The Great Unraveling: God's Judgment on Edom Text: Isaiah 34:9-15
Introduction: De-Creation as Judgment
We live in a sentimental age, an age that has tried to domesticate God. We want a God who is a celestial guidance counselor, a divine affirmation machine, a God who is all mercy and no majesty. But the God of the Bible, the God who actually exists, is a consuming fire. His holiness is beautiful, but it is also terrible to those who stand in opposition to it. And when a nation or a people sets itself against God, when it fills up the measure of its iniquity, there comes a point when God acts in definitive judgment. This is not a popular topic, but it is a profoundly biblical one.
What we have in this passage from Isaiah is a terrifying description of what that judgment looks like. This is not just a military defeat or an economic collapse. This is de-creation. This is the sovereign author of the universe taking His pen, finding a rebellious character in His story, and writing him out. He doesn't just kill the character; He erases the stage the character was standing on. He reverses the creation process itself. Where there was order, He brings back the void. Where there was life, He brings desolation. This is the covenantal curse in its most potent form.
The specific target here is Edom, the nation descended from Esau, Jacob's brother. Throughout the Old Testament, Edom stands as a perpetual enemy of God's people, a symbol of proud, earthly, and profane rebellion. They were kin, but they were hostile kin. They gloated over Jerusalem's destruction (Psalm 137:7). And so, God promises a judgment on them that is absolute and final. This is not just a historical account of a forgotten nation. This is a paradigm. Edom is a stand-in for every nation, every system, and every individual that hardens its heart against the Lord of Hosts. This is what happens when God's patience runs out.
We must understand this language. The prophets often use what we call apocalyptic or de-creation language to describe the fall of a nation. When Babylon falls, Isaiah says the stars will not give their light and the sun will be dark (Isaiah 13:10). When Egypt is judged, Ezekiel says God will cover the heavens and make the stars dark (Ezekiel 32:7-8). Jesus Himself uses this same language to describe the judgment that would fall on Jerusalem in 70 A.D. (Matthew 24:29). This is not the end of the space-time continuum; it is the end of their world. It is God unmaking their cosmos, turning their civilization back into a wilderness. And what we see here in Isaiah 34 is one of the most vivid and complete pictures of that process in all of Scripture.
The Text
And its streams will be turned into pitch,
And its dust into brimstone,
And its land will become burning pitch.
It will not be quenched night or day;
Its smoke will go up forever.
From generation to generation it will be laid waste;
None will pass through it forever and ever.
But pelican and hedgehog will possess it,
And owl and raven will dwell in it;
And He will stretch over it the line of utter formlessness
And the plumb line of utter void.
Its nobles, there is no one there
Whom they may proclaim king,
And all its princes will be non-existent.
And thorns will come up in its fortified towers,
Weeds and thistles in its fortified cities;
It will also be a haunt of jackals
And an abode of ostriches.
And the desert creatures will meet with the wolves;
The hairy goat also will cry to its kind;
Surely, the night creature will obtain relief there
And will find itself a resting place.
The owl will make its nest and find its escape there,
And it will hatch its eggs and gather them in its shade.
Surely, the falcons will be gathered there,
Every one with its kind.
(Isaiah 34:9-15 LSB)
Sodom's Encore (vv. 9-10)
The judgment begins with a complete elemental reversal, a picture of hell on earth.
"And its streams will be turned into pitch, And its dust into brimstone, And its land will become burning pitch. It will not be quenched night or day; Its smoke will go up forever. From generation to generation it will be laid waste; None will pass through it forever and ever." (Isaiah 34:9-10)
The imagery here is a direct echo of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. What was once water, the source of life, becomes pitch, a flammable accelerant. What was once earth, the source of stability and fruitfulness, becomes brimstone, the very agent of fiery judgment. The entire land becomes an unquenchable fire. This is a picture of total, irreversible judgment. The smoke going up "forever" is a sign of the finality of the verdict. This is the language the Apostle John will later pick up to describe the eternal punishment of those who worship the beast (Revelation 14:11, 19:3).
This is not a temporary setback for Edom. It is an eternal desolation. "From generation to generation it will be laid waste." This is the covenant curse of being cut off, of having no future. The promise to Abraham was a promise of descendants, of a future, of blessing through generations. The ultimate curse is to have that future erased. "None will pass through it forever and ever." The land becomes so utterly hostile to life that it is not even a place of transit. It is a black hole on the map of human civilization, a permanent monument to the wrath of God against covenant-breaking pride.
Return to the Void (v. 11)
Here, the prophet makes the theme of de-creation explicit.
