Yesaya 10:5-6

The Lord Turns on Arrogant Assyria

10:5 Assyria, the club I use to vent my anger, is as good as dead, ¹ 

a cudgel with which I angrily punish. ² 

10:6 I sent him ³  against a godless ⁴  nation,

I ordered him to attack the people with whom I was angry, ⁵ 

to take plunder and to carry away loot,

to trample them down ⁶  like dirt in the streets.

Ayub 2:10

2:10 But he replied, ⁷  “You’re talking like one of the godless ⁸  women would do! Should we receive ⁹  what is good from God, and not also ¹⁰  receive ¹¹  what is evil?” ¹²  In all this Job did not sin by what he said. ¹³ 

Ayub 34:29

34:29 But if God ¹⁴  is quiet, who can condemn ¹⁵  him?

If he hides his face, then who can see him?

Yet ¹⁶  he is over the individual and the nation alike, ¹⁷ 

Mazmur 29:11

29:11 The Lord gives ¹⁸  his people strength; ¹⁹ 

the Lord grants his people security. ²⁰ 

Mazmur 75:7

75:7 For God is the judge! ²¹ 

He brings one down and exalts another. ²² 

Pengkhotbah 7:13-14

Wisdom Acknowledges God’s Orchestration of Life

7:13 Consider the work of God:

For who can make straight what he has bent?

7:14 In times of prosperity ²³  be joyful,

but in times of adversity ²⁴  consider this:

God has made one as well as the other, ²⁵ 

so that no one can discover what the future holds. ²⁶ 

Yeremia 18:7-10

18:7 There are times, Jeremiah, ²⁷  when I threaten to uproot, tear down, and destroy a nation or kingdom. ²⁸  18:8 But if that nation I threatened stops doing wrong, ²⁹  I will cancel the destruction ³⁰  I intended to do to it. 18:9 And there are times when I promise to build up and establish ³¹  a nation or kingdom. 18:10 But if that nation does what displeases me and does not obey me, then I will cancel the good I promised to do to it.

Yeremia 51:20

51:20 “Babylon, ³²  you are my war club, ³³ 

my weapon for battle.

I used you to smash nations. ³⁴ 

I used you to destroy kingdoms.

Yehezkiel 14:15-21

14:15 “Suppose I were to send wild animals through the land and kill its children, leaving it desolate, without travelers due to the wild animals. 14:16 Even if these three men were in it, as surely as I live, declares the sovereign Lord, they could not save their own sons or daughters; they would save only their own lives, and the land would become desolate.

14:17 “Or suppose I were to bring a sword against that land and say, ‘Let a sword pass through the land,’ and I were to kill both people and animals. 14:18 Even if these three men were in it, as surely as I live, declares the sovereign Lord, they could not save their own sons or daughters – they would save only their own lives.

14:19 “Or suppose I were to send a plague into that land, and pour out my rage on it with bloodshed, killing both people and animals. 14:20 Even if Noah, Daniel, and Job were in it, as surely as I live, declares the sovereign Lord, they could not save their own son or daughter; they would save only their own lives by their righteousness.

14:21 “For this is what the sovereign Lord says: How much worse will it be when I send my four terrible judgments – sword, famine, wild animals, and plague – to Jerusalem ³⁵  to kill both people and animals!

Amos 3:6

3:6 If an alarm sounds ³⁶  in a city, do people not fear? ³⁷ 

If disaster overtakes a ³⁸  city, is the Lord not responsible? ³⁹ 

Amos 5:6

5:6 Seek the Lord so you can live!

Otherwise he will break out ⁴⁰  like fire against Joseph’s ⁴¹  family; ⁴² 

the fire ⁴³  will consume

and no one will be able to quench it and save Bethel. ⁴⁴ 

Kisah Para Rasul 4:28

4:28 to do as much as your power ⁴⁵  and your plan ⁴⁶  had decided beforehand ⁴⁷  would happen.

[10:5]  ¹ tn Heb “Woe [to] Assyria, the club of my anger.” On הוֹי (hoy, “woe, ah”) see the note on the first phrase of 1:4.

[10:5]  ² tn Heb “a cudgel is he, in their hand is my anger.” It seems likely that the final mem (ם) on בְיָדָם (bÿyadam) is not a pronominal suffix (“in their hand”), but an enclitic mem. If so, one can translate literally, “a cudgel is he in the hand of my anger.”

[10:6]  ³ sn Throughout this section singular forms are used to refer to Assyria; perhaps the king of Assyria is in view (see v. 12).

[10:6]  ⁴ tn Or “defiled”; cf. ASV “profane”; NAB “impious”; NCV “separated from God.”

[10:6]  ⁵ tn Heb “and against the people of my anger I ordered him.”

[10:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “to make it [i.e., the people] a trampled place.”

