22:6 But I 5 am a worm, 6 not a man; 7
people insult me and despise me. 8
69:19 You know how I am insulted, humiliated and disgraced;
you can see all my enemies. 9
69:20 Their insults are painful 10 and make me lose heart; 11
I look 12 for sympathy, but receive none, 13
for comforters, but find none.
49:7 This is what the Lord,
the protector 14 of Israel, their Holy One, 15 says
to the one who is despised 16 and rejected 17 by nations, 18
a servant of rulers:
“Kings will see and rise in respect, 19
princes will bow down,
because of the faithful Lord,
the Holy One of Israel who has chosen you.”
53:3 He was despised and rejected by people, 20
one who experienced pain and was acquainted with illness;
people hid their faces from him; 21
he was despised, and we considered him insignificant. 22
15:16 So 36 the soldiers led him into the palace (that is, the governor’s residence) 37 and called together the whole cohort. 38 15:17 They put a purple cloak 39 on him and after braiding 40 a crown of thorns, 41 they put it on him. 15:18 They began to salute him: “Hail, king of the Jews!” 42 15:19 Again and again 43 they struck him on the head with a staff 44 and spit on him. Then they knelt down and paid homage to him. 15:20 When they had finished mocking 45 him, they stripped him of the purple cloak and put his own clothes back on him. Then 46 they led him away to crucify him. 47
1 tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.
2 tn The verb ἐπηρώτων (ephrwtwn) has been translated as an iterative imperfect. The participle λέγοντες (legontes) is redundant in English and has not been translated here.
3 tn Grk “Who is the one who hit you?”
4 tn Or “insulting.” Luke uses a strong word here; it means “to revile, to defame, to blaspheme” (L&N 33.400).
5 tn The grammatical construction (conjunction + pronoun) highlights the contrast between the psalmist’s experience and that of his ancestors. When he considers God’s past reliability, it only heightens his despair and confusion, for God’s present silence stands in stark contrast to his past saving acts.
6 tn The metaphor expresses the psalmist’s self-perception, which is based on how others treat him (see the following line).
7 tn Or “not a human being.” The psalmist perceives himself as less than human.
8 tn Heb “a reproach of man and despised by people.”
9 tn Heb “before you [are] all my enemies.”
10 tn Heb “break my heart.” The “heart” is viewed here as the origin of the psalmist’s emotions.
11 tn The verb form appears to be a Qal preterite from an otherwise unattested root נוּשׁ (nush), which some consider an alternate form of אָנַשׁ (’anash, “be weak; be sick”; see BDB 60 s.v. I אָנַשׁ). Perhaps the form should be emended to a Niphal, וָאֵאָנְשָׁה (va’e’onshah, “and I am sick”). The Niphal of אָנַשׁ occurs in 2 Sam 12:15, where it is used to describe David’s sick child.
12 tn Heb “wait.”
13 tn Heb “and I wait for sympathy, but there is none.” The form נוּד (nud) is an infinitive functioning as a verbal noun:, “sympathizing.” Some suggest emending the form to a participle נָד (nad, “one who shows sympathy”). The verb נוּד (nud) also has the nuance “show sympathy” in Job 2:11; 42:11 and Isa 51:19.
14 tn Heb “redeemer.” See the note at 41:14.
15 sn See the note on the phrase “the Holy One of Israel” in 1:4.
16 tc The Hebrew text reads literally “to [one who] despises life.” It is preferable to read with the Qumran scroll 1QIsaa לבזוי, which should be vocalized as a passive participle, לִבְזוּי (livzuy, “to the one despised with respect to life” [נֶפֶשׁ is a genitive of specification]). The consonantal sequence וי was probably misread as ה in the MT tradition. The contextual argument favors the 1QIsaa reading. As J. N. Oswalt (Isaiah [NICOT], 2:294) points out, the three terse phrases “convey a picture of lowliness, worthlessness, and helplessness.”
17 tn MT’s Piel participle (“to the one who rejects”) does not fit contextually. The form should be revocalized as a Pual, “to the one rejected.”
18 tn Parallelism (see “rulers,” “kings,” “princes”) suggests that the singular גּוֹי (goy) be emended to a plural or understood in a collective sense (see 55:5).
19 tn For this sense of קוּם (qum), see Gen 19:1; 23:7; 33:10; Lev 19:32; 1 Sam 20:41; 25:41; 1 Kgs 2:19; Job 29:8.
20 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]).
21 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).
22 sn The servant is likened to a seriously ill person who is shunned by others because of his horrible disease.
23 tn Or “into their headquarters”; Grk “into the praetorium.”
24 sn A Roman cohort was a tenth of a legion, about 500-600 soldiers.
25 tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated.
26 sn The scarlet robe probably refers to a military garment which had the color of royal purple, and thus resembled a king’s robe. The soldiers did this to Jesus as a form of mockery in view of the charges that he was a king.
27 tn Or “weaving.”
28 sn The crown may have been made from palm spines or some other thorny plant common in Israel. In placing the crown of thorns on his head, the soldiers were unwittingly symbolizing God’s curse on humanity (cf. Gen 3:18) being placed on Jesus. Their purpose would have been to mock Jesus’ claim to be a king; the crown of thorns would have represented the “radiant corona” portrayed on the heads of rulers on coins and other artifacts in the 1st century.
29 tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated.
30 tn Or “a reed.” The Greek term can mean either “staff” or “reed.” See BDAG 502 s.v. κάλαμος 2.
31 tn Grk “they mocked him, saying.” The participle λέγοντες (legontes) is redundant and has not been translated.
32 tn Or “Long live the King of the Jews!”
33 tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated.
34 tn Or “the reed.”
35 tn The verb here has been translated as an iterative imperfect.
36 tn Here δέ (de) has been translated as “So” to indicate that the soldiers’ action is in response to Pilate’s condemnation of the prisoner in v. 15.
37 tn Grk “(that is, the praetorium).”
38 sn A Roman cohort was a tenth of a legion, about 500-600 soldiers.
39 sn The purple cloak probably refers to a military garment which had the color of royal purple, and thus resembled a king’s robe. The soldiers did this to Jesus as a form of mockery in view of the charges that he was a king (cf. 15:2).
40 tn Or “weaving.”
41 sn The crown may have been made from palm spines or some other thorny plant common in Israel. In placing the crown of thorns on his head, the soldiers were unwittingly symbolizing God’s curse on humanity (cf. Gen 3:18) being placed on Jesus. Their purpose would have been to mock Jesus’ claim to be a king; the crown of thorns would have represented the “radiant corona” portrayed on the heads of rulers on coins and other artifacts in the 1st century.
42 tn Or “Long live the King of the Jews!”
43 tn The verb here has been translated as an iterative imperfect.
44 tn Or “a reed.” The Greek term can mean either “staff” or “reed.” See BDAG 502 s.v. κάλαμος 2.
45 tn The aorist tense is taken consummatively here.
46 tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the narrative.
47 sn See the note on Crucify in 15:13.