Bilangan 12:3

12:3 (Now the man Moses was very humble, ¹  more so than any man on the face of the earth.)

Bilangan 16:15

16:15 Moses was very angry, and he said to the Lord, “Have no respect ²  for their offering! I have not taken so much as one donkey from them, nor have I harmed any one of them!”

Bilangan 20:10-12

20:10 Then Moses and Aaron gathered the community together in front of the rock, and he said to them, “Listen, you rebels, ³  must we bring ⁴  water out of this rock for you?” 20:11 Then Moses raised his hand, and struck the rock twice with his staff. And water came out abundantly. So the community drank, and their beasts drank too.

The Lord’s Judgment

20:12 Then the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust me enough ⁵  to show me as holy ⁶  before ⁷  the Israelites, therefore you will not bring this community into the land I have given them.” ⁸ 

Mazmur 106:32-33

106:32 They made him angry by the waters of Meribah,

and Moses suffered ⁹  because of them,

106:33 for they aroused ¹⁰  his temper, ¹¹ 

and he spoke rashly. ¹² 

Amsal 14:17

14:17 A person who has a quick temper ¹³  does foolish things,

and a person with crafty schemes ¹⁴  is hated. ¹⁵ 

Matius 5:22

5:22 But I say to you that anyone who is angry with a brother ¹⁶  will be subjected to judgment. And whoever insults ¹⁷  a brother will be brought before ¹⁸  the council, ¹⁹  and whoever says ‘Fool’ ²⁰  will be sent ²¹  to fiery hell. ²² 

Markus 3:5

3:5 After looking around ²³  at them in anger, grieved by the hardness of their hearts, ²⁴  he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. ²⁵ 

Yakobus 1:19

Living Out the Message

1:19 Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters! ²⁶  Let every person be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger.

[12:3]  ¹ tc The spelling of the word is a Kethib-Qere reading with only a slight difference between the two.

[12:3]  tn The word עָנָו (’anav) means “humble.” The word may reflect a trustful attitude (as in Pss 25:9, 37:11), but perhaps here the idea of “more tolerant” or “long-suffering.” The point is that Moses is not self-assertive. God singled out Moses and used him in such a way as to show that he was a unique leader. For a suggestion that the word means “miserable,” see C. Rogers, “Moses: Meek or Miserable?” JETS 29 (1986): 257-63.

[12:3]  sn Humility is a quality missing today in many leaders. Far too many are self-promoting, or competitive, or even pompous. The statement in this passage would have been difficult for Moses to write – and indeed, it is not impossible that an editor might have added it. One might think that for someone to claim to be humble is an arrogant act. But the statement is one of fact – he was not self-assertive (until Num 20 when he strikes the rock).

[16:15]  ² tn The verb means “to turn toward”; it is a figurative expression that means “to pay attention to” or “to have regard for.” So this is a prayer against Dathan and Abiram.

[20:10]  ³ tn The word is הַמֹּרִים (hammorim, “the rebels”), but here as a vocative: “you rebels.” It was a harsh address, although well-earned.

[20:10]  ⁴ tn The word order and the emphasis of the tense are important to this passage. The word order is “from this rock must we bring out to you water?” The emphasis is clearly on “from this rock!” The verb is the imperfect tense; it has one of the modal nuances here, probably obligatory – “must we do this?”

[20:12]  ⁵ tn Or “to sanctify me.”

[20:12]  sn The verb is the main word for “believe, trust.” It is the verb that describes the faith in the Word of the Lord that leads to an appropriate action. Here God says that Moses did not believe him, meaning that what he did showed more of Moses than of what God said. Moses had taken a hostile stance toward the people, and then hit the rock twice. This showed that Moses was not satisfied with what God said, but made it more forceful and terrifying, thus giving the wrong picture of God to the people. By doing this the full power and might of the Lord was not displayed to the people. It was a momentary lack of faith, but it had to be dealt with.

[20:12]  ⁶ sn Using the basic meaning of the word קָדַשׁ (qadash, “to be separate, distinct, set apart”), we can understand better what Moses failed to do. He was supposed to have acted in a way that would have shown God to be distinct, different, holy. Instead, he gave the impression that God was capricious and hostile – very human. The leader has to be aware of what image he is conveying to the people.

[20:12]  ⁷ tn Heb “in the eyes of.”

[20:12]  ⁸ tn There is debate as to exactly what the sin of Moses was. Some interpreters think that the real sin might have been that he refused to do this at first, but that fact has been suppressed from the text. Some think the text was deliberately vague to explain why they could not enter the land without demeaning them. Others simply, and more likely, note that in Moses there was unbelief, pride, anger, impatience – disobedience.

