Discovery BoxIsaiah 38:17-19 
Context38:17 “Look, the grief I experienced was for my benefit. 1
You delivered me 2 from the pit of oblivion. 3
For you removed all my sins from your sight. 4
38:18 Indeed 5 Sheol does not give you thanks;
death does not 6 praise you.
Those who descend into the pit do not anticipate your faithfulness.
38:19 The living person, the living person, he gives you thanks,
as I do today.
A father tells his sons about your faithfulness.
1 tn Heb “Look, for peace bitterness was to me bitter”; NAB “thus is my bitterness transformed into peace.”
2 tc The Hebrew text reads, “you loved my soul,” but this does not fit syntactically with the following prepositional phrase. חָשַׁקְתָּ (khashaqta, “you loved”), may reflect an aural error; most emend the form to חָשַׂכְת, (khasakht, “you held back”).
3 tn בְּלִי (bÿli) most often appears as a negation, meaning “without,” suggesting the meaning “nothingness, oblivion,” here. Some translate “decay” or “destruction.”
4 tn Heb “for you threw behind your back all my sins.”
5 tn Or “For” (KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).
6 tn The negative particle is understood by ellipsis in this line. See GKC 483 §152.z.
