Genesis 19:17

19:17 When they had brought them outside, they ¹  said, “Run ²  for your lives! Don’t look ³  behind you or stop anywhere in the valley! ⁴  Escape to the mountains or you will be destroyed!”

Genesis 19:24-25

19:24 Then the Lord rained down ⁵  sulfur and fire ⁶  on Sodom and Gomorrah. It was sent down from the sky by the Lord. ⁷  19:25 So he overthrew those cities and all that region, ⁸  including all the inhabitants of the cities and the vegetation that grew ⁹  from the ground.

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¹ tn Or “one of them”; Heb “he.” Several ancient versions (LXX, Vulgate, Syriac) read the plural “they.” See also the note on “your” in v. 19.

² tn Heb “escape.”

³ tn The Hebrew verb translated “look” signifies an intense gaze, not a passing glance. This same verb is used later in v. 26 to describe Lot’s wife’s self-destructive look back at the city.

⁴ tn Or “in the plain”; Heb “in the circle,” referring to the “circle” or oval area of the Jordan Valley.

⁵ tn The disjunctive clause signals the beginning of the next scene and highlights God’s action.

⁶ tn Or “burning sulfur” (the traditional “fire and brimstone”).

⁷ tn Heb “from the Lord from the heavens.” The words “It was sent down” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.

sn The text explicitly states that the sulfur and fire that fell on Sodom and Gomorrah was sent down from the sky by the Lord. What exactly this was, and how it happened, can only be left to intelligent speculation, but see J. P. Harland, “The Destruction of the Cities of the Plain,” BA 6 (1943): 41-54.

⁸ tn Or “and all the plain”; Heb “and all the circle,” referring to the “circle” or oval area of the Jordan Valley.

⁹ tn Heb “and the vegetation of the ground.”