Isaiah 9:4

9:4 For their oppressive yoke

and the club that strikes their shoulders,

the cudgel the oppressor uses on them, ¹ 

you have shattered, as in the day of Midian’s defeat. ² 

Isaiah 10:16-19

10:16 For this reason ³  the sovereign master, the Lord who commands armies, will make his healthy ones emaciated. ⁴  His majestic glory will go up in smoke. ⁵ 

10:17 The light of Israel ⁶  will become a fire,

their Holy One ⁷  will become a flame;

it will burn and consume the Assyrian king’s ⁸  briers

and his thorns in one day.

10:18 The splendor of his forest and his orchard

will be completely destroyed, ⁹ 

as when a sick man’s life ebbs away. ¹⁰ 

10:19 There will be so few trees left in his forest,

a child will be able to count them. ¹¹ 

Isaiah 10:32-34

10:32 This very day, standing in Nob,

they shake their fist at Daughter Zion’s mountain ¹²  –

at the hill of Jerusalem.

10:33 Look, the sovereign master, the Lord who commands armies,

is ready to cut off the branches with terrifying power. ¹³ 

The tallest trees ¹⁴  will be cut down,

the loftiest ones will be brought low.

10:34 The thickets of the forest will be chopped down with an ax,

and mighty Lebanon will fall. ¹⁵ 

Isaiah 17:12-14

17:12 The many nations massing together are as good as dead, ¹⁶ 

those who make a commotion as loud as the roaring of the sea’s waves. ¹⁷ 

The people making such an uproar are as good as dead, ¹⁸ 

those who make an uproar as loud as the roaring of powerful waves. ¹⁹ 

17:13 Though these people make an uproar as loud as the roaring of powerful waves, ²⁰ 

when he shouts at ²¹  them, they will flee to a distant land,

driven before the wind like dead weeds on the hills,

or like dead thistles ²²  before a strong gale.

17:14 In the evening there is sudden terror; ²³ 

by morning they vanish. ²⁴ 

This is the fate of those who try to plunder us,

the destiny of those who try to loot us! ²⁵ 

Isaiah 30:30-33

30:30 The Lord will give a mighty shout ²⁶ 

and intervene in power, ²⁷ 

with furious anger and flaming, destructive fire, ²⁸ 

with a driving rainstorm and hailstones.

30:31 Indeed, the Lord’s shout will shatter Assyria; ²⁹ 

he will beat them with a club.

30:32 Every blow from his punishing cudgel, ³⁰ 

with which the Lord will beat them, ³¹ 

will be accompanied by music from the ³²  tambourine and harp,

and he will attack them with his weapons. ³³ 

30:33 For ³⁴  the burial place is already prepared; ³⁵ 

it has been made deep and wide for the king. ³⁶ 

The firewood is piled high on it. ³⁷ 

The Lord’s breath, like a stream flowing with brimstone,

will ignite it.

Isaiah 31:8-9

31:8 Assyria will fall by a sword, but not one human-made; ³⁸ 

a sword not made by humankind will destroy them. ³⁹ 

They will run away from this sword ⁴⁰ 

and their young men will be forced to do hard labor.

31:9 They will surrender their stronghold ⁴¹  because of fear; ⁴² 

their officers will be afraid of the Lord’s battle flag.” ⁴³ 

This is what the Lord says –

the one whose fire is in Zion,

whose firepot is in Jerusalem. ⁴⁴ 

Isaiah 37:36-38

37:36 The Lord’s messenger ⁴⁵  went out and killed 185,000 troops ⁴⁶  in the Assyrian camp. When they ⁴⁷  got up early the next morning, there were all the corpses! ⁴⁸  37:37 So King Sennacherib of Assyria broke camp and went on his way. He went home and stayed in Nineveh. ⁴⁹  37:38 One day, ⁵⁰  as he was worshiping ⁵¹  in the temple of his god Nisroch, ⁵²  his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer struck him down with the sword. ⁵³  They ran away to the land of Ararat; his son Esarhaddon replaced him as king.

Ezekiel 39:4

39:4 You will fall dead on the mountains of Israel, you and all your troops and the people who are with you. I give you as food to every kind of bird and every wild beast.

[9:4]  ¹ tn Heb “for the yoke of his burden, and the staff of his shoulder, the scepter of the oppressor against him.” The singular pronouns are collective, referring to the people. The oppressed nation is compared to an ox weighed down by a heavy yoke and an animal that is prodded and beaten.

