Maleakhi 4:6

4:6 He will encourage fathers and their children to return to me, ¹  so that I will not come and strike the earth with judgment.” ² 

Lukas 1:16-17

1:16 He ³  will turn ⁴  many of the people ⁵  of Israel to the Lord their God. 1:17 And he will go as forerunner before the Lord ⁶  in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers back to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, ⁷  to make ready for the Lord a people prepared for him.”

[4:6]  ¹ tn Heb “he will turn the heart[s] of [the] fathers to [the] sons, and the heart[s] of [the] sons to their fathers.” This may mean that the messenger will encourage reconciliation of conflicts within Jewish families in the postexilic community (see Mal 2:10; this interpretation is followed by most English versions). Another option is to translate, “he will turn the hearts of the fathers together with those of the children [to me], and the hearts of the children together with those of their fathers [to me].” In this case the prophet encourages both the younger and older generations of sinful society to repent and return to the Lord (cf. Mal 3:7). This option is preferred in the present translation; see Beth Glazier-McDonald, Malachi (SBLDS), 256.

[4:6]  ² tn Heb “[the] ban” (חֵרֶם, kherem). God’s prophetic messenger seeks to bring about salvation and restoration, thus avoiding the imposition of the covenant curse, that is, the divine ban that the hopelessly unrepentant must expect (see Deut 7:2; 20:17; Judg 1:21; Zech 14:11). If the wicked repent, the purifying judgment threatened in 4:1-3 will be unnecessary.

[1:16]  ³ tn Grk “And he.” Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[1:16]  ⁴ sn The word translated will turn is a good summary term for repentance and denotes John’s call to a change of direction (Luke 3:1-14).

[1:16]  ⁵ tn Grk “sons”; but clearly this is a generic reference to people of both genders.

[1:17]  ⁶ tn Grk “before him”; the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[1:17]  ⁷ sn These two lines cover all relationships: Turn the hearts of the fathers back to their children points to horizontal relationships, while (turn) the disobedient to the wisdom of the just shows what God gives from above in a vertical manner.