[2:10]  ⁷ tn Heb “he said to her.”

[2:10]  ⁸ tn The word “foolish” (נָבָל, naval) has to do with godlessness more than silliness (Ps 14:1). To be foolish in this sense is to deny the nature and the work of God in life its proper place. See A. Phillips, “NEBALA – A Term for Serious Disorderly Unruly Conduct,” VT 25 (1975): 237-41; and W. M. W. Roth, “NBL,” VT 10 (1960): 394-409.

[2:10]  ⁹ tn The verb קִבֵּל (qibbel) means “to accept, receive.” It is attested in the Amarna letters with the meaning “receive meekly, patiently.”

[2:10]  ¹⁰ tn The adverb גָּם (gam, “also, even”) is placed here before the first clause, but belongs with the second. It intensifies the idea (see GKC 483 §153). See also C. J. Labuschagne, “The Emphasizing Particle GAM and Its Connotations,” Studia Biblica et Semitica, 193-203.

[2:10]  ¹¹ tn The two verbs in this sentence, Piel imperfects, are deliberative imperfects; they express the reasoning or deliberating in the interrogative sentences.

[2:10]  ¹² tn A question need not be introduced by an interrogative particle or adverb. The natural emphasis on the words is enough to indicate it is a question (GKC 473 §150.a).

[2:10]  sn The Hebrew words טוֹב (tov, “good”) and רַע (ra’, “evil”) have to do with what affects life. That which is good benefits people because it produces, promotes and protects life; that which is evil brings calamity and disaster, it harms, pains, or destroys life.

[2:10]  ¹³ tn Heb “sin with his lips,” an idiom meaning he did not sin by what he said.

[34:29]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[34:29]  ¹⁵ tn The verb in this position is somewhat difficult, although it does make good sense in the sentence – it is just not what the parallelism would suggest. So several emendations have been put forward, for which see the commentaries.

[34:29]  ¹⁶ tn The line simply reads “and over a nation and over a man together.” But it must be the qualification for the points being made in the previous lines, namely, that even if God hides himself so no one can see, yet he is still watching over them all (see H. H. Rowley, Job [NCBC], 222).

[34:29]  ¹⁷ tn The word translated “alike” (Heb “together”) has bothered some interpreters. In the reading taken here it is acceptable. But others have emended it to gain a verb, such as “he visits” (Beer), “he watches over” (Duhm), “he is compassionate” (Kissane), etc. But it is sufficient to say “he is over.”

[29:11]  ¹⁸ tn The imperfect verbal forms in v. 11 are either descriptive or generalizing.

[29:11]  ¹⁹ sn Strength. This probably refers to military power; see the use of the noun in 1 Sam 2:10 and Ps 86:16.

[29:11]  ²⁰ tn Heb “blesses his people with peace.” The Hebrew term שָׁלוֹם (shalom, “peace”) probably refers here to the protection and prosperity experienced by God’s people after the Lord intervenes in battle on their behalf.

[75:7]  ²¹ tn Or “judges.”

[75:7]  ²² tn The imperfects here emphasize the generalizing nature of the statement.

[7:14]  ²³ tn Heb “the day of good.”

[7:14]  ²⁴ tn Heb “the day of evil.”

[7:14]  ²⁵ tn Less probable renderings of this line are “God hath made the one side by side with the other” (ASV) and “God has set the one alongside the other” (NEB).

[7:14]  ²⁶ tn Heb “anything after him.” This line is misinterpreted by several versions: “that man may not find against him any just complaint” (Douay); “consequently, man may find no fault with Him” (NJPS); “so that man cannot find fault with him in anything” (NAB).

[18:7]  ²⁷ tn The word “Jeremiah” is not in the text but it is implicit from the introduction in v. 5 that he is being addressed. It is important to see how the rhetoric of this passage is structured. The words of vv. 7-10 lead up to the conclusion “So now” in v. 11 which in turns leads to the conclusion “Therefore” in v. 13. The tense of the verb in v. 12 is very important. It is a vav consecutive perfect indicating the future (cf. GKC 333 §112.p, r); their response is predictable. The words of vv. 7-10 are addressed to Jeremiah (v. 5) in fulfillment of the Lord’s promise to speak to him (v. 2) and furnish the basis for the Lord’s words of conditional threat to a people who show no promise of responding positively (vv. 11-12). Verse six then must be seen as another example of the figure of apostrophe (the turning aside from description about someone to addressing them directly; cf., e.g., Ps 6:8-9 (6:9-10 HT). Earlier examples of this figure have been seen in 6:20; 9:4; 11:13; 12:13; 15:6.

[18:7]  ²⁸ tn Heb “One moment I may speak about a nation or kingdom to…” So also in v. 9. The translation is structured this way to avoid an awkward English construction and to reflect the difference in disposition. The constructions are, however, the same.

