Psalms 119:176

119:176 I have wandered off like a lost sheep. ¹ 

Come looking for your servant,

for I do not forget your commands.

Isaiah 53:6

53:6 All of us had wandered off like sheep;

each of us had strayed off on his own path,

but the Lord caused the sin of all of us to attack him. ² 

Jeremiah 50:6

50:6 “My people have been lost sheep.

Their shepherds ³  have allow them to go astray.

They have wandered around in the mountains.

They have roamed from one mountain and hill to another. ⁴ 

They have forgotten their resting place.

Ezekiel 34:8

34:8 As surely as I live, declares the sovereign Lord, my sheep have become prey and have become food for all the wild beasts. There was no shepherd, and my shepherds did not search for my flock, but fed themselves and did not feed my sheep,

Ezekiel 34:11-12

34:11 “‘For this is what the sovereign Lord says: Look, I myself will search for my sheep and seek them out. 34:12 As a shepherd seeks out his flock when he is among his scattered sheep, so I will seek out my flock. I will rescue them from all the places where they have been scattered on a cloudy, dark day. ⁵ 

Ezekiel 34:16

34:16 I will seek the lost and bring back the strays; I will bandage the injured and strengthen the sick, but the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them – with judgment!

Ezekiel 34:31

34:31 And you, my sheep, the sheep of my pasture, are my people, ⁶  and I am your God, declares the sovereign Lord.’”

Matthew 18:12-13

18:12 What do you think? If someone ⁷  owns a hundred ⁸  sheep and one of them goes astray, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go look for the one that went astray? ⁹  18:13 And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, ¹⁰  he will rejoice more over it than over the ninety-nine that did not go astray.

John 10:15-16

10:15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father – and I lay down my life ¹¹  for ¹²  the sheep. 10:16 I have ¹³  other sheep that do not come from ¹⁴  this sheepfold. ¹⁵  I must bring them too, and they will listen to my voice, ¹⁶  so that ¹⁷  there will be one flock and ¹⁸  one shepherd.

John 10:26-28

10:26 But you refuse to believe because you are not my sheep. 10:27 My sheep listen to my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. 10:28 I give ¹⁹  them eternal life, and they will never perish; ²⁰  no one will snatch ²¹  them from my hand.

John 10:1

Jesus as the Good Shepherd

10:1 “I tell you the solemn truth, ²²  the one who does not enter the sheepfold ²³  by the door, ²⁴  but climbs in some other way, is a thief and a robber.

John 2:25

2:25 He did not need anyone to testify about man, ²⁵  for he knew what was in man. ²⁶ 

[119:176]  ¹ tn Heb “I stray like a lost sheep.” It is possible that the point of the metaphor is vulnerability: The psalmist, who is threatened by his enemies, feels as vulnerable as a straying, lost sheep. This would not suggest, however, that he has wandered from God’s path (see the second half of the verse, as well as v. 110).

[53:6]  ² tn Elsewhere the Hiphil of פָגַע (paga’) means “to intercede verbally” (Jer 15:11; 36:25) or “to intervene militarily” (Isa 59:16), but neither nuance fits here. Apparently here the Hiphil is the causative of the normal Qal meaning, “encounter, meet, touch.” The Qal sometimes refers to a hostile encounter or attack; when used in this way the object is normally introduced by the preposition -בְּ (bet, see Josh 2:16; Judg 8:21; 15:12, etc.). Here the causative Hiphil has a double object – the Lord makes “sin” attack “him” (note that the object attacked is introduced by the preposition -בְּ. In their sin the group was like sheep who had wandered from God’s path. They were vulnerable to attack; the guilt of their sin was ready to attack and destroy them. But then the servant stepped in and took the full force of the attack.

[50:6]  ³ sn The shepherds are the priests, prophets, and leaders who have led Israel into idolatry (2:8).

[50:6]  ⁴ sn The allusion here, if it is not merely a part of the metaphor of the wandering sheep, is to the worship of the false gods on the high hills (2:20, 3:2).

[34:12]  ⁵ sn The imagery may reflect the overthrow of the Israelites by the Babylonians in 587/6 b.c.

[34:31]  ⁶ tn Heb, “the sheep of my pasture, you are human.” See 36:37-38 for a similar expression. The possessive pronoun “my” is supplied in the translation to balance “I am your God” in the next clause.

[18:12]  ⁷ tn Grk “a certain man.” The Greek word ἄνθρωπος (anqrwpo") is used here in a somewhat generic sense.

[18:12]  ⁸ sn This individual with a hundred sheep is a shepherd of modest means, as flocks often had up to two hundred head of sheep.

[18:12]  ⁹ sn Look for the one that went astray. The parable pictures God’s pursuit of the sinner. On the image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd, see John 10:1-18.

[18:13]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “Truly (ἀμήν, amhn), I say to you.”

[10:15]  ¹¹ tn Or “I die willingly.”

[10:15]  ¹² tn Or “on behalf of” or “for the sake of.”

[10:16]  ¹³ tn Grk “And I have.” Because of the difference between Greek style, which often begins sentences or clauses with “and,” and English style, which generally does not, καί (kai) has not been translated here.

[10:16]  ¹⁴ tn Or “that do not belong to”; Grk “that are not of.”

[10:16]  ¹⁵ sn The statement I have other sheep that do not come from this sheepfold almost certainly refers to Gentiles. Jesus has sheep in the fold who are Jewish; there are other sheep which, while not of the same fold, belong to him also. This recalls the mission of the Son in 3:16-17, which was to save the world – not just the nation of Israel. Such an emphasis would be particularly appropriate to the author if he were writing to a non-Palestinian and primarily non-Jewish audience.

[10:16]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “they will hear my voice.”

[10:16]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “voice, and.”

[10:16]  ¹⁸ tn The word “and” is not in the Greek text, but must be supplied to conform to English style. In Greek it is an instance of asyndeton (omission of a connective), usually somewhat emphatic.

[10:28]  ¹⁹ tn Grk “And I give.”

[10:28]  ²⁰ tn Or “will never die” or “will never be lost.”

[10:28]  ²¹ tn Or “no one will seize.”

[10:1]  ²² tn Grk “Truly, truly, I say to you.”

[10:1]  ²³ sn There was more than one type of sheepfold in use in Palestine in Jesus’ day. The one here seems to be a courtyard in front of a house (the Greek word used for the sheepfold here, αὐλή [aulh] frequently refers to a courtyard), surrounded by a stone wall (often topped with briars for protection).

[10:1]  ²⁴ tn Or “entrance.”

[2:25]  ²⁵ tn The masculine form has been retained here in the translation to maintain the connection with “a man of the Pharisees” in 3:1, with the understanding that the reference is to people of both genders.

[2:25]  ²⁶ tn See previous note on “man” in this verse.