11:3 He had 700 royal wives 4 and 300 concubines; 5 his wives had a powerful influence over him. 6
4:23 Guard your heart with all vigilance, 7
for from it are the sources 8 of life.
29:13 The sovereign master 9 says,
“These people say they are loyal to me; 10
they say wonderful things about me, 11
but they are not really loyal to me. 12
Their worship consists of
nothing but man-made ritual. 13
29:14 Therefore I will again do an amazing thing for these people –
an absolutely extraordinary deed. 14
Wise men will have nothing to say,
the sages will have no explanations.” 15
4:11 Old and new wine
take away the understanding of my people. 16
4:2 There is only cursing, lying, murder, stealing, and adultery.
They resort to violence and bloodshed. 17
4:10 They will eat, but not be satisfied;
they will engage in prostitution, but not increase in numbers;
because they have abandoned the Lord
by pursuing other gods. 18
1 tn Heb “you must not go into them, and they must not go into you.”
2 tn Heb “Surely they will bend your heart after their gods.” The words “if you do” are supplied in the translation for clarification.
3 tn Heb “Solomon clung to them for love.” The pronominal suffix, translated “them,” is masculine here, even though it appears the foreign women are in view. Perhaps this is due to attraction to the masculine forms used of the nations earlier in the verse.
4 tn Heb “wives, princesses.”
5 sn Concubines were slave women in ancient Near Eastern societies who were the legal property of their master, but who could have legitimate sexual relations with their master. A concubine’s status was more elevated than a mere servant, but she was not free and did not have the legal rights of a free wife. The children of a concubine could, in some instances, become equal heirs with the children of the free wife. The usage in the present passage suggests that after the period of the Judges concubines may have become more of a royal prerogative (cf. also 2 Sam 21:10-14).
6 tn Heb “his wives bent his heart.”
7 tn Heb “more than all guarding.” This idiom means “with all vigilance.” The construction uses the preposition מִן (min) to express “above; beyond,” the word “all” and the noun “prison; guard; act of guarding.” The latter is the use here (BDB 1038 s.v. מִשְׁמָר).
8 sn The word תּוֹצְאוֹת (tots’ot, from יָצָא, yatsa’) means “outgoings; extremities; sources.” It is used here for starting points, like a fountainhead, and so the translation “sources” works well.
9 tn The Hebrew term translated “sovereign master” here is אֲדֹנָי (’adonai).
10 tn Heb “Because these people draw near to me with their mouth.”
11 tn Heb “and with their lips they honor me.”
12 tn Heb “but their heart is far from me.” The heart is viewed here as the seat of the will, from which genuine loyalty derives.
13 tn Heb “their fear of me is a commandment of men that has been taught.”
14 tn Heb “Therefore I will again do something amazing with these people, an amazing deed, an amazing thing.” This probably refers to the amazing transformation predicted in vv. 17-24, which will follow the purifying judgment implied in vv. 15-16.
15 tn Heb “the wisdom of their wise ones will perish, the discernment of their discerning ones will keep hidden.”
16 tn Heb “take away the heart of my people.” The present translation assumes that the first word of v. 12 in the Hebrew text is to be construed with the noun at the end of v. 11 (so also TEV, CEV, NLT).
17 tn Heb “they break out and bloodshed touches bloodshed.” The Hebrew term פָּרַץ (parats, “to break out”) refers to violent and wicked actions (BDB 829 s.v. פָּרַץ 7; HALOT 972 s.v. פרץ 6.c). It is used elsewhere in a concrete sense to describe breaking through physical barriers. Here it is used figuratively to describe breaking moral barriers and restraints (cf. TEV “Crimes increase, and there is one murder after another”).
18 tn Heb “by guarding harlotry.” The present translation assumes that the first word of v. 11 in the Hebrew text is to be taken with the infinitive at the end of v. 10 (so also NAB, NIV, NCV, NRSV).