Isaiah 17:10-11

17:10 For you ignore ¹  the God who rescues you;

you pay no attention to your strong protector. ² 

So this is what happens:

You cultivate beautiful plants

and plant exotic vines. ³ 

17:11 The day you begin cultivating, you do what you can to make it grow; ⁴ 

the morning you begin planting, you do what you can to make it sprout.

Yet the harvest will disappear ⁵  in the day of disease

and incurable pain.

[17:10]  ¹ tn Heb “you have forgotten” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).

[17:10]  ² tn Heb “and the rocky cliff of your strength you do not remember.”

[17:10]  ³ tn Heb “a vine, a strange one.” The substantival adjective זָר (zar) functions here as an appositional genitive. It could refer to a cultic plant of some type, associated with a pagan rite. But it is more likely that it refers to an exotic, or imported, type of vine, one that is foreign (i.e., “strange”) to Israel.

[17:11]  ⁴ tn Heb “in the day of your planting you [?].” The precise meaning of the verb תְּשַׂגְשֵׂגִי (tÿsagsegi) is unclear. It is sometimes derived from שׂוּג/סוּג (sug, “to fence in”; see BDB 691 s.v. II סוּג). In this case one could translate “you build a protective fence.” However, the parallelism is tighter if one derives the form from שָׂגָא/שָׂגָה (saga’/sagah, “to grow”); see J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah (NICOT), 1:351, n. 4. For this verb, see BDB 960 s.v. שָׂגָא.

[17:11]  ⁵ tc The Hebrew text has, “a heap of harvest.” However, better sense is achieved if נֵד (ned, “heap”) is emended to a verb. Options include נַד (nad, Qal perfect third masculine singular from נָדַד [nadad, “flee, depart”]), נָדַד (Qal perfect third masculine singular from נָדַד), נֹדֵד (noded, Qal active participle from נָדַד), and נָד (nad, Qal perfect third masculine singular, or participle masculine singular, from נוּד [nud, “wander, flutter”]). See BDB 626 s.v. נוּד and HALOT 672 s.v. I נדד. One could translate literally: “[the harvest] departs,” or “[the harvest] flies away.”