Mazmur 36:10

36:10 Extend ¹  your loyal love to your faithful followers, ² 

and vindicate ³  the morally upright! ⁴ 

Mazmur 118:27

118:27 The Lord is God and he has delivered us. ⁵ 

Tie the offering ⁶  with ropes

to the horns of the altar! ⁷ 

Yesaya 9:1

9:1 (8:23) ⁸  The gloom will be dispelled for those who were anxious. ⁹ 

In earlier times he ¹⁰  humiliated

the land of Zebulun,

and the land of Naphtali; ¹¹ 

but now he brings honor ¹² 

to the way of the sea,

the region beyond the Jordan,

and Galilee of the nations. ¹³ 

Yohanes 8:12

Jesus as the Light of the World

8:12 Then Jesus spoke out again, ¹⁴  “I am the light of the world. ¹⁵  The one who follows me will never ¹⁶  walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

Efesus 5:14

5:14 For everything made evident is light, and for this reason it says: ¹⁷ 

“Awake, ¹⁸  O sleeper! ¹⁹ 

Rise from the dead,

and Christ will shine on you!” ²⁰ 

[36:10]  ¹ tn Heb “draw out to full length.”

[36:10]  ² tn Heb “to those who know you.” The Hebrew verb יָדַע (yada’, “know”) is used here of those who “know” the Lord in the sense that they recognize his royal authority and obey his will (see Jer 22:16).

[36:10]  ³ tn Heb “and your justice to.” The verb “extend” is understood by ellipsis in the second line (see the previous line).

[36:10]  ⁴ tn Heb “the pure of heart.” The “heart” is here viewed as the seat of one’s moral character and motives. The “pure of heart” are God’s faithful followers who trust in and love the Lord and, as a result, experience his deliverance (see Pss 7:10; 11:2; 32:11; 64:10; 94:15; 97:11).

[118:27]  ⁵ tn Heb “and he has given us light.” This may be an elliptical expression, with “his face” being implied as the object (see Num 6:25; Pss 31:16; 67:1; 80:3, 7, 19). In this case, “his face has given us light” = “he has smiled on us,” or “he has shown us his favor.” Another option (the one reflected in the translation) is that “light” here symbolizes divine blessing in the form of deliverance. “Light” is often used as a metaphor for deliverance and the life/blessings it brings. See Pss 37:6; 97:11; 112:4; Isa 49:6; 51:4; Mic 7:8. Some prefer to repoint the form וְיָאֵר (vÿya’er; vav [ו] conjunctive + jussive) and translate the statement as a prayer, “may he give us light.”

[118:27]  ⁶ tn The Hebrew noun חַג (khag) normally means “festival,” but here it apparently refers metonymically to an offering made at the festival. BDB 291 s.v. חַג 2 interprets the word in this way here, citing as comparable the use of later Hebrew חֲגִיגָה, which can refer to both a festival and a festival offering (see Jastrow 424 s.v. חֲגִיגָה).

[118:27]  ⁷ tn The second half of v. 27 has been translated and interpreted in a variety of ways. For a survey of major views, see L. C. Allen, Psalms 101-150 (WBC), 122.

[9:1]  ⁸ sn In the Hebrew text (BHS) the chapter division comes one verse later than in the English Bible; 9:1 (8:23 HT). Thus 9:2-21 in the English Bible = 9:1-20 in the Hebrew text. Beginning with 10:1 the verse numbers in the English Bible and the Hebrew Bible are again the same.

[9:1]  ⁹ tn The Hebrew text reads, “Indeed there is no gloom for the one to whom there was anxiety for her.” The feminine singular pronominal suffix “her” must refer to the land (cf. vv. 22a, 23b). So one could translate, “Indeed there will be no gloom for the land which was anxious.” In this case the statement introduces the positive message to follow. Some assume an emendation of לֹא (lo’, “no”) to לוֹ (lo, “to him”) and of לָהּ (lah, “to her”) to לוֹ (lo, “to him”), yielding this literal reading: “indeed there is gloom for him, for the one to whom there was anxiety for him.” In this case the statement concludes the preceding description of judgment.

