Ulangan 32:15-16

Israel’s Rebellion

32:15 But Jeshurun ¹  became fat and kicked,

you ²  got fat, thick, and stuffed!

Then he deserted the God who made him,

and treated the Rock who saved him with contempt.

32:16 They made him jealous with other gods, ³ 

they enraged him with abhorrent idols. ⁴ 

Yesaya 1:4

1:4 ⁵ The sinful nation is as good as dead, ⁶ 

the people weighed down by evil deeds.

They are offspring who do wrong,

children ⁷  who do wicked things.

They have abandoned the Lord,

and rejected the Holy One of Israel. ⁸ 

They are alienated from him. ⁹ 

Yeremia 2:5

2:5 This is what the Lord says:

“What fault could your ancestors ¹⁰  have possibly found in me

that they strayed so far from me? ¹¹ 

They paid allegiance to ¹²  worthless idols, and so became worthless to me. ¹³ 

Yeremia 2:11-13

2:11 Has a nation ever changed its gods

(even though they are not really gods at all)?

But my people have exchanged me, their glorious God, ¹⁴ 

for a god that cannot help them at all! ¹⁵ 

2:12 Be amazed at this, O heavens! ¹⁶ 

Be shocked and utterly dumbfounded,”

says the Lord.

2:13 “Do so because my people have committed a double wrong:

they have rejected me,

the fountain of life-giving water, ¹⁷ 

and they have dug cisterns for themselves,

cracked cisterns which cannot even hold water.”

Yeremia 2:31-32

2:31 You people of this generation,

listen to what the Lord says.

“Have I been like a wilderness to you, Israel?

Have I been like a dark and dangerous land to you? ¹⁸ 

Why then do you ¹⁹  say, ‘We are free to wander. ²⁰ 

We will not come to you any more?’

2:32 Does a young woman forget to put on her jewels?

Does a bride forget to put on her bridal attire?

But my people have forgotten me

for more days than can even be counted.

Zakharia 11:8

11:8 Next I eradicated the three shepherds in one month, ²¹  for I ran out of patience with them and, indeed, they detested me as well.

Roma 1:21-23

1:21 For although they knew God, they did not glorify him as God or give him thanks, but they became futile in their thoughts and their senseless hearts ²²  were darkened. 1:22 Although they claimed ²³  to be wise, they became fools 1:23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for an image resembling mortal human beings ²⁴  or birds or four-footed animals ²⁵  or reptiles.

Roma 1:28

1:28 And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God, ²⁶  God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what should not be done. ²⁷ 

Roma 1:30

1:30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, contrivers of all sorts of evil, disobedient to parents,

Roma 8:7

8:7 because the outlook of the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to the law of God, nor is it able to do so.

Galatia 6:7

6:7 Do not be deceived. God will not be made a fool. ²⁸  For a person ²⁹  will reap what he sows,

Efesus 4:18

4:18 They are darkened in their understanding, ³⁰  being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardness of their hearts.

Kolose 1:21

Paul’s Goal in Ministry

1:21 And you were at one time strangers and enemies in your ³¹  minds ³²  as expressed through ³³  your evil deeds,

Ibrani 3:12

3:12 See to it, ³⁴  brothers and sisters, ³⁵  that none of you has ³⁶  an evil, unbelieving heart that forsakes ³⁷  the living God. ³⁸ 

[32:15]  ¹ tn To make the continuity of the referent clear, some English versions substitute “Jacob” here (NAB, NRSV) while others replace “Jeshurun” with “Israel” (NCV, CEV, NLT) or “the Lord’s people” (TEV).

[32:15]  sn Jeshurun is a term of affection derived from the Hebrew verb יָשַׁר (yashar, “be upright”). Here it speaks of Israel “in an ideal situation, with its ‘uprightness’ due more to God’s help than his own efforts” (M. Mulder, TDOT 6:475).

[32:15]  ² tc The LXX reads the third person masculine singular (“he”) for the MT second person masculine singular (“you”), but such alterations are unnecessary in Hebrew poetic texts where subjects fluctuate frequently and without warning.

[32:16]  ³ tc Heb “with strange (things).” The Vulgate actually supplies diis (“gods”).

[32:16]  ⁴ tn Heb “abhorrent (things)” (cf. NRSV). A number of English versions understand this as referring to “idols” (NAB, NIV, NCV, CEV), while NLT supplies “acts.”

[1:4]  ⁵ sn Having summoned the witnesses and announced the Lord’s accusation against Israel, Isaiah mourns the nation’s impending doom. The third person references to the Lord in the second half of the verse suggest that the quotation from the Lord (cf. vv. 2-3) has concluded.

[1:4]  ⁶ tn Heb “Woe [to the] sinful nation.” The Hebrew term הוֹי, (hoy, “woe, ah”) was used in funeral laments (see 1 Kgs 13:30; Jer 22:18; 34:5) and carries the connotation of death. In highly dramatic fashion the prophet acts out Israel’s funeral in advance, emphasizing that their demise is inevitable if they do not repent soon.

[1:4]  ⁷ tn Or “sons” (NASB). The prophet contrasts four terms of privilege – nation, people, offspring, children – with four terms that depict Israel’s sinful condition in Isaiah’s day – sinful, evil, wrong, wicked (see J. A. Motyer, The Prophecy of Isaiah, 43).

[1:4]  ⁸ sn Holy One of Israel is one of Isaiah’s favorite divine titles for God. It pictures the Lord as the sovereign king who rules over his covenant people and exercises moral authority over them.

[1:4]  ⁹ tn Heb “they are estranged backward.” The LXX omits this statement, which presents syntactical problems and seems to be outside the synonymous parallelistic structure of the verse.

[2:5]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “fathers.”

