Yesaya 1:4

1:4 ¹ The sinful nation is as good as dead, ² 

the people weighed down by evil deeds.

They are offspring who do wrong,

children ³  who do wicked things.

They have abandoned the Lord,

and rejected the Holy One of Israel. ⁴ 

They are alienated from him. ⁵ 

Yesaya 2:3

2:3 many peoples will come and say,

“Come, let us go up to the Lord’s mountain,

to the temple of the God of Jacob,

so ⁶  he can teach us his requirements, ⁷ 

and ⁸  we can follow his standards.” ⁹ 

For Zion will be the center for moral instruction; ¹⁰ 

the Lord will issue edicts from Jerusalem. ¹¹ 

Yesaya 6:13

6:13 Even if only a tenth of the people remain in the land, it will again be destroyed, ¹²  like one of the large sacred trees ¹³  or an Asherah pole, when a sacred pillar on a high place is thrown down. ¹⁴  That sacred pillar symbolizes the special chosen family.” ¹⁵ 

Yesaya 7:4

7:4 Tell him, ‘Make sure you stay calm! ¹⁶  Don’t be afraid! Don’t be intimidated ¹⁷  by these two stubs of smoking logs, ¹⁸  or by the raging anger of Rezin, Syria, and the son of Remaliah.

Yesaya 19:3

19:3 The Egyptians will panic, ¹⁹ 

and I will confuse their strategy. ²⁰ 

They will seek guidance from the idols and from the spirits of the dead,

from the pits used to conjure up underworld spirits, and from the magicians. ²¹ 

Yesaya 30:16

30:16 You say, ‘No, we will flee on horses,’

so you will indeed flee.

You say, ‘We will ride on fast horses,’

so your pursuers will be fast.

Yesaya 36:7

36:7 Perhaps you will tell me, ‘We are trusting in the Lord our God.’ But Hezekiah is the one who eliminated his high places and altars and then told the people of Judah and Jerusalem, ‘You must worship at this altar.’

Yesaya 42:22

42:22 But these people are looted and plundered;

all of them are trapped in pits ²² 

and held captive ²³  in prisons.

They were carried away as loot with no one to rescue them;

they were carried away as plunder, and no one says, “Bring that back!” ²⁴ 

Yesaya 48:16

48:16 Approach me! Listen to this!

From the very first I have not spoken in secret;

when it happens, ²⁵  I am there.”

So now, the sovereign Lord has sent me, accompanied by his spirit. ²⁶ 

Yesaya 50:4

The Servant Perseveres

50:4 The sovereign Lord has given me the capacity to be his spokesman, ²⁷ 

so that I know how to help the weary. ²⁸ 

He wakes me up every morning;

he makes me alert so I can listen attentively as disciples do. ²⁹ 

Yesaya 58:9

58:9 Then you will call out, and the Lord will respond;

you will cry out, and he will reply, ‘Here I am.’

You must ³⁰  remove the burdensome yoke from among you

and stop pointing fingers and speaking sinfully.

Yesaya 58:13

58:13 You must ³¹  observe the Sabbath ³² 

rather than doing anything you please on my holy day. ³³ 

You must look forward to the Sabbath ³⁴ 

and treat the Lord’s holy day with respect. ³⁵ 

You must treat it with respect by refraining from your normal activities,

and by refraining from your selfish pursuits and from making business deals. ³⁶ 

[1:4]  ¹ sn Having summoned the witnesses and announced the Lord’s accusation against Israel, Isaiah mourns the nation’s impending doom. The third person references to the Lord in the second half of the verse suggest that the quotation from the Lord (cf. vv. 2-3) has concluded.

[1:4]  ² tn Heb “Woe [to the] sinful nation.” The Hebrew term הוֹי, (hoy, “woe, ah”) was used in funeral laments (see 1 Kgs 13:30; Jer 22:18; 34:5) and carries the connotation of death. In highly dramatic fashion the prophet acts out Israel’s funeral in advance, emphasizing that their demise is inevitable if they do not repent soon.

[1:4]  ³ tn Or “sons” (NASB). The prophet contrasts four terms of privilege – nation, people, offspring, children – with four terms that depict Israel’s sinful condition in Isaiah’s day – sinful, evil, wrong, wicked (see J. A. Motyer, The Prophecy of Isaiah, 43).

[1:4]  ⁴ sn Holy One of Israel is one of Isaiah’s favorite divine titles for God. It pictures the Lord as the sovereign king who rules over his covenant people and exercises moral authority over them.

[1:4]  ⁵ tn Heb “they are estranged backward.” The LXX omits this statement, which presents syntactical problems and seems to be outside the synonymous parallelistic structure of the verse.

[2:3]  ⁶ tn The prefixed verb form with simple vav (ו) introduces a purpose/result clause after the preceding prefixed verb form (probably to be taken as a cohortative; see IBHS 650 §39.2.2a).

[2:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “his ways.” In this context God’s “ways” are the standards of moral conduct he decrees that people should live by.

[2:3]  ⁸ tn The cohortative with vav (ו) after the prefixed verb form indicates the ultimate purpose/goal of their action.

[2:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “walk in his ways.”

[2:3]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “for out of Zion will go instruction.”

[2:3]  ¹¹ tn Heb “the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.”

[6:13]  ¹² tn Or “be burned” (NRSV); NIV “laid waste.”

[6:13]  ¹³ tn Heb “like a massive tree or like a big tree” (perhaps, “like a terebinth or like an oak”).

