Nahum 3:3

3:3 The charioteers ¹  will charge ahead; ² 

their swords ³  will flash ⁴ 

and their spears ⁵  will glimmer! ⁶ 

There will be many people slain; ⁷ 

there will be piles of the dead,

and countless casualties ⁸  –

so many that people ⁹  will stumble over the corpses.

Isaiah 5:27

5:27 None tire or stumble,

they don’t stop to nap or sleep.

They don’t loosen their belts,

or unstrap their sandals to rest. ¹⁰ 

Jeremiah 46:12

46:12 The nations will hear of your devastating defeat. ¹¹ 

your cries of distress will echo throughout the earth.

In the panic of their flight one soldier will trip over another

and both of them will fall down defeated.” ¹² 

[3:3]  ¹ tn Heb “a horseman.” Although the Hebrew term פָּרָס (paras, alternately spelled פָּרָשׂ [paras] here) could denote “horse” (1 Sam 8:11; Joel 2:4; Hab 1:8; Jer 46:4), the Hiphil participle מַעֲלֶה (ma’aleh, “cause to charge”) – the subject of which is פָּרָס – suggests that פָּרָס refers here to “horsemen” charging their horses (2 Sam 1:6; 1 Kgs 20:20; Jer 4:29; 46:4).

[3:3]  ² tn The term מַעֲלֶה (ma’aleh; the Hiphil participle “cause to charge”) refers to charioteers bringing war-horses up to a charge or attack (e.g., Jer 46:9; 51:27). On the other hand, the KJV translates this as “lifteth up [both the bright sword and the glittering sword],” while RV renders it as “mounts [his horse (or chariot)].”

[3:3]  ³ tn Heb “a sword.”

[3:3]  ⁴ tn Heb “flash of a sword.” Alternately, “swords flash.” Although לַהַב (lahav) can mean “blade” (Judg 3:22; 1 Sam 17:7), it means “flash [of the sword]” here (e.g., Hab 3:11; see HALOT 520 s.v.) as suggested by its parallelism with וּבְרַק (uvÿraq, “flashing, gleaming point [of the spear]”); cf. Job 20:25; Deut 32:41; Hab 3:11; Ezek 21:15.

[3:3]  ⁵ tn Heb “a spear.”

[3:3]  ⁶ tn Heb “and flash of a spear.” Alternately, “spears glimmer” (HALOT 162 s.v. בָּרָק).

[3:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “many slain.”

[3:3]  ⁸ tc The MT reads לַגְּוִיָּה (laggÿviyyah, “to the dead bodies”). The LXX reflects לְגוֹיָה (lÿgoyah, “to her nations”) which arose due to confusion between the consonant ו (vav) and the vowel וֹ (holem-vav) in an unpointed text.

[3:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “they.”

[5:27]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “and the belt on his waist is not opened, and the thong of his sandals is not torn in two.”

[46:12]  ¹¹ tn Heb “of your shame.” The “shame,” however, applies to the devastating defeat they will suffer.

[46:12]  ¹² tn The words “In the panic of their flight” and “defeated” are not in the text but are supplied in the translation to give clarity to the metaphor for the average reader. The verbs in this verse are all in the tense that emphasizes that the action is viewed as already having been accomplished (i.e., the Hebrew prophetic perfect). This is consistent with the vav consecutive perfects in v. 10 which look to the future.