Isaiah 14:1-2

14:1 The Lord will certainly have compassion on Jacob; ¹  he will again choose Israel as his special people ²  and restore ³  them to their land. Resident foreigners will join them and unite with the family ⁴  of Jacob. 14:2 Nations will take them and bring them back to their own place. Then the family of Jacob will make foreigners their servants as they settle in the Lord’s land. ⁵  They will make their captors captives and rule over the ones who oppressed them.

Isaiah 45:14

The Lord is the Nations’ Only Hope

45:14 This is what the Lord says:

“The profit ⁶  of Egypt and the revenue ⁷  of Ethiopia,

along with the Sabeans, those tall men,

will be brought to you ⁸  and become yours.

They will walk behind you, coming along in chains. ⁹ 

They will bow down to you

and pray to you: ¹⁰ 

‘Truly God is with ¹¹  you; he has no peer; ¹² 

there is no other God!’”

Isaiah 49:23

49:23 Kings will be your children’s ¹³  guardians;

their princesses will nurse your children. ¹⁴ 

With their faces to the ground they will bow down to you

and they will lick the dirt on ¹⁵  your feet.

Then you will recognize that I am the Lord;

those who wait patiently for me are not put to shame.

Jeremiah 16:19

16:19 Then I said, ¹⁶ 

“Lord, you give me strength and protect me.

You are the one I can run to for safety when I am in trouble. ¹⁷ 

Nations from all over the earth

will come to you and say,

‘Our ancestors had nothing but false gods –

worthless idols that could not help them at all. ¹⁸ 

Revelation 3:9

3:9 Listen! ¹⁹  I am going to make those people from the synagogue ²⁰  of Satan – who say they are Jews yet ²¹  are not, but are lying – Look, I will make ²²  them come and bow down ²³  at your feet and acknowledge ²⁴  that I have loved you.

[14:1]  ¹ tn The sentence begins with כִּי (ki), which is understood as asseverative (“certainly”) in the translation. Another option is to translate, “For the Lord will have compassion.” In this case one of the reasons for Babylon’s coming demise (13:22b) is the Lord’s desire to restore his people.

[14:1]  ² tn The words “as his special people” are supplied in the translation for clarification.

[14:1]  ³ tn Or “settle” (NASB, NIV, NCV, NLT).

[14:1]  ⁴ tn Heb “house.”

[14:2]  ⁵ tn Heb “and the house of Jacob will take possession of them [i.e., the nations], on the land of the Lord, as male servants and female servants.”

[45:14]  ⁶ tn Heb “labor,” which stands metonymically for the fruits of labor, either “monetary profit,” or “products.”

[45:14]  ⁷ tn Or perhaps, “merchandise” (so KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV); NAB “the gain of Ethiopia”; CEV “the treasures of Ethiopia.”

[45:14]  ⁸ tn Heb “they will pass over to you”; NASB, NIV “will come over to you”; CEV “will belong to you.”

[45:14]  ⁹ sn Restored Israel is depicted here in typical ancient Near Eastern fashion as an imperial power that receives riches and slaves as tribute.

[45:14]  ¹⁰ sn Israel’s vassals are portrayed as so intimidated and awed that they treat Israel as an intermediary to God or sub-deity.

[45:14]  ¹¹ tn Or perhaps, “among.” Cf. KJV, ASV “Surely God is in thee.”

[45:14]  ¹² tn Heb “there is no other” (so NIV, NRSV). The same phrase occurs at the end of v. 18, in v. 21, and at the end of v. 22.

[49:23]  ¹³ tn Heb “your,” but Zion here stands by metonymy for her children (see v. 22b).

[49:23]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “you.” See the preceding note.

[49:23]  ¹⁵ tn Or “at your feet” (NAB, NIV); NLT “from your feet.”

[16:19]  ¹⁶ tn The words “Then I said” are not in the text. They are supplied in the translation to show the shift from God, who has been speaking to Jeremiah, to Jeremiah, who here addresses God.

[16:19]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “O Lord, my strength and my fortress, my refuge in the day of trouble. The literal which piles up attributes is of course more forceful than the predications. However, piling up poetic metaphors like this adds to the length of the English sentence and risks lack of understanding on the part of some readers. Some rhetorical force has been sacrificed for the sake of clarity.

[16:19]  ¹⁸ tn Once again the translation has sacrificed some of the rhetorical force for the sake of clarity and English style: Heb “Only falsehood did our ancestors possess, vanity and [things in which?] there was no one profiting in them.”

[3:9]  ¹⁹ tn Grk “behold” (L&N 91.13).

[3:9]  ²⁰ sn See the note on synagogue in 2:9.

[3:9]  ²¹ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “yet” to indicate the contrast between what these people claimed and what they were.

[3:9]  ²² tn The verb here is ποιέω (poiew), but in this context it has virtually the same meaning as δίδωμι (didwmi) used at the beginning of the verse. Stylistic variation like this is typical of Johannine literature.

[3:9]  ²³ tn The verb here is προσκυνήσουσιν (proskunhsousin), normally used to refer to worship.

[3:9]  ²⁴ tn Or “and know,” “and recognize.”