Jeremiah 21:10

21:10 For I, the Lord, say that ¹  I am determined not to deliver this city but to bring disaster on it. ²  It will be handed over to the king of Babylon and he will destroy it with fire.’” ³ 

Leviticus 17:10

Prohibition against Eating Blood

17:10 “‘Any man ⁴  from the house of Israel or from the foreigners who reside ⁵  in their ⁶  midst who eats any blood, I will set my face against that person who eats the blood, and I will cut him off from the midst of his people, ⁷ 

Leviticus 20:5-6

20:5 I myself will set my face against that man and his clan. I will cut off from the midst of their people both him and all who follow after him in spiritual prostitution, ⁸  to commit prostitution by worshiping Molech. ⁹ 

Prohibition against Spiritists and Mediums ¹⁰ 

20:6 “‘The person who turns to the spirits of the dead and familiar spirits ¹¹  to commit prostitution by going after them, I will set my face ¹²  against that person and cut him off from the midst of his people.

Leviticus 26:17

26:17 I will set my face against you. You will be struck down before your enemies, those who hate you will rule over you, and you will flee when there is no one pursuing you.

Psalms 34:16

34:16 But the Lord opposes evildoers

and wipes out all memory of them from the earth. ¹³ 

Ezekiel 14:7-8

14:7 For when anyone from the house of Israel, or the foreigner who lives in Israel, separates himself from me and erects his idols in his heart and sets the obstacle leading to his iniquity before his face, and then consults a prophet to seek something from me, I the Lord am determined to answer him personally. 14:8 I will set my face against that person and will make him an object lesson and a byword ¹⁴  and will cut him off from among my people. Then you will know that I am the Lord.

Ezekiel 15:7

15:7 I will set ¹⁵  my face against them – although they have escaped from the fire, ¹⁶  the fire will still consume them! Then you will know that I am the Lord, when I set my face against them.

Amos 9:4

9:4 Even when their enemies drive them into captivity, ¹⁷ 

from there ¹⁸  I will command the sword to kill them.

I will not let them out of my sight;

they will experience disaster, not prosperity.” ¹⁹ 

¹ tn Heb “oracle of the Lord.”

² tn Heb “I have set my face against this city for evil [i.e., disaster] and not for good [i.e., well-being].” For the use of the idiom “set one’s face against/toward” see, e.g., usage in 1 Kgs 2:15; 2 Kgs 2:17; Jer 42:15, 17 and note the interesting interplay of usage in Jer 44:11-12.

³ tn Heb “he will burn it with fire.”

⁴ tn Heb “And man, man.” The repetition of the word “man” is distributive, meaning “any (or every) man” (GKC 395-96 §123.c; cf. Lev 15:2).

⁵ tn Heb “from the sojourner who sojourns.”

⁶ tc The LXX, Syriac, and Vulgate have “your” (plural) rather than “their.”

⁷ tn Heb “I will give my faces against [literally “in”] the soul/person/life [נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh, feminine] who eats the blood and I will cut it [i.e., that נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh] off from the midst of its people.” The uses of נֶפֶשׁ in this and the following verse are most significant for the use of animal blood in Israel’s sacrificial system. Unfortunately, it is a most difficult word to translate accurately and consistently, and this presents a major problem for the rendering of these verses (see, e.g., G. J. Wenham, Leviticus [NICOT], 244-45). No matter which translation of נֶפֶשׁ one uses here, it is important to see that both man and animal have נֶפֶשׁ and that this נֶפֶשׁ is identified with the blood. See the further remarks on v. 11 below. On the “cutting off” penalty see the note on v. 4 above. In this instance, God takes it on himself to “cut off” the person (i.e., extirpation).

⁸ tn The adjective “spiritual” has been supplied in the translation to clarify that this is not a reference to literal prostitution, but figuratively compares idolatry to prostitution.

⁹ tn Heb “to commit harlotry after Molech.” The translation employs “worshiping” here for clarity (cf. NAB, NCV, TEV, CEV, NLT). On the “cut off” penalty see the note on Lev 7:20.

¹⁰ sn For structure and coherence in Lev 20:6-27 see the note on v. 27 below.

¹¹ tn See the note on the phrase “familiar spirits” in Lev 19:31 above.

¹² tn Heb “I will give my faces.”

¹³ tn Heb “the face of the Lord [is] against the doers of evil to cut off from the earth memory of them.”

¹⁴ tn Heb “proverbs.”

¹⁵ tn The word translated “set” is the same Hebrew word translated as “provide” in the previous verse.

¹⁶ sn This escape refers to the exile of Ezekiel and others in 597 b.c. (Ezek 1:2; 2 Kgs 24:10-16).

¹⁷ tn Heb “Even if they go into captivity before their enemies.”

¹⁸ tn Or perhaps simply, “there,” if the מ (mem) prefixed to the adverb is dittographic (note the preceding word ends in mem).

¹⁹ tn Heb “I will set my eye on them for disaster, not good.”