Haftarah Torah Portion Vayishlach
Obadiah 1: 1-21

Obadiah 1 (Haftarah Torah Portion Vayishlach)

1 The vision of Obadiah.
        The Lord God proclaims concerning Edom:
        We have heard a message from the Lord—
            a messenger has been sent among the nations:
        “Rise up! Let us rise against her for battle!”
2 Look now, I will make you of little importance among the nations;
        you will be totally despised.
3 Your proud heart has tricked you—
        you who live in the cracks of the rock,
        whose dwelling is high above.
    You who say in your heart,
        “Who will bring me down to the ground?”
4 Though you soar like the eagle,
        though your nest is set among the stars,
        I will bring you down from there,
says the Lord.

5 If thieves approach you,
        if robbers by night—how you’ve been devastated!—
        wouldn’t they steal only what they wanted?
    If those who gather grapes came to you,
        wouldn’t they leave some grapes?
6 How Esau has been looted,
        his treasures taken away!
7 All those who were your allies
        have driven you to the border.
    Those who were on your side tricked you
        and triumphed over you.
They are setting your own bread as a trap under you,
        but you don’t see it coming.
8 Won’t I on that day, says the Lord,
        destroy the wise from Edom
        and understanding from Mount Esau?
9 Your warriors will be shattered, Teman,
        and everyone from Mount Esau will be eliminated.

10 Because of the slaughter and violence done to your brother Jacob,
        shame will cover you,
        and you will be destroyed forever.
11 You stood nearby,
        strangers carried off his wealth,
    and foreigners entered his gates
        and cast lots for Jerusalem;
    you too were like one of them.
12 But you should have taken no pleasure over your brother
        on the day of his misery;
    you shouldn’t have rejoiced over the people of Judah
        on the day of their devastation;
    you shouldn’t have bragged
        on their day of hardship.
13 You shouldn’t have entered the gate of my people
        on the day of their defeat;
    you shouldn’t have even looked on his suffering
        on the day of his disaster;
    you shouldn’t have stolen his possessions
        on the day of his distress.
14 You shouldn’t have waited on the roads
        to destroy his escapees;
    you shouldn’t have handed over his survivors
        on the day of defeat.
15 The day of the Lord is near
        against all the nations.
    As you have done, so it will be done to you;
        your actions will make you suffer!
16 Just as you have drunk on my holy mountain,
        so will all the nations around you drink;
    they will drink and swallow quickly,
        and they will be like they’ve never been before.

17 But on Mount Zion there will be those who escape,
        and it will be holy;
        and the house of Jacob will drive out those who drove them out.
18 The house of Jacob will be a fire,
        the house of Joseph a flame,
        and the house of Esau straw;
    they will burn them up completely,
        and there will be no one left of the house of Esau,
for the Lord has spoken.
19 Those of the arid southern plain will possess Mount Esau,
        and those of the western foothills, the land of the Philistines;
    they will possess the land of Ephraim and the land of Samaria,
        and Benjamin will possess Gilead.
20 Those who remain of the Israelites
            will possess the land of the Canaanites as far as Zarephath;
    and those left from Jerusalem and who are now living in Sepharad
        will possess the cities of the arid southern plain.
21 The deliverers will go up to Mount Zion
        to rule Mount Esau,
        and the kingdom will be the Lord’s.