And the sea of Sodom shall cast up fish: The sea of Sodom is the Dead Sea. For the city of Sodom, see the comments on 2 Esd 2.8. Since the Dead Sea is too salty to support life, the marvel is that fish are there at all. It is not certain whether this clause means that fish will wash up on the shore of the Dead Sea (so Good News Bible) or that the sea will begin to contain fish (so Contemporary English Version). We take it to have the former sense, so a possible model is “Fish will wash up on the shores of the Dead Sea” (similarly Good News Bible). Compare verse 9.

And one whom the many do not know shall make his voice heard by night, and all shall hear his voice: This part of the verse in the Latin text is quite difficult to understand. The Latin text, which is itself uncertain, appears to make the sea the one whose voice is heard (see the Revised Standard Version footnote). Most scholars accept some correction to the text which has a meaning such as in Revised Standard Version or Good News Bible. Among these scholars there is no agreement as to the source of the voice. It could well be that the voice is not any human voice at all, or any human sounds, but some ominous sound from the earth or the sea. We shall take it that way in the following model of this verse:

• Fish will wash up on the shores of the Dead Sea, and at night everyone will hear a noise that few people have ever heard.*
* And at night … heard; the meaning of this clause is unclear in Latin.

Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on 1-2 Esdras. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2019. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.