16:4 Please let the Moabite fugitives live 1 among you.
Hide them 2 from the destroyer!”
Certainly 3 the one who applies pressure will cease, 4
the destroyer will come to an end,
those who trample will disappear 5 from the earth.
21:2 I have received a distressing message: 6
“The deceiver deceives,
the destroyer destroys.
Attack, you Elamites!
Lay siege, you Medes!
I will put an end to all the groaning!” 7
54:16 Look, I create the craftsman,
who fans the coals into a fire
and forges a weapon. 8
I create the destroyer so he might devastate.
1 tn That is, “live as resident foreigners.”
2 tn Heb “Be a hiding place for them.”
3 tn The present translation understands כִּי (ki) as asseverative, but one could take it as explanatory (“for,” KJV, NASB) or temporal (“when,” NAB, NRSV). In the latter case, v. 4b would be logically connected to v. 5.
4 tn A perfect verbal form is used here and in the next two lines for rhetorical effect; the demise of the oppressor(s) is described as if it had already occurred.
5 tc The Hebrew text has, “they will be finished, the one who tramples, from the earth.” The plural verb form תַּמּוּ, (tammu, “disappear”) could be emended to agree with the singular subject רֹמֵס (romes, “the one who tramples”) or the participle can be emended to a plural (רֹמֵסִם, romesim) to agree with the verb. The translation assumes the latter. Haplography of mem (ם) seems likely; note that the word after רֹמֵס begins with a mem.
6 tn Heb “a severe revelation has been related to me.”
7 sn This is often interpreted to mean “all the groaning” that Babylon has caused others.
8 tn Heb “who brings out an implement for his work.”