Yesaya 38:15

38:15 What can I say?

He has decreed and acted. ¹ 

I will walk slowly all my years because I am overcome with grief. ² 

Yesaya 54:4

54:4 Don’t be afraid, for you will not be put to shame!

Don’t be intimidated, ³  for you will not be humiliated!

You will forget about the shame you experienced in your youth;

you will no longer remember the disgrace of your abandonment. ⁴ 

Yesaya 59:11

59:11 We all growl like bears,

we coo mournfully like doves;

we wait for deliverance, ⁵  but there is none,

for salvation, but it is far from us.

[38:15]  ¹ tn Heb “and he has spoken and he has acted.”

[38:15]  ² tn Heb “because of the bitterness of my soul.”

[54:4]  ³ tn Or “embarrassed”; NASB “humiliated…disgraced.”

[54:4]  ⁴ tn Another option is to translate, “the disgrace of our widowhood” (so NRSV). However, the following context (vv. 6-7) refers to Zion’s husband, the Lord, abandoning her, not dying. This suggests that an אַלְמָנָה (’almanah) was a woman who had lost her husband, whether by death or abandonment.

[59:11]  ⁵ tn See the note at v. 9.