31:19 For after we turned away from you we repented.
After we came to our senses 5 we beat our breasts in sorrow. 6
We are ashamed and humiliated
because of the disgraceful things we did previously.’ 7
1 tn Heb “Stop oppressing foreigner, orphan, and widow.”
2 tn Heb “Stop shedding innocent blood.”
3 tn Heb “going/following after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for an explanation of the idiom involved here.
4 tn Heb “going after other gods to your ruin.”
5 tn For this meaning of the verb see HAL 374 s.v. יָדַע Nif 5 or W. L. Holladay, Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon, 129. REB translates “Now that I am submissive” relating the verb to a second root meaning “be submissive.” (See HALOT 375 s.v. II יָדַע and J. Barr, Comparative Philology and the Text of the Old Testament, 19-21, for evidence for this verb. Other passages cited with this nuance are Judg 8:16; Prov 10:9; Job 20:20.)
6 tn Heb “I struck my thigh.” This was a gesture of grief and anguish (cf. Ezek 21:12 [21:17 HT]). The modern equivalent is “to beat the breast.”
7 tn Heb “because I bear the reproach of my youth.” For the plural referents see the note at the beginning of v. 18.
9 tn Heb “Oracle of the