Isaiah 2:1

The Future Glory of Jerusalem

2:1 Here is the message about Judah and Jerusalem ¹  that was revealed to Isaiah son of Amoz. ² 

Isaiah 5:1

A Love Song Gone Sour

5:1 I ³  will sing to my love –

a song to my lover about his vineyard. ⁴ 

My love had a vineyard

on a fertile hill. ⁵ 

Isaiah 7:6

7:6 They say, “Let’s attack Judah, terrorize it, and conquer it. ⁶  Then we’ll set up the son of Tabeel as its king.” ⁷ 

Isaiah 8:2

8:2 Then I will summon ⁸  as my reliable witnesses Uriah the priest and Zechariah son of Jeberekiah.”

Isaiah 14:12

14:12 Look how you have fallen from the sky,

O shining one, son of the dawn! ⁹ 

You have been cut down to the ground,

O conqueror ¹⁰  of the nations! ¹¹ 

Isaiah 49:15

49:15 Can a woman forget her baby who nurses at her breast? ¹² 

Can she withhold compassion from the child she has borne? ¹³ 

Even if mothers ¹⁴  were to forget,

I could never forget you! ¹⁵ 

[2:1]  ¹ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[2:1]  ² tn Heb “the word which Isaiah son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.”

[5:1]  ³ tn It is uncertain who is speaking here. Possibly the prophet, taking the role of best man, composes a love song for his friend on the occasion of his wedding. If so, יָדִיד (yadid) should be translated “my friend.” The present translation assumes that Israel is singing to the Lord. The word דוֹד (dod, “lover”) used in the second line is frequently used by the woman in the Song of Solomon to describe her lover.

[5:1]  ⁴ sn Israel, viewing herself as the Lord’s lover, refers to herself as his vineyard. The metaphor has sexual connotations, for it pictures her capacity to satisfy his appetite and to produce children. See Song 8:12.

[5:1]  ⁵ tn Heb “on a horn, a son of oil.” Apparently קֶרֶן (qeren, “horn”) here refers to the horn-shaped peak of a hill (BDB 902 s.v.) or to a mountain spur, i.e., a ridge that extends laterally from a mountain (HALOT 1145 s.v. קֶרֶן; H. Wildberger, Isaiah, 1:180). The expression “son of oil” pictures this hill as one capable of producing olive trees. Isaiah’s choice of קֶרֶן, a rare word for hill, may have been driven by paronomastic concerns, i.e., because קֶרֶן sounds like כֶּרֶם (kerem, “vineyard”).

[7:6]  ⁵ tn Heb “and let us break it open for ourselves”; NASB “make for ourselves a breach in its walls”; NLT “fight our way into.”

[7:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “and we will make the son of Tabeel king in its midst.”

[8:2]  ⁷ tn The form in the text is a cohortative with prefixed vav (ו), suggesting that the Lord is announcing what he will do. Some prefer to change the verb to an imperative, “and summon as witnesses,” a reading that finds support from the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a. Another option is to point the prefixed conjunction as a vav consecutive and translate, “So I summoned as witnesses.” In this case Isaiah is recalling his response to the Lord’s commission. In any case, the reference to witnesses suggests that the name and the child who bears it will function as signs.

[14:12]  ⁹ tn The Hebrew text has הֵילֵל בֶּן־שָׁחַר (helel ben-shakhar, “Helel son of Shachar”), which is probably a name for the morning star (Venus) or the crescent moon. See HALOT 245 s.v. הֵילֵל.

[14:12]  ¹⁰ tn Some understand the verb to from חָלַשׁ (khalash, “to weaken”), but HALOT 324 s.v. II חלשׁ proposes a homonym here, meaning “to defeat.”

[14:12]  ¹¹ sn In this line the taunting kings hint at the literal identity of the king, after likening him to the god Helel and a tree. The verb גָדַע (gada’, “cut down”) is used of chopping down trees in 9:10 and 10:33.

[49:15]  ¹¹ tn Heb “her suckling”; NASB “her nursing child.”

[49:15]  ¹² tn Heb “so as not to have compassion on the son of her womb?”

[49:15]  ¹³ tn Heb “these” (so ASV, NASB).

[49:15]  ¹⁴ 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.