Isaiah 32:12

Mourn over the field, ¹  over the delightful fields and the fruitful vine!

Beat your breasts for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vines

Beat your breasts for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine,

Beat your breasts in sorrow for your bountiful farms that will soon be gone, and for those fruitful vines of other years.

Shed honest tears for the lost harvest, the failed vintage.

Have sorrow for the fields, the pleasing fields, the fertile vine;

Beat your breasts for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine,

People shall mourn upon their breasts For the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine.

Mourn over the field, ¹  over the delightful fields and the fruitful vine!

¹ tc The Hebrew text has “over mourning breasts.” The reference to “breasts” would make sense in light of v. 11, which refers to the practice of women baring their breasts as a sign of sorrow (see J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah [NICOT], 1:585). However, one expects the preposition עַל (’al) to introduce the source or reason for mourning (see vv. 12b-13a) and the participle סֹפְדִים (sofedim, “mourning”) seems odd modifying “breasts.” The translation above assumes a twofold emendation: (1) שָׁדַיִם (shadayim, “breasts”) is emended to [ם]שָׂדַי (saday[m], “field,” a term that also appears in Isa 56:9). The final mem (ם) would be enclitic in this case, not a plural indicator. (The Hebrew noun שָׂדֶה (sadeh, “field”) forms its plural with an וֹת- [-ot] ending). (2) The plural participle סֹפְדִים is emended to סְפֹדָה (sÿfodah), a lengthened imperatival form, meaning “mourn.” For an overview of various suggestions that have been made for this difficult line, see Oswalt, 586, n. 12).