How can it rest when the LORD has commanded it? He has appointed it against Ashkelon and the shore of its coastland.”
Parallel translations
- WEB “How can you be quiet, since Yahweh has given you a command? Against Ashkelon, and against the seashore, there has he appointed it.”
- KJV How can it be quiet, seeing the LORD hath given it a charge against Ashkelon, and against the sea shore? there hath he appointed it.
- NKJV How can it be quiet, Seeing the Lord has given it a charge Against Ashkelon and against the seashore? There He has appointed it.”
- NASB “How can it be quiet, When the Lord has given it an order? Against Ashkelon and against the sea shore— There He has summoned it.”
- NLT “But how can it be still when the Lord has sent it on a mission? For the city of Ashkelon and the people living along the sea must be destroyed.”
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The sword cannot rest because the LORD Himself has commanded it against Ashkelon and the seacoast.
Overview
The answer to the plea is that the sword has been appointed by God and must complete its task. Judgment is not random fury but the ordained work of a sovereign and just God. This sobering truth that God commissions judgment makes the mercy of the gospel all the more precious, where Christ bears the sword of justice for His people.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 11
- Mic 6:9The voice of the LORD calls out to the city (and it is sound wisdom to fear Your name): “Heed the rod and the One who ordained it.
- Ezek 14:17Or if I bring a sword against that land and say, ‘Let a sword pass through it,’ so that I cut off from it both man and beast,
- Isa 10:6I will send him against a godless nation; I will dispatch him against a people destined for My rage, to take spoils and seize plunder, and to trample them down like clay in the streets.
- Isa 37:26Have you not heard? Long ago I ordained it; in days of old I planned it. Now I have brought it to pass, that you should crush fortified cities into piles of rubble.
- Isa 13:3I have commanded My sanctified ones; I have even summoned My warriors to execute My wrath and exult in My triumph.
- Amos 3:6If a ram’s horn sounds in a city, do the people not tremble? If calamity comes to a city, has not the LORD caused it?
- Ezek 25:16therefore this is what the Lord GOD says: Behold, I will stretch out My hand against the Philistines, and I will cut off the Cherethites and destroy the remnant along the coast.
- 1 Sam 15:3Now go and attack the Amalekites and devote to destruction all that belongs to them. Do not spare them, but put to death men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and donkeys.’”
- Zeph 2:6–7So the seacoast will become a land of pastures, with wells for shepherds and folds for sheep.
- Isa 46:10–11I declare the end from the beginning, and ancient times from what is still to come. I say, ‘My purpose will stand, and all My good pleasure I will accomplish.’
- Isa 45:1–3This is what the LORD says to Cyrus His anointed, whose right hand I have grasped to subdue nations before him, to disarm kings, to open the doors before him, so that the gates will not be shut:
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Christ at the center
Against the failure of false shepherds Jeremiah promises the Righteous Branch, 'The LORD our righteousness,' and the new covenant written on the heart and sealed in the blood of Christ.
How Jeremiah 47:7 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.