Genesis 34:2

34:2 When Shechem son of Hamor the Hivite, who ruled that area, saw her, he grabbed her, forced himself on her, ¹  and sexually assaulted her. ² 

Genesis 39:7-23

39:7 Soon after these things, his master’s wife took notice of ³  Joseph and said, “Have sex with me.” ⁴  39:8 But he refused, saying ⁵  to his master’s wife, “Look, my master does not give any thought ⁶  to his household with me here, ⁷  and everything that he owns he has put into my care. ⁸  39:9 There is no one greater in this household than I am. He has withheld nothing from me except you because you are his wife. So how could I do ⁹  such a great evil and sin against God?” 39:10 Even though she continued to speak ¹⁰  to Joseph day after day, he did not respond ¹¹  to her invitation to have sex with her. ¹² 

39:11 One day ¹³  he went into the house to do his work when none of the household servants ¹⁴  were there in the house. 39:12 She grabbed him by his outer garment, saying, “Have sex with me!” But he left his outer garment in her hand and ran ¹⁵  outside. ¹⁶  39:13 When she saw that he had left his outer garment in her hand and had run outside, 39:14 she called for her household servants and said to them, “See, my husband brought ¹⁷  in a Hebrew man ¹⁸  to us to humiliate us. ¹⁹  He tried to have sex with me, ²⁰  but I screamed loudly. ²¹  39:15 When he heard me raise ²²  my voice and scream, he left his outer garment beside me and ran outside.”

39:16 So she laid his outer garment beside her until his master came home. 39:17 This is what she said to him: ²³  “That Hebrew slave ²⁴  you brought to us tried to humiliate me, ²⁵  39:18 but when I raised my voice and screamed, he left his outer garment and ran outside.”

39:19 When his master heard his wife say, ²⁶  “This is the way ²⁷  your slave treated me,” ²⁸  he became furious. ²⁹  39:20 Joseph’s master took him and threw him into the prison, ³⁰  the place where the king’s prisoners were confined. So he was there in the prison. ³¹ 

39:21 But the Lord was with Joseph and showed him kindness. ³²  He granted him favor in the sight of the prison warden. ³³  39:22 The warden put all the prisoners under Joseph’s care. He was in charge of whatever they were doing. ³⁴  39:23 The warden did not concern himself ³⁵  with anything that was in Joseph’s ³⁶  care because the Lord was with him and whatever he was doing the Lord was making successful.

Exodus 20:17

20:17 “You shall not covet ³⁷  your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that belongs to your neighbor.” ³⁸ 

Exodus 20:2

20:2 “I, ³⁹  the Lord, am your God, ⁴⁰  who brought you ⁴¹  from the land of Egypt, from the house of slavery. ⁴² 

Exodus 11:2

11:2 Instruct ⁴³  the people that each man and each woman is to request ⁴⁴  from his or her neighbor ⁴⁵  items of silver and gold.” ⁴⁶ 

Job 31:1

Job Vindicates Himself

31:1 “I made a covenant with ⁴⁷  my eyes;

how then could I entertain thoughts against a virgin? ⁴⁸ 

Job 31:9

31:9 If my heart has been enticed by a woman,

and I have lain in wait at my neighbor’s door, ⁴⁹ 

Proverbs 6:25

6:25 Do not lust ⁵⁰  in your heart for her beauty,

and do not let her captivate you with her alluring eyes; ⁵¹ 

James 1:14-15

1:14 But each one is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desires. 1:15 Then when desire conceives, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is full grown, it gives birth to death.

James 1:2

Joy in Trials

1:2 My brothers and sisters, ⁵²  consider it nothing but joy ⁵³  when you fall into all sorts of trials,

James 2:14

Faith and Works Together

2:14 What good is it, my brothers and sisters, ⁵⁴  if someone claims to have faith but does not have works? Can this kind of faith ⁵⁵  save him? ⁵⁶ 

James 2:1

Prejudice and the Law of Love

2:1 My brothers and sisters, ⁵⁷  do not show prejudice ⁵⁸  if you possess faith ⁵⁹  in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ. ⁶⁰ 

James 2:16

2:16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, keep warm and eat well,” but you do not give them what the body needs, ⁶¹  what good is it?

[34:2]  ¹ tn Heb “and he took her and lay with her.” The suffixed form following the verb appears to be the sign of the accusative instead of the preposition, but see BDB 1012 s.v. שָׁכַב.

[34:2]  ² tn The verb עָנָה (’anah) in the Piel stem can have various shades of meaning, depending on the context: “to defile; to mistreat; to violate; to rape; to shame; to afflict.” Here it means that Shechem violated or humiliated Dinah by raping her.