[9:4]  ² sn This alludes to Gideon’s victory over Midian (Judg 7-8), when the Lord delivered Israel from an oppressive foreign invader.

[10:16]  ³ sn The irrational arrogance of the Assyrians (v. 15) will prompt the judgment about to be described.

[10:16]  ⁴ tn Heb “will send leanness against his healthy ones”; NASB, NIV “will send a wasting disease.”

[10:16]  ⁵ tc Heb “and in the place of his glory burning will burn, like the burning of fire.” The highly repetitive text (יֵקַד יְקֹד כִּיקוֹד אֵשׁ, yeqad yiqod kiqod ’esh) may be dittographic; if the second consonantal sequence יקד is omitted, the text would read “and in the place of his glory, it will burn like the burning of fire.”

[10:17]  ⁶ tn In this context the “Light of Israel” is a divine title (note the parallel title “his holy one”). The title points to God’s royal splendor, which overshadows and, when transformed into fire, destroys the “majestic glory” of the king of Assyria (v. 16b).

[10:17]  ⁷ sn See the note on the phrase “the Holy One of Israel” in 1:4.

[10:17]  ⁸ tn Heb “his.” In vv. 17-19 the Assyrian king and his empire is compared to a great forest and orchard that are destroyed by fire (symbolic of the Lord).

[10:18]  ⁹ tn Heb “from breath to flesh it will destroy.” The expression “from breath to flesh” refers to the two basic components of a person, the immaterial (life’s breath) and the material (flesh). Here the phrase is used idiomatically to indicate totality.

[10:18]  ¹⁰ tn The precise meaning of this line is uncertain. מָסַס (masas), which is used elsewhere of substances dissolving or melting, may here mean “waste away” or “despair.” נָסַס (nasas), which appears only here, may mean “be sick” or “stagger, despair.” See BDB 651 s.v. I נָסַס and HALOT 703 s.v. I נסס. One might translate the line literally, “like the wasting away of one who is sick” (cf. NRSV “as when an invalid wastes away”).

[10:19]  ¹¹ tn Heb “and the rest of the trees of his forest will be counted, and a child will record them.”

[10:32]  ¹² tc The consonantal text (Kethib) has “a mountain of a house (בֵּית, bet), Zion,” but the marginal reading (Qere) correctly reads “the mountain of the daughter (בַּת, bat) of Zion.” On the phrase “Daughter Zion,” see the note on the same phrase in 1:8.

[10:33]  ¹³ tc The Hebrew text reads “with terrifying power,” or “with a crash.” מַעֲרָצָה (ma’aratsah, “terrifying power” or “crash”) occurs only here. Several have suggested an emendation to מַעֲצָד (ma’atsad, “ax”) parallel to “ax” in v. 34; see HALOT 615 s.v. מַעֲצָד and H. Wildberger, Isaiah, 1:448.

[10:33]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “the exalted of the height.” This could refer to the highest branches (cf. TEV) or the tallest trees (cf. NIV, NRSV).

[10:34]  ¹⁵ tn The Hebrew text has, “and Lebanon, by/as [?] a mighty one, will fall.” The translation above takes the preposition בְּ (bet) prefixed to “mighty one” as indicating identity, “Lebanon, as a mighty one, will fall.” In this case “mighty one” describes Lebanon. (In Ezek 17:23 and Zech 11:2 the adjective is used of Lebanon’s cedars.) Another option is to take the preposition as indicating agency and interpret “mighty one” as a divine title (see Isa 33:21). One could then translate, “and Lebanon will fall by [the agency of] the Mighty One.”

[17:12]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Woe [to] the massing of the many nations.” The word הוֹי (hoy) could be translated as a simple interjection here (“ah!”), but since the following verses announce the demise of these nations, it is preferable to take הוֹי as a funeral cry. See the note on the first phrase of 1:4.

[17:12]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “like the loud noise of the seas, they make a loud noise.”

[17:12]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “the uproar of the peoples.” The term הוֹי (hoy, “woe, ah”) does double duty in the parallel structure of the verse; the words “are as good as dead” are supplied in the translation to reflect this.

[17:12]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “like the uproar of mighty waters they are in an uproar.”

[17:13]  ²⁰ tn Heb “the peoples are in an uproar like the uproar of mighty waters.”

[17:13]  ²¹ tn Or “rebukes.” The verb and related noun are used in theophanies of God’s battle cry which terrifies his enemies. See, for example, Pss 18:15; 76:7; 106:9; Isa 50:2; Nah 1:4, and A. Caquot, TDOT 3:49-53.

