³²Moreover concerning the stranger, that is not of thy people Israel, when he shall come from a far country for thy great name’s sake, and thy mighty hand, and thy stretched out arm; when they shall come and pray toward this house: ³³then hear thou from heaven, even from thy dwelling place, and do according to all that the stranger calleth to thee for; that all the peoples of the earth may know thy name, and fear thee, as doth thy people Israel, and that they may know that this house[¹] which I have built is called by thy name. ³⁴If thy people go out to battle against their enemies, by whatsoever way thou shalt send them, and they pray unto thee toward this city which thou hast chosen, and the house which I have built for thy name:
[¹] Or, thy name is called upon this house &c.
32, 33. Compare Isaiah lvi. 6 f. (also a post-exilic passage) where it is also said that the stranger must “keep the sabbath from profaning it and hold fast by my covenant” before he can hope to be heard by Jehovah.
³⁵then hear thou from heaven their prayer and their supplication, and maintain their cause[¹].
[¹] Or, right.
35. maintain their cause] Render with margin, maintain their right.
³⁶If they sin against thee, (for there is no man that sinneth not,) and thou be angry with them, and deliver them to the enemy, so that they carry them away captive[¹] unto a land far off or near; ³⁷yet if they shall bethink themselves in the land whither they are carried captive, and turn again, and make supplication unto thee in the land of their captivity, saying, We have sinned, we have done perversely, and have dealt wickedly;
[¹] Hebrew they that take them captive carry them away.
36. there is no man that sinneth not] Compare Ecclesiastes vii. 20.
³⁸if they return unto thee with all their heart and with all their soul in the land of their captivity, whither they have carried them captive, and pray toward their land, which thou gavest unto their fathers, and the city which thou hast chosen, and toward the house which I have built for thy name: