Mazmur 3:2

3:2 Many say about me,

“God will not deliver him.” ¹  (Selah) ² 

Mazmur 4:2

4:2 You men, ³  how long will you try to turn my honor into shame? ⁴ 

How long ⁵  will you love what is worthless ⁶ 

and search for what is deceptive? ⁷  (Selah)

Mazmur 22:7-8

22:7 All who see me taunt ⁸  me;

they mock me ⁹  and shake their heads. ¹⁰ 

22:8 They say, ¹¹ 

“Commit yourself ¹²  to the Lord!

Let the Lord ¹³  rescue him!

Let the Lord ¹⁴  deliver him, for he delights in him.” ¹⁵ 

Mazmur 42:10

42:10 My enemies’ taunts cut into me to the bone, ¹⁶ 

as they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” ¹⁷ 

Nehemia 4:2-4

4:2 and in the presence of his colleagues ¹⁸  and the army of Samaria ¹⁹  he said, “What are these feeble Jews doing? Will they be left to themselves? ²⁰  Will they again offer sacrifice? Will they finish this in a day? Can they bring these burnt stones to life again from piles of dust?”

4:3 Then Tobiah the Ammonite, who was close by, said, “If even a fox were to climb up on what they are building, it would break down their wall of stones!”

4:4 Hear, O our God, for we are despised! Return their reproach on their own head! Reduce them to plunder in a land of exile!

Yesaya 37:10-11

37:10 “Tell King Hezekiah of Judah this: ‘Don’t let your God in whom you trust mislead you when he says, “Jerusalem will not be handed over to the king of Assyria.” 37:11 Certainly you have heard how the kings of Assyria have annihilated all lands. ²¹  Do you really think you will be rescued? ²² 

Yehezkiel 35:10

35:10 “‘You said, “These two nations, these two lands ²³  will be mine, and we will possess them,” ²⁴  – although the Lord was there –

Daniel 3:15

3:15 Now if you are ready, when you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, trigon, harp, pipes, and all kinds of music, you must bow down and pay homage to the statue that I had made. If you don’t pay homage to it, you will immediately be thrown into the midst of the furnace of blazing fire. Now, who is that god who can rescue you from my power?” ²⁵ 

Matius 27:40-43

27:40 and saying, “You who can destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself! ²⁶  If you are God’s Son, come down ²⁷  from the cross!” 27:41 In ²⁸  the same way even the chief priests – together with the experts in the law ²⁹  and elders ³⁰  – were mocking him: ³¹  27:42 “He saved others, but he cannot save himself! He is the king of Israel! If he comes down ³²  now from the cross, we will believe in him! 27:43 He trusts in God – let God, if he wants to, deliver him now ³³  because he said, ‘I am God’s Son’!”

[3:2]  ¹ tn Heb “there is no deliverance for him in God.”

[3:2]  ² sn The function of the Hebrew term סֶלָה (selah), transliterated here “Selah,” is uncertain. It may be a musical direction of some kind.

[4:2]  ³ tn Heb “sons of man.”

[4:2]  ⁴ tn Heb “how long my honor to shame?”

[4:2]  ⁵ tn The interrogative construction עַד־מֶה (’ad-meh, “how long?”), is understood by ellipsis in the second line.

[4:2]  ⁶ tn Heb “emptiness.”

[4:2]  ⁷ tn Heb “a lie.” Some see the metonymic language of v. 2b (“emptiness, lie”) as referring to idols or false gods. However, there is no solid immediate contextual evidence for such an interpretation. It is more likely that the psalmist addresses those who threaten him (see v. 1) and refers in a general way to their sinful lifestyle. (See R. Mosis, TDOT 7:121.) The two terms allude to the fact that sinful behavior is ultimately fruitless and self-destructive.

[22:7]  ⁸ tn Or “scoff at, deride, mock.”

[22:7]  ⁹ tn Heb “they separate with a lip.” Apparently this refers to their verbal taunting.

[22:7]  ¹⁰ sn Shake their heads. Apparently this refers to a taunting gesture. See also Job 16:4; Ps 109:25; Lam 2:15.

[22:8]  ¹¹ tn The words “they say” are supplied in the translation for clarification and for stylistic reasons. The psalmist here quotes the sarcastic taunts of his enemies.

