Yesaya 5:14

5:14 So Death ¹  will open up its throat,

and open wide its mouth; ² 

Zion’s dignitaries and masses will descend into it,

including those who revel and celebrate within her. ³ 

Yesaya 8:14

8:14 He will become a sanctuary, ⁴ 

but a stone that makes a person trip,

and a rock that makes one stumble –

to the two houses of Israel. ⁵ 

He will become ⁶  a trap and a snare

to the residents of Jerusalem. ⁷ 

Yesaya 15:2

15:2 They went up to the temple, ⁸ 

the people of Dibon went up to the high places to lament. ⁹ 

Because of what happened to Nebo and Medeba, ¹⁰  Moab wails.

Every head is shaved bare,

every beard is trimmed off. ¹¹ 

Yesaya 16:14

16:14 Now the Lord makes this announcement: “Within exactly three years ¹²  Moab’s splendor will disappear, along with all her many people; there will be just a few, insignificant survivors left.” ¹³ 

Yesaya 51:19

51:19 These double disasters confronted you.

But who feels sorry for you?

Destruction and devastation,

famine and sword.

But who consoles you? ¹⁴ 

[5:14]  ¹ tn Heb “Sheol” (so ASV, NASB, NRSV); the underworld, the land of the dead, according to the OT world view. Cf. NAB “the nether world”; TEV, CEV “the world of the dead”; NLT “the grave.”

[5:14]  ² tn Heb “so Sheol will make wide its throat, and open its mouth without limit.”

[5:14]  sn Death is portrayed in both the OT (Prov 1:12; Hab 2:5) and Canaanite myth as voraciously swallowing up its prey. In the myths Death is portrayed as having “a lip to the earth, a lip to the heavens … and a tongue to the stars.” (G. R. Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends, 69, text 5 ii 2-3.) Death describes his own appetite as follows: “But my appetite is the appetite of lions in the waste…If it is in very truth my desire to consume ‘clay’ [a reference to his human victims], then in truth by the handfuls I must eat it, whether my seven portions [indicating fullness and completeness] are already in the bowl or whether Nahar [the god of the river responsible for ferrying victims from the land of the living to the land of the dead] has to mix the cup.” (Driver, 68-69, text 5 i 14-22).

[5:14]  ³ tn Heb “and her splendor and her masses will go down, and her tumult and the one who exults in her.” The antecedent of the four feminine singular pronominal suffixes used in v. 14b is unclear. The likely referent is personified Zion/Jerusalem (see 3:25-26; 4:4-5).

[8:14]  ⁴ tn Because the metaphor of protection (“sanctuary”) does not fit the negative mood that follows in vv. 14b-15, some contend that מִקְדָּשׁ (miqdash, “sanctuary”) is probably a corruption of an original מוֹקֵשׁ (moqesh, “snare”), a word that appears in the next line (cf. NAB and H. Wildberger, Isaiah, 1:355-56). If the MT reading is retained (as in the above translation), the fact that Yahweh is a sanctuary wraps up the point of v. 13 and stands in contrast to God’s treatment of those who rebel against him (the rest of v. 14).

[8:14]  ⁵ sn The two “houses” of Israel (= the patriarch Jacob) are the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah.

[8:14]  ⁶ tn These words are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons. וְהָיָה (vÿhayah, “and he will be”) does double duty in the parallel structure of the verse.

[8:14]  ⁷ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[15:2]  ⁸ tn Heb “house.”

[15:2]  ⁹ tn Heb “even Dibon [to] the high places to weep.” The verb “went up” does double duty in the parallel structure.

[15:2]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “over [or “for”] Nebo and over [or “for”] Medeba.”

[15:2]  ¹¹ sn Shaving the head and beard were outward signs of mourning and grief.

[16:14]  ¹² tn Heb “in three years, like the years of a hired worker.” The three years must be reckoned exactly, just as a hired worker would carefully keep track of the time he had agreed to work for an employer in exchange for a predetermined wage.

[16:14]  ¹³ tn Heb “and the splendor of Moab will be disgraced with all the great multitude, and a small little remnant will not be strong.”

[51:19]  ¹⁴ tc The Hebrew text has אֲנַחֲמֵךְ (’anakhamekh), a first person form, but the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a reads correctly יִנַחֲמֵךְ (yinakhamekh), a third person form.