[6:13]  ¹⁴ tn The Hebrew text has “which in the felling, a sacred pillar in them.” Some take מַצֶּבֶת (matsevet) as “stump,” and translate, “which, when chopped down, have a stump remaining in them.” But elsewhere מַצֶּבֶת refers to a memorial pillar (2 Sam 18:18) and the word resembles מַצֶּבָה (matsevah, “sacred pillar”). בָּם (bam, “in them”) may be a corruption of בָּמָה (bamah, “high place”; the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a has במה). אֳשֶׁר (’asher, “which”) becomes a problem in this case, but one might emend the form to וּכְּאֲשֵׁרָה (ukÿ’asherah, “or like an Asherah pole”) and translate, “like one of the large sacred trees or an Asherah pole.” Though the text is difficult, the references to sacred trees and a sacred pillar suggest that the destruction of a high place is in view, an apt metaphor for the judgment of idolatrous Judah.

[6:13]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “a holy offspring [is] its sacred pillar.” If מַצֶּבֶת (matsevet) is taken as “stump,” one can see in this statement a brief glimpse of hope. The tree (the nation) is chopped down, but the stump (a righteous remnant) remains from which God can restore the nation. However, if מַצֶּבֶת is taken as “sacred pillar” (מַצֶּבָה, matsevah; see the previous note), it is much more difficult to take the final statement in a positive sense. In this case “holy offspring” alludes to God’s ideal for his covenant people, the offspring of the patriarchs. Ironically that “holy” nation is more like a “sacred pillar” and it will be thrown down like a sacred pillar from a high place and its land destroyed like the sacred trees located at such shrines. Understood in this way, the ironic statement is entirely negative in tone, just like the rest of the preceding announcement of judgment. It also reminds the people of their failure; they did not oppose pagan religion, instead they embraced it. Now they will be destroyed in the same way they should have destroyed paganism.

[7:4]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “guard yourself and be quiet,” but the two verbs should be coordinated.

[7:4]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “and let not your heart be weak”; ASV “neither let thy heart be faint.”

[7:4]  ¹⁸ sn The derogatory metaphor indicates that the power of Rezin and Pekah is ready to die out.

[19:3]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “and the spirit of Egypt will be laid waste in its midst.”

[19:3]  ²⁰ tn The verb בָּלַע (bala’, “confuse”) is a homonym of the more common בָּלַע (bala’, “swallow”); see HALOT 135 s.v. I בלע.

[19:3]  ²¹ tn Heb “they will inquire of the idols and of the spirits of the dead and of the ritual pits and of the magicians.” Hebrew אוֹב (’ov, “ritual pit”) refers to a pit used by a magician to conjure up underworld spirits. See the note on “incantations” in 8:19.

[42:22]  ²² tc The Hebrew text has בַּחוּרִים (bakhurim, “young men”), but the text should be emended to בְּהוֹרִים (bÿhorim, “in holes”).

[42:22]  ²³ tn Heb “and made to be hidden”; NAB, NASB, NIV, TEV “hidden away in prisons.”

[42:22]  ²⁴ tn Heb “they became loot and there was no one rescuing, plunder and there was no one saying, ‘Bring back’.”

[48:16]  ²⁵ tn Heb “from the time of its occurring.”

[48:16]  ²⁶ sn The speaker here is not identified specifically, but he is probably Cyrus, the Lord’s “ally” mentioned in vv. 14-15.

[50:4]  ²⁷ tn Heb “has given to me a tongue of disciples.”

[50:4]  sn Verses 4-11 contain the third of the so-called servant songs, which depict the career of the Lord’s special servant, envisioned as an ideal Israel (49:3) who rescues the exiles and fulfills God’s purposes for the world. Here the servant alludes to opposition (something hinted at in 49:4), but also expresses his determination to persevere with the Lord’s help.

[50:4]  ²⁸ tc Heb “to know [?] the weary with a word.” Comparing it with Arabic and Aramaic cognates yields the meaning of “help, sustain.” Nevertheless, the meaning of עוּת (’ut) is uncertain. The word occurs only here in the OT (see BDB 736 s.v.). Various scholars have suggested an emendation to עָנוֹת (’anot) from עָנָה (’anah, “answer”): “so that I know how to respond kindly to the weary.” Since the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a and the Vulgate support the MT reading, that reading is retained.

[50:4]  ²⁹ tn Heb “he arouses for me an ear, to hear like disciples.”

[58:9]  ³⁰ tn Heb “if you.” In the Hebrew text vv. 9b-10 are one long conditional sentence. The protasis (“if” clauses appear in vv. 9b-10a), with the apodosis (“then” clause) appearing in v. 10b.

[58:13]  ³¹ tn Lit., “if you.” In the Hebrew text vv. 13-14 are one long conditional sentence. The protasis (“if” clauses appear in v. 13), with the apodosis (“then” clause) appearing in v. 14.

[58:13]  ³² tn Heb “if you turn from the Sabbath your feet.”

[58:13]  ³³ tn Heb “[from] doing your desires on my holy day.” The Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a supplies the preposition מִן (min) on “doing.”

[58:13]  ³⁴ tn Heb “and call the Sabbath a pleasure”; KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV “a delight.”

[58:13]  ³⁵ tn Heb “and [call] the holy [day] of the Lord honored.” On קָדוֹשׁ (qadosh, “holy”) as indicating a time period, see BDB 872 s.v. 2.e (cf. also Neh 8:9-11).

[58:13]  ³⁶ tn Heb “and you honor it [by refraining] from accomplishing your ways, from finding your desire and speaking a word.” It is unlikely that the last phrase (“speaking a word”) is a prohibition against talking on the Sabbath; instead it probably refers to making transactions or plans (see Hos 10:4). Some see here a reference to idle talk (cf. 2 Sam 19:30).