors not give her any good advice? Has all of their wisdom turned bad?
Jehovah is not only God of Israel, but He is sovereign over all of the nations. The Edomites were the descendants of Esau, the twin brother of Jacob (Israel). Teman was a city in Edom which was known for her wise counselors. Eliphaz the Temanite was one of the counselors who advised Job (although Eliphaz's advice was secular and demonic). Therefore, Teman was a very old city which was as old as Job and Eliphaz. It was filled with “the wisdom of the word,” which is only dirty menstrual rags to God (Isaiah 65). Teman was filed with secular humanists and occultists who knew the ways of the satanic world system. The counselors in Teman were giving the Edomites bad advice.
Any secular or Christian counselor who has not mastered and applied Bible doctrine is a bad counselor. Any advice which comes from the satanic world system is flawed. The answer to most psychological, marriage, anger, depression, and addiction problems is that the patient has not mastered and applied Bible doctrine. Strong biblical counselors will only need to see their patients one time. Their method of counseling should be to send their patients back to study the entire counsel of the Word of God at the deepest level. Weak Bible counselors will sign up their patients for weekly and expensive secular treatments.
49:8 Turn and flee! Take up refuge in remote places, you people who live in Dedan. For I will bring disaster on the descendants of Esau. I have decided it is time for me to punish them.
Dedan means “low ground.” It was the capital city of Moab. Dedan was known for her commerce and trading. Those Edomites who were living in Dedan were commanded by Jehovah to turn and flee for their lives. A foreign nation was coming to destroy that city.
49:9 If grape pickers came to pick your grapes, would they not leave a few grapes behind? If robbers came at night, would they not pillage only what they needed?
When grape pickers arrive to glean the vineyards, they do not and cannot pick up every single grape. They leave many of the grapes on the ground. When robbers come at night, they do not steal every item in the house. They only take the most valuable goods which they can carry away.
49:10 But I will strip everything away from Esau’s descendants. I will uncover their hiding places so they cannot hide. Their children, relatives, and neighbors will all be destroyed. Not one of them will be left!
When Jehovah comes to plunder Edom, unlike the grape picker and the thieves, He will plunder everything. The Edomites would have no place to hide. Jehovah would perform national genocide on the Edomites.
Esau was the twin brother of Jacob. He was given more light than any other nation in history. He gave up the promise of the messianic seed son for a bowl of stew. He would be punished more harshly than other nations.
How much light has the United States been given? How hard will she be judged?
49:11 Leave your orphans behind and I will keep them alive. Your widows too can depend on me.”
The orphans and widows have always been forsaken and persecuted by evil nations. Jehovah looks after them. He would keep them alive.
49:12 For the Lord says, “If even those who did not deserve to drink from the cup of my wrath must drink from it, do you think you will go unpunished? You will not go unpunished, but must certainly drink from the cup of my wrath.
All of the other nations must drink from Jehovah’s wrath. Edom had more light than other nations. They would all have to drink from this cup of wrath as well.
If all of the other nations must drink from the cup of God’s wrath. Will America be any different? How much light was given to America?
49:13 For I solemnly swear,” says the Lord, “that Bozrah will become a pile of ruins. It will become an object of horror and ridicule, an example to be used in curses. All the towns around it will lie in ruins forever.”
There is no one greater than Jehovah, so He made an oath to Himself. Bozrah is Petra. Petra was a rock city which was high in the mountains with only one narrow entrance. It was easily defensible and thought to be impregnable. Jehovah would smash this rock city to pieces. All of the surrounding cites of Petra would suffer the same fate.
49:14 I said, “I have heard a message from the Lord. A messenger has been sent among the nations to say, ‘Gather your armies and march out against her! Prepare to do battle with her!’ ”
Jeremiah saw an ambassador from a foreign nation going among the Gentiles. This ambassador was asking other Gentile nations to rise up, prepare an army, and march against Edom.
49:15 The Lord says to Edom, “I will certainly make you small among nations. I will make you despised by all humankind.
Jehovah would cause Edom to lose power and to be despised by other Gentile nations.
49:16 The terror you inspire in others and the arrogance of your heart have deceived you. You may make your home in the clefts of the rocks; you may occupy the highest places in the hills. But even if you made your home where the eagles nest, I would bring you down from there,” says the Lord.
The Edomites were twin brothers of Israel, meaning that she had more light than other nations. However, she rejected this light and chose to attack and plunder other nations. She lived high in the rock city of Petra. She was protected by one narrow entrance into the city. She believed that her city was impregnable. The location and defensibility of her rock city made her arrogant. She did not think that anyone could defeat her. She could plunder other cities and safely retreat back through her one narrow opening of her city. When her enemies pursued her, then she could cut her off in the narrow entrance to the city.
49:17 “Edom will become an object of horror. All who pass by it will be filled with horror; they will hiss out their scorn because of all the disasters that have happened to it.
Edom would become despised by the other Gentile nations. Other nations would walk by Edom and say ugly things about her people. Petra is a tourist site today. People from all over the world traveled to Petra and learn of her destruction.
49:18 Edom will be destroyed like Sodom and Gomorrah and the towns that were around them. No one will live there. No human being will settle in it,” says the Lord.
Sodom and Gomorrah was destroyed by fire and brimstone. Edom had never been destroyed in this matter. Therefore, this will become a future event which would occur at the end of the Great Tribulation.
49:19 “A lion coming up from the thick undergrowth along the Jordan scatters the sheep in the pastureland around it. So too I will chase the Edomites off their land. Then I will appoint over it whomever I choose. For there is no one like me, and there is no one who can call me to account. There is no ruler who can stand up against me.
The lion who comes from the thick undergrowth would be God Himself. The sheep along the Jordan would be the Edomites. God the Lion would chase Edom the sheep out of her rock city. God would appoint the Nabateans to rule over the land of the Edomites. This transfer of power would occur between the silent years of the Old and New Testament periods (400 B.C.-0 A.D.). The silent years was a 400 year period when there were no written prophecies. There was no Scripture written during these 400 years.
49:20 So listen to what I, the Lord, have planned against Edom, what I intend to do to the people who live in Teman. Their little ones will be dragged off. I will completely destroy their land because of what they have done.
Jehovah predicted the future of the Edomites, the twin brother of Israel. The little children would be dragged off, meaning that they would not procreate. The land of Edom would be completely destroyed.
49:21 The people of the earth will quake when they hear of their downfall. Their cries of anguish will be heard all the way to the Gulf of Aqaba.
The people all over the earth will be the people living during the seen years of the Great Tribulation. When southern Jordan is completely destroyed by fire and brimstone, then cries will be heard all the way to the Gulf of Aqaba (Red Sea). The Red Sea is 200 miles from Jerusalem.
49:22 Look! Like an eagle with outspread wings, a nation will soar up and swoop down on Bozrah. At that time the soldiers of Edom will be as fearful as a woman in labor.”
The eagle who comes down upon Edom are the Nabateans of the intertestamental period. They were desert tribesmen who drove the Edomites from their land. The people of Edom were forced to migrate into southern Judah where they were called Idumeans. In 125 B.C., a Maccabean named John Hyrcanus I subjugated the Idumeans and forced them to accept Judaism (Josephus Antiquities 13.9.1; 15.4). At this time, the Edomites ceased to become a distinct national group.