Isaiah 26:11

26:11 O Lord, you are ready to act, ¹ 

but they don’t even notice.

They will see and be put to shame by your angry judgment against humankind, ² 

yes, fire will consume your enemies. ³ 

Matthew 23:13

23:13 “But woe to you, experts in the law ⁴  and you Pharisees, hypocrites! ⁵  You keep locking people out of the kingdom of heaven! ⁶  For you neither enter nor permit those trying to enter to go in.

John 11:47-48

11:47 So the chief priests and the Pharisees ⁷  called the council ⁸  together and said, “What are we doing? For this man is performing many miraculous signs. 11:48 If we allow him to go on in this way, ⁹  everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away our sanctuary ¹⁰  and our nation.”

John 12:10

12:10 So the chief priests planned to kill Lazarus too, ¹¹ 

John 12:19

12:19 Thus the Pharisees ¹²  said to one another, “You see that you can do nothing. Look, the world has run off after him!”

Acts 4:1-2

The Arrest and Trial of Peter and John

4:1 While Peter and John ¹³  were speaking to the people, the priests and the commander ¹⁴  of the temple guard ¹⁵  and the Sadducees ¹⁶  came up ¹⁷  to them, 4:2 angry ¹⁸  because they were teaching the people and announcing ¹⁹  in Jesus the resurrection of the dead.

Acts 4:16-18

4:16 saying, “What should we do with these men? For it is plain ²⁰  to all who live in Jerusalem that a notable miraculous sign ²¹  has come about through them, ²²  and we cannot deny it. 4:17 But to keep this matter from spreading any further among the people, let us warn them to speak no more ²³  to anyone in this name.” 4:18 And they called them in and ordered ²⁴  them not to speak or teach at all in the name ²⁵  of Jesus.

James 4:5

4:5 Or do you think the scripture means nothing when it says, ²⁶  “The spirit that God ²⁷  caused ²⁸  to live within us has an envious yearning”? ²⁹ 

¹ tn Heb “O Lord, your hand is lifted up.”

² tn Heb “They will see and be ashamed of zeal of people.” Some take the prefixed verbs as jussives and translate the statement as a prayer, “Let them see and be put to shame.” The meaning of the phrase קִנְאַת־עָם (qin’at-’am, “zeal of people”) is unclear. The translation assumes that this refers to God’s angry judgment upon people. Another option is to understand the phrase as referring to God’s zealous, protective love of his covenant people. In this case one might translate, “by your zealous devotion to your people.”

³ tn Heb “yes, fire, your enemies, will consume them.” Many understand the prefixed verb form to be jussive and translate, “let [fire] consume” (cf. NAB, NIV, NRSV). The mem suffixed to the verb may be enclitic; if a pronominal suffix, it refers back to “your enemies.”

⁴ tn Or “scribes.” See the note on the phrase “experts in the law” in 2:4.

⁵ tn Grk “Woe to you…because you…” The causal particle ὅτι (Joti) has not been translated here for rhetorical effect (and so throughout this chapter).

⁶ tn Grk “because you are closing the kingdom of heaven before people.”

⁷ tn The phrase “chief priests and Pharisees” is a comprehensive name for the groups represented in the ruling council (the Sanhedrin) as in John 7:45; 18:3; Acts 5:22, 26.

⁸ tn Or “Sanhedrin” (the Sanhedrin was the highest legal, legislative, and judicial body among the Jews). The συνέδριον (sunedrion) which they gathered was probably an informal meeting rather than the official Sanhedrin. This is the only occurrence of the word συνέδριον in the Gospel of John, and the only anarthrous singular use in the NT. There are other plural anarthrous uses which have the general meaning “councils.” The fact that Caiaphas in 11:49 is referred to as “one of them” supports the unofficial nature of the meeting; in the official Sanhedrin he, being high priest that year, would have presided over the assembly. Thus it appears that an informal council was called to discuss what to do about Jesus and his activities.

