Isaiah 50:1-2

50:1 This is what the Lord says:

“Where is your mother’s divorce certificate

by which I divorced her?

Or to which of my creditors did I sell you? ¹ 

Look, you were sold because of your sins; ² 

because of your rebellious acts I divorced your mother. ³ 

50:2 Why does no one challenge me when I come?

Why does no one respond when I call? ⁴ 

Is my hand too weak ⁵  to deliver ⁶  you?

Do I lack the power to rescue you?

Look, with a mere shout ⁷  I can dry up the sea;

I can turn streams into a desert,

so the fish rot away and die

from lack of water. ⁸ 

Isaiah 5:6

5:6 I will make it a wasteland;

no one will prune its vines or hoe its ground, ⁹ 

and thorns and briers will grow there.

I will order the clouds

not to drop any rain on it.

Ezekiel 14:13

14:13 “Son of man, suppose a country sins against me by being unfaithful, and I stretch out my hand against it, cut off its bread supply, ¹⁰  cause famine to come on it, and kill both people and animals.

Amos 4:4-9

Israel has an Appointment with God

4:4 “Go to Bethel ¹¹  and rebel! ¹² 

At Gilgal ¹³  rebel some more!

Bring your sacrifices in ¹⁴  the morning,

your tithes on ¹⁵  the third day!

4:5 Burn a thank offering of bread made with yeast! ¹⁶ 

Make a public display of your voluntary offerings! ¹⁷ 

For you love to do this, you Israelites.”

The sovereign Lord is speaking!

4:6 “But surely I gave ¹⁸  you no food to eat in any of your cities;

you lacked food everywhere you live. ¹⁹ 

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

4:7 “I withheld rain from you three months before the harvest. ²⁰ 

I gave rain to one city, but not to another.

One field ²¹  would get rain, but the field that received no rain dried up.

4:8 People from ²²  two or three cities staggered into one city to get ²³  water,

but remained thirsty. ²⁴ 

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

4:9 “I destroyed your crops ²⁵  with blight and disease.

Locusts kept ²⁶  devouring your orchards, ²⁷  vineyards, fig trees, and olive trees.

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

Revelation 11:6

11:6 These two have the power ²⁸  to close up the sky so that it does not rain during the time ²⁹  they are prophesying. They ³⁰  have power ³¹  to turn the waters to blood and to strike the earth with every kind of plague whenever they want.

[50:1]  ¹ sn The Lord challenges the exiles (Zion’s children) to bring incriminating evidence against him. The rhetorical questions imply that Israel accused the Lord of divorcing his wife (Zion) and selling his children (the Israelites) into slavery to pay off a debt.

[50:1]  ² sn The Lord admits that he did sell the Israelites, but it was because of their sins, not because of some debt he owed. If he had sold them to a creditor, they ought to be able to point him out, but the preceding rhetorical question implies they would not be able to do so.

[50:1]  ³ sn The Lord admits he did divorce Zion, but that too was the result of the nation’s sins. The force of the earlier rhetorical question comes into clearer focus now. The question does not imply that a certificate does not exist and that no divorce occurred. Rather, the question asks for the certificate to be produced so the accuser can see the reason for the divorce in black and white. The Lord did not put Zion away arbitrarily.

[50:2]  ⁴ sn The present tense translation of the verbs assumes that the Lord is questioning why Israel does not attempt to counter his arguments. Another possibility is to take the verbs as referring to past events: “Why did no one meet me when I came? Why did no one answer when I called?” In this case the Lord might be asking why Israel rejected his calls to repent and his offer to deliver them.

[50:2]  ⁵ tn Heb “short” (so NAB, NASB, NIV).

[50:2]  ⁶ tn Or “ransom” (NAB, NASB, NIV).

[50:2]  ⁷ tn Heb “with my rebuke.”

[50:2]  ⁸ tn Heb “the fish stink from lack of water and die from thirst.”

[5:6]  ⁹ tn Heb “it will not be pruned or hoed” (so NASB); ASV and NRSV both similar.

[14:13]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “break its staff of bread.”

[4:4]  ¹¹ sn Bethel and Gilgal were important formal worship centers because of their importance in Israel’s history. Here the Lord ironically urges the people to visit these places so they can increase their sin against him. Their formal worship, because it was not accompanied by social justice, only made them more guilty in God’s sight by adding hypocrisy to their list of sins. Obviously, theirs was a twisted view of the Lord. They worshiped a god of their own creation in order to satisfy their religious impulses (see 4:5: “For you love to do this”). Note that none of the rituals listed in 4:4-5 have to do with sin.

[4:4]  ¹² tn The Hebrew word translated “rebel” (also in the following line) could very well refer here to Israel’s violations of their covenant with God (see also the term “crimes” in 1:3 [with note] and the phrase “covenant transgressions” in 2:4 [with note]; 3:14).

[4:4]  ¹³ sn See the note on Bethel earlier in this verse.

[4:4]  ¹⁴ tn Or “for.”

[4:4]  ¹⁵ tn Or “for.”

[4:5]  ¹⁶ sn For the background of the thank offering of bread made with yeast, see Lev 7:13.

[4:5]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “proclaim voluntary offerings, announce.”

[4:6]  ¹⁸ tn The Hebrew construction is emphatic (pronoun + verb). It underscores the stark contrast between the judgments that the Lord had been sending with the God of blessing Israel was celebrating in its worship (4:4-5).

[4:6]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “But I gave to you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and lack of food in all your places.” The phrase “cleanness of teeth” is a vivid way of picturing the famine Israel experienced.

[4:7]  ²⁰ sn Rain…three months before the harvest refers to the rains of late March-early April.

[4:7]  ²¹ tn Heb “portion”; KJV, ASV “piece”; NASB “part.” The same word occurs a second time later in this verse.

[4:8]  ²² tn The words “people from” are supplied in the translation for clarification.

[4:8]  ²³ tn Heb “to drink.”

[4:8]  ²⁴ tn Or “were not satisfied.”

[4:9]  ²⁵ tn Heb “you.” By metonymy the crops belonging to these people are meant. See the remainder of this verse, which describes the agricultural devastation caused by locusts.

[4:9]  ²⁶ tn The Hiphil infinitive construct is taken adverbially (“kept”) and connected to the activity of the locusts (NJPS). It also could be taken with the preceding sentence and related to the Lord’s interventions (“I kept destroying,” cf. NEB, NJB, NIV, NRSV), or it could be understood substantivally in construct with the following nouns (“Locusts devoured your many orchards,” cf. NASB; cf. also KJV, NKJV).

[4:9]  ²⁷ tn Or “gardens.”

[11:6]  ²⁸ tn Or “authority.”

[11:6]  ²⁹ tn Grk “the days.”

[11:6]  ³⁰ tn Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started here in the translation. Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[11:6]  ³¹ tn Or “authority.”