"But pelican and hedgehog will possess it, And owl and raven will dwell in it; And He will stretch over it the line of utter formlessness And the plumb line of utter void." (Isaiah 34:11)
Civilization is displaced by the wild. The places of human habitation and commerce are taken over by creatures of the waste places. The pelican, hedgehog, owl, and raven are not just random animals; many of them are listed in Leviticus as unclean. The land that was once part of the created order, a place for man, has become so polluted by sin that it is now fit only for scavengers and creatures of the night. It has become ceremonially and existentially unclean.
But the key phrase is the last one. God, the great builder, takes up His architectural tools, but this time to un-build. He stretches over Edom "the line of utter formlessness and the plumb line of utter void." The Hebrew here is tohu and bohu. This is the exact language used in Genesis 1:2 to describe the state of the earth before God spoke His ordering Word into it: "the earth was formless and void (tohu wa-bohu)."
This is a staggering statement. God's judgment on Edom is to methodically, precisely, and deliberately reverse the work of creation. He is taking their world apart, piece by piece, and returning it to the primordial state of watery chaos and darkness. Sin is not just a mistake; it is an assault on the created order. And when judgment comes, God vindicates His order by dismantling the counterfeit order that rebels have tried to build. He hits the reset button, and the screen goes dark.
The Collapse of Society (vv. 12-15)
The de-creation continues, moving from the physical landscape to the social and political structures.
"Its nobles, there is no one there Whom they may proclaim king, And all its princes will be non-existent." (Isaiah 34:12)
What is a nation without leadership? It is chaos. The first thing to go is the political structure. The nobles and princes, the very ones who embodied the pride and rebellion of Edom, are simply gone. There is no one left to govern, no one to make decisions, no one to carry on the name of the nation. This is the essence of anarchy, the social equivalent of tohu wa-bohu.
With the human leadership gone, nature, in its cursed state, takes over completely.
"And thorns will come up in its fortified towers, Weeds and thistles in its fortified cities; It will also be a haunt of jackals And an abode of ostriches. And the desert creatures will meet with the wolves; The hairy goat also will cry to its kind; Surely, the night creature will obtain relief there And will find itself a resting place. The owl will make its nest and find its escape there, And it will hatch its eggs and gather them in its shade. Surely, the falcons will be gathered there, Every one with its kind." (Isaiah 34:13-15)
The symbols of human power and security, the fortified towers and cities, become monuments to decay. They are overgrown with thorns and thistles, the very emblems of the curse from Genesis 3. The curse pronounced on Adam's ground now swallows up Edom's civilization entirely. The palace becomes a den for jackals. The city square becomes a playground for demonic spirits, represented here by "hairy goats" (a term for satyrs or goat-demons) and the "night creature" (Lilith, a figure from pagan mythology representing a demon of the night). Isaiah is not affirming the existence of these pagan creatures; he is using their own dark vocabulary to tell them that their land will become the very picture of a demon-haunted wasteland.
The final verses paint a picture of a new kind of order, a ghastly anti-civilization. The unclean and predatory animals don't just wander through; they possess the land. They make their homes, nest, hatch their young, and gather "every one with its kind." This is a parody of the creation account, where God commanded the animals to multiply after their kind in a good and ordered world. Here, in this land under the curse of de-creation, the animals of the night and the wilderness establish their own kingdom, a kingdom of desolation, under the sovereign decree of God.
Conclusion: The Unfailing Word
This is a hard word. It is a terrifying picture. Our modern sensibilities want to recoil from it. We want to ask how a good God could do such a thing. But that is the wrong question. The right question is, given the holiness of God and the rebellious pride of man, why does He not do this to all of us? The answer is the cross of Jesus Christ.
Every element of this curse, the fire, the brimstone, the darkness, the desolation, the abandonment, is a description of hell. This is what sin deserves. And the good news of the gospel is not that God waves His hand and pretends sin doesn't matter. The good news is that God the Son entered into this very desolation on our behalf. On the cross, Jesus became Edom for us. He endured the unquenchable fire of God's wrath. He was plunged into the outer darkness. He cried out in dereliction, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" He bore the full measure of the curse of tohu wa-bohu so that we could be brought into a New Creation.
God's judgments are not random acts of anger. They are the methodical, righteous, and terrifying outworking of His covenantal sanctions. Edom stands as a perpetual warning. Any nation, any church, any family, any individual that sets itself up in proud opposition to God is standing on ground that is destined to become burning pitch. But for those who are in Christ, the promise is the reverse. God looks at the tohu wa-bohu of our sinful hearts and says, "Let there be light." He takes the wasteland of our lives and promises to make it a fruitful garden. He is the God who does not just de-create, but who gloriously re-creates.
The prophecy against Edom is a demonstration of the absolute sovereignty and faithfulness of God. His warnings are true. His judgments are sure. And therefore, His promises of salvation are just as sure. He will do what He has said. He will judge His enemies, and He will save His people. The smoke of Edom goes up forever as a testimony that not one word of God will ever fall to the ground.