John 8:53

8:53 You aren’t greater than our father Abraham who died, are you? ¹  And the prophets died too! Who do you claim to be?”

Isaiah 53:2-3

53:2 He sprouted up like a twig before God, ² 

like a root out of parched soil; ³ 

he had no stately form or majesty that might catch our attention, ⁴ 

no special appearance that we should want to follow him. ⁵ 

53:3 He was despised and rejected by people, ⁶ 

one who experienced pain and was acquainted with illness;

people hid their faces from him; ⁷ 

he was despised, and we considered him insignificant. ⁸ 

Matthew 12:42

12:42 The queen of the South ⁹  will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon – and now, ¹⁰  something greater than Solomon is here!

Hebrews 3:3

3:3 For he has come to deserve greater glory than Moses, just as the builder of a house deserves greater honor than the house itself!

¹ tn Questions prefaced with μή (mh) in Greek anticipate a negative answer. This can sometimes be indicated by using a “tag” at the end in English (here the tag is “are you?”).

² tn Heb “before him.” Some suggest an emendation to “before us.” If the third singular suffix of the Hebrew text is retained, it probably refers to the Lord (see v. 1b). For a defense of this reading, see R. Whybray, Isaiah 40-66 (NCBC), 173-74.

³ sn The metaphor in this verse suggests insignificance.

⁴ tn Heb “that we might see him.” The vav conjunctive prefixed to the imperfect introduces a result clause here. See GKC 504-5 §166.a.

⁵ tn Heb “that we should desire him.” The vav conjunctive prefixed to the imperfect introduces a result clause here. See GKC 504-5 §166.a.

⁶ tn Heb “lacking of men.” If the genitive is taken as specifying (“lacking with respect to men”), then the idea is that he lacked company because he was rejected by people. Another option is to take the genitive as indicating genus or larger class (i.e., “one lacking among men”). In this case one could translate, “he was a transient” (cf. the use of חָדֵל [khadel] in Ps 39:5 HT [39:4 ET]).

⁷ tn Heb “like a hiding of the face from him,” i.e., “like one before whom the face is hidden” (see BDB 712 s.v. מַסְתֵּר).

⁸ sn The servant is likened to a seriously ill person who is shunned by others because of his horrible disease.

⁹ sn On the queen of the South see 1 Kgs 10:1-3 and 2 Chr 9:1-12, as well as Josephus, Ant. 8.6.5-6 (8.165-175). The South most likely refers to modern southwest Arabia, possibly the eastern part of modern Yemen, although there is an ancient tradition reflected in Josephus which identifies this geo-political entity as Ethiopia.

¹⁰ tn Grk “behold.”