Matius 3:12

3:12 His winnowing fork ¹  is in his hand, and he will clean out his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the storehouse, ²  but the chaff he will burn up with inextinguishable fire.” ³ 

Matius 12:32

12:32 Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven. ⁴  But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, ⁵  either in this age or in the age to come.

Matius 18:16

18:16 But if he does not listen, take one or two others with you, so that at the testimony of two or three witnesses every matter may be established. ⁶ 

Matius 18:28

18:28 After ⁷  he went out, that same slave found one of his fellow slaves who owed him one hundred silver coins. ⁸  So ⁹  he grabbed him by the throat and started to choke him, ¹⁰  saying, ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ ¹¹ 

[3:12]  ¹ sn A winnowing fork was a pitchfork-like tool used to toss threshed grain in the air so that the wind blew away the chaff, leaving the grain to fall to the ground. The note of purging is highlighted by the use of imagery involving sifting though threshed grain for the useful kernels.

[3:12]  ² tn Or “granary,” “barn” (referring to a building used to store a farm’s produce rather than a building to house livestock).

[3:12]  ³ sn The image of fire that cannot be extinguished is from the OT: Job 20:26; Isa 34:8-10; 66:24.

[12:32]  ⁴ tn Grk “it will be forgiven him.”

[12:32]  ⁵ tn Grk “it will not be forgiven him.”

[12:32]  sn Whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. This passage has troubled many people, who have wondered whether or not they have committed this sin. Three things must be kept in mind: (1) the nature of the sin is to ascribe what is the obvious work of the Holy Spirit (e.g., releasing people from Satan’s power) to Satan himself; (2) it is not simply a momentary doubt or sinful attitude, but is indeed a settled condition which opposes the Spirit’s work, as typified by the religious leaders who opposed Jesus; and (3) a person who is concerned about it has probably never committed this sin, for those who commit it here (i.e., the religious leaders) are not in the least concerned about Jesus’ warning.

[18:16]  ⁶ sn A quotation from Deut 19:15.

[18:28]  ⁷ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[18:28]  ⁸ tn Grk “one hundred denarii.” The denarius was a silver coin worth about a day’s wage for a laborer; this would be about three month’s pay.

[18:28]  ⁹ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “so.” A new sentence was started at this point in the translation in keeping with the tendency of contemporary English style to use shorter sentences.

[18:28]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “and he grabbed him and started choking him.”

[18:28]  ¹¹ tn The word “me” is not in the Greek text, but is implied. Direct objects were often omitted in Greek when clear from the context.