Discovery BoxIsaiah 10:6 
Context10:6 I sent him 1 against a godless 2 nation,
I ordered him to attack the people with whom I was angry, 3
to take plunder and to carry away loot,
to trample them down 4 like dirt in the streets.
Isaiah 14:25
Context14:25 I will break Assyria 5 in my land,
I will trample them 6 underfoot on my hills.
Their yoke will be removed from my people,
the burden will be lifted from their shoulders. 7
Isaiah 16:4
Context16:4 Please let the Moabite fugitives live 8 among you.
Hide them 9 from the destroyer!”
Certainly 10 the one who applies pressure will cease, 11
the destroyer will come to an end,
those who trample will disappear 12 from the earth.
1 sn Throughout this section singular forms are used to refer to Assyria; perhaps the king of Assyria is in view (see v. 12).
2 tn Or “defiled”; cf. ASV “profane”; NAB “impious”; NCV “separated from God.”
3 tn Heb “and against the people of my anger I ordered him.”
4 tn Heb “to make it [i.e., the people] a trampled place.”
5 tn Heb “to break Assyria.”
6 tn Heb “him.” This is a collective singular referring to the nation, or a reference to the king of Assyria who by metonymy stands for the entire nation.
7 tn Heb “and his [i.e., Assyria’s] yoke will be removed from them [the people?], and his [Assyria’s] burden from his [the nation’s?] shoulder will be removed.” There are no antecedents in this oracle for the suffixes in the phrases “from them” and “from his shoulder.” Since the Lord’s land and hills are referred to in the preceding line and the statement seems to echo 10:27, it is likely that God’s people are the referents of the suffixes; the translation uses “my people” to indicate this.
8 tn That is, “live as resident foreigners.”
9 tn Heb “Be a hiding place for them.”
10 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.
11 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.
12 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.
