Ratapan 3:31

כ (Kaf)

3:31 For the Lord ¹  will not

reject us forever. ² 

Ratapan 5:19

5:19 But you, O Lord, reign forever;

your throne endures from generation to generation.

Ratapan 3:6

3:6 He has made me reside in deepest darkness ³ 

like those who died long ago.

Ratapan 5:20

5:20 Why do you keep on forgetting ⁴  us?

Why do you forsake us so long?

Ratapan 3:17

3:17 I ⁵  am deprived ⁶  of peace; ⁷ 

I have forgotten what happiness ⁸  is.

Ratapan 4:9-10

ט (Tet)

4:9 Those who died by the sword ⁹  are better off

than those who die of hunger, ¹⁰ 

those who ¹¹  waste away, ¹² 

struck down ¹³  from lack of ¹⁴  food. ¹⁵ 

י (Yod)

4:10 The hands of tenderhearted women ¹⁶ 

cooked their own children,

who became their food, ¹⁷ 

when my people ¹⁸  were destroyed. ¹⁹ 

Ratapan 2:16

פ (Pe)

2:16 All your enemies

gloated over you. ²⁰ 

They sneered and gnashed their teeth;

they said, “We have destroyed ²¹  her!

Ha! We have waited a long time for this day.

We have lived to see it!” ²² 

Ratapan 4:15

ס (Samek)

4:15 People cry to them, “Turn away! You are unclean!

Turn away! Turn away! Don’t touch us!”

So they have fled and wander about;

but the nations say, ²³  “They may not stay here any longer.”

Ratapan 4:21

The Prophet Speaks:

ש (Sin/Shin)

4:21 Rejoice and be glad for now, ²⁴  O people of Edom, ²⁵ 

who reside in the land of Uz.

But the cup of judgment ²⁶  will pass ²⁷  to you also;

you will get drunk and take off your clothes.

[3:31]  ¹ tc The MT reads אֲדֹנָי (’adonay, “the Lord”) here rather than יהוה (YHWH, “the Lord”). See the tc note at 1:14.

[3:31]  ² tn The verse is unusually short and something unrecoverable may be missing.

[3:6]  ³ tn The plural form of the noun מַחֲשַׁכִּים (makhashakkim, “darknesses”) is an example of the plural of intensity (see IBHS 122 §7.4.3a).

[5:20]  ⁴ tn The Hebrew verb “forget” often means “to not pay attention to, ignore,” just as the Hebrew “remember” often means “to consider, attend to.”

[5:20]  sn The verbs “to forget” and “to remember” are often used figuratively in scripture when God is the subject, particularly in contexts of judgment (God forgets his people) and restoration of blessing (God remembers his people). In this case, the verb “to forget” functions as a hypocatastasis (implied comparison), drawing a comparison between God’s judgment and rejection of Jerusalem to a person forgetting that Jerusalem even exists. God’s judgment of Jerusalem was so intense and enduring that it seemed as though he had forgotten her. The synonymous parallelism makes this clear.

[3:17]  ⁵ tn Heb “my soul.” The term נַפְשִׁי (nafshi, “my soul”) is used as a synecdoche of part (= my soul) for the whole person (= I ).

[3:17]  ⁶ tc The MT reads וַתִּזְנַח (vattiznakh), vav (ו) consecutive + Qal preterite 3rd person feminine singular from זָנַח (zanakh, “to reject”), resulting in the awkward phrase “my soul rejected from peace.” The LXX καὶ ἀπώσατο (kai apwsato) reflects a Vorlage of וַיִּזְנַח (vayyiznakh), vav (ו) consecutive + Qal preterite 3rd person masculine singular from זָנַח (zanakh): “He deprives my soul of peace.” Latin Vulgate repulsa est reflects a Vorlage of וַתִּזָּנַח (vattizzanakh), vav (ו) consecutive + Niphal preterite 3rd person feminine singular from זָנַח (zanakh): “My soul is excluded from peace.” The MT best explains the origin of the LXX and Vulgate readings. The מ (mem) beginning the next word may have been an enclitic on the verb rather than a preposition on the noun. This would be the only Qal occurrence of זָנַח (zanakh) used with the preposition מִן (min). Placing the מ (mem) on the noun would have created the confusion leading to the changes made by the LXX and Vulgate. HALOT 276 s.v. II זנח attempts to deal with the problem lexically by positing a meaning “to exclude from” for זָנַח (zanakh) plus מִן (min), but also allows that the Niphal may be the correct reading.

