26:19 1 Your dead will come back to life;
your corpses will rise up.
Wake up and shout joyfully, you who live in the ground! 2
For you will grow like plants drenched with the morning dew, 3
and the earth will bring forth its dead spirits. 4
50:2 Why does no one challenge me when I come?
Why does no one respond when I call? 5
Is my hand too weak 6 to deliver 7 you?
Do I lack the power to rescue you?
Look, with a mere shout 8 I can dry up the sea;
I can turn streams into a desert,
so the fish rot away and die
from lack of water. 9
54:9 “As far as I am concerned, this is like in Noah’s time, 10
when I vowed that the waters of Noah’s flood 11 would never again cover the earth.
In the same way I have vowed that I will not be angry at you or shout at you.
1 sn At this point the Lord (or prophet) gives the people an encouraging oracle.
2 tn Heb “dust” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV).
3 tn Heb “for the dew of lights [is] your dew.” The pronominal suffix on “dew” is masculine singular, like the suffixes on “your dead” and “your corpses” in the first half of the verse. The statement, then, is addressed to collective Israel, the speaker in verse 18. The plural form אוֹרֹת (’orot) is probably a plural of respect or magnitude, meaning “bright light” (i.e., morning’s light). Dew is a symbol of fertility and life. Here Israel’s “dew,” as it were, will soak the dust of the ground and cause the corpses of the dead to spring up to new life, like plants sprouting up from well-watered soil.
4 sn It is not certain whether the resurrection envisioned here is intended to be literal or figurative. A comparison with 25:8 and Dan 12:2 suggests a literal interpretation, but Ezek 37:1-14 uses resurrection as a metaphor for deliverance from exile and the restoration of the nation (see Isa 27:12-13).
5 sn The present tense translation of the verbs assumes that the Lord is questioning why Israel does not attempt to counter his arguments. Another possibility is to take the verbs as referring to past events: “Why did no one meet me when I came? Why did no one answer when I called?” In this case the Lord might be asking why Israel rejected his calls to repent and his offer to deliver them.
6 tn Heb “short” (so NAB, NASB, NIV).
7 tn Or “ransom” (NAB, NASB, NIV).
8 tn Heb “with my rebuke.”
9 tn Heb “the fish stink from lack of water and die from thirst.”
10 tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “For [or “indeed”] the waters of Noah [is] this to me.” כִּי־מֵי (ki-me, “for the waters of”) should be emended to כְּמֵי (kÿmey, “like the days of”), which is supported by the Qumran scroll 1QIsaa and all the ancient versions except LXX.
11 tn Heb “the waters of Noah” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).