12:33 “Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad 2 and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is known by its fruit. 12:34 Offspring of vipers! How are you able to say anything good, since you are evil? For the mouth speaks from what fills the heart.
2:17 But if you call yourself a Jew and rely on the law 4 and boast of your relationship to God 5 2:18 and know his will 6 and approve the superior things because you receive instruction from the law, 7
3:13 “Their throats are open graves, 8
they deceive with their tongues,
the poison of asps is under their lips.” 9
1 tn Grk “rotten.” The word σαπρός, modifying “tree” in both v. 17 and 18, can also mean “diseased” (L&N 65.28).
2 tn Grk “rotten.” The word σαπρός, modifying both “tree” and “fruit,” can also mean “diseased” (L&N 65.28).
3 tn A figurative extension of ὀψώνιον (oywnion), which refers to a soldier’s pay or wages. Here it refers to the end result of an activity, seen as something one receives back in return. In this case the activity is sin, and the translation “payoff” captures this thought. See also L&N 89.42.
4 sn The law refers to the Mosaic law, described mainly in the OT books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.
5 tn Grk “boast in God.” This may be an allusion to Jer 9:24.
6 tn Grk “the will.”
7 tn Grk “because of being instructed out of the law.”
8 tn Grk “their throat is an opened grave.”
9 sn A quotation from Pss 5:9; 140:3.