4:9 “I destroyed your crops 1 with blight and disease.
Locusts kept 2 devouring your orchards, 3 vineyards, fig trees, and olive trees.
Still you did not come back to me.”
The Lord is speaking!
5:12 Certainly 4 I am aware of 5 your many rebellious acts 6
and your numerous sins.
You 7 torment the innocent, you take bribes,
and you deny justice to 8 the needy at the city gate. 9
1 tn Heb “you.” By metonymy the crops belonging to these people are meant. See the remainder of this verse, which describes the agricultural devastation caused by locusts.
2 tn The Hiphil infinitive construct is taken adverbially (“kept”) and connected to the activity of the locusts (NJPS). It also could be taken with the preceding sentence and related to the Lord’s interventions (“I kept destroying,” cf. NEB, NJB, NIV, NRSV), or it could be understood substantivally in construct with the following nouns (“Locusts devoured your many orchards,” cf. NASB; cf. also KJV, NKJV).
3 tn Or “gardens.”
4 tn Or “for.”
5 tn Or “I know” (so most English versions).
6 tn Or “transgressions,” “sins.” See the note on the word “crimes” in 1:3 and on the phrase “covenant violations” in 2:4.
7 tn Heb “Those who.”
8 tn Heb “turn aside.” They “turn aside” the needy by denying them the justice they deserve at the city gate (where legal decisions were made, and therefore where justice should be done).
9 sn Legal disputes were resolved in the city gate, where the town elders met.