This verse continues the catalog of Edom’s misdeeds, which here reach a terrible climax. The Edomites not only joined in plundering Jerusalem, but they even helped to catch those people who had escaped from the city, and handed them over to the Babylonians or perhaps even killed some themselves. This may be a reference to the flight and capture of King Zedekiah and his army (2 Kgs 25.3-7). Though the Edomites are not mentioned there, some scholars believe that they could have been involved.

In this verse, as in verse 13, there are echoes of other verses: stood repeats the stood of verse 11, “cut off” (Revised Standard Version) repeats the “cut off” of verses 9 and 10, and the final phrase “in the day of distress” (Revised Standard Version) is identical with the final phrase of verse 12.

The word translated crossroads in the first line is more literally “the parting of the ways” (Revised Standard Version) or a fork in the road, a place where a road splits and goes in two directions. It would be easier to watch for the people escaping from Jerusalem at places like this, rather than to have to station separate groups of people on both roads.

The exact meaning of the word translated “cut off” in Revised Standard Version is not certain here. Often it means to kill (and is translated as “killed” by Good News Translation in verse 9), but here it seems more likely to mean “cut off the escape,” or catch. It would be an anticlimax to speak first of killing the fugitives and then of handing them over to the enemy.

Quoted with permission from Clark, David J. et al. A Handbook on the Book of Obadiah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1978, 1982, 1993. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .