14:9 Sheol 1 below is stirred up about you,
ready to meet you when you arrive.
It rouses 2 the spirits of the dead for you,
all the former leaders of the earth; 3
it makes all the former kings of the nations
rise from their thrones. 4
51:6 Look up at the sky!
Look at the earth below!
For the sky will dissipate 5 like smoke,
and the earth will wear out like clothes;
its residents will die like gnats.
But the deliverance I give 6 is permanent;
the vindication I provide 7 will not disappear. 8
1 sn Sheol is the proper name of the subterranean world which was regarded as the land of the dead.
2 tn Heb “arousing.” The form is probably a Polel infinitive absolute, rather than a third masculine singular perfect, for Sheol is grammatically feminine (note “stirred up”). See GKC 466 §145.t.
3 tn Heb “all the rams of the earth.” The animal epithet is used metaphorically here for leaders. See HALOT 903 s.v. *עַתּוּד.
4 tn Heb “lifting from their thrones all the kings of the nations.” הֵקִים (heqim, a Hiphil perfect third masculine singular) should be emended to an infinitive absolute (הָקֵים, haqem). See the note on “rouses” earlier in the verse.
5 tn Heb “will be torn in pieces.” The perfect indicates the certitude of the event, from the Lord’s rhetorical perspective.
6 tn Heb “my deliverance.” The same Hebrew word can also be translated “salvation” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT); cf. CEV “victory.”
7 tn Heb “my righteousness [or “vindication”].”
8 tn Heb “will not be shattered [or “dismayed”].”