Isaiah 3:26

3:26 Her gates will mourn and lament;

deprived of her people, she will sit on the ground. ¹ 

Isaiah 16:1

16:1 Send rams as tribute to the ruler of the land, ² 

from Sela in the desert ³ 

to the hill of Daughter Zion.

Isaiah 29:2

29:2 I will threaten Ariel,

and she will mourn intensely

and become like an altar hearth ⁴  before me.

Isaiah 33:4

33:4 Your plunder ⁵  disappears as if locusts were eating it; ⁶ 

they swarm over it like locusts! ⁷ 

[3:26]  ¹ tn Heb “she will be empty, on the ground she will sit.” Jerusalem is personified as a destitute woman who sits mourning the empty city.

[16:1]  ² tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “Send [a plural imperatival form is used] a ram [to] the ruler of the land.” The term כַּר (kar, “ram”) should be emended to the plural כָּרִים (karim). The singular form in the text is probably the result of haplography; note that the next word begins with a mem (מ).

[16:1]  ³ tn The Hebrew text has “toward [across?] the desert.”

[29:2]  ³ tn The term אֲרִיאֵל (’ari’el, “Ariel”) is the word translated “altar hearth” here. The point of the simile is not entirely clear. Perhaps the image likens Jerusalem’s coming crisis to a sacrificial fire.

[33:4]  ⁴ tn The pronoun is plural; the statement is addressed to the nations who have stockpiled plunder from their conquests of others.

[33:4]  ⁵ tn Heb “and your plunder is gathered, the gathering of the locust.”

[33:4]  ⁶ tn Heb “like a swarm of locusts swarming on it.”