Nahum 3 — Hebrew and Greek compared
Disparate in this chapter: 3:1, 3:3, 3:8, 3:17, 3:18
Each card keeps the independently rendered source readings above their shared comparison and reception notes. The badge records the source’s governing classification; disparate readings are marked in red. Each reading retains its original reference.
Chapter 3
The bloody city exposed and overthrown
Verse 3:1 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:1 Woe to the city of bloodshed, wholly filled with lies and plunder! Prey never departs.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:1 O city of bloodshed, wholly false, full of injustice! Game will not be touched.
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew says prey is unceasing; Greek says game will not be handled (psēlaphēthēsetai). The final assertion changes materially; its exact Greek contextual force remains uncertain.
Verse 3:2 Similar
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:2 The sound of the whip, the sound of rattling wheels, galloping horse and bounding chariot!
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:2 The sound of whips and the sound of shaking wheels, of a pursuing horse and a jolting chariot,
Classification & Notes
Similar. Text: Both evoke battle through repeated sound, wheels, horses and chariots. Greek preserves sound twice, has plural whips, and a pursuing horse rather than Hebrew galloping.
Verse 3:3 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:3 Horsemen charging, flashing sword and glittering spear! Many slain, heaps of corpses, no end to the bodies; they stumble over their bodies.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:3 and of a mounting horseman, a flashing sword and glittering weapons, a multitude of slain and a grievous fall! There was no limit to her nations, and they will weaken in their bodies
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Both depict battle casualties; Greek traumatiai is rendered slain contextually, a sense supported by LSJ, s.v. traumatias II [LSJ-TRAUM]. Greek nevertheless has a grievous fall, her nations and bodily weakening where Hebrew has heaps of corpses, limitless bodies and stumbling over them. The substantial contrast rests on those clauses, not a claim of living wounded versus dead.
Verse 3:4 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:4 Because of the many prostitutions of the prostitute, beautiful in charm, mistress of sorceries, who sells nations through her prostitutions and clans through her sorceries.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:4 because of the multitude of prostitution. A prostitute, beautiful and pleasing, mistress of potions, selling nations through her prostitution and tribes through her potions,
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Greek's first phrase completes 3:3. Pharmaka can mean magical preparations/potions here; Hebrew kešāfîm names sorceries. Both depict a city's seduction and exploitation, not a literal named woman.
Verse 3:5 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:5 Look, I am against you, declares YHWH of hosts. I will lift your skirts over your face and show nations your nakedness and kingdoms your disgrace.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:5 look, I am against you, says the Lord God Almighty. I will expose your hind parts over your face and show nations your shame and kingdoms your dishonor,
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew skirts and nakedness become Greek hind parts and shame; Greek adds “God” to the divine title. Both portray forced public exposure of the city.
Verse 3:6 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:6 I will throw filth upon you, disgrace you and make you a spectacle.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:6 and cast abomination upon you according to your impurities, and make you an example,
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew's act of disgracing becomes Greek's correspondence to existing impurities; spectacle/example expresses overlapping public humiliation.
Verse 3:7 Similar
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:7 Everyone who sees you will flee from you and say, “Nineveh is devastated! Who will mourn for her? Where shall I seek comforters for you?”
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:7 and everyone seeing you will spring away and say, “Miserable Nineveh! Who will lament her? Where shall I seek consolation for her?”
Classification & Notes
Similar. Text: Both depict abandonment without consolation. Greek maintains third person in the closing question where Hebrew addresses the city.
Verse 3:8 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:8 Are you better than No-Amon, who sat among the Nile channels, water around her, whose rampart was the sea and whose wall was the sea?
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:8 Prepare a portion; tune a string; prepare a portion, Amon, who dwells among rivers, water around her, whose dominion was the sea and whose walls were water,
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew compares Nineveh with No-Amon; Greek opens with repeated preparation commands and a musical string. The rhetorical question and comparison are absent, though the watery location remains.
Verse 3:9 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:9 Cush was her strength, and Egypt, without limit; Put and the Libyans were your helpers.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:9 and Ethiopia was her strength, and Egypt, and there is no limit to the flight; Libyans became her helpers.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew Put becomes Greek “flight” (phygē), and Hebrew's second-person help becomes third-person help. Cush/Ethiopia is the corresponding regional designation.
