Jeremiah 48:37
 Jeremiah 48:37 
New International Version (©2011)
Every head is shaved and every beard cut off; every hand is slashed and every waist is covered with sackcloth.

New Living Translation (©2007)
The people shave their heads and beards in mourning. They slash their hands and put on clothes made of burlap.

English Standard Version (©2001)
“For every head is shaved and every beard cut off. On all the hands are gashes, and around the waist is sackcloth.

New American Standard Bible (©1995)
"For every head is bald and every beard cut short; there are gashes on all the hands and sackcloth on the loins.

King James Bible (Cambridge Ed.)
For every head shall be bald, and every beard clipped: upon all the hands shall be cuttings, and upon the loins sackcloth.

Holman Christian Standard Bible (©2009)
Indeed, every head is bald and every beard clipped; on every hand is a gash and sackcloth around the waist.

International Standard Version (©2012)
Indeed every head will be bald and every beard cut short. There will be gashes on all the hands and sackcloth on the loins.

NET Bible (©2006)
For all of them will shave their heads in mourning. They will all cut off their beards to show their sorrow. They will all make gashes in their hands. They will all put on sackcloth.

GOD'S WORD® Translation (©1995)
"Every head is shaved, and every beard is cut off. There are gashes on every hand and sackcloth on every waist.

King James 2000 Bible (©2003)
For every head shall be bald, and every beard clipped: upon all the hands shall be gashes, and upon the loins sackcloth.

American King James Version
For every head shall be bald, and every beard clipped: on all the hands shall be cuttings, and on the loins sackcloth.

American Standard Version
For every head is bald, and every beard clipped: upon all the hands are cuttings, and upon the loins sackcloth.

Douay-Rheims Bible
For every head shall be bald, and every beard shall be shaven: all hands shall be tied together, and upon every back there shall be haircloth.

Darby Bible Translation
For every head is bald, and every beard clipped; upon all the hands are cuttings, and upon the loins sackcloth.

English Revised Version
For every head is bald, and every beard clipped: upon all the hands are cuttings, and upon the loins sackcloth.

Webster's Bible Translation
For every head shall be bald, and every beard clipped: upon all the hands shall be cuttings, and upon the loins sackcloth.

World English Bible
For every head is bald, and every beard clipped: on all the hands are cuttings, and on the waist sackcloth.

Young's Literal Translation
For every head is bald, and every beard diminished, On all hands cuttings, and on the loins -- sackcloth.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

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.


Pulpit Commentary

Verses 37, 38 (first part). - Based on Isaiah 15:2 (latter part), 3 (first part). On the primitive Arabic, Egyptian, and Hebrew custom of cutting off the hair, see on Jeremiah 16:6, and comp. Herod., 2:36. Clipped. The difference from the word in Isaiah is so slight that it may easily have arisen from a copyist. The meaning is virtually the same. Cuttings. So of Philistia (Jeremiah 47:5); see on Jeremiah 16:6.


Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

For every head shall be bald, and every beard clipped,.... Men, in times of mourning, used to pluck off the hairs of their head till they made them bald, and shaved their beards; which, as Kimchi says, were the glory of their faces; see Isaiah 15:2;

upon all the hands shall be cuttings: it was usual with the Heathens to make incisions in the several parts of their bodies, particularly in their hands and arms, with their nails, or with knives, in token of mourning; which are forbidden the Israelites, Deuteronomy 14:1;

and upon the loins sackcloth; this is a well known custom for mourners, to put off their clothes, and put on sackcloth; all these things are mentioned, to show how great was the mourning of Moab for the calamities of it.


Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

37. (See on [985]Jer 47:5; Isa 15:2, 3).

upon all … hands—that is, arms, in which such cuttings used to be made in token of grief (compare Zec 13:6).


Jeremiah 48:37 Parallel Commentaries

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The Judgment on Moab
36Therefore my heart shall sound for Moab like pipes, and my heart shall sound like pipes for the men of Kirheres: because the riches that he has gotten are perished. 37For every head shall be bald, and every beard clipped: on all the hands shall be cuttings, and on the loins sackcloth. 38There shall be lamentation generally on all the housetops of Moab, and in the streets thereof: for I have broken Moab like a vessel wherein is no pleasure, said the LORD. …

Genesis 37:34 Then Jacob tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and mourned for his son many days.
Isaiah 15:2 Dibon goes up to its temple, to its high places to weep; Moab wails over Nebo and Medeba. Every head is shaved and every beard cut off.
Isaiah 15:3 In the streets they wear sackcloth; on the roofs and in the public squares they all wail, prostrate with weeping.
Isaiah 20:2 at that time the LORD spoke through Isaiah son of Amoz. He said to him, "Take off the sackcloth from your body and the sandals from your feet." And he did so, going around stripped and barefoot.
Jeremiah 16:6 "Both high and low will die in this land. They will not be buried or mourned, and no one will cut themselves or shave their head for the dead.
Jeremiah 41:5 eighty men who had shaved off their beards, torn their clothes and cut themselves came from Shechem, Shiloh and Samaria, bringing grain offerings and incense with them to the house of the LORD.
Jeremiah 47:5 Gaza will shave her head in mourning; Ashkelon will be silenced. You remnant on the plain, how long will you cut yourselves?
Jeremiah 49:3 "Wail, Heshbon, for Ai is destroyed! Cry out, you inhabitants of Rabbah! Put on sackcloth and mourn; rush here and there inside the walls, for Molek will go into exile, together with his priests and officials.
Ezekiel 29:18 "Son of man, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon drove his army in a hard campaign against Tyre; every head was rubbed bare and every shoulder made raw. Yet he and his army got no reward from the campaign he led against Tyre.
Amos 8:10 I will turn your religious festivals into mourning and all your singing into weeping. I will make all of you wear sackcloth and shave your heads. I will make that time like mourning for an only son and the end of it like a bitter day.