Yesaya 14:9

14:9 Sheol ¹  below is stirred up about you,

ready to meet you when you arrive.

It rouses ²  the spirits of the dead for you,

all the former leaders of the earth; ³ 

it makes all the former kings of the nations

rise from their thrones. ⁴ 

Yesaya 14:21

14:21 Prepare to execute ⁵  his sons

for the sins their ancestors have committed. ⁶ 

They must not rise up and take possession of the earth,

or fill the surface of the world with cities.” ⁷ 

Yesaya 40:12

The Lord is Incomparable

40:12 Who has measured out the waters ⁸  in the hollow of his hand,

or carefully ⁹  measured the sky, ¹⁰ 

or carefully weighed ¹¹  the soil of the earth,

or weighed the mountains in a balance,

or the hills on scales? ¹² 

Yesaya 54:5

54:5 For your husband is the one who made you –

the Lord who commands armies is his name.

He is your protector, ¹³  the Holy One of Israel. ¹⁴ 

He is called “God of the entire earth.”

[14:9]  ¹ sn Sheol is the proper name of the subterranean world which was regarded as the land of the dead.

[14:9]  ² tn Heb “arousing.” The form is probably a Polel infinitive absolute, rather than a third masculine singular perfect, for Sheol is grammatically feminine (note “stirred up”). See GKC 466 §145.t.

[14:9]  ³ tn Heb “all the rams of the earth.” The animal epithet is used metaphorically here for leaders. See HALOT 903 s.v. *עַתּוּד.

[14:9]  ⁴ tn Heb “lifting from their thrones all the kings of the nations.” הֵקִים (heqim, a Hiphil perfect third masculine singular) should be emended to an infinitive absolute (הָקֵים, haqem). See the note on “rouses” earlier in the verse.

[14:21]  ⁵ tn Or “the place of slaughter for.”

[14:21]  ⁶ tn Heb “for the sin of their fathers.”

[14:21]  ⁷ sn J. N. Oswalt (Isaiah [NICOT], 1:320, n. 10) suggests that the garrison cities of the mighty empire are in view here.

[40:12]  ⁸ tn The Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a has מי ים (“waters of the sea”), a reading followed by NAB.

[40:12]  ⁹ tn Heb “with a span.” A “span” was the distance between the ends of the thumb and the little finger of the spread hand” (BDB 285 s.v. זֶרֶת).

[40:12]  ¹⁰ tn Or “the heavens.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heavens” or “sky” depending on the context.

[40:12]  ¹¹ tn Heb “or weighed by a third part [of a measure].”

[40:12]  ¹² sn The implied answer to the rhetorical questions of v. 12 is “no one but the Lord. The Lord, and no other, created the world. Like a merchant weighing out silver or commodities on a scale, the Lord established the various components of the physical universe in precise proportions.

[54:5]  ¹³ tn Or “redeemer.” See the note at 41:14.

[54:5]  ¹⁴ sn See the note on the phrase “the Holy One of Israel” in 1:4.