Psalms 89:49

89:49 Where are your earlier faithful deeds, ¹  O Lord, ² 

the ones performed in accordance with your reliable oath to David? ³ 

Luke 9:27

9:27 But I tell you most certainly, ⁴  there are some standing here who will not ⁵  experience ⁶  death before they see the kingdom of God.” ⁷ 

Psalms 89:48

89:48 No man can live on without experiencing death,

or deliver his life from the power of Sheol. ⁸  (Selah)

John 8:51

8:51 I tell you the solemn truth, ⁹  if anyone obeys ¹⁰  my teaching, ¹¹  he will never see death.” ¹² 

Hebrews 11:5

11:5 By faith Enoch was taken up so that he did not see death, and he was not to be found because God took him up. For before his removal he had been commended as having pleased God.

¹ sn The Lord’s faithful deeds are also mentioned in Pss 17:7 and 25:6.

² tc Many medieval Hebrew mss read here יְהוָה (yehvah, “the Lord”).

³ tn Heb “[which] you swore on oath to David by your faithfulness.”

⁴ tn Grk “I tell you truly” (λέγω δὲ ὑμῖν ἀληθῶς, legw de Jumin alhqw").

⁵ tn The Greek negative here (οὐ μή, ou mh) is the strongest possible.

⁶ tn Grk “will not taste.” Here the Greek verb does not mean “sample a small amount” (as a typical English reader might infer from the word “taste”), but “experience something cognitively or emotionally; come to know something” (cf. BDAG 195 s.v. γεύομαι 2).

⁷ sn The meaning of the statement that some will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God is clear at one level, harder at another. Jesus predicts some will experience the kingdom before they die. When does this happen? (1) An initial fulfillment is the next event, the transfiguration. (2) It is also possible in Luke’s understanding that all but Judas experience the initial fulfillment of the coming of God’s presence and rule in the work of Acts 2. In either case, the “kingdom of God” referred to here would be the initial rather than the final phase.

⁸ tn Heb “Who [is] the man [who] can live and not see death, [who] can deliver his life from the hand of Sheol?” The rhetorical question anticipates the answer, “No one!”

⁹ tn Grk “Truly, truly, I say to you.”

¹⁰ tn Grk “If anyone keeps.”

¹¹ tn Grk “my word.”

¹² tn Grk “he will never see death forever.” The Greek negative here is emphatic.