Isaiah 10:9-11

10:9 Is not Calneh like Carchemish?

Hamath like Arpad?

Samaria like Damascus? ¹ 

10:10 I overpowered kingdoms ruled by idols, ² 

whose carved images were more impressive than Jerusalem’s ³  or Samaria’s.

10:11 As I have done to Samaria and its idols,

so I will do to Jerusalem and its idols.” ⁴ 

Isaiah 36:18-19

36:18 Hezekiah is misleading you when he says, “The Lord will rescue us.” Has any of the gods of the nations rescued his land from the power of the king of Assyria? ⁵  36:19 Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? ⁶  Indeed, did any gods rescue Samaria ⁷  from my power? ⁸ 

Isaiah 37:12-13

37:12 Were the nations whom my predecessors ⁹  destroyed – the nations of Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden in Telassar – rescued by their gods? ¹⁰  37:13 Where are the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, and the kings of Lair, ¹¹  Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah?’”

Ezekiel 31:2-3

31:2 “Son of man, say to Pharaoh king of Egypt and his hordes:

“‘Who are you like in your greatness?

31:3 Consider Assyria, ¹²  a cedar in Lebanon, ¹³ 

with beautiful branches, like a forest giving shade,

and extremely tall;

its top reached into the clouds.

Nahum 3:8

Nineveh Will Suffer the Same Fate as Thebes

3:8 You are no more secure ¹⁴  than Thebes ¹⁵  –

she was located on the banks of the Nile;

the waters surrounded her,

her ¹⁶  rampart ¹⁷  was the sea,

the water ¹⁸  was her wall.

[10:9]  ¹ sn Calneh … Carchemish … Hamath … Arpad … Samaria … Damascus. The city states listed here were conquered by the Assyrians between 740-717 b.c. The point of the rhetorical questions is that no one can stand before Assyria’s might. On the geographical, rather than chronological arrangement of the cities, see J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah (NICOT), 1:264, n. 4.

[10:10]  ² tn Heb “Just as my hand found the kingdoms of the idol[s].” The comparison is expanded in v. 11a (note “as”) and completed in v. 11b (note “so”).

[10:10]  ³ map For the location of Jerusalem see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[10:11]  ⁴ tn The statement is constructed as a rhetorical question in the Hebrew text: “Is it not [true that] just as I have done to Samaria and its idols, so I will do to Jerusalem and its idols?”

[36:18]  ⁵ tn Heb “Have the gods of the nations rescued, each his land, from the hand of the king of Assyria?” The rhetorical question expects the answer, “Of course not!”

[36:19]  ⁶ tn The rhetorical questions in v. 34a suggest the answer, “Nowhere, they seem to have disappeared in the face of Assyria’s might.”

[36:19]  ⁷ map For location see Map2 B1; Map4 D3; Map5 E2; Map6 A4; Map7 C1.

[36:19]  ⁸ tn Heb “that they rescued Samaria from my hand?” But this gives the impression that the gods of Sepharvaim were responsible for protecting Samaria, which is obviously not the case. The implied subject of the plural verb “rescued” must be the generic “gods of the nations/lands” (vv. 18, 20).

[37:12]  ⁹ tn Heb “fathers” (so KJV, NAB, NASB); NIV “forefathers”; NCV “ancestors.”

[37:12]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “Did the gods of the nations whom my fathers destroyed rescue them – Gozan and Haran, and Rezeph and the sons of Eden who are in Telassar?”

[37:13]  ¹¹ sn Lair was a city located in northeastern Babylon. See M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 235.

[31:3]  ¹² sn Either Egypt, or the Lord compares Egypt to Assyria, which is described in vv. 3-17 through the metaphor of a majestic tree. See D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 2:185. Like Egypt, Assyria had been a great world power, but in time God brought the Assyrians down. Egypt should learn from history the lesson that no nation, no matter how powerful, can withstand the judgment of God. Rather than following the text here, some prefer to emend the proper name Assyria to a similar sounding common noun meaning “boxwood” (see Ezek 27:6), which would make a fitting parallel to “cedar of Lebanon” in the following line. In this case vv. 3-18 in their entirety refer to Egypt, not Assyria. See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 2:121-27.

[31:3]  ¹³ sn Lebanon was know for its cedar trees (Judg 9:15; 1 Kgs 4:33; 5:6; 2 Kgs 14:9; Ezra 3:7; Pss 29:5; 92:12; 104:16).

[3:8]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “Are you better than Thebes?”

[3:8]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “No-Amon.” The name is transliterated by NAB, NASB; many other English versions employ the equivalent “Thebes.”

[3:8]  ¹⁶ tn The relative pronoun אֲשֶׁר (’asher) is functioning in a possessive sense: “whose” (Job 37:17; Ps 95:5; Isa 5:28; 49:23; Jer 31:32; see HALOT 98 s.v. 4).

[3:8]  ¹⁷ tn The consonantal form חיל is vocalized in the MT as חֵיל (khel, “rampart”). The LXX translation ἡ ἀρξή (Jh arxh, “strength”) reflects confusion between the relatively rare חֵיל and the more common חַיִל (khayil, “strength”); see HALOT 310-12.

[3:8]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “from (the) sea.” The form should be emended to מַיִם (mayim, “water”). This is a figurative description of the Nile River: It functioned like a fortress wall for Thebes.