Psalms 25:11

25:11 For the sake of your reputation, ¹  O Lord,

forgive my sin, because it is great. ² 

Psalms 106:8

106:8 Yet he delivered them for the sake of his reputation, ³ 

that he might reveal his power.

Jeremiah 14:7

14:7 Then I said, ⁴ 

“O Lord, intervene for the honor of your name ⁵ 

even though our sins speak out against us. ⁶ 

Indeed, ⁷  we have turned away from you many times.

We have sinned against you.

Ephesians 4:32

4:32 Instead, ⁸  be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ also forgave you. ⁹ 

¹ tn Heb “name.” By forgiving the sinful psalmist, the Lord’s reputation as a merciful God will be enhanced.

² sn Forgive my sin, because it is great. The psalmist readily admits his desperate need for forgiveness.

³ tn Heb “his name,” which here stands metonymically for God’s reputation.

⁴ tn The words “Then I said” are not in the text. However, it cannot be a continuation of the Lord’s speech and the people have consistently refused to acknowledge their sin. The fact that the prayer here and in vv. 19-22 are followed by an address from God to Jeremiah regarding prayer (cf. 4:11 and the interchanges there between God and Jeremiah and 15:1) also argues that the speaker is Jeremiah. He is again identifying with his people (cf. 8:18-9:2). Here he takes up the petition part of the lament which often contains elements of confession of sin and statements of trust. In 14:1-6 God portrays to Jeremiah the people’s lamentable plight instead of their describing it to him. Here Jeremiah prays what they should pray. The people are strangely silent throughout.

⁵ tn Heb “Act for the sake of your name.” The usage of “act” in this absolute, unqualified sense cf. BDB 794 s.v. עָוֹשָׂה Qal.I.r and compare the usage, e.g., in 1 Kgs 8:32 and 39. For the nuance of “for the sake of your name” compare the usage in Isa 48:9 and Ezek 20:9, 14.

⁶ tn Or “bear witness against us,” or “can be used as evidence against us,” to keep the legal metaphor. Heb “testify against.”

⁷ tn The Hebrew particle כִּי (ki) can scarcely be causal here; it is either intensive (BDB 472 s.v. כִּי 1.e) or concessive (BDB 473 s.v. כִּי 2.c). The parallel usage in Gen 18:20 argues for the intensive force as does the fact that the concessive has already been expressed by אִם (’im).

⁸ 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.

⁹ tn Or “forgiving.”