2 Kings 3:25

25 Then Israel tore down the cities, each man throwing rocks on every good field until it was covered. They sealed every well and cut down every good tree. Only the stones [in the walls] of Kir Hareseth were left. Soldiers surrounded Kir Hareseth and attacked it with slings and stones.

2 Kings 3:25 Meaning and Commentary

2 Kings 3:25

And they beat down the cities
Demolished the walls of them, and houses in them, wherever they came:

and on every good piece of land cast every man his stone, and filled
it;
which they had taken out of the walls and houses they pulled down; or which they picked up in the highway, as they passed along, being a stony country; or which being laid in heaps, gathered out of the fields, they took and scattered them all over them:

and they stopped all the wells of water;
with stones and dirt:

and felled all the good trees;
fruit bearing ones; (See Gill on 2 Kings 3:19),

only in Kirharaseth left they the stones thereof;
not able to demolish it, it being a strong fortified city, the principal of the kingdom, and into which the king of Moab had thrown himself, and the remains of his forces; of which see ( Isaiah 16:7 Isaiah 16:10 ) ,

howbeit, the slingers went about it, and smote it;
smote the soldiers that appeared upon the walls of it; though Kimchi, and other Jewish writers, understand it of engineers, who cast out large stones from a sort of machines then in use, to batter down and break through the walls of cities.

2 Kings 3:25 In-Context

23 They said, "It's blood! The kings have been fighting one another and have killed each other. Now, Moabites, let's take their goods!"

24 So when the Moabites came to Israel's camp, the Israelites attacked them, and they fled from the Israelites. Israel went after the Moabites and defeated them.

25 Then Israel tore down the cities, each man throwing rocks on every good field until it was covered. They sealed every well and cut down every good tree. Only the stones [in the walls] of Kir Hareseth were left. Soldiers surrounded Kir Hareseth and attacked it with slings and stones.

26 When the king of Moab saw he was losing the battle, he took 700 swordsmen to try to break through to the king of Edom. But they couldn't do it.

27 Then he took his firstborn son, who would have succeeded him as king, and sacrificed him on the wall as a burnt offering. There was bitter anger against the Israelites. So they went home to their own country.