Isaiah 45:10

45:10 Danger awaits one who says ¹  to his father,

“What in the world ²  are you fathering?”

and to his mother,

“What in the world are you bringing forth?” ³ 

Isaiah 21:11

Bad News for Seir

21:11 Here is a message about Dumah: ⁴ 

Someone calls to me from Seir, ⁵ 

“Watchman, what is left of the night?

Watchman, what is left of the night?” ⁶ 

Isaiah 38:22

38:22 Hezekiah said, “What is the confirming sign that I will go up to the Lord’s temple?”

Isaiah 1:5

1:5 ⁷ Why do you insist on being battered?

Why do you continue to rebel? ⁸ 

Your head has a massive wound, ⁹ 

your whole body is weak. ¹⁰ 

Isaiah 3:15

3:15 Why do you crush my people

and grind the faces of the poor?” ¹¹ 

The sovereign Lord who commands armies ¹²  has spoken.

Isaiah 22:1

The Lord Will Judge Jerusalem

22:1 Here is a message about the Valley of Vision: ¹³ 

What is the reason ¹⁴ 

that all of you go up to the rooftops?

Isaiah 38:15

38:15 What can I say?

He has decreed and acted. ¹⁵ 

I will walk slowly all my years because I am overcome with grief. ¹⁶ 

Isaiah 5:4

5:4 What more can I do for my vineyard

beyond what I have already done?

When I waited for it to produce edible grapes,

why did it produce sour ones instead?

Isaiah 19:12

19:12 But where, oh where, are your wise men? ¹⁷ 

Let them tell you, let them find out

what the Lord who commands armies has planned for Egypt.

Isaiah 22:16

22:16 ‘What right do you have to be here? What relatives do you have buried here? ¹⁸ 

Why ¹⁹  do you chisel out a tomb for yourself here?

He chisels out his burial site in an elevated place,

he carves out his tomb on a cliff.

Isaiah 39:4

39:4 Isaiah ²⁰  asked, “What have they seen in your palace?” Hezekiah replied, “They have seen everything in my palace. I showed them everything in my treasuries.”

Isaiah 40:6

40:6 A voice says, “Cry out!”

Another asks, ²¹  “What should I cry out?”

The first voice responds: ²²  “All people are like grass, ²³ 

and all their promises ²⁴  are like the flowers in the field.

Isaiah 41:22

41:22 “Let them produce evidence! Let them tell us what will happen!

Tell us about your earlier predictive oracles, ²⁵ 

so we may examine them ²⁶  and see how they were fulfilled. ²⁷ 

Or decree for us some future events!

Isaiah 45:9

The Lord Gives a Warning

45:9 One who argues with his creator is in grave danger, ²⁸ 

one who is like a mere ²⁹  shard among the other shards on the ground!

The clay should not say to the potter, ³⁰ 

“What in the world ³¹  are you doing?

Your work lacks skill!” ³² 

Isaiah 52:7

52:7 How delightful it is to see approaching over the mountains ³³ 

the feet of a messenger who announces peace,

a messenger who brings good news, who announces deliverance,

who says to Zion, “Your God reigns!” ³⁴ 

Isaiah 36:4

36:4 The chief adviser said to them, “Tell Hezekiah: ‘This is what the great king, the king of Assyria, says: “What is your source of confidence? ³⁵ 

Isaiah 39:3

39:3 Isaiah the prophet visited King Hezekiah and asked him, “What did these men say? Where do they come from?” Hezekiah replied, “They come from the distant land of Babylon.”

Isaiah 52:5

52:5 And now, what do we have here?” ³⁶  says the Lord.

“Indeed my people have been carried away for nothing,

those who rule over them taunt,” ³⁷  says the Lord,

“and my name is constantly slandered ³⁸  all day long.

[45:10]  ¹ tn Heb “Woe [to] one who says” (NASB and NIV both similar); NCV “How terrible it will be.”

[45:10]  ² tn See the note at v. 9. This phrase occurs a second time later in this verse.

[45:10]  ³ sn Verses 9-10 may allude to the exiles’ criticism that the Lord does not appear to know what he is doing.

[21:11]  ⁴ tn The noun דּוּמָה (dumah) means “silence,” but here it is a proper name, probably referring to a site in northern Arabia or to the nation of Edom. See BDB 189 s.v. II דּוּמָה. If Dumah was an area in northern Arabia, it would be of interest to the Edomites because of its strategic position on trade routes which they used. See J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah (NICOT), 1:398.

[21:11]  ⁵ sn Seir is another name for Edom. See BDB 973 s.v. שֵׂעִיר.

[21:11]  ⁶ sn The “night” probably here symbolizes distress and difficult times. See BDB 539 s.v. לַיְלָה.

[1:5]  ⁷ sn In vv. 5-9 Isaiah addresses the battered nation (5-8) and speaks as their representative (9).

