Yehezkiel 16:8

16:8 “‘Then I passed by you and watched you, noticing ¹  that you had reached the age for love. ²  I spread my cloak ³  over you and covered your nakedness. I swore a solemn oath to you and entered into a marriage covenant with you, declares the sovereign Lord, and you became mine.

Yehezkiel 29:3

29:3 Tell them, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says:

“‘Look, I am against ⁴  you, Pharaoh king of Egypt,

the great monster ⁵  lying in the midst of its waterways,

who has said, “My Nile is my own, I made it for myself.” ⁶ 

Yehezkiel 37:24

37:24 “‘My servant David will be king over them; there will be one shepherd for all of them. They will follow ⁷  my regulations and carefully observe my statutes. ⁸ 

Yehezkiel 38:12

38:12 to loot and plunder, to attack ⁹  the inhabited ruins and the people gathered from the nations, who are acquiring cattle and goods, who live at the center ¹⁰  of the earth.”

[16:8]  ¹ tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something and has been translated here as a participle.

[16:8]  ² tn See similar use of this term in Ezek 23:17; Prov 7:16; Song of Songs 4:10; 7:13.

[16:8]  ³ tn Heb “wing” or “skirt.” The gesture symbolized acquiring a woman in early Arabia (similarly, see Deut 22:30; Ruth 3:9).

[29:3]  ⁴ tn Or “I challenge you.” The phrase “I am against you” may be a formula for challenging someone to combat or a duel. See D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 1:201-2, and P. Humbert, “Die Herausforderungsformel ‘h!nn#n' ?l?K>,’” ZAW 45 (1933): 101-8.

[29:3]  ⁵ tn Heb “jackals,” but many medieval Hebrew mss read correctly “the serpent.” The Hebrew term appears to refer to a serpent in Exod 7:9-10, 12; Deut 32:33; and Ps 91:13. It also refers to large creatures that inhabit the sea (Gen 1:21; Ps 148:7). In several passages it is associated with the sea or with the multiheaded sea monster Leviathan (Job 7:12; Ps 74:13; Isa 27:1; 51:9). Because of the Egyptian setting of this prophecy and the reference to the creature’s scales (v. 4), many understand a crocodile to be the referent here (e.g., NCV “a great crocodile”; TEV “you monster crocodile”; CEV “a giant crocodile”).

[29:3]  ⁶ sn In Egyptian theology Pharaoh owned and controlled the Nile. See J. D. Currid, Ancient Egypt and the Old Testament, 240-44.

[37:24]  ⁷ tn Heb “walk [in].”

[37:24]  ⁸ tn Heb “and my statutes they will guard and they will do them.”

[38:12]  ⁹ tn Heb “to turn your hand against.”

[38:12]  ¹⁰ tn The Hebrew term occurs elsewhere only in Judg 9:37. Perhaps it means “high point, top.”