Yeremia 19:8

19:8 I will make this city an object of horror, a thing to be hissed at. All who pass by it will be filled with horror and will hiss out their scorn ¹  because of all the disasters that have happened to it. ² 

Yeremia 49:17

49:17 “Edom will become an object of horror.

All who pass by it will be filled with horror;

they will hiss out their scorn

because of all the disasters that have happened to it. ³ 

Yeremia 50:13

50:13 After I vent my wrath on it Babylon will be uninhabited. ⁴ 

It will be totally desolate.

All who pass by will be filled with horror and will hiss out their scorn

because of all the disasters that have happened to it. ⁵ 

Zefanya 2:15

2:15 This is how the once-proud city will end up ⁶  –

the city that was so secure. ⁷ 

She thought to herself, ⁸  “I am unique! No one can compare to me!” ⁹ 

What a heap of ruins she has become, a place where wild animals live!

Everyone who passes by her taunts her ¹⁰  and shakes his fist. ¹¹ 

[19:8]  ¹ sn See 18:16 and the study note there.

[19:8]  ² tn Heb “all its smitings.” This word has been used several times for the metaphorical “wounds” that Israel has suffered as a result of the blows from its enemies. See, e.g., 14:17. It is used in the Hebrew Bible of scourging, both literally and metaphorically (cf. Deut 25:3; Isa 10:26), and of slaughter and defeat (1 Sam 4:10; Josh 10:20). Here it refers to the results of the crushing blows at the hands of her enemies which has made her the object of scorn.

[49:17]  ³ sn This verse is very similar to Jer 19:8 where the same judgment is pronounced on Jerusalem. For the meaning of some of the terms here (“hiss out their scorn” and “all the disasters that have happened to it”) see the notes on that verse.

[50:13]  ⁴ tn Heb “From [or Because of] the wrath of the Lord it will be uninhabited.” The causal connection is spelled out more clearly and actively and the first person has been used because the speaker is the Lord. The referent “it” has been spelled out clearly from the later occurrence in the verse, “all who pass by Babylon.”

[50:13]  ⁵ sn Compare Jer 49:17 and the study note there and see also the study notes on 18:16 and 19:8.

[2:15]  ⁶ tn Heb “this is the proud city.”

[2:15]  ⁷ tn Heb “the one that lived securely.”

[2:15]  ⁸ tn Heb “the one who says in her heart.”

[2:15]  ⁹ tn Heb “I [am], and besides me there is no other.”

[2:15]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “hisses”; or “whistles.”

[2:15]  ¹¹ sn Hissing (or whistling) and shaking the fist were apparently ways of taunting a defeated foe or an object of derision in the culture of the time.