7:10 He returns no more to his house,
nor does his place of residence 1 know him 2 any more.
7:21 And why do you not pardon my transgression,
and take away my iniquity?
For now I will lie down in the dust, 3
and you will seek me diligently, 4
but I will be gone.”
1 tn M. Dahood suggests the meaning is the same as “his abode” (“Hebrew-Ugaritic Lexicography V,” Bib 48 [1967]: 421-38).
2 tn The verb means “to recognize” by seeing. “His place,” the place where he was living, is the subject of the verb. This personification is intended simply to say that the place where he lived will not have him any more. The line is very similar to Ps 103:16b – when the wind blows the flower away, its place knows it no more.
3 tn The LXX has, “for now I will depart to the earth.”
4 tn The verb שָׁחַר (shakhar) in the Piel has been translated “to seek early in the morning” because of the possible link with the word “dawn.” But the verb more properly means “to seek diligently” (by implication).