Isaiah 1:4

1:4 ¹ The sinful nation is as good as dead, ² 

the people weighed down by evil deeds.

They are offspring who do wrong,

children ³  who do wicked things.

They have abandoned the Lord,

and rejected the Holy One of Israel. ⁴ 

They are alienated from him. ⁵ 

Isaiah 6:5

6:5 I said, “Too bad for me! I am destroyed, ⁶  for my lips are contaminated by sin, ⁷  and I live among people whose lips are contaminated by sin. ⁸  My eyes have seen the king, the Lord who commands armies.” ⁹ 

Isaiah 8:19

Darkness Turns to Light as an Ideal King Arrives

8:19 ¹⁰ They will say to you, “Seek oracles at the pits used to conjure up underworld spirits, from the magicians who chirp and mutter incantations. ¹¹  Should people not seek oracles from their gods, by asking the dead about the destiny of the living?” ¹² 

Isaiah 18:2

18:2 that sends messengers by sea,

who glide over the water’s surface in boats made of papyrus.

Go, you swift messengers,

to a nation of tall, smooth-skinned people, ¹³ 

to a people that are feared far and wide, ¹⁴ 

to a nation strong and victorious, ¹⁵ 

whose land rivers divide. ¹⁶ 

Isaiah 18:7

18:7 At that time

tribute will be brought to the Lord who commands armies,

by a people that are tall and smooth-skinned,

a people that are feared far and wide,

a nation strong and victorious,

whose land rivers divide. ¹⁷ 

The tribute ¹⁸  will be brought to the place where the Lord who commands armies has chosen to reside, on Mount Zion. ¹⁹ 

Isaiah 27:11

27:11 When its branches get brittle, ²⁰  they break;

women come and use them for kindling. ²¹ 

For these people lack understanding, ²² 

therefore the one who made them has no compassion on them;

the one who formed them has no mercy on them.

Isaiah 30:6

30:6 This is a message ²³  about the animals in the Negev:

Through a land of distress and danger,

inhabited by lionesses and roaring lions, ²⁴ 

by snakes and darting adders, ²⁵ 

they transport ²⁶  their wealth on the backs of donkeys,

their riches on the humps of camels,

to a nation that cannot help them. ²⁷ 

[1:4]  ¹ sn Having summoned the witnesses and announced the Lord’s accusation against Israel, Isaiah mourns the nation’s impending doom. The third person references to the Lord in the second half of the verse suggest that the quotation from the Lord (cf. vv. 2-3) has concluded.

[1:4]  ² tn Heb “Woe [to the] sinful nation.” The Hebrew term הוֹי, (hoy, “woe, ah”) was used in funeral laments (see 1 Kgs 13:30; Jer 22:18; 34:5) and carries the connotation of death. In highly dramatic fashion the prophet acts out Israel’s funeral in advance, emphasizing that their demise is inevitable if they do not repent soon.

[1:4]  ³ tn Or “sons” (NASB). The prophet contrasts four terms of privilege – nation, people, offspring, children – with four terms that depict Israel’s sinful condition in Isaiah’s day – sinful, evil, wrong, wicked (see J. A. Motyer, The Prophecy of Isaiah, 43).

[1:4]  ⁴ sn Holy One of Israel is one of Isaiah’s favorite divine titles for God. It pictures the Lord as the sovereign king who rules over his covenant people and exercises moral authority over them.

[1:4]  ⁵ tn Heb “they are estranged backward.” The LXX omits this statement, which presents syntactical problems and seems to be outside the synonymous parallelistic structure of the verse.

[6:5]  ⁶ tn Isaiah uses the suffixed (perfect) form of the verb for rhetorical purposes. In this way his destruction is described as occurring or as already completed. Rather than understanding the verb as derived from דָּמַה (damah, “be destroyed”), some take it from a proposed homonymic root דמה, which would mean “be silent.” In this case, one might translate, “I must be silent.”

[6:5]  ⁷ tn Heb “a man unclean of lips am I.” Isaiah is not qualified to praise the king. His lips (the instruments of praise) are “unclean” because he has been contaminated by sin.

[6:5]  ⁸ tn Heb “and among a nation unclean of lips I live.”

[6:5]  ⁹ tn Perhaps in this context, the title has a less militaristic connotation and pictures the Lord as the ruler of the heavenly assembly. See the note at 1:9.

[8:19]  ¹¹ tn It is uncertain if the prophet or the Lord is speaking in vv. 19-22. If the latter, then vv. 19-22 resume the speech recorded in vv. 12-15, after the prophet’s response in vv. 16-18.

