Ester 4:1

Esther Decides to Risk Everything in order to Help Her People

4:1 Now when Mordecai became aware of all that had been done, he ¹  tore his garments and put on sackcloth and ashes. He went out into the city, crying out in a loud ²  and bitter voice.

Ayub 3:20

Longing for Death ³ 

3:20 “Why does God ⁴  give ⁵  light to one who is in misery, ⁶ 

and life to those ⁷  whose soul is bitter,

Yesaya 22:12

22:12 At that time the sovereign master, the Lord who commands armies, called for weeping and mourning,

for shaved heads and sackcloth. ⁸ 

Yeremia 6:26

6:26 So I said, ⁹  “Oh, my dear people, ¹⁰  put on sackcloth

and roll in ashes.

Mourn with painful sobs

as though you had lost your only child.

For any moment now ¹¹  that destructive army ¹² 

will come against us.”

Ratapan 2:10

י (Yod)

2:10 The elders of Daughter Zion

sit ¹³  on the ground in silence. ¹⁴ 

They have thrown dirt on their heads;

They have dressed in sackcloth. ¹⁵ 

Jerusalem’s young women ¹⁶  stare down at the ground. ¹⁷ 

Yehezkiel 7:18

7:18 They will wear sackcloth, terror will cover them; shame will be on all their faces, and all of their heads will be shaved bald. ¹⁸ 

[4:1]  ¹ tn Heb “Mordecai.” The pronoun (“he”) was used in the translation for stylistic reasons. A repetition of the proper name here is redundant in terms of contemporary English style.

[4:1]  ² tn Heb “great.”

[3:20]  ³ sn Since he has survived birth, Job wonders why he could not have died a premature death. He wonders why God gives light and life to those who are in misery. His own condition throws gloom over life, and so he poses the question first generally, for many would prefer death to misery (20-22); then he comes to the individual, himself, who would prefer death (23). He closes his initial complaint with some depictions of his suffering that afflicts him and gives him no rest (24-26).

[3:20]  ⁴ tn Heb “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[3:20]  ⁵ tn The verb is the simple imperfect, expressing the progressive imperfect nuance. But there is no formal subject to the verb, prompting some translations to make it passive in view of the indefinite subject (so, e.g., NAB, NIV, NRSV). Such a passive could be taken as a so-called “divine passive” by which God is the implied agent. Job clearly means God here, but he stops short of naming him (see also the note on “God” earlier in this verse).

[3:20]  sn In vv. 11, 12, and 16 there was the first series of questions in which Job himself was in question. Now the questions are more general for all mankind – why should the sufferers in general have been afflicted with life?

[3:20]  ⁶ sn In v. 10 the word was used to describe the labor and sorrow that comes from it; here the one in such misery is called the עָמֵל (’amel, “laborer, sufferer”).

[3:20]  ⁷ tn The second colon now refers to people in general because of the plural construct מָרֵי נָפֶשׁ (mare nafesh, “those bitter of soul/life”). One may recall the use of מָרָה (marah, “bitter”) by Naomi to describe her pained experience as a poor widow in Ruth 1:20, or the use of the word to describe the bitter oppression inflicted on Israel by the Egyptians (Exod 1:14). Those who are “bitter of soul” are those whose life is overwhelmed with painful experiences and suffering.

[22:12]  ⁸ tn Heb “for baldness and the wearing of sackcloth.” See the note at 15:2.

[6:26]  ⁹ tn These words are not in the text but are implicit from the context.

[6:26]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “daughter of my people.” For the translation given here see 4:11 and the translator’s note there.

[6:26]  ¹¹ tn Heb “suddenly.”

[6:26]  ¹² tn Heb “the destroyer.”

[2:10]  ¹³ tc Consonantal ישׁבו (yshvy) is vocalized by the MT as יֵשְׁבוּ (yeshvu), Qal imperfect 3rd person masculine plural from יָשַׁב (yashav, “to sit”): “they sit on the ground.” However, the ancient versions (Aramaic Targum, Greek Septuagint, Syriac Peshitta, Latin Vulgate) reflect an alternate vocalization tradition of יָשְׁבוּ (yashvu), Qal imperfect 3rd person masculine plural from שׁוּב (shuv, “to return”): “they return to the ground (= the grave).” The parallelism with the following line favors the MT.

[2:10]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “they sit on the ground, they are silent.” Based on meter, the two verbs יִדְּמוּ…יֵשְׁבוּ (yeshvu…yidÿmu, “they sit…they are silent”) are in the same half of the line. Joined without a ו (vav) conjunction they form a verbal hendiadys. The first functions in its full verbal sense while the second functions adverbially: “they sit in silence.” The verb יִדְּמוּ (yidÿmu) may mean to be silent or to wail.

[2:10]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “they have girded themselves with sackcloth.”

[2:10]  sn Along with putting dirt on one’s head, wearing sackcloth was a sign of mourning.

[2:10]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “the virgins of Jerusalem.” The term “virgins” is a metonymy of association, standing for single young women who are not yet married. These single women are in grief because their potential suitors have been killed. The elders, old men, and young women function together as a merism for all of the survivors (F. W. Dobbs-Allsopp, Lamentations [IBC], 92).

[2:10]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “have bowed down their heads to the ground.”

[7:18]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “baldness will be on their heads.”