[39:7]  ³ tn Heb “she lifted up her eyes toward,” an expression that emphasizes her deliberate and careful scrutiny of him.

[39:7]  ⁴ tn Heb “lie with me.” Here the expression “lie with” is a euphemism for sexual intercourse.

[39:8]  ⁵ tn Heb “and he said.”

[39:8]  ⁶ tn Heb “know.”

[39:8]  ⁷ tn The word “here” has been supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[39:8]  ⁸ tn Heb “hand.” This is a metonymy for being under the control or care of Joseph.

[39:9]  ⁹ tn The nuance of potential imperfect fits this context.

[39:10]  ¹⁰ tn The verse begins with the temporal indicator, followed by the infinitive construct with the preposition כְּ (kÿ). This clause could therefore be taken as temporal.

[39:10]  ¹¹ tn Heb “listen to.”

[39:10]  ¹² tn Heb “to lie beside her to be with her.” Here the expression “to lie beside” is a euphemism for sexual intercourse.

[39:11]  ¹³ tn Heb “and it was about this day.”

[39:11]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “the men of the house.”

[39:12]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “he fled and he went out.” The construction emphasizes the point that Joseph got out of there quickly.

[39:12]  ¹⁶ sn For discussion of this episode, see A. M. Honeyman, “The Occasion of Joseph’s Temptation,” VT 2 (1952): 85-87.

[39:14]  ¹⁷ tn The verb has no expressed subject, and so it could be treated as a passive (“a Hebrew man was brought in”; cf. NIV). But it is clear from the context that her husband brought Joseph into the household, so Potiphar is the apparent referent here. Thus the translation supplies “my husband” as the referent of the unspecified pronominal subject of the verb (cf. NEB, NRSV).

[39:14]  ¹⁸ sn A Hebrew man. Potiphar’s wife raises the ethnic issue when talking to her servants about what their boss had done.

[39:14]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “to make fun of us.” The verb translated “to humiliate us” here means to hold something up for ridicule, or to toy with something harmfully. Attempted rape would be such an activity, for it would hold the victim in contempt.

[39:14]  ²⁰ tn Heb “he came to me to lie with me.” Here the expression “lie with” is a euphemism for sexual intercourse.

[39:14]  ²¹ tn Heb “and I cried out with a loud voice.”

[39:15]  ²² tn Heb “that I raised.”

[39:17]  ²³ tn Heb “and she spoke to him according to these words, saying.”

[39:17]  ²⁴ sn That Hebrew slave. Now, when speaking to her husband, Potiphar’s wife refers to Joseph as a Hebrew slave, a very demeaning description.

[39:17]  ²⁵ tn Heb “came to me to make fun of me.” The statement needs no explanation because of the connotations of “came to me” and “to make fun of me.” See the note on the expression “humiliate us” in v. 14.

[39:19]  ²⁶ tn Heb “and when his master heard the words of his wife which she spoke to him, saying.”

[39:19]  ²⁷ tn Heb “according to these words.”

[39:19]  ²⁸ tn Heb “did to me.”

[39:19]  ²⁹ tn Heb “his anger burned.”

[39:20]  ³⁰ tn Heb “the house of roundness,” suggesting that the prison might have been a fortress or citadel.

[39:20]  ³¹ sn The story of Joseph is filled with cycles and repetition: He has two dreams (chap. 37), he interprets two dreams in prison (chap. 40) and the two dreams of Pharaoh (chap. 41), his brothers make two trips to see him (chaps. 42-43), and here, for the second time (see 37:24), he is imprisoned for no good reason, with only his coat being used as evidence. For further discussion see H. Jacobsen, “A Legal Note on Potiphar’s Wife,” HTR 69 (1976): 177.

[39:21]  ³² tn Heb “and he extended to him loyal love.”

[39:21]  ³³ tn Or “the chief jailer” (also in the following verses).

[39:22]  ³⁴ tn Heb “all which they were doing there, he was doing.” This probably means that Joseph was in charge of everything that went on in the prison.

[39:23]  ³⁵ tn Heb “was not looking at anything.”

[39:23]  ³⁶ tn Heb “his”; the referent (Joseph) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[20:17]  ³⁷ tn The verb חָמַד (khamad) focuses not on an external act but on an internal mental activity behind the act, the motivation for it. The word can be used in a very good sense (Ps 19:10; 68:16), but it has a bad connotation in contexts where the object desired is off limits. This command is aimed at curtailing the greedy desire for something belonging to a neighbor, a desire that leads to the taking of it or the attempt to take it. It was used in the story of the Garden of Eden for the tree that was desired.

