Jeremiah 16:16

16:16 But for now I, the Lord, say: ¹  “I will send many enemies who will catch these people like fishermen. After that I will send others who will hunt them out like hunters from all the mountains, all the hills, and the crevices in the rocks. ² 

Jeremiah 49:9

49:9 If grape pickers came to pick your grapes,

would they not leave a few grapes behind? ³ 

If robbers came at night,

would they not pillage only what they needed? ⁴ 

Jeremiah 52:28-30

52:28 Here is the official record of the number of people ⁵  Nebuchadnezzar carried into exile: In the seventh year, ⁶  3,023 Jews; 52:29 in Nebuchadnezzar’s eighteenth year, ⁷  832 people from Jerusalem; 52:30 in Nebuchadnezzar’s twenty-third year, ⁸  Nebuzaradan, the captain of the royal guard, carried into exile 745 Judeans. In all 4,600 people went into exile.

Obadiah 1:5-6

1:5 “If thieves came to rob you ⁹  during the night, ¹⁰ 

they would steal only as much as they wanted! ¹¹ 

If grape pickers came to harvest your vineyards, ¹² 

they would leave some behind for the poor! ¹³ 

But you will be totally destroyed! ¹⁴ 

1:6 How the people of Esau ¹⁵  will be thoroughly plundered! ¹⁶ 

Their ¹⁷  hidden valuables will be ransacked! ¹⁸ 

Revelation 14:18

14:18 Another ¹⁹  angel, who was in charge of ²⁰  the fire, came from the altar and called in a loud voice to the angel ²¹  who had the sharp sickle, “Use ²²  your sharp sickle and gather ²³  the clusters of grapes ²⁴  off the vine of the earth, ²⁵  because its grapes ²⁶  are now ripe.” ²⁷ 

[16:16]  ¹ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.” The Lord has been speaking; the first person has been utilized in translation to avoid a shift which might create confusion.

[16:16]  ² tn Heb “Behold I am about to send for many fishermen and they will catch them. And after that I will send for many hunters and they will hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and from the cracks in the rocks.”

[49:9]  ³ tn The translation of this verse is generally based on the parallels in Obad 5. There the second line has a ה interrogative in front of it. The question can still be assumed because questions can be asked in Hebrew without a formal marker (cf. GKC 473 §150.a and BDB 519 s.v. לֹא 1.a[e] and compare usage in 2 Kgs 5:26).

[49:9]  ⁴ tn The tense and nuance of the verb translated “pillage” are both different than the verb in Obad 5. There the verb is the imperfect of גָּנַב (ganav, “to steal”). Here the verb is the perfect of a verb which means to “ruin” or “spoil.” The English versions and commentaries, however, almost all render the verb here in much the same way as in Obad 5. The nuance must mean they only “ruin, destroy” (by stealing) only as much as they need (Heb “their sufficiency”), and the verb is used as metonymical substitute, effect for cause. The perfect must be some kind of a future perfect; “would they not have destroyed only…” The negative question is carried over by ellipsis from the preceding lines.

[52:28]  ⁵ tn Heb “these are the people.”

[52:28]  ⁶ sn This would be 597 b.c.

[52:29]  ⁷ sn This would be 586 b.c.

[52:30]  ⁸ sn This would be 581 b.c.

[1:5]  ⁹ sn Obadiah uses two illustrations to show the totality of Edom’s approaching destruction. Both robbers and harvesters would have left at least something behind. Such will not be the case, however, with the calamity that is about to befall Edom. A virtually identical saying appears in Jer 49:9-10.

[1:5]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “If thieves came to you, or if plunderers of the night” (NRSV similar). The repetition here adds rhetorical emphasis.

[1:5]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Would they not have stolen only their sufficiency?” The rhetorical question is used to make an emphatic assertion, which is perhaps best represented by the indicative form in the translation.

[1:5]  ¹² tn Heb “If grape pickers came to you.” The phrase “to harvest your vineyards” does not appear in the Hebrew, but is supplied in the translation to clarify the point of the entire simile which is assumed.

