20 Moab is disgraced, for she is shattered. Wail and cry out! Announce by the Arnon that Moab is destroyed.
20 Moab is confounded; for it is broken down: howl and cry; tell ye it in Arnon, that Moab is spoiled,
20 Moab is put to shame, for it is broken; wail and cry! Tell it beside the Arnon, that Moab is laid waste.
20 Moab will be an embarrassing memory, nothing left of the place. Wail and weep your eyes out! Tell the bad news along the Arnon river. Tell the world that Moab is no more.
20 Moab is shamed, for he is broken down. Wail and cry! Tell it in Arnon, that Moab is plundered.
20 "And the reply comes back, 'Moab lies in ruins, disgraced; weep and wail! Tell it by the banks of the Arnon River: Moab has been destroyed!'
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Jeremiah 48:20
Commentary on Jeremiah 48:14-47
(Read Jeremiah 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.