Keluaran 13:21-22

13:21 Now the Lord was going before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them in the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, ¹  so that they could ²  travel day or night. ³  13:22 He did not remove the pillar of cloud by day nor the pillar of fire by night from before the people. ⁴ 

Bilangan 10:11-13

The Journey From Sinai to Kadesh

10:11 ⁵ On the twentieth day of the second month, in the second year, the cloud was taken up from the tabernacle of the testimony. ⁶  10:12 So the Israelites set out ⁷  on their journeys from the wilderness of Sinai; and the cloud settled in the wilderness of Paran.

Judah Begins the Journey

10:13 This was the first time they set out on their journey according to the commandment ⁸  of the Lord, by the authority ⁹  of Moses.

Bilangan 10:33-36

10:33 So they traveled from the mountain of the Lord three days’ journey; ¹⁰  and the ark of the covenant of the Lord was traveling before them during the three days’ journey, to find a resting place for them. 10:34 ¹¹  And the cloud of the Lord was over them by day, when they traveled ¹²  from the camp. 10:35 And when the ark traveled, Moses would say, “Rise up, O Lord! May your enemies be scattered, and may those who hate you flee before you!” 10:36 And when it came to rest he would say, “Return, O Lord, to the many thousands of Israel!” ¹³ 

Bilangan 19:17-22

19:17 “‘For a ceremonially unclean person you must take ¹⁴  some of the ashes of the heifer ¹⁵  burnt for purification from sin and pour ¹⁶  fresh running ¹⁷  water over them in a vessel. 19:18 Then a ceremonially clean person must take hyssop, dip it in the water, and sprinkle it on the tent, on all its furnishings, and on the people who were there, or on the one who touched a bone, or one killed, or one who died, or a grave. 19:19 And the clean person must sprinkle the unclean on the third day and on the seventh day; and on the seventh day he must purify him, ¹⁸  and then he must wash his clothes, and bathe in water, and he will be clean in the evening. 19:20 But the man who is unclean and does not purify himself, that person must be cut off from among the community, because he has polluted the sanctuary of the Lord; the water of purification was not sprinkled on him, so he is unclean.

19:21 “‘So this will be a perpetual ordinance for them: The one who sprinkles ¹⁹  the water of purification must wash his clothes, and the one who touches the water of purification will be unclean until evening. ²⁰  19:22 And whatever the unclean person touches will be unclean, and the person who touches it will be unclean until evening.’”

Nehemia 9:19

9:19 “Due to your great compassion you did not abandon them in the desert. The pillar of cloud did not stop guiding them in the path by day, ²¹  nor did the pillar of fire stop illuminating for them by night the path on which they should travel.

Mazmur 78:14

78:14 He led them with a cloud by day,

and with the light of a fire all night long.

Mazmur 105:39

105:39 He spread out a cloud for a cover, ²² 

and provided a fire to light up the night.

Mazmur 105:1

Psalm 105 ²³ 

105:1 Give thanks to the Lord!

Call on his name!

Make known his accomplishments among the nations!

Kolose 1:1-2

Salutation

1:1 From Paul, ²⁴  an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, 1:2 to the saints, the faithful ²⁵  brothers and sisters ²⁶  in Christ, at Colossae. Grace and peace to you ²⁷  from God our Father! ²⁸ 

Kolose 1:19-20

1:19 For God ²⁹  was pleased to have all his ³⁰  fullness dwell ³¹  in the Son ³² 

1:20 and through him to reconcile all things to himself by making peace through the blood of his cross – through him, ³³  whether things on earth or things in heaven.

[13:21]  ¹ sn God chose to guide the people with a pillar of cloud in the day and one of fire at night, or, as a pillar of cloud and fire, since they represented his presence. God had already appeared to Moses in the fire of the bush, and so here again is revelation with fire. Whatever the exact nature of these things, they formed direct, visible revelations from God, who was guiding the people in a clear and unambiguous way. Both clouds and fire would again and again represent the presence of God in his power and majesty, guiding and protecting his people, by judging their enemies.