[2:5]  ¹¹ tn Or “I did not wrong your ancestors in any way. Yet they went far astray from me.” Both translations are an attempt to render the rhetorical question which demands a negative answer.

[2:5]  ¹² tn Heb “They went/followed after.” This idiom is found most often in Deuteronomy or covenant contexts. It refers to loyalty to God and to his covenant or his commandments (e.g., 1 Kgs 14:8; 2 Chr 34:31) with the metaphor of a path or way underlying it (e.g., Deut 11:28; 28:14). To “follow other gods” was to abandon this way and this loyalty (i.e., to “abandon” or “forget” God, Judg 2:12; Hos 2:13) and to follow the customs or religious traditions of the pagan nations (e.g., 2 Kgs 17:15). The classic text on “following” God or another god is 1 Kgs 18:18, 21 where Elijah taunts the people with “halting between two opinions” whether the Lord was the true God or Baal was. The idiom is often found followed by “to serve and to worship” or “they served and worshiped” such and such a god or entity (see, e.g., Jer 8:2; 11:10; 13:10; 16:11; 25:6; 35:15).

[2:5]  ¹³ tn The words “to me” are not in the Hebrew text but are implicit from the context: Heb “they followed after the worthless thing/things and became worthless.” There is an obvious wordplay on the verb “became worthless” and the noun “worthless thing,” which is probably to be understood collectively and to refer to idols as it does in Jer 8:19; 10:8; 14:22; Jonah 2:8.

[2:11]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “have exchanged their glory [i.e., the God in whom they glory].” This is a case of a figure of speech where the attribute of a person or thing is put for the person or thing. Compare the common phrase in Isaiah, the Holy One of Israel, obviously referring to the Lord, the God of Israel.

[2:11]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “what cannot profit.” The verb is singular and the allusion is likely to Baal. See the translator’s note on 2:8 for the likely pun or wordplay.

[2:12]  ¹⁶ sn In earlier literature the heavens (and the earth) were called on to witness Israel’s commitment to the covenant (Deut 30:12) and were called to serve as witnesses to Israel’s fidelity or infidelity to it (Isa 1:2; Mic 6:1).

[2:13]  ¹⁷ tn It is difficult to decide whether to translate “fresh, running water” which the Hebrew term for “living water” often refers to (e.g., Gen 26:19; Lev 14:5), or “life-giving water” which the idiom “fountain of life” as source of life and vitality often refers to (e.g., Ps 36:9; Prov 13:14; 14:27). The contrast with cisterns, which collected and held rain water, suggests “fresh, running water,” but the reality underlying the metaphor contrasts the Lord, the source of life, health, and vitality, with useless idols that cannot do anything.

[2:31]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “a land of the darkness of Yah [= thick or deep darkness].” The idea of danger is an added connotation of the word in this context.

[2:31]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “my people.”

[2:31]  ²⁰ tn Or more freely, “free to do as we please.” There is some debate about the meaning of this verb (רוּד, rud) because its usage is rare and its meaning is debated in the few passages where it does occur. The key to its meaning may rest in the emended text (reading וְרַדְתִּי [vÿradti] for וְיָרַדְתִּי [vÿyaradti]) in Judg 11:37 where it refers to the roaming of Jephthah’s daughter on the mountains of Israel.

[11:8]  ²¹ sn Zechariah is only dramatizing what God had done historically (see the note on the word “cedars” in 11:1). The “one month” probably means just any short period of time in which three kings ruled in succession. Likely candidates are Elah, Zimri, Tibni (1 Kgs 16:8-20); Zechariah, Shallum, Menahem (2 Kgs 15:8-16); or Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, Zedekiah (2 Kgs 24:1–25:7).

[1:21]  ²² tn Grk “heart.”

[1:22]  ²³ tn The participle φάσκοντες (faskonte") is used concessively here.

[1:23]  ²⁴ tn Grk “exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God in likeness of an image of corruptible man.” Here there is a wordplay on the Greek terms ἄφθαρτος (afqarto", “immortal, imperishable, incorruptible”) and φθαρτός (fqarto", “mortal, corruptible, subject to decay”).

[1:23]  ²⁵ sn Possibly an allusion to Ps 106:19-20.

[1:28]  ²⁶ tn Grk “and just as they did not approve to have God in knowledge.”

[1:28]  ²⁷ tn Grk “the things that are improper.”

[6:7]  ²⁸ tn Or “is not mocked,” “will not be ridiculed” (L&N 33.409). BDAG 660 s.v. μυκτηρίζω has “of God οὐ μ. he is not to be mocked, treated w. contempt, perh. outwitted Gal 6:7.”

[6:7]  ²⁹ tn Here ἄνθρωπος (anqrwpo") is used in a generic sense, referring to both men and women.

[4:18]  ³⁰ tn In the Greek text this clause is actually subordinate to περιπατεῖ (peripatei) in v. 17. It was broken up in the English translation so as to avoid an unnecessarily long and cumbersome statement.

[1:21]  ³¹ tn The article τῇ (th) has been translated as a possessive pronoun (ExSyn 215).

[1:21]  ³² tn Although διανοία (dianoia) is singular in Greek, the previous plural noun ἐχθρούς (ecqrous) indicates that all those from Colossae are in view here.

[1:21]  ³³ tn The dative ἐν τοῖς ἔργοις τοῖς πονηροῖς (en toi" ergoi" toi" ponhroi") is taken as means, indicating the avenue through which hostility in the mind is revealed and made known.

[3:12]  ³⁴ tn Or “take care.”

[3:12]  ³⁵ tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 2:11.

[3:12]  ³⁶ tn Grk “that there not be in any of you.”

[3:12]  ³⁷ tn Or “deserts,” “rebels against.”

[3:12]  ³⁸ tn Grk “in forsaking the living God.”