Galatia 5:22-24

5:22 But the fruit of the Spirit ¹  is love, ²  joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, ³  5:23 gentleness, and ⁴  self-control. Against such things there is no law. 5:24 Now those who belong to Christ ⁵  have crucified the flesh ⁶  with its passions ⁷  and desires.

Efesus 5:26-27

5:26 to sanctify her by cleansing her ⁸  with the washing of the water by the word, 5:27 so that he ⁹  may present the church to himself as glorious – not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless. ¹⁰ 

Kolose 1:22

1:22 but now he has reconciled you ¹¹  by his physical body through death to present you holy, without blemish, and blameless before him –

Ibrani 12:23

12:23 and congregation of the firstborn, who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous, who have been made perfect,

Ibrani 12:1

The Lord’s Discipline

12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, ¹²  we must get rid of every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and run with endurance the race set out for us,

Yohanes 3:2

3:2 came to Jesus ¹³  at night ¹⁴  and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs ¹⁵  that you do unless God is with him.”

Yudas 1:24

Final Blessing

1:24 Now to the one who is able to keep you from falling, ¹⁶  and to cause you to stand, rejoicing, ¹⁷  without blemish ¹⁸  before his glorious presence, ¹⁹ 

Wahyu 14:5

14:5 and no lie was found on their lips; ²⁰  they ²¹  are blameless.

[5:22]  ¹ tn That is, the fruit the Spirit produces.

[5:22]  ² sn Another way to punctuate this is “love” followed by a colon (love: joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control). It is thus possible to read the eight characteristics following “love” as defining love.

[5:22]  ³ tn Or “reliability”; see BDAG 818 s.v. πίστις 1.a.

[5:23]  ⁴ tn “And” is supplied here as a matter of English style, which normally inserts “and” between the last two elements of a list or series.

[5:24]  ⁵ tc ‡ Some mss (א A B C P Ψ 0122¹ 0278 33 1175 1739 pc co) read “Christ Jesus” here, while many significant ones (Ì⁴⁶ D F G 0122*^,2 latt sy), as well as the Byzantine text, lack “Jesus.” The Byzantine text is especially not prone to omit the name “Jesus”; that it does so here argues for the authenticity of the shorter reading (for similar instances of probably authentic Byzantine shorter readings, see Matt 24:36 and Phil 1:14; cf. also W.-H. J. Wu, “A Systematic Analysis of the Shorter Readings in the Byzantine Text of the Synoptic Gospels” [Ph.D. diss., Dallas Theological Seminary, 2002]). On the strength of the alignment of Ì⁴⁶ with the Western and Byzantine texttypes, the shorter reading is preferred. NA²⁷ includes the word in brackets, indicating doubts as to its authenticity.

[5:24]  ⁶ tn See the note on the word “flesh” in Gal 5:13.

[5:24]  ⁷ tn The Greek term παθήμασιν (paqhmasin, translated “passions”) refers to strong physical desires, especially of a sexual nature (L&N 25.30).

[5:26]  ⁸ tn The direct object “her” is implied, but not found in the Greek text. It has been supplied in the English translation to clarify the sense of the passage.

[5:27]  ⁹ tn The use of the pronoun αὐτός (autos) is intensive and focuses attention on Christ as the one who has made the church glorious.

[5:27]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “but in order that it may be holy and blameless.”

[1:22]  ¹¹ tc Some of the better representatives of the Alexandrian and Western texts have a passive verb here instead of the active ἀποκατήλλαξεν (apokathllaxen, “he has reconciled”): ἀποκατηλλάγητε (apokathllaghte) in (Ì⁴⁶) B, ἀποκατήλλακται [sic] (apokathllaktai) in 33, and ἀποκαταλλαγέντες (apokatallagente") in D* F G. Yet the active verb is strongly supported by א A C D² Ψ 048 075 [0278] 1739 1881 Ï lat sy. Internally, the passive creates an anacoluthon in that it looks back to the accusative ὑμᾶς (Juma", “you”) of v. 21 and leaves the following παραστῆσαι (parasthsai) dangling (“you were reconciled…to present you”). The passive reading is certainly the harder reading. As such, it may well explain the rise of the other readings. At the same time, it is possible that the passive was produced by scribes who wanted some symmetry between the ποτε (pote, “at one time”) of v. 21 and the νυνὶ δέ (nuni de, “but now”) of v. 22: Since a passive periphrastic participle is used in v. 21, there may have a temptation to produce a corresponding passive form in v. 22, handling the ὑμᾶς of v. 21 by way of constructio ad sensum. Since παραστῆσαι occurs ten words later, it may not have been considered in this scribal modification. Further, the Western reading (ἀποκαταλλαγέντες) hardly seems to have arisen from ἀποκατηλλάγητε (contra TCGNT 555). As difficult as this decision is, the preferred reading is the active form because it is superior externally and seems to explain the rise of all forms of the passive readings.

[1:22]  tn The direct object is omitted in the Greek text, but it is clear from context that “you” (ὑμᾶς, Jumas) is implied.

[12:1]  ¹² tn Grk “having such a great cloud of witnesses surrounding us.”

[3:2]  ¹³ tn Grk “him”; the referent (Jesus) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[3:2]  ¹⁴ tn Or “during the night.”

[3:2]  sn Possibly Nicodemus came…at night because he was afraid of public association with Jesus, or he wanted a lengthy discussion without interruptions; no explanation for the timing of the interview is given by the author. But the timing is significant for John in terms of the light-darkness motif – compare John 9:4, 11:10, 13:30 (especially), 19:39, and 21:3. Out of the darkness of his life and religiosity Nicodemus came to the Light of the world. The author probably had multiple meanings or associations in mind here, as is often the case.

[3:2]  ¹⁵ sn The reference to signs (σημεῖα, shmeia) forms a link with John 2:23-25. Those people in Jerusalem believed in Jesus because of the signs he had performed. Nicodemus had apparently seen them too. But for Nicodemus all the signs meant is that Jesus was a great teacher sent from God. His approach to Jesus was well-intentioned but theologically inadequate; he had failed to grasp the messianic implications of the miraculous signs.

[1:24]  ¹⁶ tn The construction in Greek is a double accusative object-complement. “You” is the object and “free from falling” is the adjectival complement.

[1:24]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “with rejoicing.” The prepositional clause is placed after “his glorious presence” in Greek, but most likely goes with “cause you to stand.”

[1:24]  ¹⁸ tn The construction in Greek is a double accusative object-complement. “You” is the object and “without blemish” is the adjectival complement.

[1:24]  ¹⁹ tn Or “in the presence of his glory,” “before his glory.”

[14:5]  ²⁰ tn Grk “in their mouth was not found a lie.”

[14:5]  ²¹ tc Several mss (Ì⁴⁷ א 1 1006 1611 2351 Ï^K pc) have the conjunction “for” (γάρ, gar) here so that the phrase reads: “for they are blameless.” Other important mss (A C P 1854 2053 al lat) lack the word. The shorter reading is to be preferred since the scribes were more likely to make the connection explicit through the addition of “for” than they would have been to omit the conjunction. As it is, the passage without the conjunction makes good sense and evokes a very somber tone.