¹ tn Or “has hired herself out to lovers”; cf. NIV “has sold herself to lovers.”

³ tn Heb “But you have played the prostitute with many lovers.”

¹ tn Heb “How is your beloved [better] than [another] lover?”

¹ tn Heb “great peace [is] to the lovers of your law.”

³ tn Heb “for a lover of the ground he [was].”

² tn Or “I belong to my beloved, and my lover belongs to me.” Alternately, “I am devoted to my beloved, and my lover is devoted to me.”

¹ tn Or “they have hired themselves out to lovers”; cf. NASB “they hire allies among the nations.”

⁵ tn Heb “love a woman who is loved of a lover and is an adulteress.”

¹ sn The term “lovers” is a figurative expression (hypocatastasis), comparing Jerusalem’s false gods and political alliance with Assyria to a woman’s immoral lovers. The prophet Hosea uses similar imagery (Hos 2:5, 7, 10, 13).

¹ tn Heb “according to custom toward the lovers of your name.” The “lovers of” God’s “name” are the Lord’s loyal followers. See Pss 5:11; 69:36; Isa 56:6.

¹ tn Heb “I gave her into the hand of her lovers, into the hand of the sons of Assyria.”

⁸ tn Heb “they are lovers of cakes of raisins.” A number of English translations render this literally (e.g., ASV, NAB, NASB, NRSV).

³ tn Heb “your lovers.” For the use of this term to refer to allies, see 30:14 and a semantically similar term in 4:30.

³ tn Heb “You sat for them [the lovers, i.e., the foreign gods] beside the road like an Arab in the desert.”

³ tn The imperative הַשְׁמִיעִינִי (hashmiʿini) functions as a request. The lover asks his beloved to let him hear her beautiful voice (e.g., Song 2:14).

² tn Heb “lovers.” The term “lovers” is a figurative expression (hypocatastasis), comparing Jerusalem’s false gods and foreign political alliances to sexually immoral lovers. Hosea uses similar imagery (Hos 2:5, 7, 10, 13). It may also function as a double entendre, first evoking a disconcerting picture of a funeral where the widow has no loved ones present to comfort her. God also does not appear to be present to comfort Jerusalem and will later be called her enemy. The imagery in Lamentations frequently capitalizes on changing the reader’s expectations midstream.

³ sn Scholars offer three interpretations of her figurative request: (1) The Beloved desires her Lover to embrace her breasts, like a gazelle romping over mountains (mountains are figurative); (2) The Beloved entreats her Lover to leave and go back over the hills from whence he had journeyed (mountains are literal); and (3) As her Lover prepares to leave her country village, the Beloved asks him to return to her again in the same way he arrived, like a gazelle bounding over the mountains in 2:8-10 (mountains are literal).

² tn Or “self-centered.” The first two traits in 2 Tim 3:2 and the last two in 3:4 are Greek words beginning with the root “lovers of,” and so bracket the list at beginning and end.

⁴ tn The meaning of the noun רֵעַ (reaʿ) is debated because it has a broad range of meanings: (1) “friend,” (2) “lover,” (3) “companion,” (4) “neighbor,” and (5) “another” (HALOT 1253-55 s.v. II רֵעַ; BDB 945-46 s.v. II רֵעַ). The Hebrew lexicons favor the nuance “lover; paramour” here (HALOT 1255 s.v. 2; BDB 946 s.v. 1). Most scholars adopt the same approach; however, a few suggest that רֵעַ does not refer to another man, but to her husband (Hosea). Both approaches are reflected in English translations. NASB has “a woman who is loved by her husband”; NIV, “though she is loved by another”; NAB, “a woman beloved of a paramour”; KJV, “a woman beloved of her friend”; NJPS, “a woman who, while befriended by a companion”; TEV, “a woman who is committing adultery with a lover”; and CEV, “an unfaithful woman who has a lover.”

³ sn The severe action is more extreme than beating the breasts in anguish (Isa 32:12; Nah 2:7). It is also ironic, for these are the very breasts she so blatantly offered to her lovers (vv. 3, 21).