Psalms 22:9-10

22:9 Yes, you are the one who brought me out ¹  from the womb

and made me feel secure on my mother’s breasts.

22:10 I have been dependent on you since birth; ² 

from the time I came out of my mother’s womb you have been my God. ³ 

Psalms 71:6

71:6 I have leaned on you since birth; ⁴ 

you pulled me ⁵  from my mother’s womb.

I praise you continually. ⁶ 

Job 31:15

31:15 Did not the one who made me in the womb make them? ⁷ 

Did not the same one form us in the womb?

Isaiah 44:2

44:2 This is what the Lord, the one who made you, says –

the one who formed you in the womb and helps you:

“Don’t be afraid, my servant Jacob,

Jeshurun, ⁸  whom I have chosen!

Isaiah 46:3

46:3 “Listen to me, O family of Jacob, ⁹ 

all you who are left from the family of Israel, ¹⁰ 

you who have been carried from birth, ¹¹ 

you who have been supported from the time you left the womb. ¹² 

Jeremiah 1:5

1:5 “Before I formed you in your mother’s womb ¹³  I chose you. ¹⁴ 

Before you were born I set you apart.

I appointed you to be a prophet to the nations.”

[22:9]  ¹ tn Or “the one who pulled me.” The verb is derived from either גָחָה (gakhah; see HALOT 187 s.v. גחה) or גִּיחַ (giyakh; see BDB 161 s.v. גִּיחַ) and seems to carry the nuance “burst forth” or “pull out.”

[22:10]  ² tn Heb “upon you I was cast from [the] womb.”

[22:10]  ³ tn Heb “from the womb of my mother you [have been] my God.”

[71:6]  ⁴ tn Heb “from the womb.”

[71:6]  ⁵ tc The form in the MT is derived from גָזָה (gazah, “to cut off”), perhaps picturing God as the one who severed the psalmist’s umbilical cord. Many interpreters and translators prefer to emend the text to גֹחִי (gokhiy), from גוּח (gukh) or גִיח, (gikh, “pull out”; see Ps 22:9; cf. the present translation) or to עוּזִּי (’uzziy, “my strength”; cf. NEB “my protector since I left my mother’s womb”).

[71:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “in you [is] my praise continually.”

[31:15]  ⁷ tn Heb “him,” but the plural pronoun has been used in the translation to indicate that the referent is the servants mentioned in v. 13 (since the previous “him” in v. 14 refers to God).

[44:2]  ⁸ sn Jeshurun is a poetic name for Israel; it occurs here and in Deut 32:15; 33:5, 26.

[46:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “house of Jacob”; TEV “descendants of Jacob.”

[46:3]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “and all the remnant of the house of Israel.”

[46:3]  ¹¹ tn Heb “from the womb” (so NRSV); KJV “from the belly”; NAB “from your infancy.”

[46:3]  ¹² tn Heb “who have been lifted up from the womb.”

[1:5]  ¹³ tn Heb “the womb.” The words “your mother’s” are implicit and are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[1:5]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “I knew you.” The parallelism here with “set you apart” and “appointed you” make clear that Jeremiah is speaking of his foreordination to be a prophet. For this same nuance of the Hebrew verb see Gen 18:19; Amos 3:2.