[13:21]  ² tn The infinitive construct here indicates the result of these manifestations – “so that they went” or “could go.”

[13:21]  ³ tn These are adverbial accusatives of time.

[13:22]  ⁴ sn See T. W. Mann, “The Pillar of Cloud in the Reed Sea Narrative,” JBL 90 (1971): 15-30.

[10:11]  ⁵ sn This section is somewhat mechanical: It begins with an introduction (vv. 11, 12), and then begins with Judah (vv. 13-17), followed by the rest of the tribes (vv. 18-27), and finally closes with a summary (v. 28). The last few verses (vv. 29-36) treat the departure of Hobab.

[10:11]  ⁶ tc Smr inserts a lengthy portion from Deut 1:6-8, expressing the command for Israel to take the land from the Amorites.

[10:11]  tn The expression is difficult; it is מִשְׁכַּן הָעֵדֻת (mishkan ha’edut). The reference is to the sacred shrine that covered the ark with the commandments inside. NEB renders the expression as “tabernacle of the Token”; NAB has “the dwelling of the commandments.”

[10:12]  ⁷ sn The verb is the same as the noun: “they journeyed on their journeyings.” This underscores the point of their continual traveling.

[10:13]  ⁸ tn Heb “mouth.”

[10:13]  ⁹ tn Heb “hand.”

[10:33]  ¹⁰ tn The phrase “a journey of three days” is made up of the adverbial accusative qualified with the genitives.

[10:34]  ¹¹ tc The scribes sensed that there was a dislocation with vv. 34-36, and so they used the inverted letters nun (נ) as brackets to indicate this.

[10:34]  ¹² tn The adverbial clause of time is composed of the infinitive construct with a temporal preposition and a suffixed subjective genitive.

[10:36]  ¹³ sn These two formulaic prayers were offered by Moses at the beginning and at the end of the journeys. They prayed for the Lord to fight ahead of the nation when it was on the move, and to protect them when they camped. The theme of the first is found in Ps 68:1. The prayers reflect the true mentality of holy war, that it was the Lord who fought for Israel and defended her. The prayers have been included in the prayer book for synagogue services.

[19:17]  ¹⁴ tn The verb is the perfect tense, third masculine plural, with a vav (ו) consecutive. The verb may be worded as a passive, “ashes must be taken,” but that may be too awkward for this sentence. It may be best to render it with a generic “you” to fit the instruction of the text.

[19:17]  ¹⁵ tn The word “heifer” is not in the Hebrew text, but it is implied.

[19:17]  ¹⁶ tn Here too the verb is the perfect tense with vav (ו) consecutive; rather than make this passive, it is here left as a direct instruction to follow the preceding one. For the use of the verb נָתַן (natan) in the sense of “pour,” see S. C. Reif, “A Note on a Neglected Connotation of ntn,” VT 20 (1970): 114-16.

[19:17]  ¹⁷ tn The expression is literally “living water.” Living water is the fresh, flowing spring water that is clear, life-giving, and not the collected pools of stagnant or dirty water.

[19:19]  ¹⁸ tn The construction uses a simple Piel of חָטָא (khata’, “to purify”) with a pronominal suffix – “he shall purify him.” Some commentators take this to mean that after he sprinkles the unclean then he must purify himself. But that would not be the most natural way to read this form.

[19:21]  ¹⁹ tn The form has the conjunction with it: וּמַזֵּה (umazzeh). The conjunction subordinates the following as the special law. It could literally be translated “and this shall be…that the one who sprinkles.”

[19:21]  ²⁰ sn This gives the indication of the weight of the matter, for “until the evening” is the shortest period of ritual uncleanness in the Law. The problem of contamination had to be taken seriously, but this was a relatively simple matter to deal with – if one were willing to obey the Law.

[9:19]  ²¹ tn Heb “did not turn from them by day to guide them in the path.”

