2:20 At that time 1 men will throw
their silver and gold idols,
which they made for themselves to worship, 2
into the caves where rodents and bats live, 3
30:22 You will desecrate your silver-plated idols 4
and your gold-plated images. 5
You will throw them away as if they were a menstrual rag,
saying to them, “Get out!”
11:18 “When they return to it, they will remove from it all its detestable things and all its abominations.
14:8 O Ephraim, I do not want to have anything to do 6 with idols anymore!
I will answer him and care for him.
I am like 7 a luxuriant cypress tree; 8
your fruitfulness comes from me! 9
1 tn Or “in that day” (KJV).
2 tn Or “bow down to.”
3 tn Heb “to the shrews and to the bats.” On the meaning of חֲפַרְפָּרָה (khafarparah, “shrew”), see HALOT 341 s.v. חֲפַרְפָּרָה. The BHS text as it stands (לַחְפֹּר פֵּרוֹת, perot lakhpor), makes no sense. Based on Theodotion’s transliteration and a similar reading in the Qumran scroll 1QIsaa, most scholars suggest that the MT mistakenly divided a noun (a hapax legomenon) that should be translated “moles,” “shrews,” or “rodents.”
4 tn Heb “the platings of your silver idols.”
5 tn Heb “the covering of your gold image.”
6 tn The Hebrew expression מַה־לִּי עוֹד (mah-li ’od) is a formula of repudiation/emphatic denial that God has anything in common with idols: “I want to have nothing to do with […] any more!” Cf., e.g., Judg 11:12; 2 Sam 16:10; 19:23; 1 Kgs 17:18; 2 Kgs 3:13; 2 Chr 35:21; Jer 2:18; Ps 50:16; BDB 553 s.v. מָה 1.d.(c).
7 tn The term “like” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity, as in the majority of English versions (including KJV).
8 tn Cf. KJV “a green fir tree”; NIV, NCV “a green pine tree”; NRSV “an evergreen cypress.”
9 tn Heb “your fruit is found in me”; NRSV “your faithfulness comes from me.”
10 tn Or “detest.”