27:5 They crafted 2 all your planks out of fir trees from Senir; 3
they took a cedar from Lebanon to make your mast.
31:5 Therefore it grew taller than all the trees of the field;
its boughs grew large and its branches grew long,
because of the plentiful water in its shoots. 4
1 tn Most modern translations take the statement as a comparison (“how is vine wood better than any forest wood?”) based on the preposition מִן (min). But a comparison should have a word as an adjective or stative verb designating a quality, i.e., a word for “good/better” is lacking. The preposition is translated above in its partitive sense.
sn Comparing Israel to the wood of the vine may focus on Israel’s inferiority to the other nations. For the vine imagery in relation to Israel and the people of God, see Ps 80:8-13; John 15:1-7; Rom 11:17-22.
2 tn Heb “built.”
3 tn Perhaps the hull or deck. The term is dual, so perhaps it refers to a double-decked ship.
4 tn Heb “when it sends forth.” Repointing the consonants of the Masoretic text would render the proposed reading “shoots” (cf. NRSV).
5 tc The LXX reads “porches.”