Yeremia 22:22

22:22 My judgment will carry off all your leaders like a storm wind! ¹ 

Your allies will go into captivity.

Then you will certainly ²  be disgraced and put to shame

because of all the wickedness you have done.

Yeremia 30:14

30:14 All your allies have abandoned you. ³ 

They no longer have any concern for you.

For I have attacked you like an enemy would.

I have chastened you cruelly.

For your wickedness is so great

and your sin is so much. ⁴ 

Ratapan 1:19

ק (Qof)

1:19 I called for my lovers, ⁵ 

but they had deceived me.

My priests and my elders

perished in the city.

Truly they had ⁶  searched for food

to ⁷  keep themselves ⁸  alive. ⁹ 

Yehezkiel 16:33-34

16:33 All prostitutes receive payment, ¹⁰  but instead you give gifts to every one of your lovers. You bribe them to come to you from all around for your sexual favors! 16:34 You were different from other prostitutes ¹¹  because no one solicited you. When you gave payment and no payment was given to you, you became the opposite!

Hosea 8:9

The Willful Donkey and the Wanton Harlot

8:9 They have gone up to Assyria,

like a wild donkey that wanders off.

Ephraim has hired prostitutes as lovers. ¹² 

[22:22]  ¹ tn Heb “A wind will shepherd away all your shepherds.” The figures have all been interpreted in the translation for the sake of clarity. For the use of the word “wind” as a metaphor or simile for God’s judgment (using the enemy forces) see 4:11-12; 13:24; 18:17. For the use of the word “shepherd” to refer to rulers/leaders 2:8; 10:21; and 23:1-4. For the use of the word “shepherd away” in the sense of carry off/drive away see BDB 945 s.v. רָעָה 2.d and compare Job 20:26. There is an obvious wordplay involved in two different senses of the word “shepherd,” one referring to their leaders and one referring to the loss of those leaders by the wind driving them off. There may even be a further play involving the word “wickedness” which comes from a word having the same consonants. If the oracles in this section are chronologically ordered this threat was fulfilled in 597 b.c. when many of the royal officials and nobles were carried away captive with Jehoiachin (see 2 Kgs 24:15) who is the subject of the next oracle.

[22:22]  ² tn The use of the Hebrew particle כִּי (ki) is intensive here and probably also at the beginning of the last line of v. 21. (See BDB 472 s.v. כִּי 1.e.)

[30:14]  ³ tn Heb “forgotten you.”

[30:14]  ⁴ tn Heb “attacked you like…with the chastening of a cruel one because of the greatness of your iniquity [and because] your sins are many.” The sentence has been broken down to conform to contemporary English style and better poetic scansion.

[1:19]  ⁵ sn The term “lovers” is a figurative expression (hypocatastasis), comparing Jerusalem’s false gods and political alliance with Assyria to a woman’s immoral lovers. The prophet Hosea uses similar imagery (Hos 2:5, 7, 10, 13).

[1:19]  ⁶ tn Here the conjunction כּי (ki) functions in (1) a temporal sense in reference to a past event, following a perfect: “when” (BDB 473 s.v. 2.a; cf. KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV) or (2) a concessive sense, following a perfect: “although” (Pss 21:12; 119:83; Mic 7:8; Nah 1:10; cf. BDB 473 s.v. 2.c.β) or (3) with an intensive force, introducing a statement with emphasis: “surely, certainly” (BDB 472 s.v. 1.e). The present translation follows the third option.

[1:19]  ⁷ tn The vav (ו) prefixed to וַיָשִׁיבוּ (vayashivu) introduces a purpose clause: “they sought food for themselves, in order to keep themselves alive.”

[1:19]  ⁸ tn The noun נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh) functions as a metonymy (= soul) of association (= life) (e.g., Gen 44:30; Exod 21:23; 2 Sam 14:7; Jon 1:14). When used with נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh), the Hiphil הָשִׁיב (hashiv) of שׁוּב (shuv, “to turn, return”) may mean “to preserve a person’s life,” that is, to keep a person alive (Lam 1:14, 19).

[1:19]  ⁹ tc The LXX adds καὶ οὐχ εὗρον (kai ouc Jeuron, “but they did not find it”). This is probably an explanatory scribal gloss, indicated to explicate what appeared to be ambiguous. The LXX often adds explanatory glosses in many OT books.

[16:33]  ¹⁰ tn The Hebrew word occurs only here in the OT.

[16:34]  ¹¹ tn Heb “With you it was opposite of women in your prostitution.”

[8:9]  ¹² tn Or “has hired herself out to lovers”; cf. NIV “has sold herself to lovers.”