Isaiah 13:18

13:18 Their arrows will cut young men to ribbons; ¹ 

they have no compassion on a person’s offspring, ² 

they will not ³  look with pity on children.

Isaiah 49:15

49:15 Can a woman forget her baby who nurses at her breast? ⁴ 

Can she withhold compassion from the child she has borne? ⁵ 

Even if mothers ⁶  were to forget,

I could never forget you! ⁷ 

[13:18]  ¹ tn Heb “and bows cut to bits young men.” “Bows” stands by metonymy for arrows.

[13:18]  ² tn Heb “the fruit of the womb.”

[13:18]  ³ tn Heb “their eye does not.” Here “eye” is a metonymy for the whole person.

[49:15]  ⁴ tn Heb “her suckling”; NASB “her nursing child.”

[49:15]  ⁵ tn Heb “so as not to have compassion on the son of her womb?”

[49:15]  ⁶ tn Heb “these” (so ASV, NASB).

[49:15]  ⁷ sn The argument of v. 15 seems to develop as follows: The Lord has an innate attachment to Zion, just like a mother does for her infant child. But even if mothers were to suddenly abandon their children, the Lord would never forsake Zion. In other words, the Lord’s attachment to Zion is like a mother’s attachment to her infant child, but even stronger.