Discovery BoxIsaiah 41:4-7 
Context41:4 Who acts and carries out decrees? 1
Who 2 summons the successive generations from the beginning?
I, the Lord, am present at the very beginning,
and at the very end – I am the one. 3
41:5 The coastlands 4 see and are afraid;
the whole earth 5 trembles;
they approach and come.
one says to the other, ‘Be strong!’
41:7 The craftsman encourages the metalsmith,
the one who wields the hammer encourages 7 the one who pounds on the anvil.
He approves the quality of the welding, 8
and nails it down so it won’t fall over.”
1 tn Heb “Who acts and accomplishes?”; NASB “Who has performed and accomplished it.”
2 tn The interrogative particle is understood by ellipsis (note the preceding line).
3 tn Heb “I, the Lord, [am with] the first, and with the last ones I [am] he.”
4 tn Or “islands” (NIV, CEV); NCV “faraway places”; NLT “lands beyond the sea.”
5 tn Heb “the ends of the earth,” but this is a merism, where the earth’s extremities stand for its entirety, i.e., the extremities and everything in between them.
6 tn Heb “each his neighbor helps”; NCV “The workers help each other.”
7 tn The verb “encourages” is understood by ellipsis (note the preceding line).
8 tn Heb “saying of the welding, ‘It is good.’”
