Isaiah 65-66 - Indepthbible.org

3665:7 your iniquities,34 35and I will repay into their lap--and your fathers’ iniquities together-- 3734The Massoretic Text reads a double occurrence: yTiÞm.L;viw> yTim.L;êvi, “I repaid and I willrepay.” The second verb is omitted by the Greek translation, the Harclean Syriac and the Arabictranslation. The second verb may have been omitted by homoteleuton (same endings), and wedisagree with D. Winton Thomas’ (editor of Isaiah in the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia) decisionto delete the verb on the basis of this slight textual evidence. We think the repeated verb is aHebrew way of making the statement (doubly) emphatic.Could this double occurrence of the verb mean “I repaid such actions in the past, and I willrepay them again in the present and future”? If so, it warns, “Let not the present generation supposethey can escape the punishment that I sent upon their fathers.”35This phrase ~q")yxe-l[;, “into (or ‘upon’) their lap,” means that the repayment will comedirectly to them, “into their arms,” striking them “in their heart.” Watts translates by “Yes, I willrepay on their bodies.” (P. 339) Compare the similar statement in the very next verse 7; andsee:Jeremiah 32:18, “You bring the punishment for the fathers’ missings-of-the-mark into the laps oftheir children after them”;Psalm 79:12, “Pay back into the laps of our neighbors seven times the reproach they have hurledat You, YHWH!”36 ndInstead of the 2 person plural suffix of the Hebrew text, “your iniquities,” both the Greekrdand Syriac translations read the 3 person plural suffix, “their iniquities.”37For this combination of ~k,ÛyteAba] tnO“wO[]w: ~k,ytenOwO[], “your iniquities (or ‘guilts’) andiniquities (or ‘guilts’) of your fathers,” see the following passages from the Hebrew Bible:Exodus 34:7, “...He (YHWH) punishes the children and their children for the !wOæ[], iniquity of thefathers to the third and fourth generation”;Leviticus 26:39, 40, “Those of you who are left will waste away in the lands of their enemiesbecause of their iniquities; also because of their fathers’ iniquities they will waste away.But if they will confess their iniquities and the iniquities of their fathers...”Numbers 14:18, “He (YHWH) punishes the children for the iniquity of the fathers to the third andfourth generation.”Numbers 18:1, “YHWH said to Aaron, ‘You, your sons and your father’s family are to bear theresponsibility for offenses against the sanctuary...”Isaiah 65:7 (here), (“(I will repay into their laps) both your iniquities and the iniquities of yourfathers,’ says YHWH”)44(continued...)