74:20 Remember your covenant promises, 1
for the dark regions of the earth are full of places where violence rules. 2
137:8 O daughter Babylon, soon to be devastated! 3
How blessed will be the one who repays you
for what you dished out to us! 4
137:9 How blessed will be the one who grabs your babies
and smashes them on a rock! 5
13:17 Look, I am stirring up the Medes to attack them; 6
they are not concerned about silver,
nor are they interested in gold. 7
13:18 Their arrows will cut young men to ribbons; 8
they have no compassion on a person’s offspring, 9
they will not 10 look with pity on children.
14:6 It 11 furiously struck down nations
with unceasing blows. 12
It angrily ruled over nations,
oppressing them without restraint. 13
47:6 I was angry at my people;
I defiled my special possession
and handed them over to you.
You showed them no mercy; 14
you even placed a very heavy burden on old people. 15
1:6 Look, I am about to empower 16 the Babylonians,
that ruthless 17 and greedy 18 nation.
They sweep across the surface 19 of the earth,
seizing dwelling places that do not belong to them.
1:7 They are frightening and terrifying;
they decide for themselves what is right. 20
1:8 Their horses are faster than leopards
and more alert 21 than wolves in the desert. 22
Their horses 23 gallop, 24
their horses come a great distance;
like a vulture 25 they swoop down quickly to devour their prey. 26
16:6 because they poured out the blood of your saints and prophets,
so 28 you have given them blood to drink. They got what they deserved!” 29
1 tc Heb “look at the covenant.” The LXX reads “your covenant,” which seems to assume a second person pronominal suffix. The suffix may have been accidentally omitted by haplography. Note that the following word (כִּי) begins with kaf (כ).
2 tn Heb “for the dark places of the earth are full of dwelling places of violence.” The “dark regions” are probably the lands where the people have been exiled (see C. A. Briggs and E. G. Briggs, Psalms [ICC], 2:157). In some contexts “dark regions” refers to Sheol (Ps 88:6) or to hiding places likened to Sheol (Ps 143:3; Lam 3:6).
3 tn Heb “O devastated daughter of Babylon.” The psalmist dramatically anticipates Babylon’s demise.
4 tn Heb “O the happiness of the one who repays you your wage which you paid to us.”
5 sn For other references to the wholesale slaughter of babies in the context of ancient Near Eastern warfare, see 2 Kgs 8:12; Isa 13:16; Hos 13:16; Nah 3:10.
6 tn Heb “against them”; NLT “against Babylon.”
7 sn They cannot be bought off, for they have a lust for bloodshed.
8 tn Heb “and bows cut to bits young men.” “Bows” stands by metonymy for arrows.
9 tn Heb “the fruit of the womb.”
10 tn Heb “their eye does not.” Here “eye” is a metonymy for the whole person.
11 tn Or perhaps, “he” (cf. KJV; NCV “the king of Babylon”). The present translation understands the referent of the pronoun (“it”) to be the “club/scepter” of the preceding line.
12 tn Heb “it was striking down nations in fury [with] a blow without ceasing.” The participle (“striking down”) suggests repeated or continuous action in past time.
13 tn Heb “it was ruling in anger nations [with] oppression without restraint.” The participle (“ruling”) suggests repeated or continuous action in past time.
14 tn Or “compassion.”
15 tn Heb “on the old you made very heavy your yoke.”
16 tn Heb “raise up” (so KJV, ASV).
17 tn Heb “bitter.” Other translation options for this word in this context include “fierce” (NASB, NRSV); “savage” (NEB); or “grim.”
18 tn Heb “hasty, quick.” Some translate here “impetuous” (so NEB, NASB, NIV, NRSV) or “rash,” but in this context greed may very well be the idea. The Babylonians move quickly and recklessly ahead in their greedy quest to expand their empire.
19 tn Heb “the open spaces.”
20 tn Heb “from him his justice, even his lifting up, goes out.” In this context שְׂאֵת (sÿ’et) probably has the nuance “authority.” See R. D. Patterson, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah (WEC), 150.
21 tn Heb “sharper,” in the sense of “keener” or “more alert.” Some translate “quicker” on the basis of the parallelism with the first line (see HALOT 291 s.v. חדד).
22 tn Heb “wolves of the evening,” that is, wolves that prowl at night. The present translation assumes an emendation to עֲרָבָה (’aravah, “desert”). On this phrase see also Zeph 3:3.
23 tn Or “horsemen,” “cavalry.”
24 tn The precise nuance of the rare verb פָּוַשׁ (parash) is unclear here. Elsewhere it is used of animals jumping or leaping (see Jer 50:11; Mal 4:2).
25 tn Or “eagle” (so NASB, NRSV). The term can refer to either eagles or vultures, but in this context of gruesome destruction and death “vulture” is preferred.
26 tn Heb “they fly like a vulture/an eagle quickly to devour.” The direct object “their prey” is not included in the Hebrew text but is implied, and has been supplied in the translation for clarity.
27 tn Grk “boasts against, exults over,” in victory.
28 tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “so” to indicate that this judgment is the result of what these wicked people did to the saints and prophets.
29 tn Grk “They are worthy”; i.e., of this kind of punishment. By extension, “they got what they deserve.”