Yesaya 2:8

2:8 Their land is full of worthless idols;

they worship ¹  the product of their own hands,

what their own fingers have fashioned.

Yesaya 37:19

37:19 They have burned the gods of the nations, ²  for they are not really gods, but only the product of human hands manufactured from wood and stone. That is why the Assyrians could destroy them. ³ 

Yesaya 40:19-20

40:19 A craftsman casts ⁴  an idol;

a metalsmith overlays it with gold

and forges silver chains for it.

40:20 To make a contribution one selects wood that will not rot; ⁵ 

he then seeks a skilled craftsman

to make ⁶  an idol that will not fall over.

Yesaya 44:17

44:17 With the rest of it he makes a god, his idol;

he bows down to it and worships it.

He prays to it, saying,

‘Rescue me, for you are my god!’

[2:8]  ¹ tn Or “bow down to” (NIV, NRSV).

[37:19]  ² tn Heb “and they put their gods in the fire.”

[37:19]  ³ tn Heb “so they destroyed them” (NASB similar).

[40:19]  ⁴ tn Heb “pours out”; KJV “melteth.”

[40:20]  ⁵ tn The first two words of the verse (הַמְסֻכָּן תְּרוּמָה, hamsukan tÿrumah) are problematic. Some take מְסֻכָּן as an otherwise unattested Pual participle from סָכַן (sakhan, “be poor”) and translate “the one who is impoverished.” תְּרוּמָה (tÿrumah, “contribution”) can then be taken as an adverbial accusative, “with respect to a contribution,” and the entire line translated, “the one who is too impoverished for such a contribution [i.e., the metal idol of v. 19?] selects wood that will not rot.” However, מְסֻכָּן is probably the name of a tree used in idol manufacturing (cognate with Akkadian musukkanu, cf. H. R. Cohen, Biblical Hapax Legomena [SBLDS], 133). מְסֻכָּן may be a scribal interpretive addition attempting to specify עֵץ (’ets) or עֵץ may be a scribal attempt to categorize מְסֻכָּן. How an idol constitutes a תְּרוּמָה (“contribution”) is not entirely clear.

[40:20]  ⁶ tn Or “set up” (ASV, NAB, NIV, NRSV); KJV, NASB “to prepare.”