[8:19]  ¹² tn Heb “inquire of the ritual pits and of the magicians who chirp and mutter.” The Hebrew word אוֹב (’ov, “ritual pit”) refers to a pit used by a magician to conjure up underworld spirits. In 1 Sam 28:7 the witch of Endor is called a אוֹב-בַּעֲלַת (ba’alat-’ov, “owner of a ritual pit”). See H. Hoffner, “Second Millennium Antecedents to the Hebrew ’OñBù,” JBL 86 (1967): 385-401.

[8:19]  ¹³ tn Heb “Should a nation not inquire of its gods on behalf of the living, (by inquiring) of the dead?” These words appear to be a continuation of the quotation begun in the first part of the verse. אֱלֹהָיו (’elohayv) may be translated “its gods” or “its God.” Some take the second half of the verse as the prophet’s (or the Lord’s) rebuke of the people who advise seeking oracles at the ritual pits, but in this case the words “the dead on behalf of the living” are difficult to explain.

[18:2]  ¹⁶ tn The precise meaning of the qualifying terms is uncertain. מְמֻשָּׁךְ (mÿmushakh) appears to be a Pual participle from the verb מָשַׁךְ (mashakh, “to draw, extend”). Lexicographers theorize that it here refers to people who “stretch out,” as it were, or are tall. See BDB 604 s.v. מָשַׁךְ, and HALOT 645-46 s.v. משׁךְ. מוֹרָט (morat) is taken as a Pual participle from מָרַט (marat), which can mean “to pull out [hair],” in the Qal, “become bald” in the Niphal, and “be wiped clean” in the Pual. Lexicographers theorize that the word here refers to people with bare, or smooth, skin. See BDB 598-99 s.v. מָרַט, and HALOT 634-35 s.v. מרט. These proposed meanings, which are based on etymological speculation, must be regarded as tentative.

[18:2]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “from it and onwards.” HALOT 245 s.v. הָלְאָה suggests the translation “far and wide.”

[18:2]  ¹⁸ tn Once more the precise meaning of the qualifying terms is uncertain. The expression קַו־קָו (qav-qav) is sometimes related to a proposed Arabic cognate and taken to mean “strength” (see BDB 876 II קַו). Others, on the basis of Isa 28:10, 13, understand the form as gibberish (literally, “kav, kav”) and take it to be a reference to this nation’s strange, unknown language. The form מְבוּסָה (mÿvusah) appears to be derived from בּוּס (bus, “to trample”), so lexicographers suggest the meaning “trampling” or “subjugation,” i.e., a nation that subdues others. See BDB 101 s.v. בּוּס and HALOT 541 s.v. מְבוּסָה. These proposals, which are based on etymological speculation, must be regarded as tentative.

[18:2]  ¹⁹ tn The precise meaning of the verb בָּזָא (baza’), which occurs only in this oracle (see also v. 7) in the OT, is uncertain. BDB 102 s.v. suggests “divide” on the basis of alleged Aramaic and Arabic cognates; HALOT 117 s.v., citing an alleged Arabic cognate, suggests “wash away.”

[18:7]  ²¹ tn On the interpretive difficulties of this verse, see the notes at v. 2, where the same terminology is used.

[18:7]  ²² tn The words “the tribute” are repeated here in the translation for clarity.

[18:7]  ²³ tn Heb “to the place of the name of the Lord who commands armies [traditionally, the Lord of hosts], Mount Zion.”

[27:11]  ²⁶ tn Heb “are dry” (so NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[27:11]  ²⁷ tn Heb “women come [and] light it.” The city is likened to a dead tree with dried up branches that is only good for firewood.

[27:11]  ²⁸ tn Heb “for not a people of understanding [is] he.”

[30:6]  ³¹ tn Traditionally, “burden” (so KJV, ASV); NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV “oracle.”

[30:6]  ³² tc Heb “[a land of] a lioness and a lion, from them.” Some emend מֵהֶם (mehem, “from them”) to מֵהֵם (mehem), an otherwise unattested Hiphil participle from הָמַם (hamam, “move noisily”). Perhaps it would be better to take the initial mem (מ) as enclitic and emend the form to הֹמֶה (homeh), a Qal active participle from הָמָה (hamah, “to make a noise”); cf. J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah (NICOT), 1:542, n. 9.

[30:6]  ³³ tn Heb “flying fiery one.” See the note at 14:29.

[30:6]  ³⁴ tn Or “carry” (KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[30:6]  ³⁵ sn This verse describes messengers from Judah transporting wealth to Egypt in order to buy Pharaoh’s protection through a treaty.