[20:17]  ³⁸ sn See further G. Wittenburg, “The Tenth Commandment in the Old Testament,” Journal for Theology in South Africa 21 (1978): 3-17: and E. W. Nicholson, “The Decalogue as the Direct Address of God,” VT 27 (1977): 422-33.

[20:2]  ³⁹ sn The revelation of Yahweh here begins with the personal pronoun. “I” – a person, a living personality, not an object or a mere thought. This enabled him to address “you” – Israel, and all his people, making the binding stipulations for them to conform to his will (B. Jacob, Exodus, 544).

[20:2]  ⁴⁰ tn Most English translations have “I am Yahweh your God.” But the preceding chapters have again and again demonstrated how he made himself known to them. Now, the emphasis is on “I am your God” – and what that would mean in their lives.

[20:2]  ⁴¹ tn The suffix on the verb is second masculine singular. It is this person that will be used throughout the commandments for the whole nation. God addresses them all as his people, but he addresses them individually for their obedience. The masculine form is not, thereby, intended to exclude women.

[20:2]  ⁴² tn Heb “the house of slaves” meaning “the land of slavery.”

[11:2]  ⁴³ tn Heb “Speak now in the ears of the people.” The expression is emphatic; it seeks to ensure that the Israelites hear the instruction.

[11:2]  ⁴⁴ tn The verb translated “request” is וְיִשְׁאֲלוּ (vÿyish’alu), the Qal jussive: “let them ask.” This is the point introduced in Exod 3:22. The meaning of the verb might be stronger than simply “ask”; it might have something of the idea of “implore” (see also its use in the naming of Samuel, who was “asked” from Yahweh [1 Sam 1:20]).

[11:2]  ⁴⁵ tn “each man is to request from his neighbor and each woman from her neighbor.”

[11:2]  ⁴⁶ sn See D. Skinner, “Some Major Themes of Exodus,” Mid-America Theological Journal 1 (1977): 31-42.

[31:1]  ⁴⁷ tn The idea of cutting a covenant for something may suggest a covenant that is imposed, except that this construction elsewhere argues against it (see 2 Chr 29:10).

[31:1]  ⁴⁸ tn This half-verse is the effect of the covenant. The interrogative מָה (mah) may have the force of the negative, and so be translated “not to pay attention.”

[31:9]  ⁴⁹ tn Gordis notes that the word פֶּתַח (petakh, “door”) has sexual connotations in rabbinic literature, based on Prov 7:6ff. (see b. Ketubbot 9b). See also the use in Song 4:12 using a synonym.

[6:25]  ⁵⁰ tn The negated jussive gives the young person an immediate warning. The verb חָמַד (khamad) means “to desire,” and here in the sense of lust. The word is used in the Decalogue of Deut 5:21 for the warning against coveting.

[6:25]  ⁵¹ tn Heb “her eyelids” (so KJV, NASB); NRSV “eyelashes”; TEV “flirting eyes”). This term is a synecdoche of part (eyelids) for the whole (eyes) or a metonymy of association for painted eyes and the luring glances that are the symptoms of seduction (e.g., 2 Kgs 9:30). The term “alluring” is not in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for the sake of clarification.

[1:2]  ⁵² tn Grk “brothers,” but the Greek word may be used for “brothers and sisters” or “fellow Christians” as here (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 1, where considerable nonbiblical evidence for the plural ἀδελφοί [adelfoi] meaning “brothers and sisters” is cited). Where the plural term is used in direct address, as here, “brothers and sisters” is used; where the term is singular and not direct address (as in v. 9), “believer” is preferred.

[1:2]  ⁵³ tn Grk “all joy,” “full joy,” or “greatest joy.”

[2:14]  ⁵⁴ tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 1:2.

[2:14]  ⁵⁵ tn Grk “the faith,” referring to the kind of faith just described: faith without works. The article here is anaphoric, referring to the previous mention of the noun πίστις (pisti") in the verse. See ExSyn 219.

[2:14]  ⁵⁶ sn The form of the question in Greek expects a negative answer.

[2:1]  ⁵⁷ tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 1:2.

[2:1]  ⁵⁸ tn Or “partiality.”

[2:1]  ⁵⁹ tn Grk “do not have faith with personal prejudice,” with emphasis on the last phrase.

[2:1]  ⁶⁰ tn Grk “our Lord Jesus Christ of glory.” Here δόξης (doxhs) has been translated as an attributive genitive.

[2:16]  ⁶¹ tn Grk “what is necessary for the body.”