9:9 He said to me, “The sin of the house of Israel and Judah is extremely great; the land is full of murder, and the city is full of corruption, 1 for they say, ‘The Lord has abandoned the land, and the Lord does not see!’ 2
“‘Look, I am against 3 you, Pharaoh king of Egypt,
the great monster 4 lying in the midst of its waterways,
who has said, “My Nile is my own, I made it for myself.” 5
39:17 “As for you, son of man, this is what the sovereign Lord says: Tell every kind of bird and every wild beast: ‘Assemble and come! Gather from all around to my slaughter 8 which I am going to make for you, a great slaughter on the mountains of Israel! You will eat flesh and drink blood.
1 tn Or “lawlessness” (NAB); “perversity” (NRSV). The Hebrew word occurs only here in the OT, and its meaning is uncertain. The similar phrase in 7:23 has a common word for “violence.”
2 sn The saying is virtually identical to that of the elders in Ezek 8:12.
3 tn Or “I challenge you.” The phrase “I am against you” may be a formula for challenging someone to combat or a duel. See D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 1:201-2, and P. Humbert, “Die Herausforderungsformel ‘h!nn#n' ?l?K>,’” ZAW 45 (1933): 101-8.
4 tn Heb “jackals,” but many medieval Hebrew
5 sn In Egyptian theology Pharaoh owned and controlled the Nile. See J. D. Currid, Ancient Egypt and the Old Testament, 240-44.
6 tn Or “sanctify,” Heb “make holy.”
7 tn Heb “young lions.”
8 tn Or “sacrifice” (so also in the rest of this verse).