[105:39]  ²² tn Or “curtain.”

[105:1]  ²³ sn Psalm 105. The psalmist summons Israel to praise God because he delivered his people from Egypt in fulfillment of his covenantal promises to Abraham. A parallel version of vv. 1-15 appears in 1 Chr 16:8-22.

[1:1]  ²⁴ tn Grk “Paul.” The word “from” is not in the Greek text, but has been supplied to indicate the sender of the letter.

[1:2]  ²⁵ tn Grk “and faithful.” The construction in Greek (as well as Paul’s style) suggests that the saints are identical to the faithful; hence, the καί (kai) is best left untranslated (cf. Eph 1:1). See ExSyn 281-82.

[1:2]  ²⁶ tn Grk “brothers,” but the Greek word may be used for “brothers and sisters” or “fellow Christians” as here (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 1, where considerable nonbiblical evidence for the plural ἀδελφοί [adelfoi] meaning “brothers and sisters” is cited).

[1:2]  ²⁷ tn Or “Grace to you and peace.”

[1:2]  ²⁸ tc Most witnesses, including some important ones (א A C F G I [P] 075 Ï it bo), read “and the Lord Jesus Christ” at the end of this verse, no doubt to conform the wording to the typical Pauline salutation. However, excellent and early witnesses (B D K L Ψ 33 81 1175 1505 1739 1881 al sa) lack this phrase. Since the omission is inexplicable as arising from the longer reading (otherwise, these mss would surely have deleted the phrase in the rest of the corpus Paulinum), it is surely authentic.

[1:19]  ²⁹ tn The noun “God” does not appear in the Greek text, but since God is the one who reconciles the world to himself (cf. 2 Cor 5:19), he is clearly the subject of εὐδόκησεν (eudokhsen).

[1:19]  ³⁰ tn The Greek article τό (to), insofar as it relates to God, may be translated as a possessive pronoun, i.e., “his.” BDAG 404 s.v. εὐδοκέω 1 translates the phrase as “all the fullness willed to dwell in him” thus leaving the referent as impersonal. Insofar as Paul is alluding to the so-called emanations from God this is acceptable. But the fact that “the fullness” dwells in a person (i.e., “in him”) seems to argue for the translation “his fullness” where “his” refers to God.

[1:19]  ³¹ tn The aorist verb κατοικῆσαι (katoikhsai) could be taken as an ingressive, in which case it refers to the incarnation and may be translated as “begin to dwell, to take up residence.” It is perhaps better, though, to take it as a constative aorist and simply a reference to the fact that the fullness of God dwells in Jesus Christ. This is a permanent dwelling, though, not a temporary one, as the present tense in 2:9 makes clear.

[1:19]  ³² tn Grk “him”; the referent (the Son; see v. 13) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[1:20]  ³³ tc The presence or absence of the second occurrence of the phrase δι᾿ αὐτοῦ (di’ autou, “through him”) is a difficult textual problem to solve. External evidence is fairly evenly divided. Many ancient and excellent witnesses lack the phrase (B D* F G I 0278 81 1175 1739 1881 2464 al latt sa), but equally important witnesses have it (Ì⁴⁶ א A C D¹ Ψ 048^vid 33 Ï). Both readings have strong Alexandrian support, which makes the problem difficult to decide on external evidence alone. Internal evidence points to the inclusion of the phrase as original. The word immediately preceding the phrase is the masculine pronoun αὐτοῦ (autou); thus the possibility of omission through homoioteleuton in various witnesses is likely. Scribes might have deleted the phrase because of perceived redundancy or awkwardness in the sense: The shorter reading is smoother and more elegant, so scribes would be prone to correct the text in that direction. As far as style is concerned, repetition of key words and phrases for emphasis is not foreign to the corpus Paulinum (see, e.g., Rom 8:23, Eph 1:13, 2 Cor 12:7). In short, it is easier to account for the shorter reading arising from the longer reading than vice versa, so the longer reading is more likely original.