translation_id: net-engnet

label: NET translator note

text: For location see Map2-B1 ; Map4-D3 ; Map5-E2 ; Map6-A4 ; Map7-C1 .


text: Heb “in the eyes of.”


text: Heb “went up against.”


text: Heb “and the king of Assyria found in Hoshea conspiracy.”


text: Heb “and bound him in the house of confinement.”


text: The Hebrew text has simply “Israel” as the object of the verb.


text: Heb “and from under the hand of.” The words “freed them” are added in the translation for stylistic reasons.


text: Heb “feared.”


text: Heb “walked in the customs.”


text: Heb “and [the practices of] the kings of Israel which they did.”


text: The meaning of the verb וַיְחַפְּאוּ ( vayÿkhappÿ ’ u ), translated here “said,” is uncertain. Some relate it to the verbal root חָפַה ( khafah ), “to cover,” and translate “they did it in secret” (see BDB 341 s.v. חָפָא ). However, the pagan practices specified in the following sentences were hardly done in secret. Others propose a meaning “ascribe, impute,” which makes good contextual sense but has little etymological support (see HALOT 339 s.v. חפא ). In this case Israel claimed that the Lord authorized their pagan practices.


text: Heb “and they did evil things, angering the Lord .”


text: Or “served.”


text: Heb “about which the Lord had said to them, ‘You must not do this thing.’”


text: Heb “obey my commandments and rules according to all the law which I commanded your fathers and which I sent to you by the hand of my servants the prophets.”


text: Heb and they stiffened their neck like the neck of their fathers.”


text: Or “and his warnings he had given them.”


text: Heb “They went [or, ‘followed’] after.” This idiom probably does not mean much if translated literally. It is found most often in Deuteronomy or in literature related to the covenant. It refers in the first instance to loyalty to God and to His covenant or His commandments ( 1 Kgs 14:8 ; 2 Chr 34:31 ) with the metaphor of a path or way underlying it ( Deut 11:28; 28:14 ). To “follow other gods” was to abandon this way and this loyalty (to “abandon” or “forget” God, Judg 2:12 ; Hos 2:13 ) and to follow the customs or religious traditions of the pagan nations ( 2 Kgs 17:15 ). The classic text on “following” God or another god is 1 Kgs 18:18, 21 where Elijah taunts the people with “halting between two opinions” whether the Lord was the true God or Baal was. The idiom is often found followed by “to serve and to worship” or “they served and worshiped” such and such a god or entity ( Jer 8:2; 11:10; 13:10; 16:11; 25:6; 35:15 ).


text: Heb “they followed after the worthless thing/things and became worthless.” The words “to the Lord ” are not in the Hebrew text but are implicit from the context. There is an obvious wordplay on the verb “became worthless” and the noun “worthless thing”, which is probably to be understood collectively and to refer to idols as it does in Jer 8:19; 10:8; 14:22 ; Jonah 2:8 .


text: Heb “and [they walked] after the nations which were around them, concerning which the Lord commanded them not to do like them.”


text: The phrase כָל צְבָא הַשָּׁמַיִם ( khol tsÿva ’ hashamayim ), traditionally translated “all the host of heaven,” refers to the heavenly lights, including stars and planets. In 1 Kgs 22:19 these heavenly bodies are pictured as members of the Lord’s royal court or assembly, but many other texts view them as the illegitimate objects of pagan and Israelite worship.


text: Heb “they sold themselves to doing what was evil in the eyes of the Lord , angering him.”


text: Heb “very angry.”


text: Heb “turned them away from his face.”


text: Heb “they walked in the practices of Israel which they did.”


text: Or “afflicted.”


text: Heb “and they made Jeroboam son of Nebat king.”


label: NET textual note

text: The consonantal text ( Kethib ) assumes the verb is נָדָא ( nada ’), an alternate form of נָדָה ( nadah ), “push away.” The marginal reading ( Qere ) assumes the verb נָדָח ( nadakh ), “drive away.”


text: Heb “a great sin.”


text: Heb “turn away from.”


text: Heb “until.”


text: Heb “the Lord turned Israel away from his face.”


text: Heb “just as he said.”


text: The object is supplied in the translation.


text: Heb “in the beginning of their living there.”


text: Heb “fear.”


text: Heb “and they said to the king of Assyria, saying.” The plural subject of the verb is indefinite.


text: Heb “Look they are killing them.”


text: The second plural subject may refer to the leaders of the Assyrian army. However, some prefer to read “whom I deported,” changing the verb to a first person singular form with a third masculine plural pronominal suffix. This reading has some support from Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic witnesses.


text: Heb “and let them go and let them live there, and let him teach them the requirements of the God of the land.” The two plural verbs seem inconsistent with the preceding and following contexts, where only one priest is sent back to Samaria. The singular has the support of Greek, Syriac, and Latin witnesses.


text: For location see Map4-G4 ; Map5-C1 ; Map6-E3 ; Map7-D1 ; Map8-G3 .


text: Heb “Samaritans.” This refers to the Israelites who had been deported from the land.


text: Heb “feared.”


text: Heb “and they appointed for themselves from their whole people priests for the high places and they were serving for them in the house[s] of the high places.”


text: Heb “fearing.”


text: Heb “commanded.”


text: Or “covenant.”


text: Heb “and outstretched arm.”