[1:5]  ⁸ tn Heb “Why are you still beaten? [Why] do you continue rebellion?” The rhetorical questions express the prophet’s disbelief over Israel’s apparent masochism and obsession with sin. The interrogative construction in the first line does double duty in the parallelism. H. Wildberger (Isaiah, 1:18) offers another alternative by translating the two statements with one question: “Why do you still wish to be struck that you persist in revolt?”

[1:5]  ⁹ tn Heb “all the head is ill”; NRSV “the whole head is sick”; CEV “Your head is badly bruised.”

[1:5]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “and all the heart is faint.” The “heart” here stands for bodily strength and energy, as suggested by the context and usage elsewhere (see Jer 8:18; Lam 1:22).

[3:15]  ¹⁰ sn The rhetorical question expresses the Lord’s outrage at what the leaders have done to the poor. He finds it almost unbelievable that they would have the audacity to treat his people in this manner.

[3:15]  ¹¹ tn Heb “the master, the Lord who commands armies [traditionally, the Lord of hosts].” On the title “the Lord who commands armies,” see the note at 1:9.

[22:1]  ¹³ sn The following message pertains to Jerusalem. The significance of referring to the city as the Valley of Vision is uncertain. Perhaps the Hinnom Valley is in view, but why it is associated with a prophetic revelatory “vision” is not entirely clear. Maybe the Hinnom Valley is called this because the destruction that will take place there is the focal point of this prophetic message (see v. 5).

[22:1]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “What to you, then?”

[38:15]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “and he has spoken and he has acted.”

[38:15]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “because of the bitterness of my soul.”

[19:12]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “Where are they? Where are your wise men?” The juxtaposition of the interrogative pronouns is emphatic. See HALOT 38 s.v. אֶי.

[22:16]  ²² tn Heb “What to you here? And who to you here?” The point of the second question is not entirely clear. The interpretation reflected in the translation is based on the following context, which suggests that Shebna has no right to think of himself so highly and arrange such an extravagant burial place for himself.

[22:16]  ²³ tn Heb “that you chisel out.”

[39:4]  ²⁵ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Isaiah) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[40:6]  ²⁸ tn Heb “and he says.” Apparently a second “voice” responds to the command of the first “voice.”

[40:6]  ²⁹ tn The words “the first voice responds” are supplied in the translation for clarification. The first voice tells the second one what to declare.

[40:6]  ³⁰ tn Heb “all flesh is grass.” The point of the metaphor is explained in v. 7.

[40:6]  ³¹ tn Heb “and all his loyalty.” The antecedent of the third masculine suffix is בָּשָׂר (basar, “flesh”), which refers collectively to mankind. The LXX, apparently understanding the antecedent as “grass,” reads “glory,” but חֶסֶד (khesed) rarely, if ever, has this nuance. The normal meaning of חֶסֶד (“faithfulness, loyalty, devotion”) fits very well in the argument. Human beings and their faithfulness (verbal expressions of faithfulness are specifically in view; cf. NRSV “constancy”) are short-lived and unreliable, in stark contrast to the decrees and promises of the eternal God.

[41:22]  ³¹ tn Heb “As for the former things, tell us what they are!”

[41:22]  ³² tn Heb “so we might set [them to] our heart.”

[41:22]  ³³ tn Heb “and might know their outcome.”

[45:9]  ³⁴ tn Heb “Woe [to] the one who argues with the one who formed him.”

[45:9]  ³⁵ tn The words “one who is like a mere” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons and clarification.

[45:9]  ³⁶ tn Heb “Should the clay say to the one who forms it?” The rhetorical question anticipates a reply, “Of course not!”

[45:9]  ³⁷ tn The words “in the world” are supplied in the translation to approximate in English idiom the force of the sarcastic question.

[45:9]  ³⁸ tn Heb “your work, there are no hands for it,” i.e., “your work looks like something made by a person who has no hands.”

[52:7]  ³⁷ tn Heb “How delightful on the mountains.”

[52:7]  ³⁸ tn Or “has become king.” When a new king was enthroned, his followers would give this shout. For other examples of this enthronement formula (Qal perfect 3rd person masculine singular מָלַךְ [malakh], followed by the name of the king), see 2 Sam 15:10; 1 Kgs 1:11, 13, 18; 2 Kgs 9:13. The Lord is an eternal king, but here he is pictured as a victorious warrior who establishes his rule from Zion.

[36:4]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “What is this object of trust in which you are trusting?”

[52:5]  ⁴³ tn Heb “and now what [following the marginal reading (Qere)] to me here?”

[52:5]  ⁴⁴ tn The verb appears to be a Hiphil form from the root יָלַל (yalal, “howl”), perhaps here in the sense of “mock.” Some emend the form to יְהוֹלָּלוֹ (yÿhollalo) and understand a Polel form of the root הָלַל meaning here “mock, taunt.”

[52:5]  ⁴⁵ tn The verb is apparently a Hitpolal form (with assimilated tav, ת) from the root נָאַץ (na’ats), but GKC 151-52 §55.b explains it as a mixed form, combining Pual and Hitpolel readings.