[22:8]  ¹² tn Heb “roll [yourself].” The Hebrew verb גלל here has the sense of “commit” (see Prov 16:3). The imperatival form in the Hebrew text indicates the enemies here address the psalmist. Since they refer to him in the third person in the rest of the verse, some prefer to emend the verb to a perfect, “he commits himself to the Lord.”

[22:8]  ¹³ tn Heb “Let him”; the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[22:8]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “Let him”; the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[22:8]  ¹⁵ tn That is, “for he [the Lord] delights in him [the psalmist].” For other cases where the expression “delight in” refers to God’s delight in a person, see Num 14:8; 1 Kgs 10:9; Pss 18:19; 40:8.

[22:8]  sn This statement does not necessarily reflect the enemies’ actual belief, but it does reflect the psalmist’s confession. The psalmist’s enemies sarcastically appeal to God to help him, because he claims to be an object of divine favor. However, they probably doubted the reality of his claim.

[42:10]  ¹⁶ tc Heb “with a shattering in my bones my enemies taunt me.” A few medieval Hebrew mss and Symmachus’ Greek version read “like” instead of “with.”

[42:10]  ¹⁷ sn “Where is your God?” The enemies ask this same question in v. 3.

[4:2]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “brothers.”

[4:2]  ¹⁹ map For location see Map2 B1; Map4 D3; Map5 E2; Map6 A4; Map7 C1.

[4:2]  ²⁰ tc The Hebrew text is difficult here. The present translation follows the MT, but the text may be corrupt. H. G. M. Williamson (Ezra, Nehemiah [WBC], 213-14) translates these words as “Will they commit their cause to God?” suggesting that MT לָהֶם (lahem, “to them”) should be emended to לֵאלֹהִים (lelohim, “to God”), a proposal also found in the apparatus of BHS. In his view later scribes altered the phrase out of theological motivations. J. Blenkinsopp’s translation is similar: “Are they going to leave it all to God?” (Ezra–Nehemiah [OTL], 242-44). However, a problem for this view is the absence of external evidence to support the proposed emendation. The sense of the MT reading may be the notion that the workers – if left to their own limited resources – could not possibly see such a demanding and expensive project through to completion. This interpretation understands the collocation עָזַב (’azav, “to leave”) plus לְ (lÿ, “to”) to mean “commit a matter to someone,” with the sense in this verse “Will they leave the building of the fortified walls to themselves?”

[37:11]  ²¹ tn Heb “Look, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the lands, annihilating them.”

[37:11]  ²² tn Heb “and will you be rescued?” The rhetorical question expects the answer, “No, of course not!”

[35:10]  ²³ sn The reference is to Israel and Judah.

[35:10]  ²⁴ tn Heb “it.”

[3:15]  ²⁵ tn Aram “hand.” So also in v. 17.

[27:40]  ²⁶ sn There is rich irony in the statements of those who were passing by, “save yourself!” and “come down from the cross!” In summary, they wanted Jesus to come down from the cross and save his physical life, but it was indeed his staying on the cross and giving his physical life that led to the fact that they could experience a resurrection from death to life.

[27:40]  ²⁷ tc ‡ Many important witnesses (א* A D pc it sy^[s],p) read καί (kai, here with the force of “then”) before κατάβηθι (katabhqi, “come down”). The shorter reading may well be due to homoioarcton, but judging by the diverse external evidence (א² B L W Θ 0250 Ë^1,13 33 Ï lat) it is equally possible that the shorter reading is original (and is so considered for this translation). NA²⁷ puts the καί in brackets, indicating doubts as to its authenticity.

[27:41]  ²⁸ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated.

[27:41]  ²⁹ tn Or “with the scribes.” See the note on the phrase “experts in the law” in 2:4.

[27:41]  ³⁰ tn Only “chief priests” is in the nominative case; this sentence structure attempts to capture this emphasis.

[27:41]  ³¹ tn Grk “Mocking him, the chief priests…said.”

[27:42]  ³² tn Here the aorist imperative καταβάτω (katabatw) has been translated as a conditional imperative. This fits the pattern of other conditional imperatives (imperative + καί + future indicative) outlined by ExSyn 489.

[27:43]  ³³ sn An allusion to Ps 22:8.