Matthew 6:14-15

6:14 “For if you forgive others ¹  their sins, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 6:15 But if you do not forgive others, your Father will not forgive you your sins.

Matthew 11:25-26

Jesus’ Invitation

11:25 At that time Jesus said, ²  “I praise ³  you, Father, Lord ⁴  of heaven and earth, because ⁵  you have hidden these things from the wise ⁶  and intelligent, and revealed them to little children. 11:26 Yes, Father, for this was your gracious will. ⁷ 

Matthew 18:35

18:35 So also my heavenly Father will do to you, if each of you does not forgive your ⁸  brother ⁹  from your heart.”

Ephesians 4:31-32

4:31 You must put away every kind of bitterness, anger, wrath, quarreling, and evil, slanderous talk. 4:32 Instead, ¹⁰  be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ also forgave you. ¹¹ 

Colossians 3:13

3:13 bearing with one another and forgiving ¹²  one another, if someone happens to have ¹³  a complaint against anyone else. Just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also forgive others. ¹⁴ 

James 2:13

2:13 For judgment is merciless for the one who has shown no mercy. But mercy triumphs over ¹⁵  judgment.

¹ tn Here ἄνθρωπος (anqrwpo") is used in a generic sense: “people, others.”

² tn Grk “At that time, answering, Jesus said.” This construction is somewhat redundant in English and has been simplified in the translation.

³ tn Or “thank.”

⁴ sn The title Lord is an important name for God, showing his sovereignty, but it is interesting that it comes next to a reference to the Father, a term indicative of God’s care. The two concepts are often related in the NT; see Eph 1:3-6.

⁵ tn Or “that.”

⁶ sn See 1 Cor 1:26-31.

⁷ tn Grk “for (to do) thus was well-pleasing before you,” BDAG 325 s.v. ἔμπροσθεν 1.b.δ; speaking of something taking place “before” God is a reverential way of avoiding direct connection of the action to him.

⁸ tn Grk “his.” The pronoun has been translated to follow English idiom (the last pronoun of the verse [“from your heart”] is second person plural in the original).

⁹ tn Here the term “brother” means “fellow believer” or “fellow Christian” (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 2.a), whether male or female. Concerning the familial connotations, see also the note on the first occurrence of this term in v. 15.

¹⁰ tc ‡ Although most witnesses have either δέ (de; Ì⁴⁹ א A D² Ψ 33 1739^mg Ï lat) or οὖν (oun; D* F G 1175) here, a few important mss lack a conjunction (Ì⁴⁶ B 0278 6 1739* 1881). If either conjunction were originally in the text, it is difficult to explain how the asyndetic construction could have arisen (although the dropping of δέ could have occurred via homoioteleuton). Further, although Hellenistic Greek rarely joined sentences without a conjunction, such does occur in the corpus Paulinum on occasion, especially to underscore a somber point. “Instead” has been supplied in the translation because of stylistic requirements, not textual basis. NA²⁷ places δέ in brackets, indicating some doubt as to its authenticity.

¹¹ tn Or “forgiving.”

¹² tn For the translation of χαριζόμενοι (carizomenoi) as “forgiving,” see BDAG 1078 s.v. χαρίζομαι 3. The two participles “bearing” (ἀνεχόμενοι, anecomenoi) and “forgiving” (χαριζόμενοι) express the means by which the action of the finite verb “clothe yourselves” is to be carried out.

¹³ tn Grk “if someone has”; the term “happens,” though not in the Greek text, is inserted to bring out the force of the third class condition.

¹⁴ tn The expression “forgive others” is not in the Greek text, but is implied. It is included in the translation to make the sentence complete and more comprehensible to the English reader.

¹⁵ tn Grk “boasts against, exults over,” in victory.