Nehemia 4:4-5

4:4 Hear, O our God, for we are despised! Return their reproach on their own head! Reduce them to plunder in a land of exile! 4:5 Do not cover their iniquity, and do not wipe out their sin from before them. For they have bitterly offended ¹  the builders! ² 

Mazmur 109:14-15

109:14 May his ancestors’ ³  sins be remembered by the Lord!

May his mother’s sin not be forgotten! ⁴ 

109:15 May the Lord be constantly aware of them, ⁵ 

and cut off the memory of his children ⁶  from the earth!

Mazmur 137:7-9

137:7 Remember, O Lord, what the Edomites did

on the day Jerusalem fell. ⁷ 

They said, “Tear it down, tear it down, ⁸ 

right to its very foundation!”

137:8 O daughter Babylon, soon to be devastated! ⁹ 

How blessed will be the one who repays you

for what you dished out to us! ¹⁰ 

137:9 How blessed will be the one who grabs your babies

and smashes them on a rock! ¹¹ 

Yeremia 10:25

10:25 Vent your anger on the nations that do not acknowledge you. ¹² 

Vent it on the peoples ¹³  who do not worship you. ¹⁴ 

For they have destroyed the people of Jacob. ¹⁵ 

They have completely destroyed them ¹⁶ 

and left their homeland in utter ruin.

Yeremia 18:23

18:23 But you, Lord, know

all their plots to kill me.

Do not pardon their crimes!

Do not ignore their sins as though you had erased them! ¹⁷ 

Let them be brought down in defeat before you!

Deal with them while you are still angry! ¹⁸ 

Yeremia 51:35

51:35 The person who lives in Zion says,

“May Babylon pay for the violence done to me and to my relatives.”

Jerusalem says,

“May those living in Babylonia pay for the bloodshed of my people.” ¹⁹ 

Lukas 23:31

23:31 For if such things are done ²⁰  when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?” ²¹ 

Wahyu 6:10

6:10 They ²²  cried out with a loud voice, ²³  “How long, ²⁴  Sovereign Master, ²⁵  holy and true, before you judge those who live on the earth and avenge our blood?”

[4:5]  ¹ tn The Hiphil stem of כָּעַס (ka’as) may mean: (1) “to provoke to anger”; (2) “to bitterly offend”; or (3) “to grieve” (BDB 495 s.v. Hiph.; HALOT 491 s.v. כעס hif). The Hebrew lexicons suggest that “bitterly offend” is the most appropriate nuance here.

[4:5]  ² tn Heb “before the builders.” The preposition נֶגֶד (neged, “before”) here connotes “in the sight of” or “in the view of” (BDB 617 s.v. 1.a; HALOT 666 s.v. 1.a).

[109:14]  ³ tn Or “fathers’ sins.”

[109:14]  ⁴ tn Heb “not be wiped out.”

[109:14]  sn According to ancient Israelite theology and its doctrine of corporate solidarity and responsibility, children could be and often were punished for the sins of their parents. For a discussion of this issue see J. Kaminsky, Corporate Responsibility in the Hebrew Bible (JSOTSup). (Kaminsky, however, does not deal with Ps 109.)

[109:15]  ⁵ tn Heb “may they [that is, the sins mentioned in v. 14] be before the Lord continually.”

[109:15]  ⁶ tn Heb “their memory.” The plural pronominal suffix probably refers back to the children mentioned in v. 13, and for clarity this has been specified in the translation.

[137:7]  ⁷ tn Heb “remember, O Lord, against the sons of Edom, the day of Jerusalem.”

[137:7]  ⁸ tn Heb “lay [it] bare, lay [it] bare.”

[137:8]  ⁹ tn Heb “O devastated daughter of Babylon.” The psalmist dramatically anticipates Babylon’s demise.

[137:8]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “O the happiness of the one who repays you your wage which you paid to us.”

[137:9]  ¹¹ sn For other references to the wholesale slaughter of babies in the context of ancient Near Eastern warfare, see 2 Kgs 8:12; Isa 13:16; Hos 13:16; Nah 3:10.

[10:25]  ¹² tn Heb “know you.” For this use of the word “know” (יָדַע, yada’) see the note on 9:3.

[10:25]  ¹³ tn Heb “tribes/clans.”

[10:25]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “who do not call on your name.” The idiom “to call on your name” (directed to God) refers to prayer (mainly) and praise. See 1 Kgs 18:24-26 and Ps 116:13, 17. Here “calling on your name” is parallel to “acknowledging you.” In many locations in the OT “name” is equivalent to the person. In the OT, the “name” reflected the person’s character (cf. Gen 27:36; 1 Sam 25:25) or his reputation (Gen 11:4; 2 Sam 8:13). To speak in a person’s name was to act as his representative or carry his authority (1 Sam 25:9; 1 Kgs 21:8). To call someone’s name over something was to claim it for one’s own (2 Sam 12:28).

[10:25]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “have devoured Jacob.”

[10:25]  ¹⁶ tn Or “have almost completely destroyed them”; Heb “they have devoured them and consumed them.” The figure of hyperbole is used here; elsewhere Jeremiah and God refer to the fact that they will not be completely consumed. See for example 4:27; 5:10, 18.

[18:23]  ¹⁷ sn Heb “Do not blot out their sins from before you.” For this anthropomorphic figure which looks at God’s actions as though connected with record books, i.e., a book of wrongdoings to be punished, and a book of life for those who are to live, see e.g., Exod 32:32, 33, Ps 51:1 (51:3 HT); 69:28 (69:29 HT).

[18:23]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “in the time of your anger.”

[51:35]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “‘The violence done to me and to my flesh be upon Babylon,’ says the one living in Zion. ‘My blood be upon those living in Chaldea,’ says Jerusalem.” For the usage of the genitive here in the phrase “violence done to me and my relatives” see GKC 414 §128.a (a construct governing two objects) and IBHS 303 §16.4d (an objective genitive). For the nuance of “pay” in the sense of retribution see BDB 756 s.v. עַל 7.a(b) and compare the usage in Judg 9:24. For the use of שְׁאֵר (shÿ’er) in the sense of “relatives” see BDB 985 s.v. שְׁאֵר 2 and compare NJPS. For the use of “blood” in this idiom see BDB 197 s.v. דָּם 2.k and compare the usage in 2 Sam 4:11; Ezek 3:18, 20. The lines have been reversed for better English style.

[23:31]  ²⁰ tn Grk “if they do such things.” The plural subject here is indefinite, so the active voice has been translated as a passive (see ExSyn 402).

[23:31]  ²¹ sn The figure of the green wood and the dry has been variously understood. Most likely the picture compares the judgment on Jesus as the green (living) wood to the worse judgment that will surely come for the dry (dead) wood of the nation.

[6:10]  ²² tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[6:10]  ²³ tn Grk “voice, saying”; the participle λέγοντες (legontes) is redundant in contemporary English and has not been translated here.

[6:10]  ²⁴ tn The expression ἕως πότε (ews pote) was translated “how long.” Cf. BDAG 423 s.v. ἕως 1.b.γ.

[6:10]  ²⁵ tn The Greek term here is δεσπότης (despoths; see L&N 37.63).