Exodus 18:11

18:11 Now I know that the Lord is greater than all the gods, for in the thing in which they dealt proudly against them he has destroyed them.” ¹ 

Psalms 18:26

18:26 You prove to be reliable ²  to one who is blameless,

but you prove to be deceptive ³  to one who is perverse. ⁴ 

Isaiah 45:9

The Lord Gives a Warning

45:9 One who argues with his creator is in grave danger, ⁵ 

one who is like a mere ⁶  shard among the other shards on the ground!

The clay should not say to the potter, ⁷ 

“What in the world ⁸  are you doing?

Your work lacks skill!” ⁹ 

[18:11]  ¹ tn The end of this sentence seems not to have been finished, or it is very elliptical. In the present translation the phrase “he has destroyed them” is supplied. Others take the last prepositional phrase to be the completion and supply only a verb: “[he was] above them.” U. Cassuto (Exodus, 216) takes the word “gods” to be the subject of the verb “act proudly,” giving the sense of “precisely (כִּי, ki) in respect of these things of which the gods of Egypt boasted – He is greater than they (עֲלֵיהֶם, ‘alehem).” He suggests rendering the clause, “excelling them in the very things to which they laid claim.”

[18:26]  ² tn Or “blameless.”

[18:26]  ³ tn The Hebrew verb פָתַל (patal) is used in only three other texts. In Gen 30:8 it means literally “to wrestle,” or “to twist.” In Job 5:13 it refers to devious individuals, and in Prov 8:8 to deceptive words.

[18:26]  ⁴ tn The adjective עִקֵּשׁ (’iqqesh) has the basic nuance “twisted, crooked,” and by extension refers to someone or something that is morally perverse. It appears frequently in Proverbs, where it is used of evil people (22:5), speech (8:8; 19:1), thoughts (11:20; 17:20), and life styles (2:15; 28:6). A righteous king opposes such people (Ps 101:4).

[45:9]  ⁵ tn Heb “Woe [to] the one who argues with the one who formed him.”

[45:9]  ⁶ tn The words “one who is like a mere” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons and clarification.

[45:9]  ⁷ tn Heb “Should the clay say to the one who forms it?” The rhetorical question anticipates a reply, “Of course not!”

[45:9]  ⁸ tn The words “in the world” are supplied in the translation to approximate in English idiom the force of the sarcastic question.

[45:9]  ⁹ tn Heb “your work, there are no hands for it,” i.e., “your work looks like something made by a person who has no hands.”