[9:1]  ¹⁰ tn The Lord must be understood as the subject of the two verbs in this verse.

[9:1]  ¹¹ sn The statement probably alludes to the Assyrian conquest of Israel in ca. 734-733 b.c., when Tiglath-pileser III annexed much of Israel’s territory and reduced Samaria to a puppet state.

[9:1]  ¹² tn Heb Just as in earlier times he humiliated…, [in] the latter times he has brought honor.” The main verbs in vv. 1b-4 are Hebrew perfects. The prophet takes his rhetorical stance in the future age of restoration and describes future events as if they have already occurred. To capture the dramatic effect of the original text, the translation uses the English present or present perfect.

[9:1]  ¹³ sn These three geographical designations may refer to provinces established by the Assyrians in 734-733 b.c. The “way of the sea” is the province of Dor, along the Mediterranean coast, the “region beyond the Jordan” is the province of Gilead in Transjordan, and “Galilee of the nations” (a title that alludes to how the territory had been overrun by foreigners) is the province of Megiddo located west of the Sea of Galilee. See Y. Aharoni, Land of the Bible, 374.

[8:12]  ¹⁴ tn Grk “Then again Jesus spoke to them saying.”

[8:12]  ¹⁵ sn The theory proposed by F. J. A. Hort (The New Testament in the Original Greek, vol. 2, Introduction; Appendix, 87-88), that the backdrop of 8:12 is the lighting of the candelabra in the court of women, may offer a plausible setting to the proclamation by Jesus that he is the light of the world. The last time that Jesus spoke in the narrative (assuming 7:53-8:11 is not part of the original text, as the textual evidence suggests) is in 7:38, where he was speaking to a crowd of pilgrims in the temple area. This is where he is found in the present verse, and he may be addressing the crowd again. Jesus’ remark has to be seen in view of both the prologue (John 1:4, 5) and the end of the discourse with Nicodemus (John 3:19-21). The coming of Jesus into the world provokes judgment: A choosing up of sides becomes necessary. The one who comes to the light, that is, who follows Jesus, will not walk in the darkness. The one who refuses to come, will walk in the darkness. In this contrast, there are only two alternatives. So it is with a person’s decision about Jesus. Furthermore, this serves as in implicit indictment of Jesus’ opponents, who still walk in the darkness, because they refuse to come to him. This sets up the contrast in chap. 9 between the man born blind, who receives both physical and spiritual sight, and the Pharisees (John 9:13, 15, 16) who have physical sight but remain in spiritual darkness.

[8:12]  ¹⁶ tn The double negative οὐ μή (ou mh) is emphatic in 1st century Hellenistic Greek.

[5:14]  ¹⁷ sn The following passage has been typeset as poetry because many scholars regard this passage as poetic or hymnic. These terms are used broadly to refer to the genre of writing, not to the content. There are two broad criteria for determining if a passage is poetic or hymnic: “(a) stylistic: a certain rhythmical lilt when the passages are read aloud, the presence of parallelismus membrorum (i.e., an arrangement into couplets), the semblance of some metre, and the presence of rhetorical devices such as alliteration, chiasmus, and antithesis; and (b) linguistic: an unusual vocabulary, particularly the presence of theological terms, which is different from the surrounding context” (P. T. O’Brien, Philippians [NIGTC], 188-89). Classifying a passage as hymnic or poetic is important because understanding this genre can provide keys to interpretation. However, not all scholars agree that the above criteria are present in this passage, so the decision to typeset it as poetry should be viewed as a tentative decision about its genre.

[5:14]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “Rise up.”

[5:14]  ¹⁹ tn The articular nominative participle ὁ καθεύδων (Jo kaqeudwn) is probably functioning as a nominative for vocative. Thus, it has been translated as “O sleeper.”

[5:14]  ²⁰ sn A composite quotation, possibly from Isa 26:19, 51:17, 52:1, and 60:1.