Discovery Box1 Samuel 2:7-8
Context2:7 The Lord impoverishes and makes wealthy;
he humbles and he exalts.
2:8 He lifts the weak 1 from the dust;
he raises 2 the poor from the ash heap
to seat them with princes
and to bestow on them an honored position. 3
The foundations of the earth belong to the Lord,
and he has placed the world on them.
Esther 4:14
Context4:14 “Don’t imagine that because you are part of the king’s household you will be the one Jew 4 who will escape. If you keep quiet at this time, liberation and protection for the Jews will appear 5 from another source, 6 while you and your father’s household perish. It may very well be 7 that you have achieved royal status 8 for such a time as this!”
Isaiah 10:5-6
Context10:5 Assyria, the club I use to vent my anger, is as good as dead, 9
a cudgel with which I angrily punish. 10
10:6 I sent him 11 against a godless 12 nation,
I ordered him to attack the people with whom I was angry, 13
to take plunder and to carry away loot,
to trample them down 14 like dirt in the streets.
Isaiah 45:1-3
Context45:1 This is what the Lord says to his chosen 15 one,
to Cyrus, whose right hand I hold 16
in order to subdue nations before him,
and disarm kings, 17
to open doors before him,
so gates remain unclosed:
45:2 “I will go before you
and level mountains. 18
Bronze doors I will shatter
and iron bars 19 I will hack through.
45:3 I will give you hidden treasures, 20
riches stashed away in secret places,
so you may recognize that I am the Lord,
the one who calls you by name, the God of Israel.
Jeremiah 27:6-7
Context27:6 I have at this time placed all these nations of yours under the power 21 of my servant, 22 King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. I have even made all the wild animals subject to him. 23 27:7 All nations must serve him and his son and grandson 24 until the time comes for his own nation to fall. 25 Then many nations and great kings will in turn subjugate Babylon. 26
Daniel 4:22
Context4:22 it is you, 27 O king! For you have become great and strong. Your greatness is such that it reaches to heaven, and your authority to the ends of the earth.
Daniel 5:18-21
Context5:18 As for you, O king, the most high God bestowed on your father Nebuchadnezzar a kingdom, greatness, honor, and majesty. 28 5:19 Due to the greatness that he bestowed on him, all peoples, nations, and language groups were trembling with fear 29 before him. He killed whom he wished, he spared 30 whom he wished, he exalted whom he wished, and he brought low whom he wished. 5:20 And when his mind 31 became arrogant 32 and his spirit filled with pride, he was deposed from his royal throne and his honor was removed from him. 5:21 He was driven from human society, his mind 33 was changed to that of an animal, he lived 34 with the wild donkeys, he was fed grass like oxen, and his body became damp with the dew of the sky, until he came to understand that the most high God rules over human kingdoms, and he appoints over them whomever he wishes.
[2:8] 1 tn Or “lowly”; Heb “insignificant.”
[2:8] 2 tn The imperfect verbal form, which is parallel to the participle in the preceding line, is best understood here as indicating what typically happens.
[2:8] 3 tn Heb “a seat of honor.”
[4:14] 4 tn Heb “from all the Jews”; KJV “more than all the Jews”; NIV “you alone of all the Jews.”
[4:14] 5 tn Heb “stand”; KJV, NASB, NIV, NLT “arise.”
[4:14] 6 tn Heb “place” (so KJV, NIV, NLT); NRSV “from another quarter.” This is probably an oblique reference to help coming from God. D. J. A. Clines disagrees; in his view a contrast between deliverance by Esther and deliverance by God is inappropriate (Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther [NCBC], 302). But Clines’ suggestion that perhaps the reference is to deliverance by Jewish officials or by armed Jewish revolt is less attractive than seeing this veiled reference as part of the literary strategy of the book, which deliberately keeps God’s providential dealings entirely in the background.
[4:14] 7 tn Heb “And who knows whether” (so NASB). The question is one of hope, but free of presumption. Cf. Jonah 3:9.
