Ezekiel 5:17

5:17 I will send famine and wild beasts against you and they will take your children from you. ¹  Plague and bloodshed will overwhelm you, ²  and I will bring a sword against you. I, the Lord, have spoken!”

Leviticus 26:22

26:22 I will send the wild animals ³  against you and they will bereave you of your children, ⁴  annihilate your cattle, and diminish your population ⁵  so that your roads will become deserted.

Leviticus 26:1

Exhortation to Obedience

26:1 “‘You must not make for yourselves idols, ⁶  so you must not set up for yourselves a carved image or a pillar, and you must not place a sculpted stone in your land to bow down before ⁷  it, for I am the Lord your God.

Leviticus 20:1-2

Prohibitions against Illegitimate Family Worship

20:1 The Lord spoke to Moses: 20:2 “You are to say to the Israelites, ‘Any man from the Israelites or from the foreigners who reside in Israel ⁸  who gives any of his children ⁹  to Molech ¹⁰  must be put to death; the people of the land must pelt him with stones. ¹¹ 

Leviticus 17:1

The Slaughter of Animals

17:1 The Lord spoke to Moses:

Jeremiah 15:3

15:3 “I will punish them in four different ways: I will have war kill them. I will have dogs drag off their dead bodies. I will have birds and wild beasts devour and destroy their corpses. ¹² 

[5:17]  ¹ tn Heb “will bereave you.”

[5:17]  ² tn Heb “will pass through you.” This threat recalls the warning of Lev 26:22, 25 and Deut 32:24-25.

[26:22]  ³ tn Heb “the animal of the field.” This collective singular has been translated as a plural. The expression “animal of the field” refers to a wild (i.e., nondomesticated) animal.

[26:22]  ⁴ tn The words “of your children” are not in the Hebrew text, but are implied.

[26:22]  ⁵ tn Heb “and diminish you.”

[26:1]  ⁶ sn For the literature regarding the difficult etymology and meaning of the term for “idols” (אֱלִילִם, ’elilim), see the literature cited in the note on Lev 19:4. It appears to be a diminutive play on words with אֵל (’el, “god, God”) and, perhaps at the same time, recalls a common Semitic word for “worthless, weak, powerless, nothingness.” Snaith suggests a rendering of “worthless godlings.”

[26:1]  ⁷ tn Heb “on.” The “sculpted stone” appears to be some sort of stone with images carved into (see B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 181, and J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 449).

[20:2]  ⁸ tn Heb “or from the sojourner who sojourns”; NAB “an alien residing in Israel.”

[20:2]  ⁹ tn Heb “his seed” (so KJV, ASV); likewise in vv. 3-4.

[20:2]  ¹⁰ tn Regarding Molech and Molech worship see the note on Lev 18:21.

[20:2]  ¹¹ tn This is not the most frequently-used Hebrew verb for stoning (see instead סָקַל, saqal), but a word that refers to the action of throwing, slinging, or pelting someone with stones (רָגָם, ragam; see HALOT 1187 s.v. רגם qal.a, and B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 136).

[15:3]  ¹² tn The translation attempts to render in understandable English some rather unusual uses of terms here. The verb translated “punish” is often used that way (cf. BDB 823 s.v. פָּקַד Qal.A.3 and compare usage in Jer 11:22, 13:21). However, here it is accompanied by a direct object and a preposition meaning “over” which is usually used in the sense of appointing someone over someone (cf. BDB 823 s.v. פָּקַד Qal.B.1 and compare usage in Jer 51:27). Moreover the word translated “different ways” normally refers to “families,” “clans,” or “guilds” (cf. BDB 1046-47 s.v. מִשְׁפָּחָה for usage). Hence the four things mentioned are referred to figuratively as officers or agents into whose power the Lord consigns them. The Hebrew text reads: “I will appoint over them four guilds, the sword to kill, the dogs to drag away, the birds of the skies and the beasts of the earth to devour and to destroy.”