26:12 When Isaac planted in that land, he reaped in the same year a hundred times what he had sown, 1 because the Lord blessed him. 2
67:6 The earth yields its crops.
May God, our God, bless us!
67:7 May God bless us! 20
Then all the ends of the earth will give him the honor he deserves. 21
3:9 Honor 22 the Lord from your wealth
and from the first fruits of all your crops; 23
3:10 then your barns will be filled completely, 24
and your vats 25 will overflow 26 with new wine.
30:23 He will water the seed you plant in the ground,
and the ground will produce crops in abundance. 27
At that time 28 your cattle will graze in wide pastures.
2:21 “At that time, 30 I will willingly respond,” 31 declares the Lord.
“I will respond to the sky,
and the sky 32 will respond to the ground;
2:22 then the ground will respond to the grain, the new wine, and the olive oil;
and they will respond to ‘God Plants’ (Jezreel)! 33
2:23 Then I will plant her as my own 34 in the land.
I will have pity on ‘No Pity’ (Lo-Ruhamah).
I will say to ‘Not My People’ (Lo-Ammi), ‘You are my people!’
And he 35 will say, ‘You are 36 my God!’”
2:22 Do not fear, wild animals! 37
For the pastures of the wilderness are again green with grass.
Indeed, the trees bear their fruit;
the fig tree and the vine yield to their fullest. 38
9:13 “Be sure of this, 39 the time is 40 coming,” says the Lord,
“when the plowman will catch up to the reaper 41
and the one who stomps the grapes 42 will overtake 43 the planter. 44
Juice will run down the slopes, 45
it will flow down all the hillsides. 46
9:14 I will bring back my people, Israel; 47
they will rebuild the cities lying in rubble 48 and settle down. 49
They will plant vineyards and drink the wine they produce; 50
they will grow orchards 51 and eat the fruit they produce. 52
9:15 I will plant them on their land
and they will never again be uprooted from the 53 land I have given them,”
says the Lord your God.
1 tn Heb “a hundredfold.”
2 tn This final clause explains why Isaac had such a bountiful harvest.
3 tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have resultative force here.
4 tn Heb “the tree of the field will give its fruit.” As a collective singular this has been translated as plural.
5 tn Heb “will reach for you the vintage season.”
6 tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have resultative force here.
7 tn Heb “to satisfaction”; KJV, ASV, NASB “to the full.”
8 tn Heb “the fruit of your womb” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).
9 sn Come in…go out. To “come in” and “go out” is a figure of speech (merism) indicating all of life and its activities.
10 tn Heb “who rise up against” (so NIV).
11 tn Heb “way” (also later in this verse and in v. 25).
12 tn Heb “the
13 tn Heb “the commandments of the
14 tn Heb “and walk in his ways” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).
15 tn Heb “the name of the Lord is called over you.” The Hebrew idiom indicates ownership; see 2 Sam 12:28; Isa 4:1, as well as BDB 896 s.v. קָרָא Niph. 2.d.(4).
16 tn Heb “the fruit of your womb” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV); CEV “will give you a lot of children.”
17 tn Heb “the
18 tn Heb “fathers” (also in vv. 36, 64).
19 tn Heb “all the work of your hands.”
20 tn The prefixed verb forms in vv. 6b-7a are understood as jussives.
21 tn Heb “will fear him.” After the jussive of the preceding line, the prefixed verbal form with prefixed vav (ו) conjunctive is understood as indicating purpose/result. (Note how v. 3 anticipates the universal impact of God showing his people blessing.) Another option is to take the verb as a jussive and translate, “Let all the ends of the earth fear him.”
22 tn The imperative כַּבֵּד (kabbed, “honor”) functions as a command, instruction, counsel or exhortation. To honor God means to give him the rightful place of authority by rendering to him gifts of tribute. One way to acknowledge God in one’s ways (v. 6) is to honor him with one’s wealth (v. 9).
23 tn Heb “produce.” The noun תְּבוּאָה (tÿvu’ah) has a two-fold range of meaning: (1) “product; yield” of the earth (= crops; harvest) and (2) “income; revenue” in general (BDB 100 s.v.). The imagery in vv. 9-10 is agricultural; however, all Israelites – not just farmers – were expected to give the best portion (= first fruits) of their income to
24 tn Heb “with plenty” (so KJV, NASB, NRSV); NIV “to overflowing.” The noun שָׂבָע (sava’, “plenty; satiety”) functions as an adverbial accusative of manner or contents: “completely.”
25 sn This pictures the process of pressing grapes in which the upper receptacle is filled with grapes and the lower one catches the juice. The harvest of grapes will be so plentiful that the lower vat will overflow with grape juice. The pictures in v. 10 are metonymies of effect for cause (= the great harvest that God will provide when they honor him).
