Jude 1:21

1:21 maintain ¹  yourselves in the love of God, while anticipating ²  the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that brings eternal life. ³ 

Exodus 3:6

3:6 He added, “I am the God of your father, ⁴  the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Then Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look ⁵  at God.

Proverbs 12:10

12:10 A righteous person cares for ⁶  the life of his animal,

but even the most compassionate acts ⁷  of the wicked are cruel.

Jeremiah 39:7

39:7 Then he had Zedekiah’s eyes put out and had him bound in chains ⁸  to be led off to Babylon.

¹ tn Or “keep.”

² tn Or “waiting for.”

³ tn Grk “unto eternal life.”

⁴ sn This self-revelation by Yahweh prepares for the revelation of the holy name. While no verb is used here, the pronoun and the predicate nominative are a construction used throughout scripture to convey the “I am” disclosures – “I [am] the God of….” But the significant point here is the naming of the patriarchs, for this God is the covenant God, who will fulfill his promises.

⁵ tn The clause uses the Hiphil infinitive construct with a preposition after the perfect tense: יָרֵא מֵהַבִּיט (yare’ mehabbit, “he was afraid from gazing”) meaning “he was afraid to gaze.” The preposition min (מִן) is used before infinitives after verbs like the one to complete the verb (see BDB 583 s.v. 7b).

⁶ tn Heb “knows”; NLT “concerned for the welfare of.” The righteous take care of animals, not just people.

⁷ tn Heb “but the mercies.” The additional words appear in the translation for the sake of clarification. The line can be interpreted in two ways: (1) when the wicked exhibit a kind act, they do it in a cruel way, or (2) even the kindest of their acts is cruel by all assessments, e.g., stuffing animals with food to fatten them for market – their “kindness” is driven by ulterior motives (J. H. Greenstone, Proverbs, 129).

⁸ tn Heb “fetters of bronze.” The more generic “chains” is used in the translation because “fetters” is a word unfamiliar to most modern readers.