¹ tn Heb “my eye pitied.”

¹ tn Or perhaps “don’t take pity on” (cf. CEV).

³ tn Or “felt great affection for him,” “felt great pity for him.”

² tn Heb “my stomach churns for him.” The parallelism shows that this refers to pity or compassion.

⁴ tc The LXX adds, “Deceitful souls go astray in sins, but the righteous are pitiful and merciful.”

² tn Heb “and he does not pity,” but the clause is functioning adverbially in the line.

¹ tn The meaning of the Hebrew term is primarily emotional: “to pity,” which in context implies an action, as in being moved by pity in order to spare them from the horror of their punishment.

² tn The meaning of the Hebrew term is primarily emotional: “to pity,” which in context implies an action, as in being moved by pity in order to spare them from the horror of their punishment.

¹ tn The meaning of the Hebrew term is primarily emotional: “to pity,” which in context implies an action, as in being moved by pity in order to spare them from the horror of their punishment.

¹ tn The meaning of the Hebrew term is primarily emotional: “to pity,” which in context implies an action, as in being moved by pity in order to spare them from the horror of their punishment.

¹ tn The meaning of the Hebrew term is primarily emotional: “to pity,” which in context implies an action, as in being moved by pity in order to spare them from the horror of their punishment.

¹ tn The meaning of the Hebrew term is primarily emotional: “to pity,” which in context implies an action, as in being moved by pity in order to spare them from the horror of their punishment.

¹ tn Heb “it had pity,” apparently with the understood subject being “my eye,” in accordance with a common expression.

¹ sn These verbs, “pity” and “spare,” echo the judgment oracles in 5:11; 7:4, 9; 8:18; 9:5, 10.

¹ sn Psalm 39. The psalmist laments his frailty and mortality as he begs the Lord to take pity on him and remove his disciplinary hand.

² tn The word order in this line is rhetorical, emphasizing the divine decision to withhold pity from Israel but to bestow it on Judah. The accusative direct object, which is introduced by a disjunctive vav (to denote contrast), appears before the verb: וְאֶת־בֵּית יְהוּדָה אֲרַחֵם (v^eʾet bet y^ehudah ʾarakhem, “but upon the house of Judah I will show pity”).

² sn The negative particle לֹא (loʾ, “no, not”) and the root רָחַם (rakham, “compassion”) are repeated in 1:6, creating a wordplay between the name Lo-Ruhamah (literally “No-Pity”) and the announcement of divine judgment, “I will no longer have pity on the nation of Israel.”

¹ tn The words “of Judah” have been added to clarify the addressee, which is actually the people of Judah. There is no certain explanation for the triple repetition of the word “land” here. F. B. Huey (Jeremiah, Lamentations [NAC], 209) suggests the idea of exasperation, but is it exasperation at their continued apostasy, which made these exiles necessary, or at their pitiful hopes of seeing Jeconiah restored? Perhaps “pitiful, pitiful, pitiful land of Judah” would convey some of the force of the repetition. The triple address could be a highly emphatic way (cf. Isa 6:3; Ezek 21:27) to gain attention (cf. Gen 22:11; 46:2; Exod 3:4; 1 Sam 3:10).

¹ sn It is unclear who is being addressed in this verse. Perhaps the prophet, playing the role of a panic-stricken Moabite refugee, requests the leaders of Judah (the imperatives are plural) to take pity on the fugitives.

¹ tn There have been several attempts to emend the line, none of which are particularly helpful or interesting. H. H. Rowley (Job [NCBC], 225) says, “It is a pity to rob Elihu of a poetic line when he creates one.”