Malachi 1:4

4 Whereas Edom says, "We are beaten down, but we will return and build the waste places;" thus says Yahweh of Hosts, "They shall build, but I will throw down; and men will call them 'The Wicked Land,' even the people against whom Yahweh shows wrath forever."

Malachi 1:4 Meaning and Commentary

Malachi 1:4

Whereas Edom saith, We are impoverished
Or the Idumeans, as the Targum; the posterity of Esau, who acknowledge themselves greatly reduced by the desolations made in their country, cities, towns, and houses, being plundered of all their valuable things. Kimchi interprets it, if the congregation of Edom should say, though we are become poor and low, and our land is laid waste: but we will return;
being now become rich, as the Targum adds; that is, as Jarchi explains it, with the spoils of Jerusalem: and build the desolate places:
as Israel did, as Kimchi observes, when they returned from their captivity; and so the Edomites hoped to do the same: thus saith the Lord of hosts, They shall build, but I will throw
down;
they attempted to build again their cities and towns, but could not succeed, God was against them: and they shall call them;
or, "they shall be called" ^F21; this shall be the name they, shall go by among men, by way of proverb and reproach: The border of wickedness;
a wicked kingdom and nation, from one end to the other; this shall be said of them, as the reason of their utter and perpetual desolation: and, The people against whom the Lord hath indignation for ever;
not for seventy years only, as against the Jews, ( Zechariah 1:12 ) , but forever; and these are now no more a people; they are utterly extinct; their name and nation are lost; there is not the least appearance of them; when the Jews, though they are scattered about in the world, yet they are still a people, and distinct from all others.

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FOOTNOTES:

F21 (Mhl warqw) "et vocabuntur", V. L. Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Drusius, Grotius.

Malachi 1:4 In-Context

2 "I have loved you," says Yahweh. Yet you say, "How have you loved us?" "Wasn't Esau Jacob's brother?" says Yahweh, "Yet I loved Jacob;

3 but Esau I hated, and made his mountains a desolation, and gave his heritage to the jackals of the wilderness."

4 Whereas Edom says, "We are beaten down, but we will return and build the waste places;" thus says Yahweh of Hosts, "They shall build, but I will throw down; and men will call them 'The Wicked Land,' even the people against whom Yahweh shows wrath forever."

5 Your eyes will see, and you will say, "Yahweh is great -- even beyond the border of Israel!"

6 "A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If I am a father, then where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is the respect due me? Says Yahweh of Hosts to you, priests, who despise my name. You say, 'How have we despised your name?'