[18:8]  ²⁹ tn Heb “turns from its wickedness.”

[18:8]  ³⁰ tn There is a good deal of debate about how the word translated here “revoke” should be translated. There is a good deal of reluctance to translate it “change my mind” because some see that as contradicting Num 23:19 and thus prefer “relent.” However, the English word “relent” suggests the softening of an attitude but not necessarily the change of course. It is clear that in many cases (including here) an actual change of course is in view (see, e.g., Amos 7:3, 6; Jonah 3:9; Jer 26:19; Exod 13:17; 32:14). Several of these passages deal with “conditional” prophecies where a change in behavior of the people or the mediation of a prophet involves the change in course of the threatened punishment (or the promised benefit). “Revoke” or “forgo” may be the best way to render this in contemporary English idiom.

[18:8]  sn There is a wordplay here involving the word “evil” (רָעָה, ra’ah) which refers to both the crime and the punishment. This same play is carried further in Jonah 3:10-4:1 where Jonah becomes very displeased (Heb “it was very evil to Jonah with great evil”) when God forgoes bringing disaster (evil) on Nineveh because they have repented of their wickedness (evil).

[18:9]  ³¹ sn Heb “plant.” The terms “uproot,” “tear down,” “destroy,” “build,” and “plant” are the two sides of the ministry Jeremiah was called to (cf. Jer 1:10).

[51:20]  ³² tn Or “Media.” The referent is not identified in the text; the text merely says “you are my war club.” Commentators in general identify the referent as Babylon because Babylon has been referred to as a hammer in 50:23 and Babylon is referred to in v. 25 as a “destroying mountain” (compare v. 20d). However, S. R. Driver, Jeremiah, 317, n. c maintains that v. 24 speaks against this. It does seem a little inconsistent to render the vav consecutive perfect at the beginning of v. 24 as future while rendering those in vv. 20b-23 as customary past. However, change in person from second masculine singular (vv. 20b-23) to the second masculine plural in “before your very eyes” and its position at the end of the verse after “which they did in Zion” argue that a change in address occurs there. Driver has to ignore the change in person and take “before your eyes” with the verb “repay” at the beginning to maintain the kind of consistency he seeks. The vav (ו) consecutive imperfect can be used for either the customary past (GKC 335-36 §112.dd with cross reference back to GKC 331-32 §112.e) or the future (GKC 334 §112.x). Hence the present translation has followed the majority of commentaries (and English versions like TEV, NCV, CEV, NIrV) in understanding the referent as Babylon and v. 24 being a transition to vv. 25-26 (cf., e.g., J. Bright, Jeremiah [AB], 356-57, and J. A. Thompson, Jeremiah [NICOT], 756-57). If the referent is understood as Media then the verbs in vv. 20-23 should all be translated as futures. See also the translator’s note on v. 24.

[51:20]  ³³ tn This Hebrew word (מַפֵּץ, mappets) only occurs here in the Hebrew Bible, but its meaning is assured from the use of the verbs that follow which are from the same root (נָפַץ, nafats) and there is a cognate noun מַפָּץ (mappats) that occurs in Ezek 9:2 in the sense of weapon of “smashing.”

[51:20]  ³⁴ tn Heb “I smash nations with you.” This same structure is repeated throughout the series in vv. 20c-23.

[14:21]  ³⁵ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[3:6]  ³⁶ tn Heb “If the ram’s horn is blown.”

[3:6]  ³⁷ tn Or “tremble” (NASB, NIV, NCV); or “shake.”

[3:6]  ³⁸ tn Heb “is in”; NIV, NCV, NLT “comes to.”

[3:6]  ³⁹ tn Heb “has the Lord not acted?”

[5:6]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “rush.” The verb depicts swift movement.

[5:6]  ⁴¹ sn Here Joseph (= Ephraim and Manasseh), as the most prominent of the Israelite tribes, represents the entire northern kingdom.

[5:6]  ⁴² tn Heb “house.”

[5:6]  ⁴³ tn Heb “it”; the referent (the fire mentioned in the previous line) has been supplied in the translation for clarity.

[5:6]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “to/for Bethel.” The translation assumes that the preposition indicates advantage, “on behalf of.” Another option is to take the preposition as vocative, “O Bethel.”

[4:28]  ⁴⁵ tn Grk “hand,” here a metaphor for God’s strength or power or authority.

[4:28]  ⁴⁶ tn Or “purpose,” “will.”

[4:28]  ⁴⁷ tn Or “had predestined.” Since the term “predestine” is something of a technical theological term, not in wide usage in contemporary English, the translation “decide beforehand” was used instead (see L&N 30.84). God’s direction remains as the major theme.