[17:13]  ²² tn Or perhaps “tumbleweed” (NAB, NIV, CEV); KJV “like a rolling thing.”

[17:14]  ²³ tn Heb “at the time of evening, look, sudden terror.”

[17:14]  ²⁴ tn Heb “before morning he is not.”

[17:14]  ²⁵ tn Heb “this is the portion of those who plunder us, and the lot of those who loot us.”

[30:30]  ²⁶ tn Heb “the Lord will cause the splendor of his voice to be heard.”

[30:30]  ²⁷ tn Heb “and reveal the lowering of his arm.”

[30:30]  ²⁸ tn Heb “and a flame of consuming fire.”

[30:31]  ²⁹ tn Heb “Indeed by the voice of the Lord Assyria will be shattered.”

[30:32]  ³⁰ tc The Hebrew text has “every blow from a founded [i.e., “appointed”?] cudgel.” The translation above, with support from a few medieval Hebrew mss, assumes an emendation of מוּסָדָה (musadah, “founded”) to מוּסָרֹה (musaroh, “his discipline”).

[30:32]  ³¹ tn Heb “which the Lord lays on him.”

[30:32]  ³² tn Heb “will be with” (KJV similar).

[30:32]  ³³ tn The Hebrew text reads literally, “and with battles of brandishing [weapons?] he will fight against him.” Some prefer to emend וּבְמִלְחֲמוֹת (uvÿmilkhamot, “and with battles of”) to וּבִמְחֹלוֹת (uvimkholot, “and with dancing”). Note the immediately preceding references to musical instruments.

[30:33]  ³⁴ tn Or “indeed.”

[30:33]  ³⁵ tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “for arranged from before [or “yesterday”] is [?].” The meaning of תָּפְתֶּה (tafÿteh), which occurs only here, is unknown. The translation above (as with most English versions) assumes an emendation to תֹּפֶת (tofet, “Topheth”; cf. NASB, NIV, NLT) and places the final hey (ה) on the beginning of the next word as an interrogative particle. Topheth was a place near Jerusalem used as a burial ground (see Jer 7:32; 19:11).

[30:33]  ³⁶ tn The Hebrew text reads literally, “Also it is made ready for the king, one makes it deep and wide.” If one takes the final hey (ה) on תָּפְתֶּה (tafÿteh) and prefixes it to גָּם (gam) as an interrogative particle (see the preceding note), one can translate, “Is it also made ready for the king?” In this case the question is rhetorical and expects an emphatic affirmative answer, “Of course it is!”

[30:33]  ³⁷ tn Heb “its pile of wood, fire and wood one makes abundant.”

[31:8]  ³⁸ tn Heb “Assyria will fall by a sword, not of a man.”

[31:8]  ³⁹ tn Heb “and a sword not of humankind will devour him.”

[31:8]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “he will flee for himself from before a sword.”

[31:9]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “rocky cliff” (cf. ASV, NASB “rock”), viewed metaphorically as a place of defense and security.

[31:9]  ⁴² tn Heb “His rocky cliff, because of fear, will pass away [i.e., “perish”].”

[31:9]  ⁴³ tn Heb “and they will be afraid of the flag, his officers.”

[31:9]  ⁴⁴ sn The “fire” and “firepot” here symbolize divine judgment, which is heating up like a fire in Jerusalem, waiting to be used against the Assyrians when they attack the city.

[37:36]  ⁴⁵ tn Traditionally, “the angel of the Lord” (so NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).

[37:36]  ⁴⁶ tn The word “troops” is supplied in the translation for smoothness and clarity.

[37:36]  ⁴⁷ tn This refers to the Israelites and/or the rest of the Assyrian army.

[37:36]  ⁴⁸ tn Heb “look, all of them were dead bodies”; NLT “they found corpses everywhere.”

[37:37]  ⁴⁹ tn Heb “and Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and went and returned and lived in Nineveh.”

[37:38]  ⁵⁰ sn The assassination of King Sennacherib probably took place in 681 b.c.

[37:38]  ⁵¹ tn The verb that introduces this verse serves as a discourse particle and is untranslated; see note on “in the future” in 2:2.

[37:38]  ⁵² sn No such Mesopotamian god is presently known. Perhaps the name Nisroch is a corruption of Nusku.

[37:38]  ⁵³ sn Extra-biblical sources also mention the assassination of Sennacherib, though they refer to only one assassin. See M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 239-40.