He is gone up to Bajith... — The noun is better taken not as a proper name, but as “the house” or “temple” of the Moabite god. In this and in the “high places” (Bamôth) we may probably recognise the Bamoth-baal (high places of Baal) which appears in Joshua 13:17, side by side with Dibon, and the Beth-Bamoth of the Moabite stone (Records of the Past, xi. 167). That stone was, it may be noted, found at Dibân, which stands on two hills, and represents the ancient city of that name. What the prophet sees as following on the destruction of Ar and Kir is the terror which leads men to join in solemn processional prayers to the temples of their gods.
Nebo. — Not the mountain that bore that name as such (Deuteronomy 34:1), but a city named after the same deity. Mesha boasts of having taken it, and slain seven thousand men (Records of the Past, xi. 166). Medeba is named by him (ib.) as having been taken by Omri, and held by the Israelites for forty years.
On all their heads shall be baldness... — This, originally, perhaps, sacrificial in its character, became at a very early period a symbol of intensest sorrow among Eastern nations. It was forbidden to Israel, probably as identified with the worship of other deities than Jehovah (Leviticus 21:5; Deuteronomy 14:1; Job 1:20; Micah 1:16; ; Deuteronomy 19:6; 2 Samuel 14:11; Isaiah 59:20; Psalms 19:14.) The idea of a “ransom,” however — i.e., of a price paid for freedom — does not lie in the Hebrew word.