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Ezekiel 16:4-6
New English Translation
Ezekiel 16:4-6
New English Translation
4 As for your birth, on the day you were born your umbilical cord was not cut, nor were you washed in water;[a] you were certainly not rubbed down with salt, nor wrapped with blankets.[b] 5 No eye took pity on you to do even one of these things for you to spare you;[c] you were thrown out into the open field[d] because you were detested on the day you were born.
6 “‘I passed by you and saw you kicking around helplessly in your blood. I said to you as you lay there in your blood, “Live!” I said to you as you lay there in your blood, “Live!”[e]
Read full chapterFootnotes
- Ezekiel 16:4 tn Heb “in water you were not washed for cleansing” or “with water you were not washed smooth” (see D. I. Block, Ezekiel [NICOT], 1:473, n. 57, for a discussion of possible meanings of this hapax legomenon).
- Ezekiel 16:4 sn Arab midwives still cut the umbilical cords of infants and then proceed to apply salt and oil to their bodies.
- Ezekiel 16:5 sn These verbs, “pity” and “spare,” echo the judgment oracles in 5:11; 7:4, 9; 8:18; 9:5, 10.
- Ezekiel 16:5 sn A similar concept is found in Deut 32:10.
- Ezekiel 16:6 tc The translation reflects the Hebrew text, which repeats the statement, perhaps for emphasis. However, a few medieval Hebrew manuscripts, the Old Greek, and the Syriac do not include the repetition. The statement could have been accidentally repeated, or the second occurrence could have been accidentally omitted. Based on the available evidence it is difficult to know which is more likely.
New English Translation (NET)
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