26:16 Today the Lord your God is commanding you to keep these statutes and ordinances, something you must do with all your heart and soul. 4
32:25 The sword will make people childless outside,
and terror will do so inside;
they will destroy 5 both the young man and the virgin,
the infant and the gray-haired man.
16:18 Pride 6 goes 7 before destruction,
and a haughty spirit before a fall. 8
38:17 “‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: Are you the one of whom I spoke in former days by my servants 15 the prophets of Israel, who prophesied in those days 16 that I would bring you against them?
5:22 “But you, his son 21 Belshazzar, have not humbled yourself, 22 although you knew all this. 5:23 Instead, you have exalted yourself against the Lord of heaven. You brought before you the vessels from his temple, and you and your nobles, together with your wives and concubines, drank wine from them. You praised the gods of silver, gold, bronze, iron, wood, and stone – gods 23 that cannot see or hear or comprehend! But you have not glorified the God who has in his control 24 your very breath and all your ways!
2:4 Look, the one whose desires are not upright will faint from exhaustion, 25
but the person of integrity 26 will live 27 because of his faithfulness. 28
1 tn The words “be sure” are not in the Hebrew text; vv. 12-14 are part of the previous sentence. For stylistic reasons a new sentence was started at the beginning of v. 12 in the translation and the words “be sure” repeated from v. 11 to indicate the connection.
2 tn Heb “the
3 tn Or “wilderness” (so KJV, NRSV, NLT); likewise in v. 15.
4 tn Or “mind and being”; cf. NCV “with your whole being”; TEV “obey them faithfully with all your heart.”
5 tn A verb is omitted here in the Hebrew text; for purposes of English style one suitable to the context is supplied.
6 sn The two lines of this proverb are synonymous parallelism, and so there are parasynonyms. “Pride” is paired with “haughty spirit” (“spirit” being a genitive of specification); and “destruction” is matched with “a tottering, falling.”
7 tn Heb “[is] before destruction.”
8 sn Many proverbs have been written in a similar way to warn against the inevitable disintegration and downfall of pride. W. McKane records an Arabic proverb: “The nose is in the heavens, the seat is in the mire” (Proverbs [OTL], 490).
9 tn Heb “set your face against.”
10 sn This may refer to a Lydian king in western Asia Minor in the seventh century
11 sn One of the sons of Japheth according to Gen 10:2; 1 Chr 1:5.
12 tn Heb “the prince, the chief of Meshech and Tubal.” Some translate “the prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal,” but it is more likely that the Hebrew noun in question is a common noun in apposition to “prince,” rather than a proper name. See D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 2:434-35. As Block demonstrates, attempts by some popular writers to identify these proper names with later geographical sites in Russia are anachronistic. See as well E. Yamauchi, Foes From the Northern Frontier, 19-27.
13 tn D. I. Block prefers to see the Hebrew word as referring here to a western ally of Egypt or as an alternative spelling for Pathros, that is, Upper Egypt. See D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 2:439-40.
14 sn That is, Lydia.
15 tn Heb “by the hand of my servants.”
16 tn The Hebrew text adds “years” here, but this is probably a scribal gloss on the preceding phrase. See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 2:201.
17 tn Aram “heart.”
18 sn The point of describing Nebuchadnezzar as arrogant is that he had usurped divine prerogatives, and because of his immense arrogance God had dealt decisively with him.
19 tn Aram “heart.”
20 tn Aram “his dwelling.”
21 tn Or “descendant”; or “successor.”
22 tn Aram “your heart.”
23 tn Aram “which.”
24 tn Aram “in whose hand [are].”
25 tn The meaning of this line is unclear, primarily because of the uncertainty surrounding the second word, עֲפְּלָה (’apÿlah). Some read this as an otherwise unattested verb עָפַל (’afal, “swell”) from which are derived nouns meaning “mound” and “hemorrhoid.” This “swelling” is then understood in an abstract sense, “swell with pride.” This would yield a translation, “As for the proud, his desires are not right within him” (cf. NASB “as for the proud one”; NIV “he is puffed up”; NRSV “Look at the proud!”). A multitude of other interpretations of this line, many of which involve emendations of the problematic form, may be found in the commentaries and periodical literature. The present translation assumes an emendation to a Pual form of the verb עָלַף (’alaf, “be faint, exhausted”). (See its use in the Pual in Isa 51:20, and in the Hitpael in Amos 8:13 and Jonah 4:8.) In the antithetical parallelism of the verse, it corresponds to חָיָה (khayah, “live”). The phrase לֹא יָשְׁרָה נַפְשׁוֹ בּוֹ (lo’ yoshrah nafsho bo), literally, “not upright his desire within him,” is taken as a substantival clause that contrasts with צַדִּיק (tsadiq, “the righteous one”) and serves as the subject of the preceding verb. Here נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh) is understood in the sense of “desire” (see BDB 660-61 s.v. נֶפֶשׁ for a list of passages where the word carries this sense).
26 tn Or “righteous.” The oppressed individuals mentioned in 1:4 are probably in view here.
27 tn Or “will be preserved.” In the immediate context this probably refers to physical preservation through both the present oppression and the coming judgment (see Hab 3:16-19).
28 tn Or “loyalty”; or “integrity.” The Hebrew word אֱמוּנָה (’emunah) has traditionally been translated “faith,” but the term nowhere else refers to “belief” as such. When used of human character and conduct it carries the notion of “honesty, integrity, reliability, faithfulness.” The antecedent of the suffix has been understood in different ways. It could refer to God’s faithfulness, but in this case one would expect a first person suffix (the original form of the LXX has “my faithfulness” here). Others understand the “vision” to be the antecedent. In this case the reliability of the prophecy is in view. For a statement of this view, see J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (OTL), 111-12. The present translation assumes that the preceding word “[the person of] integrity” is the antecedent. In this case the
29 sn A quotation from Prov 3:34.