Amsal 15:8

15:8 The Lord abhors ¹  the sacrifices ²  of the wicked, ³ 

but the prayer ⁴  of the upright pleases him. ⁵ 

Mazmur 34:15-17

34:15 The Lord pays attention to the godly

and hears their cry for help. ⁶ 

34:16 But the Lord opposes evildoers

and wipes out all memory of them from the earth. ⁷ 

34:17 The godly ⁸  cry out and the Lord hears;

he saves them from all their troubles. ⁹ 

Mazmur 66:18-19

66:18 If I had harbored sin in my heart, ¹⁰ 

the Lord would not have listened.

66:19 However, God heard;

he listened to my prayer.

Mazmur 145:18-19

145:18 The Lord is near all who cry out to him,

all who cry out to him sincerely. ¹¹ 

145:19 He satisfies the desire ¹²  of his loyal followers; ¹³ 

he hears their cry for help and delivers them.

Yesaya 55:8-9

55:8 “Indeed, ¹⁴  my plans ¹⁵  are not like ¹⁶  your plans,

and my deeds ¹⁷  are not like ¹⁸  your deeds,

55:9 for just as the sky ¹⁹  is higher than the earth,

so my deeds ²⁰  are superior to ²¹  your deeds

and my plans ²²  superior to your plans.

Yohanes 9:31

9:31 We know that God doesn’t listen to ²³  sinners, but if anyone is devout ²⁴  and does his will, God ²⁵  listens to ²⁶  him. ²⁷ 

Roma 8:26-27

8:26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness, for we do not know how we should pray, ²⁸  but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with inexpressible groanings. 8:27 And he ²⁹  who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit ³⁰  intercedes on behalf of the saints according to God’s will.

Yakobus 5:16-18

5:16 So confess your sins to one another and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great effectiveness. ³¹  5:17 Elijah was a human being ³²  like us, and he prayed earnestly ³³  that it would not rain and there was no rain on the land for three years and six months! 5:18 Then ³⁴  he prayed again, and the sky gave rain and the land sprouted with a harvest.

Yakobus 5:1

Warning to the Rich

5:1 Come now, you rich! Weep and cry aloud ³⁵  over the miseries that are coming on you.

Pengkhotbah 3:12

Enjoy Life in the Present

3:12 I have concluded ³⁶  that there is nothing better for people ³⁷ 

than ³⁸  to be happy and to enjoy

themselves ³⁹  as long as they live,

[15:8]  ¹ tn Heb “an abomination of the Lord.” The term יְהוָה (yÿhvah, “the Lord”) functions as a subjective genitive: “the Lord abhors.” Cf. NIV “the Lord detests”; NCV, NLT “the Lord hates”; CEV “the Lord is disgusted.”

[15:8]  ² tn Heb “sacrifice” (so many English versions).

[15:8]  ³ sn The sacrifices of the wicked are hated by the Lord because the worshipers are insincere and blasphemous (e.g., Prov 15:29; 21:3; 28:9; Ps 40:6-8; Isa 1:10-17). In other words, the spiritual condition of the worshiper determines whether or not the worship is acceptable to God.

[15:8]  ⁴ sn J. H. Greenstone notes that if God will accept the prayers of the upright, he will accept their sacrifices; for sacrifice is an outer ritual and easily performed even by the wicked, but prayer is a private and inward act and not usually fabricated by unbelievers (Proverbs, 162).

[15:8]  ⁵ tn Heb “[is] his pleasure.” The 3rd person masculine singular suffix functions as a subjective genitive: “he is pleased.” God is pleased with the prayers of the upright.

[34:15]  ⁶ tn Heb “the eyes of the Lord [are] toward the godly, and his ears [are] toward their cry for help.”

[34:16]  ⁷ tn Heb “the face of the Lord [is] against the doers of evil to cut off from the earth memory of them.”

[34:17]  ⁸ tn Heb “they” (i.e., the godly mentioned in v. 15).

[34:17]  ⁹ tn The three perfect verbal forms are taken in a generalizing sense in v. 17 and translated with the present tense (note the generalizing mood of vv. 18-22).

[66:18]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “sin if I had seen in my heart.”

[145:18]  ¹¹ tn Heb “in truth.”

[145:19]  ¹² tn In this context “desire” refers to the followers’ desire to be delivered from wicked enemies.

[145:19]  ¹³ tn Heb “the desire of those who fear him, he does.”

[55:8]  ¹⁴ tn Or “For” (KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV).

[55:8]  ¹⁵ tn Or “thoughts” (so many English versions).

[55:8]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “are not.” “Like” is interpretive, but v. 9 indicates that a comparison is in view.

[55:8]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “ways” (so many English versions).

[55:8]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “are not.” “Like” is interpretive, but v. 9 indicates that a comparison is in view.

[55:9]  ¹⁹ tn Or “the heavens.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heavens” or “sky” depending on the context.

[55:9]  ²⁰ tn Heb “ways” (so many English versions).

[55:9]  ²¹ tn Heb “are higher than.”

[55:9]  ²² tn Or “thoughts” (so many English versions).

[9:31]  ²³ tn Grk “God does not hear.”

[9:31]  ²⁴ tn Or “godly.”

[9:31]  ²⁵ tn Grk “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[9:31]  ²⁶ tn Or “hears.”

[9:31]  ²⁷ tn Grk “this one.”

[8:26]  ²⁸ tn Or “for we do not know what we ought to pray for.”

[8:27]  ²⁹ sn He refers to God here; Paul has not specifically identified him for the sake of rhetorical power (for by leaving the subject slightly ambiguous, he draws his audience into seeing God’s hand in places where he is not explicitly mentioned).

[8:27]  ³⁰ tn Grk “he,” or “it”; the referent (the Spirit) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[5:16]  ³¹ tn Or “the fervent prayer of a righteous person is very powerful”; Grk “is very powerful in its working.”

[5:17]  ³² tn Although it is certainly true that Elijah was a “man,” here ἄνθρωπος (anqrwpo") has been translated as “human being” because the emphasis in context is not on Elijah’s masculine gender, but on the common humanity he shared with the author and the readers.

[5:17]  ³³ tn Grk “he prayed with prayer” (using a Hebrew idiom to show intensity).

[5:18]  ³⁴ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events.

[5:1]  ³⁵ tn Or “wail”; Grk “crying aloud.”

[3:12]  ³⁶ tn Heb “I know.”

[3:12]  ³⁷ tn Heb “for them”; the referent (people, i.e., mankind) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[3:12]  ³⁸ tn Qoheleth uses the exceptive particle אִם…כִּי (ki…’im, “except”) to identify the only exception to the futility within man’s life (BDB 474 s.v. כִּי 2).

[3:12]  ³⁹ tn Heb “to do good.” The phrase לַעֲשׂוֹת טוֹב (la’asot tov) functions idiomatically for “to experience [or see] happiness [or joy].” The verb עָשַׂה (’asah) probably denotes “to acquire; to obtain” (BDB 795 s.v. עָשַׂה II.7), and טוֹב (tov) means “good; pleasure; happiness,” e.g., Eccl 2:24; 3:13; 5:17 (BDB 375 s.v. טוֹב 1).