11:16 Make sure you do not turn away to serve and worship other gods! 12
8:16 Then he brought me to the inner court of the Lord’s house. Right there 24 at the entrance to the Lord’s temple, between the porch and the altar, 25 were about twenty-five 26 men with their backs to the Lord’s temple, 27 facing east – they were worshiping the sun 28 toward the east!
1 sn Two great lights. The text goes to great length to discuss the creation of these lights, suggesting that the subject was very important to the ancients. Since these “lights” were considered deities in the ancient world, the section serves as a strong polemic (see G. Hasel, “The Polemical Nature of the Genesis Cosmology,” EvQ 46 [1974]: 81-102). The Book of Genesis is affirming they are created entities, not deities. To underscore this the text does not even give them names. If used here, the usual names for the sun and moon [Shemesh and Yarih, respectively] might have carried pagan connotations, so they are simply described as greater and lesser lights. Moreover, they serve in the capacity that God gives them, which would not be the normal function the pagans ascribed to them. They merely divide, govern, and give light in God’s creation.
2 tn Heb “and the stars.” Now the term “stars” is added as a third object of the verb “made.” Perhaps the language is phenomenological, meaning that the stars appeared in the sky from this time forward.
3 tn Heb “them”; the referent (the lights mentioned in the preceding verses) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
4 sn In days one to three there is a naming by God; in days five and six there is a blessing by God. But on day four there is neither. It could be a mere stylistic variation. But it could also be a deliberate design to avoid naming “sun” and “moon” or promoting them beyond what they are, things that God made to serve in his creation.
5 tn Heb “lest you lift up your eyes.” In the Hebrew text vv. 16-19 are subordinated to “Be careful” in v. 15, but this makes for an unduly long sentence in English.
6 tn Or “heavens.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heaven(s)” or “sky” depending on the context.
7 tn Heb “all the host of heaven.”
8 tn In the Hebrew text the verbal sequence in v. 19 is “lest you look up…and see…and be seduced…and worship them…and serve them.” However, the first two actions are not prohibited in and of themselves. The prohibition pertains to the final three actions. The first two verbs describe actions that are logically subordinate to the following actions and can be treated as temporal or circumstantial: “lest, looking up…and seeing…, you are seduced.” See Joüon 2:635 §168.h.
9 tn Or “allotted.”
10 tn Or “nations.”
11 tn Heb “under all the heaven.”
12 tn Heb “Watch yourselves lest your heart turns and you turn aside and serve other gods and bow down to them.”
13 tc The MT reads “and to the sun,” thus including the sun, the moon, and other heavenly spheres among the gods. However, Theodotion and Lucian read “or to the sun,” suggesting perhaps that the sun and the other heavenly bodies are not in the category of actual deities.
14 tn Heb “which I have not commanded you.” The words “to worship” are supplied in the translation for clarification.
15 tn Heb “gates.”
16 tn Heb “does the evil in the eyes of the
17 tn Heb “the
18 tn The verb אָהַב (’ahav, “love”) here and commonly elsewhere in the Book of Deuteronomy speaks of God’s elective grace toward Israel. See note on the word “loved” in Deut 4:37.
19 tc MT, 4QJera and LXX read “the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven,” but 4QJerc reads “the sun and all the stars.”
20 tn Heb “the sun, moon, and host of heaven which they…”
21 tn Heb “followed after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the idiom.
22 tn Heb “they will not” but the referent is far enough removed that it might be ambiguous.
23 tn Heb “like dung/manure on the surface of the ground.”
24 tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something.
25 sn The priests prayed to God between the porch and the altar on fast days (Joel 2:17). This is the location where Zechariah was murdered (Matt 23:35).
26 tc The LXX reads “twenty” instead of twenty-five, perhaps because of the association of the number twenty with the Mesopotamian sun god Shamash.
27 sn The temple faced east.
28 tn Or “the sun god.”