4For Gaza shall be forsaken,

and Ashkelon shall be a waste,

Ashdod they shall drive out at midday,

and Ekron* shall be uprooted.b

5Ah! You who dwell by the seacoast,

the nation of Cherethites,*

the word of theLord is against you!

O Canaan, land of the Philistines,

I will leave you to perish without an inhabitant!

6You shall become fields for shepherds,

and folds for flocks.

7The seacoast shall belong

to the remnant of the house of Judah;

by the sea they shall pasture.

In the houses of Ashkelon

they shall lie down in the evening.

For theLord their God will take care of them,

and bring about their restoration.

8I have heard the taunts uttered by Moab,

and the insults of the Ammonites,*

When they taunted my people

and made boasts against their territory.c

9Therefore, as I live—

oracle of theLord of hosts—

the God of Israel,

Moab shall become like Sodom,

the Ammonites like Gomorrah:

A field of weeds,

a salt pit,

a waste forever.

The remnant of my people shall plunder them,

the survivors of my nation dispossess them.

10This will be the recompense for their pride,

because they taunted and boasted against

the people of theLord of hosts.

11TheLord shall inspire them with terror

when he makes all the gods of earth waste away;

Then the distant shores of the nations,

each from its own place,

shall bow down to him.

12You too, O Cushites,*

shall be slain by the sword of theLord.d

13He will stretch out his hand against the north,

to destroy Assyria;

He will make Nineveh a waste,

dry as the desert.e

14In her midst flocks shall lie down,

all the wild life of the hollows;

The screech owl and the desert owl

shall roost in her columns;

The owl shall hoot from the window,

the raven croak from the doorway.f

15Is this the exultant city*

that dwelt secure,

That told itself,

“I and there is no one else”?

How it has become a waste,

a lair for wild animals!

Those who pass by it

hiss, and shake their fists!