Zefanya 3:10

3:10 From beyond the rivers of Ethiopia, ¹ 

those who pray to me ²  will bring me tribute.

Maleakhi 1:11

1:11 For from the east to the west my name will be great among the nations. Incense and pure offerings will be offered in my name everywhere, for my name will be great among the nations,” ³  says the Lord who rules over all.

Yohanes 4:21-24

4:21 Jesus said to her, “Believe me, woman, ⁴  a time ⁵  is coming when you will worship ⁶  the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 4:22 You people ⁷  worship what you do not know. We worship what we know, because salvation is from the Jews. ⁸  4:23 But a time ⁹  is coming – and now is here ¹⁰  – when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks ¹¹  such people to be ¹²  his worshipers. ¹³  4:24 God is spirit, ¹⁴  and the people who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

Roma 15:27-28

15:27 For they were pleased to do this, and indeed they are indebted to the Jerusalem saints. ¹⁵  For if the Gentiles have shared in their spiritual things, they are obligated also to minister to them in material things. 15:28 Therefore after I have completed this and have safely delivered this bounty to them, ¹⁶  I will set out for Spain by way of you,

Roma 15:1

Exhortation for the Strong to Help the Weak

15:1 But we who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak, and not just please ourselves. ¹⁷ 

Pengkhotbah 2:5

2:5 I designed ¹⁸  royal gardens ¹⁹  and parks ²⁰  for myself,

and I planted all kinds of fruit trees in them.

Pengkhotbah 2:9

2:9 So ²¹  I was far wealthier ²²  than all my predecessors in Jerusalem,

yet I maintained my objectivity: ²³ 

[3:10]  ¹ tn Or “Nubia”; Heb “Cush.” “Cush” is traditionally assumed to refer to the region south of Egypt, i.e. Nubia or northern Sudan, referred to as “Ethiopia” by classical authors (not the more recent Abyssinia).

[3:10]  ² tn Heb “those who pray to me, the daughter of my dispersed ones.” The meaning of the phrase is unclear. Perhaps the text is corrupt at this point or a proper name should be understood. For a discussion of various options see Adele Berlin, Zephaniah (AB 25A), 134-35.

[3:10]  sn It is not certain if those who pray to me refers to the converted nations or to God’s exiled covenant people.

[1:11]  ³ sn My name will be great among the nations. In what is clearly a strongly ironic shift of thought, the Lord contrasts the unbelief and virtual paganism of the postexilic community with the conversion and obedience of the nations that will one day worship the God of Israel.

[4:21]  ⁴ sn Woman was a polite form of address (see BDAG 208-9 s.v. γυνή 1), similar to “Madam” or “Ma’am” used in English in different regions.

[4:21]  ⁵ tn Grk “an hour.”

[4:21]  ⁶ tn The verb is plural.

[4:22]  ⁷ tn The word “people” is not in the Greek text, but is supplied to indicate that the Greek verb translated “worship” is second person plural and thus refers to more than the woman alone.

[4:22]  ⁸ tn Or “from the Judeans.” See the note on “Jew” in v. 9.

[4:23]  ⁹ tn Grk “an hour.”

[4:23]  ¹⁰ tn “Here” is not in the Greek text but is supplied to conform to contemporary English idiom.

[4:23]  ¹¹ sn See also John 4:27.

[4:23]  ¹² tn Or “as.” The object-complement construction implies either “as” or “to be.”

[4:23]  ¹³ tn This is a double accusative construction of object and complement with τοιούτους (toioutous) as the object and the participle προσκυνοῦντας (proskunounta") as the complement.

[4:23]  sn The Father wants such people as his worshipers. Note how the woman has been concerned about where people ought to worship, while Jesus is concerned about who people ought to worship.

[4:24]  ¹⁴ tn Here πνεῦμα (pneuma) is understood as a qualitative predicate nominative while the articular θεός (qeos) is the subject.

[15:27]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “to them”; the referent (the Jerusalem saints) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[15:28]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “have sealed this fruit to them.”

[15:1]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “and not please ourselves.” NT Greek negatives used in contrast like this are often not absolute, but relative: “not so much one as the other.”

[2:5]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “made.”

[2:5]  ¹⁹ tn The term does not refer here to vegetable gardens, but to orchards (cf. the next line). In the same way the so-called “garden” of Eden was actually an orchard filled with fruit trees. See Gen 2:8-9.

[2:5]  ²⁰ tn The noun פַּרְדֵּס (pardes, “garden, parkland, forest”) is a foreign loanword that occurs only 3 times in biblical Hebrew (Song 4:13; Eccl 2:5; Neh 2:8). The original Old Persian term pairidaeza designated the enclosed parks and pleasure-grounds that were the exclusive domain of the Persian kings and nobility (HALOT 963 s.v. פַּרְדֵּס; LSJ 1308 s.v παράδεισος). The related Babylonian term pardesu “marvelous garden” referred to the enclosed parks of the kings (AHw 2:833 and 3:1582). The term passed into Greek as παράδεισος (paradeisos, “enclosed park, pleasure-ground”), referring to the enclosed parks and gardens of the Persian kings (LSJ 1308). The Greek term has been transliterated into English as “paradise.”

[2:9]  ²¹ tn The vav prefixed to וְגָדַלְתִּי (vÿgadalti, vav + Qal perfect first common singular from גָּדַל, gadal, “to be great; to increase”) functions in a final summarizing sense, that is, it introduces the concluding summary of 2:4-9.

[2:9]  ²² tn Heb “I became great and I surpassed” (וְהוֹסַפְתִּי וְגָדַלְתִּי, vÿgadalti vÿhosafti). This is a verbal hendiadys in which the second verb functions adverbially, modifying the first: “I became far greater.” Most translations miss the hendiadys and render the line in a woodenly literal sense (KJV, ASV, RSV, NEB, NRSV, NAB, NASB, MLB, Moffatt), while only a few recognize the presence of hendiadys here: “I became greater by far” (NIV) and “I gained more” (NJPS).

[2:9]  ²³ tn Heb “yet my wisdom stood for me,” meaning he retained his wise perspective despite his great wealth.