Amsal 20:30

20:30 Beatings and wounds cleanse away ¹  evil,

and floggings cleanse ²  the innermost being. ³ 

Yesaya 4:4

4:4 At that time ⁴  the sovereign master ⁵  will wash the excrement ⁶  from Zion’s women,

he will rinse the bloodstains from Jerusalem’s midst, ⁷ 

as he comes to judge

and to bring devastation. ⁸ 

Yehezkiel 36:25

36:25 I will sprinkle you with pure water ⁹  and you will be clean from all your impurities. I will purify you from all your idols.

Zakharia 13:1

The Refinement of Judah

13:1 “In that day there will be a fountain opened up for the dynasty ¹⁰  of David and the people of Jerusalem ¹¹  to cleanse them from sin and impurity. ¹² 

Matius 23:25-26

23:25 “Woe to you, experts in the law ¹³  and you Pharisees, hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 23:26 Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup, ¹⁴  so that the outside may become clean too!

Ibrani 9:14

9:14 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our ¹⁵  consciences from dead works to worship the living God.

[20:30]  ¹ tc The verb מָרַק (maraq) means “to polish; to scour”; in the Hiphil it means “to cleanse away,” but it is only attested here, and that in the Kethib reading of תַּמְרִיק (tamriq). The Qere has תַּמְרוּק (tamruq, “are a means of cleansing”). The LXX has “blows and contusions fall on evil men, and stripes penetrate their inner beings”; the Latin has “the bruise of a wound cleanses away evil things.” C. H. Toy suggests emending the text to read “stripes cleanse the body, and blows the inward parts” or “cosmetics purify the body, and blows the soul” (Proverbs [ICC], 397). Cf. CEV “can knock all of the evil out of you.”

[20:30]  ² tn The term “cleanse” does not appear in this line but is supplied in the translation in the light of the parallelism.

[20:30]  ³ sn Physical punishment may prove spiritually valuable. Other proverbs say that some people will never learn from this kind of punishment, but in general this may be the only thing that works for some cases.

[4:4]  ⁴ tn Heb “when” (so KJV, NAB, NASB); CEV “after”; NRSV “once.”

[4:4]  ⁵ tn The Hebrew term translated “sovereign master” here is אֲדֹנָי (’adonai).

[4:4]  ⁶ tn The word refers elsewhere to vomit (Isa 28:8) and fecal material (Isa 36:12). Many English versions render this somewhat euphemistically as “filth” (e.g., NAB, NIV, NRSV). Ironically in God’s sight the beautiful jewelry described earlier is nothing but vomit and feces, for it symbolizes the moral decay of the city’s residents (cf. NLT “moral filth”).

[4:4]  ⁷ sn See 1:21 for a related concept.

[4:4]  ⁸ tn Heb “by a spirit of judgment and by a spirit of burning.” The precise meaning of the second half of the verse is uncertain. רוּחַ (ruakh) can be understood as “wind” in which case the passage pictures the Lord using a destructive wind as an instrument of judgment. However, this would create a mixed metaphor, for the first half of the verse uses the imagery of washing and rinsing to depict judgment. Perhaps the image would be that of a windstorm accompanied by heavy rain. רוּחַ can also mean “spirit,” in which case the verse may be referring to the Lord’s Spirit or, more likely, to a disposition that the Lord brings to the task of judgment. It is also uncertain if בָּעַר (ba’ar) here means “burning” or “sweeping away, devastating.”

[36:25]  ⁹ sn The Lord here uses a metaphor from the realm of ritual purification. For the use of water in ritual cleansing, see Exod 30:19-20; Lev 14:51; Num 19:18; Heb 10:22.

[13:1]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “house” (so NIV, NRSV), referring to dynastic descendants.

[13:1]  ¹¹ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[13:1]  ¹² tn Heb “for sin and for impurity.” The purpose implied here has been stated explicitly in the translation for clarity.

[13:1]  sn This reference to the fountain opened up…to cleanse them from sin and impurity is anticipatory of the cleansing from sin that lies at the heart of the NT gospel message (Rom 10:9-10; Titus 3:5). “In that day” throughout the passage (vv. 1, 2, 4) locates this cleansing in the eschatological (church) age (John 19:37).

[23:25]  ¹³ tn Or “scribes.” See the note on the phrase “experts in the law” in 2:4.

[23:26]  ¹⁴ tc A very difficult textual problem is found here. The most important Alexandrian and Byzantine, as well as significant Western, witnesses (א B C L W 0102 0281 ˹³ 33 Ï lat co) have “and the dish” (καὶ τῆς παροψίδος, kai th" paroyido") after “cup,” while few important witnesses (D Θ Ë¹ 700 and some versional and patristic authorities) omit the phrase. On the one hand, scribes sometimes tended to eliminate redundancy; since “and the dish” is already present in v. 25, it may have been deleted in v. 26 by well-meaning scribes. On the other hand, as B. M. Metzger notes, the singular pronoun αὐτοῦ (autou, “its”) with τὸ ἐκτός (to ekto", “the outside”) in some of the same witnesses that have the longer reading (viz., B* ˹³ al) hints that their archetype lacked the words (TCGNT 50). Further, scribes would be motivated both to add the phrase from v. 25 and to change αὐτοῦ to the plural pronoun αὐτῶν (aujtwn, “their”). Although the external evidence for the shorter reading is not compelling in itself, combined with these two prongs of internal evidence, it is to be slightly preferred.

[9:14]  ¹⁵ tc The reading adopted by the translation is attested by many authorities (A D* K P 365 1739* al). But many others (א D² 0278 33 1739^c 1881 Ï lat sa) read “your” instead of “our.” The diversity of evidence makes this a difficult case to decide from external evidence alone. The first and second person pronouns differ by only one letter in Greek, as in English, also making this problem difficult to decide based on internal evidence and transcriptional probability. In the context, the author’s description of sacrificial activities seems to invite the reader to compare his own possible participation in OT liturgy as over against the completed work of Christ, so the second person pronoun “your” might make more sense. On the other hand, TCGNT 599 argues that “our” is preferable because the author of Hebrews uses direct address (i.e., the second person) only in the hortatory sections. What is more, the author seems to prefer the first person in explanatory remarks or when giving the logical grounds for an assertion (cf. Heb 4:15; 7:14). It is hard to reach a definitive conclusion in this case, but the data lean slightly in favor of the first person pronoun.