106:6 We have sinned like 7 our ancestors; 8
we have done wrong, we have done evil.
6:5 I said, “Too bad for me! I am destroyed, 9 for my lips are contaminated by sin, 10 and I live among people whose lips are contaminated by sin. 11 My eyes have seen the king, the Lord who commands armies.” 12
5:7 Our forefathers 13 sinned and are dead, 14
but we 15 suffer 16 their punishment. 17
1 tn Heb “saying.”
2 tn Heb “to enslave as male servants and female servants.”
3 tn Heb “sons.”
4 tn Heb “in the eyes of.”
5 tn Heb “turned their faces.”
6 tn Heb “and turned the back.”
7 tn Heb “with.”
8 tn Heb “fathers” (also in v. 7).
9 tn Isaiah uses the suffixed (perfect) form of the verb for rhetorical purposes. In this way his destruction is described as occurring or as already completed. Rather than understanding the verb as derived from דָּמַה (damah, “be destroyed”), some take it from a proposed homonymic root דמה, which would mean “be silent.” In this case, one might translate, “I must be silent.”
10 tn Heb “a man unclean of lips am I.” Isaiah is not qualified to praise the king. His lips (the instruments of praise) are “unclean” because he has been contaminated by sin.
11 tn Heb “and among a nation unclean of lips I live.”
12 tn Perhaps in this context, the title has a less militaristic connotation and pictures the Lord as the ruler of the heavenly assembly. See the note at 1:9.
13 tn Heb “fathers,” but here the term also refers to “forefathers,” i.e., more distant ancestors.
14 tn Heb “and are no more.”
15 tc The Kethib is written אֲנַחְנוּ (’anakhnu, “we”) but the Qere reads וַאֲנַחְנוּ (va’anakhnu, “but we”). The Qere is supported by many medieval Hebrew
16 tn Heb “so we bear.”
17 tn Heb “their iniquities.” The noun עָוֹן (’avon) has a broad range of meanings, including: (1) iniquity, (2) guilt of iniquity, and (3) consequence or punishment for iniquity (cause-effect metonymical relation). The context suggests that “punishment for sin” is most appropriate here (e.g., Gen 4:13; 19:15; Exod 28:38, 43; Lev 5:1, 17; 7:18; 10:17; 16:22; 17:16; 19:8; 20:17, 19; 22:16; 26:39, 41, 43; Num 5:31; 14:34; 18:1, 23; 30:15; 1 Sam 25:24; 28:10; 2 Sam 14:9; 2 Kgs 7:9; Job 10:14; Pss 31:11; 69:28; 106:43; Prov 5:22; Isa 5:18; 30:13; 40:2; 53:6, 11; 64:5, 6; Jer 51:6; Lam 4:22; 5:7; Ezek 4:4-6, 17; 7:16; 14:10; 18:19-20; 21:30, 34; 24:23; 32:27; 35:5; 39:23; 44:10, 12).
18 sn Among whom. The relative pronoun phrase that begins v. 3 is identical, except for gender, to the one that begins v. 2 (ἐν αἵς [en Jais], ἐν οἵς [en Jois]). By the structure, the author is building an argument for our hopeless condition: We lived in sin and we lived among sinful people. Our doom looked to be sealed as well in v. 2: Both the external environment (kingdom of the air) and our internal motivation and attitude (the spirit that is now energizing) were under the devil’s thumb (cf. 2 Cor 4:4).
19 tn Grk “we all.”
20 tn Or “even.”
21 sn Children of wrath is a Semitic idiom which may mean either “people characterized by wrath” or “people destined for wrath.”
22 sn Eph 2:1-3. The translation of vv. 1-3 is very literal, even to the point of retaining the awkward syntax of the original. See note on the word dead in 2:1.