Leviticus 26:36-37

26:36 “‘As for ¹  the ones who remain among you, I will bring despair into their hearts in the lands of their enemies. The sound of a blowing leaf will pursue them, and they will flee as one who flees the sword and fall down even though there is no pursuer. 26:37 They will stumble over each other as those who flee before a sword, though ²  there is no pursuer, and there will be no one to take a stand ³  for you before your enemies.

Deuteronomy 28:25

Curses by Defeat and Deportation

28:25 “The Lord will allow you to be struck down before your enemies; you will attack them from one direction but flee from them in seven directions and will become an object of terror ⁴  to all the kingdoms of the earth.

Deuteronomy 32:30

32:30 How can one man chase a thousand of them, ⁵ 

and two pursue ten thousand;

unless their Rock had delivered them up, ⁶ 

and the Lord had handed them over?

Joshua 7:12-13

7:12 The Israelites are unable to stand before their enemies; they retreat because they have become subject to annihilation. ⁷  I will no longer be with you, ⁸  unless you destroy what has contaminated you. ⁹  7:13 Get up! Ritually consecrate the people and tell them this: ‘Ritually consecrate yourselves for tomorrow, because the Lord God of Israel says, “You are contaminated, ¹⁰  O Israel! You will not be able to stand before your enemies until you remove what is contaminating you.” ¹¹ 

Psalms 44:9-11

44:9 But ¹²  you rejected and embarrassed us!

You did not go into battle with our armies. ¹³ 

44:10 You made us retreat ¹⁴  from the enemy.

Those who hate us take whatever they want from us. ¹⁵ 

44:11 You handed us ¹⁶  over like sheep to be eaten;

you scattered us among the nations.

Jeremiah 29:4

29:4 “The Lord God of Israel who rules over all ¹⁷  says to all those he sent ¹⁸  into exile to Babylon from Jerusalem, ¹⁹ 

Jeremiah 48:41

48:41 Her towns ²⁰  will be captured.

Her fortresses will be taken.

At that time the soldiers of Moab will be frightened

like a woman in labor. ²¹ 

Jeremiah 51:30-32

51:30 The soldiers of Babylonia will stop fighting.

They will remain in their fortified cities.

They will lose their strength to do battle. ²² 

They will be as frightened as women. ²³ 

The houses in her cities will be set on fire.

The gates of her cities will be broken down. ²⁴ 

51:31 One runner after another will come to the king of Babylon.

One messenger after another will come bringing news. ²⁵ 

They will bring news to the king of Babylon

that his whole city has been captured. ²⁶ 

51:32 They will report that the fords have been captured,

the reed marshes have been burned,

the soldiers are terrified. ²⁷ 

Jeremiah 52:7

52:7 They broke through the city walls, and all the soldiers tried to escape. They left the city during the night. They went through the gate between the two walls that is near the king’s garden. ²⁸  (The Babylonians had the city surrounded.) Then they headed for the Jordan Valley. ²⁹ 

[26:36]  ¹ tn Heb “And.”

[26:37]  ² tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) is used in a concessive sense here.

[26:37]  ³ tn The term rendered “to stand up” is a noun, not an infinitive. It occurs only here and appears to designate someone who would take a powerful stand for them against their enemies.

[28:25]  ⁴ tc The meaningless MT reading זַעֲוָה (za’avah) is clearly a transposition of the more commonly attested Hebrew noun זְוָעָה (zÿva’ah, “terror”).

[32:30]  ⁵ tn The words “man” and “of them” are not in the Hebrew text, but are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[32:30]  ⁶ tn Heb “sold them” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).

[7:12]  ⁷ tn Heb “they turn [the] back before their enemies because they are set apart [to destruction by the Lord].”

[7:12]  ⁸ tn The second person pronoun is plural in Hebrew, indicating these words are addressed to the entire nation.

[7:12]  ⁹ tn Heb “what is set apart [to destruction by the Lord] from your midst.”

[7:13]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “what is set apart [to destruction by the Lord] [is] in your midst.”

[7:13]  ¹¹ tn Heb “remove what is set apart [i.e., to destruction by the Lord] from your midst.”

[44:9]  ¹² tn The particle אַף (’af, “but”) is used here as a strong adversative contrasting the following statement with what precedes.

