Isaiah 5:7

5:7 Indeed ¹  Israel ²  is the vineyard of the Lord who commands armies,

the people ³  of Judah are the cultivated place in which he took delight.

He waited for justice, but look what he got – disobedience! ⁴ 

He waited for fairness, but look what he got – cries for help! ⁵ 

Isaiah 5:2

5:2 He built a hedge around it, ⁶  removed its stones,

and planted a vine.

He built a tower in the middle of it,

and constructed a winepress.

He waited for it to produce edible grapes,

but it produced sour ones instead. ⁷ 

Isaiah 8:15

8:15 Many will stumble over the stone and the rock, ⁸ 

and will fall and be seriously injured,

and will be ensnared and captured.”

Isaiah 8:2

8:2 Then I will summon ⁹  as my reliable witnesses Uriah the priest and Zechariah son of Jeberekiah.”

Isaiah 19:9

19:9 Those who make clothes from combed flax will be embarrassed;

those who weave will turn pale. ¹⁰ 

Ezekiel 22:3-7

22:3 Then say, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: O city, who spills blood within herself (which brings on her doom), ¹¹  and who makes herself idols (which results in impurity), 22:4 you are guilty because of the blood you shed and defiled by the idols you made. You have hastened the day of your doom; ¹²  the end of your years has come. ¹³  Therefore I will make ¹⁴  you an object of scorn to the nations, an object to be mocked by all lands. 22:5 Those both near and far from you will mock you, you with your bad reputation, ¹⁵  full of turmoil.

22:6 “‘See how each of the princes of Israel living within you has used his authority to shed blood. ¹⁶  22:7 They have treated father and mother with contempt ¹⁷  within you; they have oppressed the foreigner among you; they have wronged the orphan and the widow ¹⁸  within you.

Micah 3:2-3

3:2 yet you ¹⁹  hate what is good, ²⁰ 

and love what is evil. ²¹ 

You flay my people’s skin ²² 

and rip the flesh from their bones. ²³ 

3:3 You ²⁴  devour my people’s flesh,

strip off their skin,

and crush their bones.

You chop them up like flesh in a pot ²⁵  –

like meat in a kettle.

Zephaniah 3:1-3

Jerusalem is Corrupt

3:1 The filthy, ²⁶  stained city is as good as dead;

the city filled with oppressors is finished! ²⁷ 

3:2 She is disobedient; ²⁸ 

she refuses correction. ²⁹ 

She does not trust the Lord;

she does not seek the advice of ³⁰  her God.

3:3 Her princes ³¹  are as fierce as roaring lions; ³² 

her rulers ³³  are as hungry as wolves in the desert, ³⁴ 

who completely devour their prey by morning. ³⁵ 

Acts 7:52

7:52 Which of the prophets did your ancestors ³⁶  not persecute? ³⁷  They ³⁸  killed those who foretold long ago the coming of the Righteous One, ³⁹  whose betrayers and murderers you have now become! ⁴⁰ 

[5:7]  ¹ tn Or “For” (KJV, ASV, NASB, NRSV).

[5:7]  ² tn Heb “the house of Israel” (so NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[5:7]  ³ tn Heb “men,” but in a generic sense.

[5:7]  ⁴ tn Heb “but, look, disobedience.” The precise meaning of מִשְׂפָּח (mishpakh), which occurs only here in the OT, is uncertain. Some have suggested a meaning “bloodshed.” The term is obviously chosen for its wordplay value; it sounds very much like מִשְׁפָּט (mishpat, “justice”). The sound play draws attention to the point being made; the people have not met the Lord’s expectations.

[5:7]  ⁵ tn Heb “but, look, a cry for help.” The verb (“he waited”) does double duty in the parallelism. צְעָקָה (tsa’qah) refers to the cries for help made by the oppressed. It sounds very much like צְדָקָה (tsÿdaqah, “fairness”). The sound play draws attention to the point being made; the people have not met the Lord’s expectations.

[5:2]  ⁶ tn Or, “dug it up” (so NIV); KJV “fenced it.’ See HALOT 810 s.v. עזק.

[5:2]  ⁷ tn Heb “wild grapes,” i.e., sour ones (also in v. 4).

[8:15]  ⁸ tn Heb “over them” (so NASB); NCV “over this rock.”

[8:2]  ⁹ 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.

[19:9]  ¹⁰ tn BDB 301 s.v. חוֹרִי suggests the meaning “white stuff” for חוֹרִי (khori); the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a has חָוֵרוּ (khaveru), probably a Qal perfect, third plural form of חוּר, (khur, “be white, pale”). See HALOT 299 s.v. I חור. The latter reading is assumed in the translation above.

[22:3]  ¹¹ tn Heb “her time”; this refers to the time of impending judgment (see the note on “doom” in v. 4).