[106:32]  ⁹ tn Heb “there was harm to Moses.”

[106:33]  ¹⁰ tn The Hebrew text vocalizes the form as הִמְרוּ (himru), a Hiphil from מָרָה (marah, “to behave rebelliously”), but the verb fits better with the object (“his spirit”) if it is revocalized as הֵמֵרוּ (hemeru), a Hiphil from מָרַר (marar, “to be bitter”). The Israelites “embittered” Moses’ “spirit” in the sense that they aroused his temper with their complaints.

[106:33]  ¹¹ tn Heb “his spirit.”

[106:33]  ¹² tn The Hebrew text adds “with his lips,” but this has not been included in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[106:33]  sn Verses 32-33 allude to the events of Num 20:1-13.

[14:17]  ¹³ sn The proverb discusses two character traits that are distasteful to others – the quick tempered person (“short of anger” or impatient) and the crafty person (“man of devices”). C. H. Toy thinks that the proverb is antithetical and renders it “but a wise man endures” (Proverbs [ICC], 292). In other words, the quick-tempered person acts foolishly and loses people’s respect, but the wise man does not.

[14:17]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “a man of devices.”

[14:17]  ¹⁵ tc The LXX reads “endures” (from נָשָׂא, nasa’) rather than “is hated” (from שָׂנֵא, sane’). This change seems to have arisen on the assumption that a contrast was needed. It has: “a man of thought endures.” Other versions take מְזִמּוֹת (mÿzimmot) in a good sense; but antithetical parallelism is unwarranted here.

[5:22]  ¹⁶ tc The majority of mss read the word εἰκῇ (eikh, “without cause”) here after “brother.” This insertion has support from א² D L W Θ 0233 Ë^1,13 33 Ï it sy co Ir^lat Or^mss Cyp Cyr. Thus the Western, Caesarean, and Byzantine texttypes all include the word, while the best Alexandrian and some other witnesses (Ì⁶⁴ א* B 1424^mg pc aur vg Or Hier^mss) lack it. The ms evidence favors its exclusion, though there is a remote possibility that εἰκῇ could have been accidentally omitted from these witnesses by way of homoioarcton (the next word, ἔνοχος [enocos, “guilty”], begins with the same letter). An intentional change would likely arise from the desire to qualify “angry,” especially in light of the absolute tone of Jesus’ words. While “without cause” makes good practical sense in this context, and must surely be a true interpretation of Jesus’ meaning (cf. Mark 3:5), it does not commend itself as original.

[5:22]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “whoever says to his brother ‘Raca,’” an Aramaic word of contempt or abuse meaning “fool” or “empty head.”

[5:22]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “subjected,” “guilty,” “liable.”

[5:22]  ¹⁹ tn Grk “the Sanhedrin.”

[5:22]  ²⁰ tn The meaning of the term μωρός (mwros) is somewhat disputed. Most take it to mean, following the Syriac versions, “you fool,” although some have argued that it represents a transliteration into Greek of the Hebrew term מוֹרֵה (moreh) “rebel” (Deut 21:18, 20; cf. BDAG 663 s.v. μωρός c).

[5:22]  ²¹ tn Grk “subjected,” “guilty,” “liable.”

[5:22]  ²² tn Grk “the Gehenna of fire.”

[5:22]  sn The word translated hell is “Gehenna” (γέεννα, geenna), a Greek transliteration of the Hebrew words ge hinnom (“Valley of Hinnom”). This was the valley along the south side of Jerusalem. In OT times it was used for human sacrifices to the pagan god Molech (cf. Jer 7:31; 19:5-6; 32:35), and it came to be used as a place where human excrement and rubbish were disposed of and burned. In the intertestamental period, it came to be used symbolically as the place of divine punishment (cf. 1 En. 27:2, 90:26; 4 Ezra 7:36).

[3:5]  ²³ tn The aorist participle περιβλεψάμενος (peribleyameno") has been translated as antecedent (prior) to the action of the main verb. It could also be translated as contemporaneous (“Looking around…he said”).

[3:5]  ²⁴ tn This term is a collective singular in the Greek text.

[3:5]  ²⁵ sn The passive was restored points to healing by God. Now the question became: Would God exercise his power through Jesus, if what Jesus was doing were wrong? Note also Jesus’ “labor.” He simply spoke and it was so.

[1:19]  ²⁶ tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 1:2.