Isaiah 34

This is what you do with a scroll when you’re done with it. Roll it up and put it away. This word picture shows up in only one other Bible passage: Revelation 6:14, after the four horsemen of the apocalypse arrive. “The sky disappeared, like someone rolling up a scroll. Every mountain and island disappeared, too.”

Edom was Judah’s neighbor east of the Dead Sea, in what is now the country of Jordan. Edom and Judah competed for the copper mines in the long valley south of the Dead Sea, stretching to the northern tip of the Red Sea, at the Gulf of Aqaba. When Babylon levelled Jerusalem in 586 BC, the prophet Obadiah said Edom supported the invaders and later joined in robbing conquered Judah of whatever the Babylonians failed to take.

Destruction” is a word loaded with powerful Jewish history. The Hebrew word is herem. When Joshua and the Israelites invaded Canaan, the Promised Land that became ancient Israel and Judah, the soldiers took a vow to dedicate themselves to herem, the annihilation of the Canaanites. In today’s culture, that might qualify as genocide. This kind of vow in ancient times was considered irrevocable and irredeemable. You couldn’t take it back. And nothing of the enemy was allowed to live. Everything in the city was devoted to God, much like sacrificial animals that are slaughtered and burned. “It’s a vow of devotion. If something is devoted to the LORD—whether human, animal, or land—you can’t have it back. If you devote something in this unique way, it’s holy and it stays holy because it belongs to the LORD…You can’t reverse that. You can’t buy back that person’s life. That person is doomed to die” (Leviticus 27:28-29).

Though animals die in war, these animals apparently represent the common people. Their leaders die in verse 7.

Bozrah may have been the capital of Edom at one time. The name means an impenetrable fortress. Some archaeologists associate it with Busaira, about 30 miles (50 km) north of Petra. Petra itself was an easily defended city people entered through a long, narrow trail between two sheer cliffs.

Some words in this verse are rare, leaving scholars guessing. That’s why there is so much discrepancy between Bible translations and paraphrases. Some scholars say demons and ghosts probably belong on this list because many people in ancient times said demons lived in the desert badlands. That’s where Satan tempted Jesus, in the Judean desert (Matthew 4:1-11; Mark 1:12-13; Luke 4:1-13).

Literally Lilith, demon of the night. In myths during Bible times, Lilith referred to a group of female demons who seduced and killed young men. There’s another myth, which scholars say was written after the Genesis story about Adam and Eve. This myth says a woman named Lilith was Adam’s first wife. They did not part politely. Lilith took to killing children afterward.

Scholars say this suggests God didn’t give the job to someone else. He did it himself.