Divine Judgment and Justice in the Bible

1The vision of Obadiah. This is what the Lord Yahweh says about Edom. We have heard news from Yahweh, and an ambassador is sent among the nations, saying, "Arise, and let`s rise up against her in battle.

10For the violence done to your brother Jacob, shame will cover you, and you will be cut off forever.

15For the day of Yahweh is near all the nations! As you have done, it will be done to you. Your deeds will return upon your own head.

16For as you have drunk on my holy mountain, so will all the nations drink continually. Yes, they will drink, swallow down, and will be as though they had not been.

18The house of Jacob will be a fire, the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble. They will burn among them, and devour them. There will not be any remaining to the house of Esau." Indeed, Yahweh has spoken.

2Behold, I have made you small among the nations. You are greatly despised.

4Though you mount on high as the eagle, and though your nest is set among the stars, I will bring you down from there, says Yahweh.

14So the angel who talked with me said to me, Cry you, saying, Thus says Yahweh of Hosts: I am jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion with a great jealousy.

15I am very sore displeased with the nations that are at ease; for I was but a little displeased, and they helped forward the affliction.

2Yahweh was sore displeased with your fathers.

3My anger is kindled against the shepherds, and I will punish the male goats; for Yahweh of Hosts has visited his flock, the house of Judah, and will make them as his goodly horse in the battle.

17Woe to the worthless shepherd who leaves the flock! the sword shall be on his arm, and on his right eye: his arm shall be clean dried up, and his right eye shall be utterly darkened.

1Behold, a day of Yahweh comes, when your spoil shall be divided in the midst of you.

2For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the women ravished; and half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and the residue of the people shall not be cut off from the city.

3Then shall Yahweh go forth, and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle.

4His feet shall stand in that day on the Mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east; and the Mount of Olives shall be cleft in the midst of it toward the east and toward the west, [and there shall be] a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south.

5You shall flee by the valley of my mountains; for the valley of the mountains shall reach to Azel; yes, you shall flee, like as you fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah; and Yahweh my God shall come, and all the holy ones with you.

1Then again I lifted up my eyes, and saw, and, behold, a flying scroll.

2He said to me, What see you? I answered, I see a flying scroll; the length of it is twenty cubits, and the breadth of it ten cubits.

3Then said he to me, This is the curse that goes forth over the surface of the whole land: for everyone who steals shall be cut off on the one side according to it; and everyone who swears shall be cut off on the other side according to it.

4I will cause it to go forth, says Yahweh of Hosts, and it shall enter into the house of the thief, and into the house of him who swears falsely by my name; and it shall abide in the midst of his house, and shall consume it with the timber of it and the stones of it.

12Yes, they made their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words which Yahweh of Hosts had sent by his Spirit by the former prophets: therefore there came great wrath from Yahweh of Hosts.

13It is come to pass that, as he cried, and they would not hear, so they shall cry, and I will not hear, said Yahweh of Hosts;

14but I will scatter them with a whirlwind among all the nations which they have not known. Thus the land was desolate after them, so that no man passed through nor returned: for they laid the pleasant land desolate.

1The burden of the word of Yahweh on the land of Hadrach, and Damascus [shall be] its resting-place (for the eye of man and of all the tribes of Israel is toward Yahweh);

2and Hamath, also, which borders thereon; Tyre and Sidon, because they are very wise.

3Tyre did build herself a stronghold, and heaped up silver as the dust, and fine gold as the mire of the streets.

4Behold, the Lord will dispossess her, and he will strike her power in the sea; and she shall be devoured with fire.

5Ashkelon shall see it, and fear; Gaza also, and shall be sore pained; and Ekron, for her expectation shall be put to shame; and the king shall perish from Gaza, and Ashkelon shall not be inhabited.

6A bastard shall dwell in Ashdod, and I will cut off the pride of the Philistines.

7I will take away his blood out of his mouth, and his abominations from between his teeth; and he also shall be a remnant for our God; and he shall be as a chieftain in Judah, and Ekron as a Jebusite.

17I will bring distress on men, that they will walk like blind men, because they have sinned against Yahweh, and their blood will be poured out like dust, and their flesh like dung.

2I will utterly sweep away everything off of the surface of the earth, says Yahweh.

3I will sweep away man and animal. I will sweep away the birds of the sky, the fish of the sea, and the heaps of rubble with the wicked. I will cut off man from the surface of the earth, says Yahweh.

4I will stretch out my hand against Judah, and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem. I will cut off the remnant of Baal from this place: the name of the idolatrous and pagan priests,

13He will stretch out his hand against the north, destroy Assyria, and will make Nineveh a desolation, and dry like the wilderness.

4For Gaza will be forsaken, and Ashkelon a desolation. They will drive out Ashdod at noonday, and Ekron will be rooted up.

5Yahweh, in the midst of her, is righteous. He will do no wrong. Every morning he brings his justice to light. He doesn`t fail, but the unjust know no shame.

8"Therefore wait for me," says Yahweh, "until the day that I rise up to the prey, for my determination is to gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdoms, to pour on them my indignation, even all my fierce anger, for all the earth will be devoured with the fire of my jealousy.