[3:17]  ⁷ tn Heb “from peace.” H. Hummel suggests that שָׁלוֹם (shalom) is the object and the מ (mem) is not the preposition מִן (min), but an enclitic on the verb (“Enclitic Mem in Early Northwest Semitic, Especially in Hebrew” JBL 76 [1957]: 105). שָׁלוֹם (shalom) has a wide range of meaning. The connotation is that there is no peace within; the speaker is too troubled for any calm to take hold.

[3:17]  ⁸ tn Heb “goodness.”

[4:9]  ⁹ tn Heb “those pierced of the sword.” The genitive-construct denotes instrumentality: “those pierced by the sword” (חַלְלֵי־חֶרֶב, khalle-kherev). The noun חָלָל (khalal) refers to a “fatal wound” and is used substantivally to refer to “the slain” (Num 19:18; 31:8, 19; 1 Sam 17:52; 2 Sam 23:8, 18; 1 Chr 11:11, 20; Isa 22:2; 66:16; Jer 14:18; 25:33; 51:49; Lam 4:9; Ezek 6:7; 30:11; 31:17, 18; 32:20; Zeph 2:12).

[4:9]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “those slain of hunger.” The genitive-construct denotes instrumentality: “those slain by hunger,” that is, those who are dying of hunger.

[4:9]  ¹¹ tn Heb “who…” The antecedent of the relative pronoun שֶׁהֵם (shehem, “who”) are those dying of hunger in the previous line: מֵחַלְלֵי רָעָב (mekhalle ra’av, “those slain of hunger”).

[4:9]  ¹² tn Heb “they flow away.” The verb זוּב (zuv, “to flow, gush”) is used figuratively here, meaning “to pine away” or “to waste away” from hunger. See also the next note.

[4:9]  ¹³ tn Heb “pierced through and through.” The term מְדֻקָּרִים (mÿduqqarim), Pual participle masculine plural from דָּקַר (daqar, “to pierce”), is used figuratively. The verb דָּקַר (daqar, “to pierce”) usually refers to a fatal wound inflicted by a sword or spear (Num 25:8; Judg 9:54; 1 Sam 31:4; 1 Chr 10:4; Isa 13:15; Jer 37:10; 51:4; Zech 12:10; 13:3). Here, it describes people dying from hunger. This is an example of hypocatastasis: an implied comparison between warriors being fatally pierced by sword and spear and the piercing pangs of hunger and starvation. Alternatively “those who hemorrhage (זוּב [zuv, “flow, gush”]) [are better off] than those pierced by lack of food” in parallel to the structure of the first line.

[4:9]  ¹⁴ tn The preposition מִן (min, “from”) denotes deprivation: “from lack of” something (BDB 580 s.v. 2.f; HALOT 598 s.v. 6).

[4:9]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “produce of the field.”

[4:10]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “the hands of compassionate women.”

[4:10]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “eating.” The infinitive construct (from I בָּרָה, barah) is translated as a noun. Three passages employ the verb (2 Sam 3:35; 12:17; 13:5,6,10) for eating when ill or in mourning.

[4:10]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “the daughter of my people.”

[4:10]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “in the destruction of the daughter of my people.”

[2:16]  ²⁰ tn Heb “they have opened wide their mouth against you.”

[2:16]  ²¹ tn Heb “We have swallowed!”

[2:16]  ²² tn Heb “We have attained, we have seen!” The verbs מָצָאנוּ רָאִינוּ (matsa’nu ra’inu) form a verbal hendiadys in which the first retains its full verbal sense and the second functions as an object complement. It forms a Hebrew idiom that means something like, “We have lived to see it!” The three asyndetic 1st person common plural statements in 2:16 (“We waited, we destroyed, we saw!”) are spoken in an impassioned, staccato style reflecting the delight of the conquerors.

[4:15]  ²³ tn Heb “They say among the nations.”

[4:21]  ²⁴ tn The phrase “for now” is added in the translation to highlight the implied contrast between the present joy of the Gentiles (4:21a) and their future judgment (4:21b).

[4:21]  ²⁵ tn Heb “O Daughter of Edom.”

[4:21]  ²⁶ tn Heb “the cup.” Judgment is often depicted as a cup of wine that God forces a person to drink, causing him to lose consciousness, red wine drooling out of his mouth – resembling corpses lying on the ground as a result of the actual onslaught of the Lord’s judgment. The drunkard will reel and stagger, causing bodily injury to himself – an apt metaphor to describe the devastating effects of God’s judgment. Just as a cup of poison kills all those who are forced to drink it, the cup of God’s wrath destroys all those who must drink it (e.g., Ps 75:9; Isa 51:17, 22; Jer 25:15, 17, 28; 49:12; 51:7; Lam 4:21; Ezek 23:33; Hab 2:16).

[4:21]  ²⁷ tn The imperfect verb “will pass” may also be a jussive, continuing the element of request, “let the cup pass…”