95:11 So I made a vow in my anger,
‘They will never enter into the resting place I had set aside for them.’” 16
1 tn Heb “Those that went in, male and female from all flesh they went in.”
2 sn Here again is the oath that God swore in his wrath, an oath he swore by himself, that they would not enter the land. “As the
3 tn The word נְאֻם (nÿ’um) is an “oracle.” It is followed by the subjective genitive: “the oracle of the
4 tn Heb “in my ears.”
5 tn Or “your corpses” (also in vv. 32, 33).
6 tn The relative pronoun “which” is joined with the resumptive pronoun “in it” to form a smoother reading “where.”
7 tn The Hebrew text uses the anthropomorphic expression “I raised my hand” in taking an oath.
8 tn Heb “to cause you to dwell; to cause you to settle.”
9 tn Or “plunder.”
10 tn Heb “know.”
11 tn The word is “shepherds.” It means that the people would be wilderness nomads, grazing their flock on available land.
12 tn Heb “you shall bear your whoredoms.” The imagery of prostitution is used throughout the Bible to reflect spiritual unfaithfulness, leaving the covenant relationship and following after false gods. Here it is used generally for their rebellion in the wilderness, but not for following other gods.
13 tn The infinitive is from תָּמַם (tamam), which means “to be complete.” The word is often used to express completeness in a good sense – whole, blameless, or the like. Here and in v. 35 it seems to mean “until your deaths have been completed.” See also Gen 47:15; Deut 2:15.
14 tn Heb “you shall bear.”
15 tn The phrase refers to the consequences of open hostility to God, or perhaps abandonment of God. The noun תְּנוּאָה (tÿnu’ah) occurs in Job 33:10 (perhaps). The related verb occurs in Num 30:6 HT (30:5 ET) and 32:7 with the sense of “disallow, discourage.” The sense of the expression adopted in this translation comes from the meticulous study of R. Loewe, “Divine Frustration Exegetically Frustrated,” Words and Meanings, 137-58.
16 tn Heb “my resting place.” The promised land of Canaan is here viewed metaphorically as a place of rest for God’s people, who are compared to sheep (see v. 7).
17 tn The syntactical relationship between vv. 24-25 is disputed. The question turns on whether v. 25 is connected to v. 24 or not. A lack of a clear connective makes an independent idea more likely. However, one must then determine what the beginning of the sentence connects to. Though it makes for slightly awkward English, the translation has opted to connect it to “he will answer” so that this functions, in effect, as an apodosis. One could end the sentence after “us” and begin a new sentence with “He will answer” to make simpler sentences, although the connection between the two sentences is thereby less clear. The point of the passage, however, is clear. Once the door is shut, because one failed to come in through the narrow way, it is closed permanently. The moral: Do not be too late in deciding to respond.
18 tn Or “the master of the household.”
19 tn Or “rises,” or “stands up.”
20 tn Or “Sir.”
21 tn Grk “Open to us.”
22 tn Grk “and answering, he will say to you.” This is redundant in contemporary English and has been simplified to “he will answer you.”
23 sn For the imagery behind the statement “I do not know where you come from,” see Ps 138:6; Isa 63:16; Jer 1:5; Hos 5:3.
24 tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “So” to indicate a summary or conclusion to the argument of the preceding paragraph.
25 tn Grk “must do evil still.”
26 tn For this translation see L&N 88.258; the term refers to living in moral filth.
27 tn Grk “filthy, and the.” This is a continuation of the previous sentence in Greek, but because of the length and complexity of the construction a new sentence was started in the translation.