וְטִמֵּאתֶם אֶת־צִפּוּי פְּסִילֵי כַסְפֶּךָ וְאֶת־אֲפֻדַּת מַסֵּכַת זְהָבֶךָ תִּזְרֵם כְּמוֹ דָוָה צֵא תֹּאמַר לוֹ׃ And you will treat as unclean the silver overlay of your images and the golden plating of your idols. You will cast them away like a menstruous woman. “Out!” you will call to them. (JPS)NRSVUE:Then you will defile your silver-covered idols and…

JPS and NRSVUE give the sense of “startle” but note that the meaning is uncertain. This reading mainly depends on Arabic nāza “to leap” with the hifil having the meaning “cause to leap up” (which is not quite the same thing as startling, with the Arabic word lacking the emotional import of “startle”), with the…

But for more:Although some expected a victorious Davidic messiah (such as the author of the Psalms of Solomon), there were other notions such as a priestly messiah (such as at Qumran in 1QS 9:11, 4QFlorilegium, 4Q521, 11QMelch) or a heavenly messiah called the Son of Man who would sit on a heavenly throne and judge…

“Though you smote Litan the wriggling serpent (ltn.bṯn.brḥ), finished off the writhing serpent (bṯn.ʿqltn), Encircler with seven heads” (KTU 1.5 i 1-3; translation from Nick Wyatt’s Religious Texts From Ugarit) “On that day Yahweh with his cruel and great and strong sword will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent (lwytn nḥš brḥ), Leviathan the twisting serpent…

This is not about speech. In holiness contexts, that which is “profane” is that which is “ordinary” (Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55; vol II, pg 253). To profane something holy (literally “set apart”) is to desecrate it, to defile it—to treat as something not special For this verse in context, speaking to the Babylonians:I was angry with…

According to Richard Patterson, “Metaphors of Marriage as Expressions of Divine-Human Relations,” JETS 51/4 (Dec 2008), p. 691-698), “mother” is the ideal Israel of God’s intent in history past, whereas her “children” are the wayward present population God is judging.

After the elegant hope voiced in 65:17–25 as promise to the “seekers after Yahweh,” this complex chapter returns us to the disputatious life of emerging Judaism. Although the glorious vision of Yahweh’s coming future may have been powerful and comprehensive enough to gain the assent of all parties in the community, the concrete response to…

But also, In How to Read the Bible, Kugel suggests that the child may be a mere hypothetical:To begin with, it is unclear whether the first word of Isa. 7:14 is to be translated as “Behold,” “Look,” and the like, or (as I have done) “Suppose . . .” The latter is indeed sometimes a…

The passage is found in the so-called Fourth Servant Song (Is 52:13-53:12). The overall structure can be outlined as having two oracle-like statements pronounced by YHWH (Is 52:13-15; 53: 12, or better: 53:11aβ-12) framing a collective account of the deeds of the Servant (Is 53: 1-11, or better: Is 53:1-11aα); for an in-depth analysis of…

The easiest thing for me is that second Isaiah calls out Cyrus (the Persian king who conquered Babylon and allowed the Hebrew captives to return to Jerusalem) by name. Either Isaiah was factually a future-seer (which is not really what the ancient term “prophet” means), or that part was written by somebody over a century…