26 tn Heb “burst open.” The verb פָּרַץ (parats, “to burst open”) functions as hyperbole here to emphasize the fullness of the wine vats (BDB 829 s.v. 9).
27 tn Heb “and he will give rain for your seed which you plant in the ground, and food [will be] the produce of the ground, and it will be rich and abundant.”
28 tn Or “in that day” (KJV).
29 tn Heb “showers of blessing.” Abundant rain, which in turn produces fruit and crops (v. 27), is a covenantal blessing for obedience (Lev 26:4).
30 tn Heb “And in that day”; NAB, NRSV “On that day.”
31 tn The verb עָנָה, (’anah) which is used throughout 2:23-24, is related to the root I עָנָה (’anah), “to answer, listen attentively, react willingly” (BDB 772 s.v. 1.b; HALOT 852 s.v. ענה 3.b).
32 tn Heb “and they.” In the Hebrew text the plural pronoun is used because it refers back to the term translated “sky,” which is a dual form in Hebrew. Many English versions (e.g., NAB, NASB, NRSV) use the plural term “heavens” here, which agrees with a plural pronoun (cf. also NIV, NCV “skies”).
33 tn Heb “Jezreel.” The use of the name יִזְרְעֶאל (yizré’e’l, “Jezreel”) creates a powerful three-fold wordplay: (1) The proper name יִזְרְעֶאל (“Jezreel”) is a phonetic wordplay on the similar sounding name יִשְׂרָאֵל (yisra’el, “Israel”): God will answer Israel, that is, Jezreel. (2) The name יִזְרְעֶאל (“Jezreel”) plays on the verb זָרַע (zara’, “to sow, plant”), the immediately following word: וּזְרַעְתִּיהָ (uzéra’tiha, vav + Qal perfect 1st person common singular + 3rd person feminine singular suffix: “I will sow/plant her”). This wordplay creates a popular etymology for יִזְרְעֶאל meaning, “God sows/plants,” which fits well into the agricultural fertility imagery in 2:21-23 [2:23-25]. (3) This positive connotation of יִזְרְעֶאל (“Jezreel”) in 2:21-23[23-25] reverses the negative connotation of יִזְרְעֶאל (“Jezreel”) in 1:4-5 (bloodshed of Jehu in the Jezreel Valley).
34 tn Heb “for myself.”
35 tn The Hebrew text, carrying out the reference to the son born in 1:8-9, uses the third person masculine singular pronoun here; some English translations use third person plural (“they,” so KJV, NASB, NIV, CEV) in keeping with the immediate context, which refers to reestablished Israel.
36 tn The words “You are” do not appear in the Hebrew text, but are implied. It is necessary to supply the phrase in the translation to prevent the reader from understanding the predicate “my God” as an exclamation (cf. NAB).
37 tn Heb “beasts of the field.”
38 tn Heb “their strength.” The trees and vines will produce a maximum harvest, in contrast to the failed agricultural conditions previously described.
39 tn Heb “behold” or “look.”
40 tn Heb “the days are.”
41 sn The plowman will catch up to the reaper. Plowing occurred in October-November, and harvesting in April-May (see P. King, Amos, Hosea, Micah, 109.) But in the future age of restored divine blessing, there will be so many crops the reapers will take all summer to harvest them, and it will be time for plowing again before the harvest is finished.
42 sn When the grapes had been harvested, they were placed in a press where workers would stomp on them with their feet and squeeze out the juice. For a discussion of grape harvesting technique, see O. Borowski, Agriculture in Iron Age Israel, 110-12.
43 tn The verb is omitted here in the Hebrew text, but has been supplied in the translation from the parallel line.
44 sn The grape harvest occurred in August-September, planting in November-December (see P. King, Amos, Hosea, Micah, 109). But in the future age described here there will be so many grapes the workers who stomp them will still be working when the next planting season arrives.
45 tn Or “hills,” where the vineyards were planted.
46 tn Heb “and all the hills will melt.”
47 tn This line can also be translated “I will restore the fortunes of my people, Israel” and is a common idiom (e.g., Deut 30:3; Jer 30:3; Hos 6:11; Zeph 3:20). This rendering is followed by several modern English versions (e.g., NEB, NRSV, NJPS).
48 tn Or “the ruined [or “desolate”] cities.”
49 tn Or “and live [in them].”
50 tn Heb “drink their wine.”
51 tn Or “gardens.”
52 tn Heb “eat their fruit.”
53 tn Heb “their.” The pronoun was replaced by the English definite article in the translation for stylistic reasons.