2:1 The heavens and the earth 1 were completed with everything that was in them. 2 2:2 By 3 the seventh day God finished the work that he had been doing, 4 and he ceased 5 on the seventh day all the work that he had been doing.
1:5 I will remove 11 those who worship the stars in the sky from their rooftops, 12
those who swear allegiance to the Lord 13 while taking oaths in the name of 14 their ‘king,’ 15
1 tn See the note on the phrase “the heavens and the earth” in 1:1.
2 tn Heb “and all the host of them.” Here the “host” refers to all the entities and creatures that God created to populate the world.
3 tn Heb “on/in the seventh day.”
4 tn Heb “his work which he did [or “made”].”
5 tn The Hebrew term שָׁבַּת (shabbat) can be translated “to rest” (“and he rested”) but it basically means “to cease.” This is not a rest from exhaustion; it is the cessation of the work of creation.
6 tn Heb “she will become nations.”
7 tn Heb “peoples.”
8 tn Heb “the one born to him, whom Sarah bore to him, Isaac.” The two modifying clauses, the first introduced with an article and the second with the relative pronoun, are placed in the middle of the sentence, before the name Isaac is stated. They are meant to underscore that this was indeed an actual birth to Abraham and Sarah in fulfillment of the promise.
9 tn The words “by dead bodies” is not in the text but is implicit from the context. They are supplied in the translation for clarity.
10 tn Heb “the host of heaven.”
11 tn The words “I will remove” are repeated from v. 4b for stylistic reasons. In the Hebrew text vv. 4b-6 contain a long list of objects for the verb “I will remove” in v. 4b. In the present translation a new sentence was begun at the beginning of v. 5 in keeping with the tendency of contemporary English to use shorter sentences.
12 tn Heb “those who worship on their roofs the host of heaven.” The “host of heaven” included the sun, moon, planets, and stars, all of which were deified in the ancient Near East.
13 tc The MT reads, “those who worship, those who swear allegiance to the
14 tn Heb “those who swear by.”
15 tn The referent of “their king” is unclear. It may refer sarcastically to a pagan god (perhaps Baal) worshiped by the people. Some English versions (cf. NEB, NASB, NRSV) prefer to emend the text to “Milcom,” the name of an Ammonite god (following some LXX
16 sn The expression and gave them over suggests similarities to the judgment on the nations described by Paul in Rom 1:18-32.
17 tn Or “stars.”
18 tn The two terms for sacrifices “semantically reinforce one another and are here combined essentially for emphasis” (L&N 53.20).
19 tn The Greek construction anticipates a negative reply which is indicated in the translation by the ‘tag’ question, “was it?”
20 tn Grk “who.” The relative pronoun was converted to a personal pronoun and, because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started here in the translation.
21 tn Grk “the lie.”
22 tn Or “creature, created things.”