As the neighbors of Zion have now seen your capture: This means “just as, at the present time, the neighboring cities are aware [or, have seen] that you have been taken captive.” It does not mean that they have just now seen it, or that the capture has just now taken place. Good News Translation renders it well by not expressing now (similarly Contemporary English Version). In languages that do not have the passive voice, we may say, for example, “The neighboring cities also watched as your enemies forcibly took you away.” For the neighbors of Zion, see the comments on verses 9 and 14. This verse is referring back particularly to verse 14.
They soon will see your salvation by God: Good News Translation and Contemporary English Version bring the Everlasting up from the last line and combine it with God here to form “the Eternal God.” Many translators will find this helpful. A possible restructuring is “Soon they will see the Eternal God [or, the God who lives forever] rescue you.”
Which will come to you with great glory and with the splendor of the Everlasting: Translators who do not structure these two lines as poetry may combine them in a way similar to Good News Translation or say something like “as he comes with great power and shining light.” We may compare the picture in this verse with that in Isa 60.1-3. The glory and splendor of the Lord, which is to accompany the exiles on their westward trek homeward, is like the sun rising in the east. Jerusalem will see the glory and splendor of the Lord when she looks eastward and sees her returning children.
The last three lines of this verse are effectively combined in Good News Translation, but with one problem. The Good News Translation restructuring has the neighboring cities seeing God. What they will actually see, according to the text, is the rescue (which is what salvation means here) of the exiles by God. The wording of Good News Translation is not a problem, unless someone takes it literally. The translator may wish to guard against this by perhaps translating as follows:
• Just as the neighboring cities saw you taken captive, they soon will see you returning home when the Eternal God comes with great power and shining light [or, splendor] to rescue you.
Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on The Shorter Books of the Deuterocanon. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2006. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.