23:19 But just watch! 1 The wrath of the Lord
will come like a storm! 2
Like a raging storm it will rage down 3
on the heads of those who are wicked.
23:20 The anger of the Lord will not turn back
until he has fully carried out his intended purposes. 4
In days to come 5
you people will come to understand this clearly. 6
25:32 The Lord who rules over all 7 says,
‘Disaster will soon come on one nation after another. 8
A mighty storm of military destruction 9 is rising up
from the distant parts of the earth.’
58:9 Before the kindling is even placed under your pots, 10
he 11 will sweep it away along with both the raw and cooked meat. 12
1:27 when what you dread 13 comes like a whirlwind, 14
and disaster strikes you 15 like a devastating storm, 16
when distressing trouble 17 comes on you.
9:14 Then the Lord will appear above them, and his arrow will shoot forth like lightning; the Lord God will blow the trumpet and will sally forth on the southern storm winds.
1 tn Heb “Behold!”
2 tn The syntax of this line has generally been misunderstood, sometimes to the point that some want to delete the word wrath. Both here and in 30:23 where these same words occur the word “anger” stands not as an accusative of attendant circumstance but an apposition, giving the intended referent to the figure. Comparison should be made with Jer 25:15 where “this wrath” is appositional to “the cup of wine” (cf. GKC 425 §131.k).
3 tn The translation is deliberate, intending to reflect the repetition of the Hebrew root which is “swirl/swirling.”
4 tn Heb “until he has done and until he has carried out the purposes of his heart.”
5 tn Heb “in the latter days.” However, as BDB 31 s.v. אַחֲרִית b suggests, the meaning of this idiom must be determined from the context. Sometimes it has remote, even eschatological, reference and other times it has more immediate reference as it does here and in Jer 30:23 where it refers to the coming days of Babylonian conquest and exile.
6 tn The translation is intended to reflect a Hebrew construction where a noun functions as the object of a verb from the same root word (the Hebrew cognate accusative).
7 tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”
8 tn Heb “will go forth from nation to nation.”
9 tn The words “of military destruction” have been supplied in the translation to make the metaphor clear. The metaphor has shifted from that of God as a lion, to God as a warrior, to God as a judge, to God as the author of the storm winds of destruction.
10 tn Heb “before your pots perceive thorns.”
11 tn Apparently God (v. 6) is the subject of the verb here.
12 tn Heb “like living, like burning anger he will sweep it away.” The meaning of the text is unclear. The translation assumes that within the cooking metaphor (see the previous line) חַי (khay, “living”) refers here to raw meat (as in 1 Sam 2:15, where it modifies בָּשָׂר, basar, “flesh”) and that חָרוּן (kharun; which always refers to God’s “burning anger” elsewhere) here refers to food that is cooked. The pronominal suffix on the verb “sweep away” apparently refers back to the “thorns” of the preceding line. The image depicts swift and sudden judgment. Before the fire has been adequately kindled and all the meat cooked, the winds of judgment will sweep away everything in their path.
13 tn Heb “your dread.” See note on 1:31.
14 sn The term “whirlwind” (NAB, NIV, NRSV; cf. TEV, NLT “storm”) refers to a devastating storm and is related to the verb שׁוֹא (sho’, “to crash into ruins”; see BDB 996 s.v. שׁוֹאָה). Disaster will come swiftly and crush them like a devastating whirlwind.
15 tn Heb “your disaster.” The 2nd person masculine singular suffix is an objective genitive: “disaster strikes you.”
16 tn Heb “like a storm.” The noun סוּפָה (sufah, “storm”) is often used in similes to describe sudden devastation (Isa 5:28; Hos 8:7; Amos 1:14).
17 tn Heb “distress and trouble.” The nouns “distress and trouble” mean almost the same thing so they may form a hendiadys. The two similar sounding terms צוּקָה (tsuqah) and צָרָה (tsarah) also form a wordplay (paronomasia) which also links them together.