9:12 Even if they raise their children,
I will take away every last one of them. 4
Woe to them!
For I will turn away from them.
9:13 Just as lion cubs are born predators, 5
so Ephraim will bear his sons for slaughter.
9:14 Give them, O Lord –
what will you give them?
Give them wombs that miscarry,
and breasts that cannot nurse! 6
9:15 Because of all their evil in Gilgal,
I hate them there.
On account of their evil deeds,
I will drive them out of my land. 7
I will no longer love them;
all their rulers are rebels.
9:16 Ephraim will be struck down 8 –
their root will be dried up;
they will not yield any fruit.
Even if they do bear children,
I will kill their precious offspring.
1 tn Heb “the fruit of your womb” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).
2 tn Heb “For thus says the
3 tn Heb “Thus says the
4 tn Heb “I will bereave them from a man”; NRSV “I will bereave them until no one is left.”
5 tc The MT is corrupt in 9:13. The BHS editors suggest emending the text to follow the LXX reading. See D. Barthélemy, ed., Preliminary and Interim Report on the Hebrew Old Testament Text Project, 5:250-51.
6 tn Heb “breasts that shrivel up dry”; cf. KJV, NAB, NASB, NRSV “dry breasts.”
7 tn Heb “out of my house” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV); TEV, NCV, NLT “my land.”
8 tn Or perhaps, following the plant metaphor, “will be blighted” (NIV similar).
9 tn Grk “For behold.”
10 tn Grk “Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that have not borne, and the breasts that have not nursed!”
11 sn The figure of crying out to the mountains ‘Fall on us!’ (appealing to creation itself to hide them from God’s wrath), means that a time will come when people will feel they are better off dead (Hos 10:8).
12 sn An allusion to Hos 10:8 (cf. Rev 6:16).