Psalms 18:21

18:21 For I have obeyed the Lord’s commands; ¹ 

I have not rebelled against my God. ² 

Isaiah 59:15

59:15 Honesty has disappeared;

the one who tries to avoid evil is robbed.

The Lord watches and is displeased, ³ 

for there is no justice.

Ezekiel 6:9

6:9 Then your survivors will remember me among the nations where they are exiled. They will realize ⁴  how I was crushed by their unfaithful ⁵  heart which turned from me and by their eyes which lusted after their idols. They will loathe themselves ⁶  because of the evil they have done and because of all their abominable practices.

Hosea 1:2

Symbols of Sin and Judgment: The Prostitute and Her Children

1:2 When the Lord first spoke ⁷  through ⁸  Hosea, he ⁹  said to him, ¹⁰  “Go marry ¹¹  a prostitute ¹²  who will bear illegitimate children conceived through prostitution, ¹³  because the nation ¹⁴  continually commits spiritual prostitution ¹⁵  by turning away from ¹⁶  the Lord.”

Hebrews 3:12

3:12 See to it, ¹⁷  brothers and sisters, ¹⁸  that none of you has ¹⁹  an evil, unbelieving heart that forsakes ²⁰  the living God. ²¹ 

¹ tn Heb “for I have kept the ways of the Lord.” The phrase “ways of the Lord” refers here to the “conduct required” by the Lord. In Ps 25 the Lord’s “ways” are associated with his covenantal demands (see vv. 4, 9-10). See also Ps 119:3 (cf. vv. 1, 4), as well as Deut 8:6; 10:12; 11:22; 19:9; 26:17; 28:9; 30:16.

² tn Heb “I have not acted wickedly from my God.” The statement is elliptical; the idea is, “I have not acted wickedly and, in so doing, departed from my God.”

³ tn Heb “and it is displeasing in his eyes.”

⁴ tn The words “they will realize” are not in the Hebrew text; they are added here for stylistic reasons since this clause assumes the previous verb “to remember” or “to take into account.”

⁵ tn Heb “how I was broken by their adulterous heart.” The image of God being “broken” is startling, but perfectly natural within the metaphorical framework of God as offended husband. The idiom must refer to the intense grief that Israel’s unfaithfulness caused God. For a discussion of the syntax and semantics of the Hebrew text, see M. Greenberg, Ezekiel (AB), 1:134.

⁶ tn Heb adds “in their faces.”

⁷ tn The construct noun תְּחִלַּת (tékhillat, “beginning of”) displays a wider use of the construct state here, preceding a perfect verb דִּבֶּר (dibber, “he spoke”; Piel perfect 3rd person masculine singular) rather than a genitive noun. This is an unusual temporal construction (GKC 422 §130.d). It may be rendered, “When he (= the Lord) began to speak” (cf. ASV, NASB, NIV, NRSV, TEV, and most other modern English versions, all of which are similar). This time-determinative was not correctly understood by the LXX or by the KJV: “The beginning of the word of the Lord.”

⁸ tn The preposition בְּ (bet) on בְּהוֹשֵׁעַ (bÿhoshea’) is an instrumental use of the preposition (BDB 89 s.v. בְּ III.2.b): “by, with, through Hosea” rather than a directional “to Hosea.” This focuses on the entire prophetic revelation through Hosea to Israel.

⁹ tn Heb “the Lord.” This is redundant in English, so the pronoun has been used in the translation (cf. TEV, NLT).

¹⁰ tn Heb “to Hosea.” The proper name is replaced by the pronoun here to avoid redundancy in English (cf. NIV, NCV, NLT).

¹¹ tn Heb “Go, take for yourself” (so NRSV; NASB, NIV “to yourself”). In conjunction with the following phrase this means “marry.”

¹² tn Heb “a wife of harlotries.” The noun זְנוּנִים (zÿnunim) means “prostitute; harlot” (HALOT 275-76 s.v. זְנוּנִים). The term does not refer to mere adultery (cf. NIV; also NCV, TEV, CEV “unfaithful”) which is expressed by the root נַאַף (na’af, “adultery”; HALOT 658 s.v. נאף). The plural noun זְנוּנִים (zénunim, literally, “harlotries”) is an example of the plural of character or plural of repeated behavior. The phrase “wife of harlotries” (אֵשֶׁת זְנוּנִים, ’eshet zénunim) probably refers to a prostitute, possibly a temple prostitute serving at a Baal temple.

¹³ tn Heb “and children of harlotries.” However, TEV takes the phrase to mean the children will behave like their mother (“your children will be just like her”).

¹⁴ tn Heb “the land.” The term “the land” is frequently used as a synecdoche of container (the land of Israel) for the contained (the people of Israel).

¹⁵ tn Heb “prostitution.” The adjective “spiritual” is supplied in the translation to clarify that apostasy is meant here. The construction זָנֹה תִזְנֶה (zanoh tizneh, infinitive absolute + imperfect of the same root) repeats the root זָנַה (zanah, “harlotry”) for rhetorical emphasis. Israel was guilty of gross spiritual prostitution by apostatizing from Yahweh. The verb זָנַה is used in a concrete sense to refer to a spouse being unfaithful in a marriage relationship (HALOT 275 s.v. זנה 1), and figuratively meaning “to be unfaithful” in a relationship with God by prostituting oneself with other gods and worshiping idols (Exod 34:15; Lev 17:7; 20:5, 6; Deut 31:16; Judg 8:27, 33; 21:17; 1 Chr 5:25; Ezek 6:9; 20:30; 23:30; Hos 4:15; Ps 106:39; see HALOT 275 s.v. 2).

¹⁶ tn Heb “from after.”

¹⁷ tn Or “take care.”

¹⁸ tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 2:11.

¹⁹ tn Grk “that there not be in any of you.”

²⁰ tn Or “deserts,” “rebels against.”

²¹ tn Grk “in forsaking the living God.”