[44:9]  ¹³ tn Heb “you did not go out with our armies.” The prefixed verbal form is a preterite (without vav [ו] consecutive).

[44:10]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “you caused us to turn backward.”

[44:10]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “plunder for themselves.” The prepositional phrase לָמוֹ (lamo, “for themselves”) here has the nuance “at their will” or “as they please” (see Ps 80:6).

[44:11]  ¹⁶ tn The prefixed verbal form is a preterite (without vav [ו] consecutive).

[29:4]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies, the God of Israel.”

[29:4]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “I sent.” This sentence exhibits a rapid switch in person, here from the third person to the first. Such switches are common to Hebrew poetry and prophecy (cf. GKC 462 §144.p). Contemporary English, however, does not exhibit such rapid switches and it creates confusion for the careful reader. Such switches have regularly been avoided in the translation.

[29:4]  ¹⁹ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[48:41]  ²⁰ tn Parallelism argues that the word קְרִיּוֹת (qÿriyyot) be understood as the otherwise unattested feminine plural of the noun קִרְיָה (qiryah, “city”) rather than the place name Kerioth mentioned in v. 24 (cf. HALOT 1065 s.v. קִרְיָה). Both this noun and the parallel term “fortresses” are plural but are found with feminine singular verbs, being treated either as collectives or distributive plurals (cf. GKC 462-63 §145.c or 464 §145.l).

[48:41]  ²¹ tn Heb “The heart of the soldiers of Moab will be like the heart of a woman in labor.”

[51:30]  ²² tn Heb “Their strength is dry.” This is a figurative nuance of the word “dry” which BDB 677 s.v. נָשַׁת Qal.1 explain as meaning “fails.” The idea of “strength to do battle” is implicit from the context and is supplied in the translation here for clarity.

[51:30]  ²³ tn Heb “They have become women.” The metaphor has been turned into a simile and the significance of the comparison drawn out for the sake of clarity. See 50:37 for the same figure.

[51:30]  ²⁴ tn Heb “Her dwelling places have been set on fire. Her bars [i.e., the bars on the gates of her cities] have been broken.” The present translation has substituted the word “gates” for “bars” because the intent of the figure is to show that the bars of the gates have been broken giving access to the city. “Gates” makes it easier for the modern reader to understand the figure.

[51:31]  ²⁵ tn Heb “Runner will run to meet runner and…” The intent is to portray a relay of runners carrying the news that follows on in vv. 31d-33 to the king of Babylon. The present translation attempts to spell out the significance.

[51:31]  ²⁶ tn Heb “Runner will run to meet runner and messenger to meet messenger to report to the king of Babylon that his city has been taken in [its] entirety.” There is general agreement among the commentaries that the first two lines refer to messengers converging on the king of Babylon from every direction bringing news the sum total of which is reported in the lines that follow. For the meaning of the last phrase see BDB 892 s.v. קָצֶה 3 and compare the usage in Gen 19:4 and Isa 56:11. The sentence has been broken down and restructured to better conform with contemporary English style.

[51:32]  ²⁷ tn The words “They will report that” have been supplied in the translation to show the linkage between this verse and the previous one. This is still a part of the report of the messengers. The meaning of the word translated “reed marshes” has seemed inappropriate to some commentators because it elsewhere refers to “pools.” However, all the commentaries consulted agree that the word here refers to the reedy marshes that surrounded Babylon. (For a fuller discussion regarding the meaning of this word and attempts to connect it with a word meaning “fortress” see W. L. Holladay, Jeremiah [Hermeneia], 2:427.)

[52:7]  ²⁸ sn The king’s garden is mentioned again in Neh 3:15 in conjunction with the pool of Siloam and the stairs that go down from the city of David. This would have been in the southern part of the city near the Tyropean Valley which agrees with the reference to the “two walls” which were probably the walls on the eastern and western hills.

[52:7]  ²⁹ sn Heb “toward the Arabah.” The Arabah was the rift valley north and south of the Dead Sea. Here the intention was undoubtedly to escape across the Jordan to Moab or Ammon. It appears from 40:14; 41:15 that the Ammonites were known to harbor fugitives from the Babylonians.