Ulangan 31:17

31:17 At that time ¹  my anger will erupt against them ²  and I will abandon them and hide my face from them until they are devoured. Many disasters and distresses will overcome ³  them ⁴  so that they ⁵  will say at that time, ‘Have not these disasters ⁶  overcome us ⁷  because our ⁸  God is not among us ⁹ ?’

Ulangan 32:19-22

A Word of Judgment

32:19 But the Lord took note and despised them

because his sons and daughters enraged him.

32:20 He said, “I will reject them, ¹⁰ 

I will see what will happen to them;

for they are a perverse generation,

children ¹¹  who show no loyalty.

32:21 They have made me jealous ¹²  with false gods, ¹³ 

enraging me with their worthless gods; ¹⁴ 

so I will make them jealous with a people they do not recognize, ¹⁵ 

with a nation slow to learn ¹⁶  I will enrage them.

32:22 For a fire has been kindled by my anger,

and it burns to lowest Sheol; ¹⁷ 

it consumes the earth and its produce,

and ignites the foundations of the mountains.

[31:17]  ¹ tn Heb “on that day.” This same expression also appears later in the verse and in v. 18.

[31:17]  ² tn Heb “him.” Smr, LXX, and the Targums read the plural “them.” See note on the first occurrence of “they” in v. 16.

[31:17]  ³ tn Heb “find,” “encounter.”

[31:17]  ⁴ tn Heb “him.” Smr, LXX, and the Targums read the plural “them.” See note on the first occurrence of “they” in v. 16.

[31:17]  ⁵ tn Heb “he.” Smr, LXX, and the Targums read the plural “they.” See note on the first occurrence of “they” in v. 16.

[31:17]  ⁶ tn Heb “evils.”

[31:17]  ⁷ tn Heb “me.” Smr, LXX, and the Targums read the plural “us,” which is necessary in any case in the translation because of contemporary English style.

[31:17]  ⁸ tn Heb “my.”

[31:17]  ⁹ tn Heb “me.” Smr, LXX, and the Targums read the plural “us,” which is necessary in any case in the translation because of contemporary English style.

[32:20]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “I will hide my face from them.”

[32:20]  ¹¹ tn Heb “sons” (so NAB, NASB); TEV “unfaithful people.”

[32:21]  ¹² sn They have made me jealous. The “jealousy” of God is not a spirit of pettiness prompted by his insecurity, but righteous indignation caused by the disloyalty of his people to his covenant grace (see note on the word “God” in Deut 4:24). The jealousy of Israel, however (see next line), will be envy because of God’s lavish attention to another nation. This is an ironic wordplay. See H. Peels, NIDOTTE 3:938-39.

[32:21]  ¹³ tn Heb “what is not a god,” or a “nondeity.”

[32:21]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “their empty (things).” The Hebrew term used here to refer pejoratively to the false gods is הֶבֶל (hevel, “futile” or “futility”), used frequently in Ecclesiastes (e.g., Eccl 1:1, “Futile! Futile!” laments the Teacher, “Absolutely futile! Everything is futile!”).

[32:21]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “what is not a people,” or a “nonpeople.” The “nonpeople” (לֹא־עָם, lo’-’am) referred to here are Gentiles who someday would become God’s people in the fullest sense (cf. Hos 1:9; 2:23).

[32:21]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “a foolish nation” (so KJV, NAB, NRSV); NIV “a nation that has no understanding”; NLT “I will provoke their fury by blessing the foolish Gentiles.”

[32:22]  ¹⁷ tn Or “to the lowest depths of the earth”; cf. NAB “to the depths of the nether world”; NIV “to the realm of death below”; NLT “to the depths of the grave.”

[32:22]  sn Sheol refers here not to hell and hell-fire – a much later concept – but to the innermost parts of the earth, as low down as one could get. The parallel with “the foundations of the mountains” makes this clear (cf. Pss 9:17; 16:10; 139:8; Isa 14:9, 15; Amos 9:2).