[4:14] 8 tn Heb “have come to the kingdom”; NRSV “to royal dignity”; NIV “to royal position”; NLT “have been elevated to the palace.”
[10:5] 9 tn Heb “Woe [to] Assyria, the club of my anger.” On הוֹי (hoy, “woe, ah”) see the note on the first phrase of 1:4.
[10:5] 10 tn Heb “a cudgel is he, in their hand is my anger.” It seems likely that the final mem (ם) on בְיָדָם (bÿyadam) is not a pronominal suffix (“in their hand”), but an enclitic mem. If so, one can translate literally, “a cudgel is he in the hand of my anger.”
[10:6] 11 sn Throughout this section singular forms are used to refer to Assyria; perhaps the king of Assyria is in view (see v. 12).
[10:6] 12 tn Or “defiled”; cf. ASV “profane”; NAB “impious”; NCV “separated from God.”
[10:6] 13 tn Heb “and against the people of my anger I ordered him.”
[10:6] 14 tn Heb “to make it [i.e., the people] a trampled place.”
[45:1] 15 tn Heb “anointed” (so KJV, NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT); NCV “his appointed king.”
[45:1] 16 sn The “right hand” is a symbol of activity and strength; the Lord directs Cyrus’ activities and assures his success.
[45:1] 17 tn Heb “and the belts of kings I will loosen”; NRSV “strip kings of their robes”; NIV “strip kings of their armor.”
[45:2] 18 tc The form הֲדוּרִים (hadurim) makes little, if any, sense here. It is probably a corruption of an original הָרָרִים (hararim, “mountains”), the reduplicated form of הָר (har, “mountain”).
[45:2] 19 tn That is, on the gates. Cf. CEV “break the iron bars on bronze gates.”
[45:3] 20 tn Heb “treasures of darkness” (KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV); TEV “treasures from dark, secret places.”
[27:6] 21 tn Heb “have given…into the hand of.”
[27:6] 22 sn See the study note on 25:9 for the significance of the application of this term to Nebuchadnezzar.
[27:6] 23 tn Heb “I have given…to him to serve him.” The verb “give” in this syntactical situation is functioning like the Hiphil stem, i.e., as a causative. See Dan 1:9 for parallel usage. For the usage of “serve” meaning “be subject to” compare 2 Sam 22:44 and BDB 713 s.v. עָבַד 3.
[27:7] 24 sn This is a figure that emphasizes that they will serve for a long time but not for an unlimited duration. The kingdom of Babylon lasted a relatively short time by ancient standards. It lasted from 605
[27:7] 25 tn Heb “until the time of his land, even his, comes.” The independent pronoun is placed here for emphasis on the possessive pronoun. The word “time” is used by substitution for the things that are done in it (compare in the NT John 2:4; 7:30; 8:20 “his hour had not yet come”).
[27:7] 26 tn Heb “him.” This is a good example of the figure of substitution where the person is put for his descendants or the nation or subject he rules. (See Gen 28:13-14 for another good example and Acts 22:7 in the NT.)
[4:22] 27 sn Much of modern scholarship views this chapter as a distortion of traditions that were originally associated with Nabonidus rather than with Nebuchadnezzar. A Qumran text, the Prayer of Nabonidus, is often cited for parallels to these events.
[5:18] 28 tn Or “royal greatness and majestic honor,” if the four terms are understood as a double hendiadys.
[5:19] 29 tn Aram “were trembling and fearing.” This can be treated as a hendiadys, “were trembling with fear.”
[5:19] 30 tn Aram “let live.” This Aramaic form is the aphel participle of חַיָה(khayah, “to live”). Theodotion and the Vulgate mistakenly take the form to be from מְחָא (mÿkha’, “to smite”).
[5:20] 32 sn The point of describing Nebuchadnezzar as arrogant is that he had usurped divine prerogatives, and because of his immense arrogance God had dealt decisively with him.
