Isaiah 32:12
Translations
King James Version (KJV)
They shall lament for the teats, for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine.
American King James Version (AKJV)
They shall lament for the teats, for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine.
American Standard Version (ASV)
They shall smite upon the breasts for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine.
Basic English Translation (BBE)
Have sorrow for the fields, the pleasing fields, the fertile vine;
Webster's Revision
They shall lament for the breasts, for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine.
World English Bible
Beat your breasts for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine.
English Revised Version (ERV)
They shall smite upon the breasts for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine.
Definitions for Isaiah 32:12
Clarke's Isaiah 32:12 Bible Commentary
They shall lament - for the pleasant fields "Mourn ye for the pleasant field" - The Septuagint, Syriac, and Vulgate read ספדו siphdu, mourn ye, imperative; twelve MSS., (five ancient), two editions, the Septuagint, Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion, Syriac, and Vulgate, all read שדה sadeh, a field; not שדי shedey, breasts.
Barnes's Isaiah 32:12 Bible Commentary
They shall lament for the teats - Interpreters have been not a little perplexed by this expression. Lowth supposes it is to be taken in connection with the previous verse, and that it denotes that sackcloth was to be girded upon the breast as well as upon the loins. Others have supposed that it denotes to 'smite upon the breasts,' as a token of grief; others, that the word 'breast' here denotes children by a synecdoche, as having been nourished by the breast, and that the women here were called to mourn over their children. But it is evident, I think, that the word breasts here is used to denote that which nourishes or sustains life, and is synonymous with fruitful fields. It is so used in Homer (Iliad, ix. 141), where οίθαρ ἀρούρης oithar arourēs denotes fertility of land. And here the sense doubtless is, that they would mourn over the fields which once contributed to sustain life, but which were now desolate. In regard to the grammatical difficulties of the place, Rosenmuller and Gesenius may be consulted.
The pleasant fields - Margin, as in Hebrew, 'Fields of desire.'
Wesley's Isaiah 32:12 Bible Commentary
32:12 The teats - For the pleasant and fruitful fields, which like teats yielded you plentiful and excellent nourishment.