⁹ tn Grk “If we let him do thus.”

¹⁰ tn Or “holy place”; Grk “our place” (a reference to the temple in Jerusalem).

¹¹ sn According to John 11:53 the Jewish leadership had already planned to kill Jesus. This plot against Lazarus apparently never got beyond the planning stage, however, since no further mention is made of it by the author.

¹² sn See the note on Pharisees in 1:24.

¹³ tn Grk “While they”; the referents (Peter and John) have been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹⁴ tn Or “captain.”

¹⁵ tn Grk “the official of the temple,” a title for the commander of the Jewish soldiers guarding the temple (thus the translation, “the commander of the temple guard”). See L&N 37.91.

¹⁶ sn The Sadducees controlled the official political structures of Judaism at this time, being the majority members of the Sanhedrin. They were known as extremely strict on law and order issues (Josephus, J. W. 2.8.2 [2.119], 2.8.14 [2.164-166]; Ant. 13.5.9 [13.171-173], 13.10.6 [13.293-298], 18.1.2 [18.11], 18.1.4 [18.16-17], 20.9.1 [20.199]; Life 2 [10-11]). See also Matt 3:7; 16:1-12; 22:23-34; Mark 12:18-27; Luke 20:27-38; Acts 5:17; 23:6-8.

¹⁷ tn Or “approached.” This verb often denotes a sudden appearing (BDAG 418 s.v. ἐφίστημι 1).

¹⁸ tn Or “greatly annoyed,” “provoked.”

¹⁹ tn Or “proclaiming.”

²⁰ tn Or “evident.”

²¹ tn Here σημεῖον (shmeion) has been translated as “miraculous sign” rather than simply “sign” or “miracle” since both components appear to be present in the context. It is clear that the healing of the lame man was a miracle, but for the Sanhedrin it was the value of the miraculous healing as a sign that concerned them because it gave attestation to the message of Peter and John. The sign “speaks” as Peter claimed in 3:11-16.

²² tn Or “has been done by them.”

²³ tn Or “speak no longer.”

²⁴ tn Or “commanded.”

²⁵ sn In the name of Jesus. Once again, the “name” reflects the person. The person of Jesus and his authority is the “troubling” topic that, as far as the Jewish leadership is concerned, needs controlling.

²⁶ tn Grk “vainly says.”

²⁷ tn Grk “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

²⁸ tc The Byzantine text and a few other mss (P 33 Ï) have the intransitive κατῴκησεν (katwkhsen) here, which turns τὸ πνεῦμα (to pneuma) into the subject of the verb: “The spirit which lives within us.” But the more reliable and older witnesses (Ì⁷⁴ א B Ψ 049 1241 1739 al) have the causative verb, κατῴκισεν (katwkisen), which implies a different subject and τὸ πνεῦμα as the object: “The spirit that he causes to live within us.” Both because of the absence of an explicit subject and the relative scarcity of the causative κατοικίζω (katoikizw, “cause to dwell”) compared to the intransitive κατοικέω (katoikew, “live, dwell”) in biblical Greek (κατοικίζω does not occur in the NT at all, and occurs one twelfth as frequently as κατοικέω in the LXX), it is easy to see why scribes would replace κατῴκισεν with κατῴκησεν. Thus, on internal and external grounds, κατῴκισεν is the preferred reading.

²⁹ tn Interpreters debate the referent of the word “spirit” in this verse: (1) The translation takes “spirit” to be the lustful capacity within people that produces a divided mind (1:8, 14) and inward conflicts regarding God (4:1-4). God has allowed it to be in man since the fall, and he provides his grace (v. 6) and the new birth through the gospel message (1:18-25) to counteract its evil effects. (2) On the other hand the word “spirit” may be taken positively as the Holy Spirit and the sense would be, “God yearns jealously for the Spirit he caused to live within us.” But the word for “envious” or “jealous” is generally negative in biblical usage and the context before and after seems to favor the negative interpretation.