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.

Yesaya 17:14

17:14 In the evening there is sudden terror; ⁷ 

by morning they vanish. ⁸ 

This is the fate of those who try to plunder us,

the destiny of those who try to loot us! ⁹ 

Yesaya 24:16

24:16 From the ends of the earth we ¹⁰  hear songs –

the Just One is majestic. ¹¹ 

But I ¹²  say, “I’m wasting away! I’m wasting away! I’m doomed!

Deceivers deceive, deceivers thoroughly deceive!” ¹³ 

[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.”

[17:14]  ⁷ tn Heb “at the time of evening, look, sudden terror.”

[17:14]  ⁸ tn Heb “before morning he is not.”

[17:14]  ⁹ tn Heb “this is the portion of those who plunder us, and the lot of those who loot us.”

[24:16]  ¹⁰ sn The identity of the subject is unclear. Apparently in vv. 15-16a an unidentified group responds to the praise they hear in the west by exhorting others to participate.

[24:16]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Beauty belongs to the just one.” These words may summarize the main theme of the songs mentioned in the preceding line.

[24:16]  ¹² sn The prophet seems to contradict what he hears the group saying. Their words are premature because more destruction is coming.

[24:16]  ¹³ tn Heb “and [with] deception deceivers deceive.”

[24:16]  tn Verse 16b is a classic example of Hebrew wordplay. In the first line (“I’m wasting away…”) four consecutive words end with hireq yod ( ִי); in the second line all forms are derived from the root בָּגַד (bagad). The repetition of sound draws attention to the prophet’s lament.