Mazmur 103:12

103:12 As far as the eastern horizon ¹  is from the west, ² 

so he removes the guilt of our rebellious actions ³  from us.

Yesaya 38:17

38:17 “Look, the grief I experienced was for my benefit. ⁴ 

You delivered me ⁵  from the pit of oblivion. ⁶ 

For you removed all my sins from your sight. ⁷ 

Yehezkiel 33:16

33:16 None of the sins he has committed will be counted ⁸  against him. He has done what is just and right; he will certainly live.

Mikha 7:18-19

7:18 There is no other God like you! ⁹ 

You ¹⁰  forgive sin

and pardon ¹¹  the rebellion

of those who remain among your people. ¹² 

You do not remain angry forever, ¹³ 

but delight in showing loyal love.

7:19 You will once again ¹⁴  have mercy on us;

you will conquer ¹⁵  our evil deeds;

you will hurl our ¹⁶  sins into the depths of the sea. ¹⁷ 

Zakharia 3:4

3:4 The angel ¹⁸  spoke up to those standing all around, “Remove his filthy clothes.” Then he said to Joshua, “I have freely forgiven your iniquity and will dress you ¹⁹  in fine clothing.”

Zakharia 3:9

3:9 As for the stone ²⁰  I have set before Joshua – on the one stone there are seven eyes. ²¹  I am about to engrave an inscription on it,’ says the Lord who rules over all, ‘to the effect that I will remove the iniquity of this land in a single day. ²² 

[103:12]  ¹ tn Heb “sunrise.”

[103:12]  ² tn Or “sunset.”

[103:12]  ³ tn The Hebrew term פֶּשַׁע (pesha’, rebellious act”) is here used metonymically for the guilt such actions produce.

[38:17]  ⁴ tn Heb “Look, for peace bitterness was to me bitter”; NAB “thus is my bitterness transformed into peace.”

[38:17]  ⁵ tc The Hebrew text reads, “you loved my soul,” but this does not fit syntactically with the following prepositional phrase. חָשַׁקְתָּ (khashaqta, “you loved”), may reflect an aural error; most emend the form to חָשַׂכְת, (khasakht, “you held back”).

[38:17]  ⁶ tn בְּלִי (bÿli) most often appears as a negation, meaning “without,” suggesting the meaning “nothingness, oblivion,” here. Some translate “decay” or “destruction.”

[38:17]  ⁷ tn Heb “for you threw behind your back all my sins.”

[33:16]  ⁸ tn Heb “remembered.”

[7:18]  ⁹ tn Heb “Who is a God like you?” The rhetorical question expects the answer, “No one!”

[7:18]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “one who.” The prayer moves from direct address (second person) in v. 18a to a descriptive (third person) style in vv. 18b-19a and then back to direct address (second person) in vv. 19b-20. Due to considerations of English style and the unfamiliarity of the modern reader with alternation of persons in Hebrew poetry, the entire section has been rendered as direct address (second person) in the translation.

[7:18]  ¹¹ tn Heb “pass over.”

[7:18]  ¹² tn Heb “of the remnant of his inheritance.”

[7:18]  ¹³ tn Heb “he does not keep hold of his anger forever.”

[7:19]  ¹⁴ tn The verb יָשׁוּב (yashuv, “he will return”) is here used adverbially in relation to the following verb, indicating that the Lord will again show mercy.

[7:19]  ¹⁵ tn Some prefer to read יִכְבֹּס (yikhbos, “he will cleanse”; see HALOT 459 s.v. כבס pi). If the MT is taken as it stands, sin is personified as an enemy that the Lord subdues.

[7:19]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “their sins,” but the final mem (ם) may be enclitic rather than a pronominal suffix. In this case the suffix from the preceding line (“our”) may be understood as doing double duty.

[7:19]  ¹⁷ sn In this metaphor the Lord disposes of Israel’s sins by throwing them into the waters of the sea (here symbolic of chaos).

[3:4]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “and he”; the referent (the angel, cf. v. 1) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[3:4]  ¹⁹ tn The occurrence of the infinitive absolute here for an expected imperfect 1st person common singular (or even imperative 2nd person masculine plural or preterite 3rd person masculine plural) is well-attested elsewhere. Most English translations render this as 1st person singular (“and I will clothe”), but cf. NAB “Take off…and clothe him.”

[3:9]  ²⁰ sn The stone is also a metaphor for the Messiah, a foundation stone that, at first rejected (Ps 118:22-23; Isa 8:13-15), will become the chief cornerstone of the church (Eph 2:19-22).

[3:9]  ²¹ tn Some understand the Hebrew term עַיִן (’ayin) here to refer to facets (cf. NAB, NRSV, NLT) or “faces” (NCV, CEV “seven sides”) of the stone rather than some representation of organs of sight.

[3:9]  sn The seven eyes are symbolic of divine omniscience and universal dominion (cf. Zech 1:10; 4:10; 2 Chr 16:9).

[3:9]  ²² sn Inscriptions were common on ancient Near Eastern cornerstones. This inscription speaks of the redemption achieved by the divine resident of the temple, the Messiah, who will in the day of the Lord bring salvation to all Israel (cf. Isa 66:7-9).