Isaiah 15:5

(5) My heart shall cry out for Moab . . .—The prophet, though a stranger to Moab, and belonging to a hostile people, is touched with pity at the sight—the fugitives fleeing before the army coming from the north to Zoar, at the extreme south of the Dead Sea (see Note on Genesis 19:22), in the wild scare as of a frightened heifer as yet untamed by the yoke (Jeremiah 31:18; Jeremiah 48:34; Jeremiah 1:11). The English “fugitives” answers to the marginal reading of the Hebrew, the text of which (followed by the Vulg.) gives, “his bars reach unto Zoar;” but it is not easy to connect this with the context.

By the mounting up of Luhith . . .—No city has been identified as bearing this name. Probably “the ascent of Luhith” (the name may indicate a staircase of boards) was the well-known approach (Jeremiah 48:5) to a Moabite sanctuary. Eusebius (Onomast.) speaks of it as between Zoar and Areopolis (Rabbath Moab). Horonaim (here and in Jeremiah 48:3; Jeremiah 48:5; Jeremiah 48:34) is as little known as its companion. The name, which in Hebrew means “two caverns,” is, perhaps, descriptive of the nature of the sanctuary. The point of the description is that the fugitives when they reach Horonaim, are met with the cry of destruction, “All is over.”