Text -- Isaiah 23:4 (NET)

23:4 Be ashamed, O Sidon, for the sea says this, O fortress of the sea: “I have not gone into labor or given birth; I have not raised young men or brought up young women.”

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: Isa 23:4

¹ tn J. N. Oswalt (Isaiah [NICOT], 1:430-31) sees here a reference to Yam, the Canaanite god of the sea. He interprets the phrase מָעוֹז הַיָּם (ma’oz hayyam, “fortress of the sea”) as a title of Yam, translating “Mighty One of the Sea.” A more traditional view is that the phrase refers to Sidon.

² tn Or “virgins” (KJV, ASV, NAB, NASB).

sn The sea is personified here as a lamenting childless woman. The foreboding language anticipates the following announcement of Tyre’s demise, viewed here as a child of the sea, as it were.