Deuteronomy 28:53-56

28:53 You will then eat your own offspring, ¹  the flesh of the sons and daughters the Lord your God has given you, because of the severity of the siege ²  by which your enemies will constrict you. 28:54 The man among you who is by nature tender and sensitive will turn against his brother, his beloved wife, and his remaining children. 28:55 He will withhold from all of them his children’s flesh that he is eating (since there is nothing else left), because of the severity of the siege by which your enemy will constrict ³  you in your villages. 28:56 Likewise, the most ⁴  tender and delicate of your women, who would never think of putting even the sole of her foot on the ground because of her daintiness, ⁵  will turn against her beloved husband, her sons and daughters,

Isaiah 9:19-21

9:19 Because of the anger of the Lord who commands armies, the land was scorched, ⁶ 

and the people became fuel for the fire. ⁷ 

People had no compassion on one another. ⁸ 

9:20 They devoured ⁹  on the right, but were still hungry,

they ate on the left, but were not satisfied.

People even ate ¹⁰  the flesh of their own arm! ¹¹ 

9:21 Manasseh fought against ¹²  Ephraim,

and Ephraim against Manasseh;

together they fought against Judah.

Despite all this, his anger does not subside,

and his hand is ready to strike again. ¹³ 

Jeremiah 19:9

19:9 I will reduce the people of this city to desperate straits during the siege imposed on it by their enemies who are seeking to kill them. I will make them so desperate that they will eat the flesh of their own sons and daughters and the flesh of one another.”’” ¹⁴ 

Ezekiel 5:10

5:10 Therefore fathers will eat their sons within you, Jerusalem, ¹⁵  and sons will eat their fathers. I will execute judgments on you, and I will scatter any survivors ¹⁶  to the winds. ¹⁷ 

[28:53]  ¹ tn Heb “the fruit of your womb” (so NAB, NRSV); NASB “the offspring of your own body.”

[28:53]  ² tn Heb “siege and stress.”

[28:55]  ³ tn Heb “besiege,” redundant with the noun “siege.”

[28:56]  ⁴ tc The LXX adds σφόδρα (sfodra, “very”) to bring the description into line with v. 54.

[28:56]  ⁵ tn Heb “delicateness and tenderness.”

[9:19]  ⁶ tn The precise meaning of the verb עְתַּם (’ÿtam), which occurs only here, is uncertain, though the context strongly suggests that it means “burn, scorch.”

[9:19]  ⁷ sn The uncontrollable fire of the people’s wickedness (v. 18) is intensified by the fire of the Lord’s judgment (v. 19). God allows (or causes) their wickedness to become self-destructive as civil strife and civil war break out in the land.

[9:19]  ⁸ tn Heb “men were not showing compassion to their brothers.” The idiom “men to their brothers” is idiomatic for reciprocity. The prefixed verbal form is either a preterite without vav (ו) consecutive or an imperfect used in a customary sense, describing continual or repeated behavior in past time.

[9:20]  ⁹ tn Or “cut.” The verb גָּזַר (gazar) means “to cut.” If it is understood here, then one might paraphrase, “They slice off meat on the right.” However, HALOT 187 s.v. I גזר, proposes here a rare homonym meaning “to devour.”

[9:20]  ¹⁰ tn The prefixed verbal form is either a preterite without vav consecutive or an imperfect used in a customary sense, describing continual or repeated behavior in past time.

[9:20]  ¹¹ tn Some suggest that זְרֹעוֹ (zÿro’o, “his arm”) be repointed זַרְעוֹ (zar’o, “his offspring”). In either case, the metaphor is that of a desperately hungry man who resorts to an almost unthinkable act to satisfy his appetite. He eats everything he can find to his right, but still being unsatisfied, then turns to his left and eats everything he can find there. Still being desperate for food, he then resorts to eating his own flesh (or offspring, as this phrase is metaphorically understood by some English versions, e.g., NIV, NCV, TEV, NLT). The reality behind the metaphor is the political turmoil of the period, as the next verse explains. There was civil strife within the northern kingdom; even the descendants of Joseph were at each other’s throats. Then the northern kingdom turned on their southern brother, Judah.

[9:21]  ¹² tn The words “fought against” are supplied in the translation both here and later in this verse for stylistic reasons.

[9:21]  ¹³ tn Heb “in all this his anger is not turned, and still his hand is outstretched” (KJV and ASV both similar); NIV “his hand is still upraised.”

[19:9]  ¹⁴ tn This verse has been restructured to try to bring out the proper thought and subordinations reflected in the verse without making the sentence too long and complex in English: Heb “I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and daughters. And they will eat one another’s flesh in the siege and in the straits which their enemies who are seeking their lives reduce them to.” This also shows the agency through which God’s causation was effected, i.e., the siege.

[5:10]  ¹⁵ tn In context “you” refers to the city of Jerusalem. To make this clear for the modern reader, “Jerusalem” has been supplied in the translation in apposition to “you.”

[5:10]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “all of your survivors.”

[5:10]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “to every wind.”