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 14:9

14:9 Sheol ⁴  below is stirred up about you,

ready to meet you when you arrive.

It rouses ⁵  the spirits of the dead for you,

all the former leaders of the earth; ⁶ 

it makes all the former kings of the nations

rise from their thrones. ⁷ 

Yesaya 14:11

14:11 Your splendor ⁸  has been brought down to Sheol,

as well as the sound of your stringed instruments. ⁹ 

You lie on a bed of maggots,

with a blanket of worms over you. ¹⁰ 

[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).

[14:9]  ⁴ sn Sheol is the proper name of the subterranean world which was regarded as the land of the dead.

[14:9]  ⁵ tn Heb “arousing.” The form is probably a Polel infinitive absolute, rather than a third masculine singular perfect, for Sheol is grammatically feminine (note “stirred up”). See GKC 466 §145.t.

[14:9]  ⁶ tn Heb “all the rams of the earth.” The animal epithet is used metaphorically here for leaders. See HALOT 903 s.v. *עַתּוּד.

[14:9]  ⁷ tn Heb “lifting from their thrones all the kings of the nations.” הֵקִים (heqim, a Hiphil perfect third masculine singular) should be emended to an infinitive absolute (הָקֵים, haqem). See the note on “rouses” earlier in the verse.

[14:11]  ⁸ tn Or “pride” (NCV, CEV); KJV, NIV, NRSV “pomp.”

[14:11]  ⁹ tn Or “harps” (NAB, NIV, NRSV).

[14:11]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “under you maggots are spread out, and worms are your cover.”