Verse 3:10 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:10 Yet she too went into exile, into captivity. Her little ones were dashed to pieces at the head of every street; they cast lots for her honored ones, and all her great men were bound in chains.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:10 She too will go into deportation as a captive; they will dash her infants to the ground at the head of all her roads, cast lots for all her glorious things; and all her nobles will be bound in handcuffs.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew recalls the city's captivity; Greek predicts it. Hebrew honored people become Greek neuter glorious things, and the restraints are specified differently. The final Greek clause is passive: all her nobles will be bound.
Verse 3:11 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:11 You too will become drunk; you will be hidden. You too will seek refuge from the enemy.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:11 You too will become drunk and be overlooked; you too will seek a place to stand away from enemies.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew hidden/refuge becomes Greek overlooked/standing place. Both foretell helpless withdrawal.
Verse 3:12 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:12 All your fortresses are fig trees with early fruit; if shaken, they fall into the eater's mouth.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:12 All your fortresses are fig trees having lookouts; if shaken, they will fall into the eater's mouth.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew early figs differ from Greek skopous, literally lookouts/watchers. The odd Greek noun is preserved provisionally within the shared falling-fig image.
Verse 3:13 Similar
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:13 Look, your people within you are women! The gates of your land are opened wide to your enemies; fire has consumed your bars.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:13 Look, your people within you are like women! The gates of your land will open wide to your enemies, and fire will consume your bars.
Classification & Notes
Similar. Text: Greek marks the comparison with “like” and predicts what Hebrew presents as accomplished. Both use the ancient military taunt and breached gates.
Verse 3:14 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:14 Draw water for the siege; strengthen your fortresses. Go into the mud, tread the clay, take hold of the brick mold.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:14 Draw water for yourself for the siege, hold your fortresses firmly; step into mud, be trampled in straw, hold fast over the brick.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Both direct preparations for siege. Greek explicitly says for yourself; Hebrew has active clay treading and a brick mold, while Greek has passive trampling in straw and the difficult instruction over a brick. The latter expressions remain provisional.
Verse 3:15 Divergent
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:15 There fire will consume you; a sword will cut you off, devouring you like the locust. Multiply yourself like the locust; multiply yourself like the swarm.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:15 There fire will consume you; a sword will destroy you, devouring you like a locust, and you will become heavy like a crawling locust.
Classification & Notes
Divergent. Text: Greek lacks the second multiplication command and converts the first into future heaviness. Insect labels are provisional types, not modern species identifications.
Verse 3:16 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:16 You multiplied your merchants beyond the stars of heaven. The locust strips and flies away.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:16 You multiplied your trading beyond the stars of heaven. A crawling locust rushed out and flew away.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew merchants becomes Greek commerce, and stripping becomes rushing. The vast number and departure agree.
Verse 3:17 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:17 Your officials are like locusts, your marshals like a swarm of locusts settling on fences on a cold day. The sun rises, they fly away, and their place is unknown—where are they?
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:17 Your mixed company leaped away like a young locust, like a locust perched on a fence on frosty days. The sun rose, it leaped away, and it did not know its place. Woe to them!
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew distinguishes officials and marshals; Greek has a mixed company and adds a woe. Hebrew unknown location becomes the locust's not knowing its place, changing the disappearance's description. The final Greek knowing verb has no expressed subject; linking it to the locust is a provisional reading, not the only possible construal.
Verse 3:18 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:18 Your shepherds slumber, king of Assyria; your nobles lie still. Your people are scattered upon the mountains, and no one gathers them.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:18 Your shepherds slumbered; the Assyrian king put your rulers to sleep. Your people departed upon the mountains, and there was no one receiving them.
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew addresses the Assyrian king while his nobles lie still; Greek makes that king the agent putting rulers to sleep. Gathering scattered people becomes receiving departing people.
Verse 3:19 Similar
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
3:19 There is no easing of your fracture; your wound is grievous. All who hear the news of you clap their hands over you, for upon whom has your evil not continually passed?
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
3:19 There is no healing for your crushing; your wound has become inflamed. All who hear the report of you will clap their hands over you, for upon whom has your evil not continually come?
Classification & Notes
Similar. Text: Both announce incurable ruin and universal rejoicing over the oppressor's fall; Greek specifies inflammation rather than general severity.