[22:4]  ¹² tn Heb “you have brought near your days.” The expression “bring near your days” appears to be an adaptation of the idiom “days draw near,” which is used to indicate that an event, such as death, is imminent (see Gen 27:41; 47:29; Deut 31:14; 1 Kgs 2:1; Ezek 12:23). Here “your days” probably refers to the days of the personified city’s life, which was about to come to an end through God’s judgment.

[22:4]  ¹³ tn Heb “and you have come to your years.” This appears to mean that she has arrived at the time when her years (i.e., life) would end, though it may mean that her years of punishment will begin. Because “day” and “time” are so closely associated in the immediate context (see 21:25, 29) some prefer to emend the text and read “you have brought near your time.” See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 2:31, as well as the translator’s note on verse 3.

[22:4]  ¹⁴ tn The Hebrew verb is a prophetic perfect, emphasizing that the action is as good as done from the speaker’s perspective.

[22:5]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “unclean of name.”

[22:6]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Look! The princes of Israel, each according to his arm, were in you in order to shed blood.”

[22:7]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “treated lightly, cursed.”

[22:7]  ¹⁸ tn Widows and orphans are often coupled together in the OT (Deut 14:29; 16:11, 14; 24:19-21; 26:12-13; Jer 7:6; 22:3). They represented all who were poor and vulnerable to economic exploitation.

[3:2]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “the ones who.”

[3:2]  ²⁰ tn Or “good.”

[3:2]  ²¹ tn Or “evil.”

[3:2]  ²² tn Heb “their skin from upon them.” The referent of the pronoun (“my people,” referring to Jacob and/or the house of Israel, with the Lord as the speaker) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[3:2]  ²³ tn Heb “and their flesh from their bones.”

[3:3]  ²⁴ tn Heb “who.”

[3:3]  ²⁵ tc The MT reads “and they chop up as in a pot.” The translation assumes an emendation of כַּאֲשֶׁר (ka’asher, “as”) to כִּשְׁאֵר (kish’er, “like flesh”).

[3:1]  ²⁶ tn The present translation assumes מֹרְאָה (mor’ah) is derived from רֹאִי (ro’i,“excrement”; see Jastrow 1436 s.v. רֳאִי). The following participle, “stained,” supports this interpretation (cf. NEB “filthy and foul”; NRSV “soiled, defiled”). Another option is to derive the form from מָרָה (marah, “to rebel”); in this case the term should be translated “rebellious” (cf. NASB, NIV “rebellious and defiled”). This idea is supported by v. 2. For discussion of the two options, see HALOT 630 s.v. I מרא and J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (OTL), 206.

[3:1]  ²⁷ tn Heb “Woe, soiled and stained one, oppressive city.” The verb “is finished” is supplied in the second line. On the Hebrew word הוֹי (hoy, “ah, woe”), see the note on the word “dead” in 2:5.

[3:2]  ²⁸ tn Heb “she does not hear a voice” Refusing to listen is equated with disobedience.

[3:2]  ²⁹ tn Heb “she does not receive correction.” The Hebrew phrase, when negated, refers elsewhere to rejecting verbal advice (Jer 17:23; 32:33; 35:13) and refusing to learn from experience (Jer 2:30; 5:3).

[3:2]  ³⁰ tn Heb “draw near to.” The present translation assumes that the expression “draw near to” refers to seeking God’s will (see 1 Sam 14:36).

[3:3]  ³¹ tn Or “officials.”

[3:3]  ³² tn Heb “her princes in her midst are roaring lions.” The metaphor has been translated as a simile (“as fierce as”) for clarity.

[3:3]  ³³ tn Traditionally “judges.”

[3:3]  ³⁴ tn Heb “her judges [are] wolves of the evening,” that is, wolves that prowl at night. The translation assumes an emendation to עֲרָבָה (’aravah, “desert”). For a discussion of this and other options, see Adele Berlin, Zephaniah (AB 25A), 128. The metaphor has been translated as a simile (“as hungry as”) for clarity.

[3:3]  ³⁵ tn Heb “they do not gnaw [a bone] at morning.” The precise meaning of the line is unclear. The statement may mean these wolves devour their prey so completely that not even a bone is left to gnaw by the time morning arrives. For a discussion of this and other options, see Adele Berlin, Zephaniah (AB 25A), 129.

[7:52]  ³⁶ tn Or “forefathers”; Grk “fathers.”

[7:52]  ³⁷ sn Which…persecute. The rhetorical question suggests they persecuted them all.

[7:52]  ³⁸ tn Grk “And they.” Because of the difference between Greek style, which often begins sentences or clauses with “and,” and English style, which generally does not, καί (kai) has not been translated here.

[7:52]  ³⁹ sn The Righteous One is a reference to Jesus Christ.

[7:52]  ⁴⁰ sn Whose betrayers and murderers you have now become. The harsh critique has OT precedent (1 Kgs 19:10-14; Neh 9:26; 2 Chr 36:16).