Isaiah 19:3

19:3 The Egyptians will panic, ¹ 

and I will confuse their strategy. ² 

They will seek guidance from the idols and from the spirits of the dead,

from the pits used to conjure up underworld spirits, and from the magicians. ³ 

Isaiah 19:13-14

19:13 The officials of Zoan are fools,

the officials of Memphis ⁴  are misled;

the rulers ⁵  of her tribes lead Egypt astray.

19:14 The Lord has made them undiscerning; ⁶ 

they lead Egypt astray in all she does,

so that she is like a drunk sliding around in his own vomit. ⁷ 

Isaiah 19:2

19:2 “I will provoke civil strife in Egypt, ⁸ 

brothers will fight with each other,

as will neighbors,

cities, and kingdoms. ⁹ 

Isaiah 17:14

17:14 In the evening there is sudden terror; ¹⁰ 

by morning they vanish. ¹¹ 

This is the fate of those who try to plunder us,

the destiny of those who try to loot us! ¹² 

Isaiah 17:1

The Lord Will Judge Damascus

17:1 Here is a message about Damascus:

“Look, Damascus is no longer a city,

it is a heap of ruins!

Isaiah 22:20-22

22:20 “At that time ¹³  I will summon my servant Eliakim, son of Hilkiah. 22:21 I will put your robe on him, tie your belt around him, and transfer your authority to him. ¹⁴  He will become a protector of ¹⁵  the residents of Jerusalem and of the people ¹⁶  of Judah. 22:22 I will place the key ¹⁷  to the house of David on his shoulder. When he opens the door, no one can close it; when he closes the door, no one can open it.

Job 39:17

39:17 For God deprived her of wisdom,

and did not impart understanding to her.

Ezekiel 14:7-9

14:7 For when anyone from the house of Israel, or the foreigner who lives in Israel, separates himself from me and erects his idols in his heart and sets the obstacle leading to his iniquity before his face, and then consults a prophet to seek something from me, I the Lord am determined to answer him personally. 14:8 I will set my face against that person and will make him an object lesson and a byword ¹⁸  and will cut him off from among my people. Then you will know that I am the Lord.

14:9 “‘As for the prophet, if he is made a fool by being deceived into speaking a prophetic word – I, the Lord, have made a fool of ¹⁹  that prophet, and I will stretch out my hand against him and destroy him from among my people Israel.

Ezekiel 14:2

14:2 The word of the Lord came to me:

Ezekiel 2:1

Ezekiel’s Commission

2:1 He said to me, “Son of man, ²⁰  stand on your feet and I will speak with you.”

[19:3]  ¹ tn Heb “and the spirit of Egypt will be laid waste in its midst.”

[19:3]  ² tn The verb בָּלַע (bala’, “confuse”) is a homonym of the more common בָּלַע (bala’, “swallow”); see HALOT 135 s.v. I בלע.

[19:3]  ³ tn Heb “they will inquire of the idols and of the spirits of the dead and of the ritual pits and of the magicians.” Hebrew אוֹב (’ov, “ritual pit”) refers to a pit used by a magician to conjure up underworld spirits. See the note on “incantations” in 8:19.

[19:13]  ⁴ tn Heb “Noph” (so KJV); most recent English versions substitute the more familiar “Memphis.”

[19:13]  ⁵ tn Heb “the cornerstone.” The singular form should be emended to a plural.

[19:14]  ⁶ tn Heb “the Lord has mixed into her midst a spirit of blindness.”

[19:14]  ⁷ tn Heb “like the going astray of a drunkard in his vomit.”

[19:2]  ⁸ tn Heb I will provoke Egypt against Egypt” (NAB similar).

[19:2]  ⁹ tn Heb “and they will fight, a man against his brother, and a man against his neighbor, city against city, kingdom against kingdom.” Civil strife will extend all the way from the domestic level to the provincial arena.

[17:14]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “at the time of evening, look, sudden terror.”

[17:14]  ¹¹ tn Heb “before morning he is not.”

[17:14]  ¹² tn Heb “this is the portion of those who plunder us, and the lot of those who loot us.”

[22:20]  ¹³ tn Or “in that day.” The verb that introduces this verse serves as a discourse particle and is untranslated; see note on “in the future” in 2:2.

[22:21]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “and your dominion I will place in his hand.”

[22:21]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “a father to.” The Hebrew term אָב (’av, “father”) is here used metaphorically of one who protects and supports those under his care and authority, like a father does his family. For another example of this metaphorical use of the word, see Job 29:16.

[22:21]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “house.”

[22:22]  ¹⁷ sn This may refer to a literal insignia worn by the chief administrator. Even so, it would still symbolize the administrator’s authority to grant or exclude access to the king. See J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah (NICOT), 1:422.

[14:8]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “proverbs.”

[14:9]  ¹⁹ tn The translation is uncertain due to difficulty both in determining the meaning of the verb’s stem and its conjugation in this context. In the Qal stem the basic meaning of the verbal root פָּתַה (patah) is “to be gullible, foolish.” The doubling stems (the Pual and Piel used in this verse) typically give such stative verbs a factitive sense, hence either “make gullible” (i.e., “entice”) or “make into a fool” (i.e., “to show to be a fool”). The latter represents the probable meaning of the term in Jer 20:7, 10 and is followed here (see L. C. Allen, Ezekiel [WBC], 1:193; R. Mosis “Ez 14, 1-11 - ein Ruf zur Umkehr,” BZ 19 [1975]: 166-69 and ThWAT 4:829-31). In this view, if a prophet speaks when not prompted by God, he will be shown to be a fool, but this does not reflect negatively on the Lord because it is God who shows him to be a fool. Secondly, the verb is in the perfect conjugation and may be translated “I have made a fool of him” or “I have enticed him,” or to show determination (see IBHS 439-41 §27.2f and g), or in certain syntactical constructions as future. Any of these may be plausible if the doubling stems used are understood in the sense of “making a fool of.” But if understood as “to make gullible,” more factors come into play. As the Hebrew verbal form is a perfect, it is often translated as present perfect: “I have enticed.” In this case the Lord states that he himself enticed the prophet to cooperate with the idolaters. Such enticement to sin would seem to be a violation of God’s moral character, but sometimes he does use such deception and enticement to sin as a form of punishment against those who have blatantly violated his moral will (see, e.g., 2 Sam 24). If one follows this line of interpretation in Ezek 14:9, one would have to assume that the prophet had already turned from God in his heart. However, the context gives no indication of this. Therefore, it is better to take the perfect as indicating certitude and to translate it with the future tense: “I will entice.” In this case the Lord announces that he will judge the prophet appropriately. If a prophet allows himself to be influenced by idolaters, then the Lord will use deception as a form of punishment against that deceived prophet. A comparison with the preceding oracles also favors this view. In 14:4 the perfect of certitude is used for emphasis (see “I will answer”), though in v. 7 a participle is employed. For a fuller discussion of this text, see R. B. Chisholm, Jr., “Does God Deceive?” BSac 155 (1998): 23-25.

[2:1]  ²⁰ sn The phrase son of man occurs ninety-three times in the book of Ezekiel. It simply means “human one,” and distinguishes the prophet from the nonhuman beings that are present in the world of his vision.