22:10 That is why snares surround you,
and why sudden fear terrifies you,
7:5 Then King Ahasuerus responded 6 to Queen Esther, “Who is this individual? Where is this person to be found who is presumptuous enough 7 to act in this way?”
9:15 The nations fell 8 into the pit they had made;
their feet were caught in the net they had hidden. 9
35:8 Let destruction take them by surprise! 10
Let the net they hid catch them!
Let them fall into destruction! 11
5:22 The wicked 12 will be captured by his 13 own iniquities, 14
and he will be held 15 by the cords of his own sin. 16
29:6 In the transgression of an evil person there is a snare, 17
but a righteous person can sing 18 and rejoice. 19
32:3 “‘This is what the sovereign Lord says:
“‘I will throw my net over you 20 in the assembly of many peoples;
and they will haul you up in my dragnet.
32:1 In the twelfth year, in the twelfth month, on the first of the month, 21 the word of the Lord came to me:
2:1 He said to me, “Son of man, 29 stand on your feet and I will speak with you.”
1 tn Heb “If upon the king it is good”; KJV “If it please the king.”
2 tn Heb “let it be written” (so KJV, ASV); NASB “let it be decreed.”
3 sn The enormity of the monetary sum referred to here can be grasped by comparing this amount (10,000 talents of silver) to the annual income of the empire, which according to Herodotus (Histories 3.95) was 14,500 Euboic talents. In other words Haman is offering the king a bribe equal to two-thirds of the royal income. Doubtless this huge sum of money was to come (in large measure) from the anticipated confiscation of Jewish property and assets once the Jews had been destroyed. That such a large sum of money is mentioned may indicate something of the economic standing of the Jewish population in the empire of King Ahasuerus.
4 tc Part of the Greek tradition and the Syriac Peshitta understand this word as “friends,” probably reading the Hebrew term רֲכָמָיו (rakhamayv, “his friends”) rather than the reading of the MT חֲכָמָיו (hakhamayv, “his wise men”). Cf. NLT “all his friends”; the two readings appear to be conflated by TEV as “those wise friends of his.”
5 tn Heb “from the seed of the Jews”; KJV, ASV similar.
6 tc The second occurrence of the Hebrew verb וַיּאמֶר (vayyo’mer, “and he said”) in the MT should probably be disregarded. The repetition is unnecessary in the context and may be the result of dittography in the MT.
7 tn Heb “has so filled his heart”; NAB “who has dared to do this.”
8 tn Heb “sank down.”
9 sn The hostility of the nations against God’s people is their downfall, for it prompts God to intervene and destroy them. See also Ps 7:15-16.
10 tn Heb “let destruction [which] he does not know come to him.” The singular is used of the enemy in v. 8, probably in a representative or collective sense. The psalmist has more than one enemy, as vv. 1-7 make clear.
11 tn The psalmist’s prayer for his enemies’ demise continues. See vv. 4-6.
12 tn The suffix on the verb is the direct object suffix; “the wicked” is a second object by apposition: They capture him, the wicked. Since “the wicked” is not found in the LXX, it could be an old scribal error; or the Greek translator may have simply smoothed out the sentence. C. H. Toy suggests turning the sentence into a passive idea: “The wicked will be caught in his iniquities” (Proverbs [ICC], 117).
13 tn The word is the subject of the clause, but the pronominal suffix has no clear referent. The suffix is proleptic, referring to the wicked.
14 tn Heb “his own iniquities will capture the wicked.” The translation shifts the syntax for the sake of smoothness and readability.
15 sn The lack of discipline and control in the area of sexual gratification is destructive. The one who plays with this kind of sin will become ensnared by it and led to ruin.
16 tn The Hebrew is structured chiastically: “his own iniquities will capture the wicked, by the cords of his own sin will he be held.”
17 tn The Syriac and Tg. Prov 29:6 simplify the meaning by writing it with a passive verb: “the evil man is ensnared by his guilt.” The metaphor of the snare indicates that the evil person will be caught in his own transgression.
18 tc The two verbs create some difficulty because the book of Proverbs does not usually duplicate verbs like this and because the first verb יָרוּן (yarun) is irregular. The BHS editors prefer to emend it to יָרוּץ (yaruts, “will rush”; cf. NAB “runs on joyfully”). W. McKane emends it to “exult” to form a hendiadys: “is deliriously happy” (Proverbs [OTL], 638). G. R. Driver suggests changing the word to יָדוֹן (yadon) based on two Hebrew
19 sn These two verbs express the confidence of the righteous – they have no fears and so can sing. So the proverb is saying that only the righteous can enjoy a sense of security.
20 tn The expression “throw my net” is common in Ezekiel (12:13; 17:20; 19:8).
21 sn This would be March 3, 585
22 sn Moses (Exod 3:19) and Isaiah (Isa 6:9-10) were also told that their messages would not be received.
23 sn A similar description of Israel’s disobedience is given in 1 Sam 8:7.
24 tn Heb “hard of forehead and stiff of heart.”
25 tn The words “they will realize” are not in the Hebrew text; they are added here for stylistic reasons since this clause assumes the previous verb “to remember” or “to take into account.”
26 tn Heb “how I was broken by their adulterous heart.” The image of God being “broken” is startling, but perfectly natural within the metaphorical framework of God as offended husband. The idiom must refer to the intense grief that Israel’s unfaithfulness caused God. For a discussion of the syntax and semantics of the Hebrew text, see M. Greenberg, Ezekiel (AB), 1:134.
27 tn Heb adds “in their faces.”
28 tn Heb “set your face against.” The expression occurs at the beginning of Ezekiel’s prophetic oracles in Ezek 13:17; 20:46; 21:2; 25:2; 28:21; 29:2; 35:2; 38:2.
29 sn The phrase son of man occurs ninety-three times in the book of Ezekiel. It simply means “human one,” and distinguishes the prophet from the nonhuman beings that are present in the world of his vision.