4:6 Many say, “Who can show us anything good?”
Smile upon us, Lord! 1
4:7 You make me happier 2
than those who have abundant grain and wine. 3
27:4 I have asked the Lord for one thing –
this is what I desire!
I want to live 4 in the Lord’s house 5 all the days of my life,
so I can gaze at the splendor 6 of the Lord
and contemplate in his temple.
63:2 Yes, 7 in the sanctuary I have seen you, 8
and witnessed 9 your power and splendor.
63:3 Because 10 experiencing 11 your loyal love is better than life itself,
my lips will praise you.
63:4 For this reason 12 I will praise you while I live;
in your name I will lift up my hands. 13
63:5 As if with choice meat 14 you satisfy my soul. 15
My mouth joyfully praises you, 16
73:28 But as for me, God’s presence is all I need. 17
I have made the sovereign Lord my shelter,
as 18 I declare all the things you have done.
14:8 Philip said, 19 “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be content.” 20
1 tn Heb “lift up upon us the light of your face,
2 tn Heb “you place joy in my heart.” Another option is to understand the perfect verbal form as indicating certitude, “you will make me happier.”
3 tn Heb “from (i.e., more than) the time (when) their grain and their wine are abundant.”
4 tn Heb “my living.”
5 sn The
6 tn Or “beauty.”
7 tn The Hebrew particle כֵּן (ken) is used here to stress the following affirmation (see Josh 2:4).
8 tn The perfect verbal form is understood here as referring to a past experience which the psalmist desires to be repeated. Another option is to take the perfect as indicating the psalmist’s certitude that he will again stand in God’s presence in the sanctuary. In this case one can translate, “I will see you.”
9 tn Heb “seeing.” The preposition with the infinitive construct here indicates an accompanying circumstance.
10 tn This line is understood as giving the basis for the praise promised in the following line. Another option is to take the Hebrew particle כִּי (ki) as asseverative/emphasizing, “Indeed, your loyal love is better” (cf. NEB, which leaves the particle untranslated).
11 tn The word “experiencing” is supplied in the translation for clarification. The psalmist does not speak here of divine loyal love in some abstract sense, but of loyal love revealed and experienced.
12 tn Or perhaps “then.”
13 sn I will lift up my hands. Lifting up one’s hands toward God was a gesture of prayer (see Ps 28:2; Lam 2:19) or respect (Ps 119:48).
14 tn Heb “like fat and fatness.”
15 tn Or “me.”
16 tn Heb “and [with] lips of joy my mouth praises.”
17 tn Heb “but as for me, the nearness of God for me [is] good.”
18 tn The infinitive construct with -לְ (lÿ) is understood here as indicating an attendant circumstance. Another option is to take it as indicating purpose (“so that I might declare”) or result (“with the result that I declare”).
19 tn Grk “said to him.”
20 tn Or “and that is enough for us.”
21 tn Many interpreters have associated μοναί (monai) with an Aramaic word that can refer to a stopping place or resting place for a traveler on a journey. This is similar to one of the meanings the word can have in secular Greek (Pausanius 10.31.7). Origen understood the use here to refer to stations on the road to God. This may well have been the understanding of the Latin translators who translated μονή (monh) by mansio, a stopping place. The English translation “mansions” can be traced back to Tyndale, but in Middle English the word simply meant “a dwelling place” (not necessarily large or imposing) with no connotation of being temporary. The interpretation put forward by Origen would have been well suited to Gnosticism, where the soul in its ascent passes through stages during which it is gradually purified of all that is material and therefore evil. It is much more likely that the word μονή should be related to its cognate verb μένω (menw), which is frequently used in the Fourth Gospel to refer to the permanence of relationship between Jesus and the Father and/or Jesus and the believer. Thus the idea of a permanent dwelling place, rather than a temporary stopping place, would be in view. Luther’s translation of μοναί by Wohnungen is very accurate here, as it has the connotation of a permanent residence.
22 sn Most interpreters have understood the reference to my Father’s house as a reference to heaven, and the dwelling places (μονή, monh) as the permanent residences of believers there. This seems consistent with the vocabulary and the context, where in v. 3 Jesus speaks of coming again to take the disciples to himself. However, the phrase in my Father’s house was used previously in the Fourth Gospel in 2:16 to refer to the temple in Jerusalem. The author in 2:19-22 then reinterpreted the temple as Jesus’ body, which was to be destroyed in death and then rebuilt in resurrection after three days. Even more suggestive is the statement by Jesus in 8:35, “Now the slave does not remain (μένω, menw) in the household forever, but the son remains (μένω) forever.” If in the imagery of the Fourth Gospel the phrase in my Father’s house is ultimately a reference to Jesus’ body, the relationship of μονή to μένω suggests the permanent relationship of the believer to Jesus and the Father as an adopted son who remains in the household forever. In this case the “dwelling place” is “in” Jesus himself, where he is, whether in heaven or on earth. The statement in v. 3, “I will come again and receive you to myself,” then refers not just to the parousia, but also to Jesus’ postresurrection return to the disciples in his glorified state, when by virtue of his death on their behalf they may enter into union with him and with the Father as adopted sons. Needless to say, this bears numerous similarities to Pauline theology, especially the concepts of adoption as sons and being “in Christ” which are prominent in passages like Eph 1. It is also important to note, however, the emphasis in the Fourth Gospel itself on the present reality of eternal life (John 5:24, 7:38-39, etc.) and the possibility of worshiping the Father “in the Spirit and in truth” (John 4:21-24) in the present age. There is a sense in which it is possible to say that the future reality is present now. See further J. McCaffrey, The House With Many Rooms (AnBib 114).
23 tc A number of important
24 tn Or “to prepare.”
25 tn Or “If not, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?” What is the meaning of the last clause with or without the ὅτι? One of the questions that must be answered here is whether or not τόπος (topos) is to be equated with μονή (monh). In Rev 12:8 τόπος is used to refer to a place in heaven, which would suggest that the two are essentially equal here. Jesus is going ahead of believers to prepare a place for them, a permanent dwelling place in the Father’s house (see the note on this phrase in v. 2).