[1:5]  ¹³ tn Heb “Would they not have left some gleanings?” The rhetorical question makes an emphatic assertion, which for the sake of clarity is represented by the indicative form in the translation. The implied answer to these rhetorical questions is “yes.” The fact that something would have remained after the imagined acts of theft or harvest stands in stark contrast to the totality of Edom’s destruction as predicted by Obadiah. Edom will be so decimated as a result of God’s judgment that nothing at all will be left

[1:5]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “O how you will be cut off.” This emotional interjection functions rhetorically as the prophet’s announcement of judgment on Edom. In Hebrew this statement actually appears between the first and second metaphors, that is, in the middle of this verse. As the point of the comparison, one would expect it to follow both of the two metaphors; however, Obadiah interrupts his own sentence to interject his emphatic exclamation that cannot wait until the end of the sentence. This emphatic sentence structure is eloquent in Hebrew but awkward in English. Since this emphatic assertion is the point of his comparison, it appears at the end of the sentence in this translation, where one normally expects to find the concluding point of a metaphorical comparison.

[1:6]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “Esau.” The name Esau here is a synecdoche of part for whole referring to the Edomites. Cf. “Jacob” in v. 10, where the meaning is “Israelites.”

[1:6]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “How Esau will be searched!”; NAB “How they search Esau.” The Hebrew verb חָפַשׂ (khafas, “to search out”) is used metonymically here for plundering the hidden valuables of a conquered people (e.g., 1 Kgs 20:6).

[1:6]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “his” (so KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV); this is singular agreeing with “Esau” in the previous line.

[1:6]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “searched out” (so NASB, NRSV); NIV “pillaged”; TEV “looted”; NLT “found and taken.” This pictures the violent action of conquering warriors ransacking the city in order to loot and plunder its valuables.

[14:18]  ¹⁹ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[14:18]  ²⁰ tn Grk “who had authority over.” This appears to be the angel who tended the fire on the altar.

[14:18]  ²¹ tn Grk “to the one having the sharp sickle”; the referent (the angel in v. 17) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[14:18]  ²² tn Grk “Send.”

[14:18]  ²³ tn On this term BDAG 1018 s.v. τρυγάω states: “‘gather in’ ripe fruit, esp. harvest (grapes) w. acc. of the fruit (POslo. 21, 13 [71 ad]; Jos., Ant. 4, 227) Lk 6:44; Rv 14:18 (in imagery, as in the foll. places)…W. acc. of that which bears the fruit gather the fruit of the vine…or the vineyard (s. ἄμπελος a) Rv 14:19.”

[14:18]  ²⁴ tn On this term BDAG 181 s.v. βότρυς states, “bunch of grapes Rv 14:18…The word is also found in the Phrygian Papias of Hierapolis, in a passage in which he speaks of the enormous size of the grapes in the new aeon (in the Lat. transl. in Irenaeus 5, 33, 2f.): dena millia botruum Papias (1:2). On this see Stephan. Byz. s.v. Εὐκαρπία: Metrophanes says that in the district of Εὐκαρπία in Phrygia Minor the grapes were said to be so large that one bunch of them caused a wagon to break down in the middle.”

[14:18]  ²⁵ tn The genitive τῆς γῆς (ths ghs), taken symbolically, could be considered a genitive of apposition.

[14:18]  ²⁶ tn Or perhaps, “its bunches of grapes” (a different Greek word from the previous clause). L&N 3.38 states, “the fruit of grapevines (see 3.27) – ‘grape, bunch of grapes.’ τρύγησον τοὺς βότρυας τῆς ἀμπέλου τῆς γῆς, ὅτι ἤκμασαν αἱ σταφυλαὶ αὐτῆς ‘cut the grapes from the vineyard of the earth because its grapes are ripe’ Re 14:18. Some scholars have contended that βότρυς means primarily a bunch of grapes, while σταφυλή designates individual grapes. In Re 14:18 this difference might seem plausible, but there is scarcely any evidence for such a distinction, since both words may signify grapes as well as bunches of grapes.”

[14:18]  ²⁷ tn On the use of ἥκμασαν (hkmasan) BDAG 36 s.v. ἀκμάζω states, “to bloom…of grapes…Rv 14:18.”