22:31 They will come and tell about his saving deeds; 1
they will tell a future generation what he has accomplished. 2
71:18 Even when I am old and gray, 3
O God, do not abandon me,
until I tell the next generation about your strength,
and those coming after me about your power. 4
78:3 What we have heard and learned 5 –
that which our ancestors 6 have told us –
78:4 we will not hide from their 7 descendants.
We will tell the next generation
about the Lord’s praiseworthy acts, 8
about his strength and the amazing things he has done.
78:5 He established a rule 9 in Jacob;
he set up a law in Israel.
He commanded our ancestors
to make his deeds known to their descendants, 10
78:6 so that the next generation, children yet to be born,
might know about them.
They will grow up and tell their descendants about them. 11
105:1 Give thanks to the Lord!
Call on his name!
Make known his accomplishments among the nations!
105:2 Sing to him!
Make music to him!
Tell about all his miraculous deeds!
13:14 18 In the future, 19 when your son asks you 20 ‘What is this?’ 21 you are to tell him, ‘With a mighty hand 22 the Lord brought us out from Egypt, from the land of slavery. 23 13:15 When Pharaoh stubbornly refused 24 to release us, the Lord killed all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of people to the firstborn of animals. 25 That is why I am sacrificing 26 to the Lord the first male offspring of every womb, but all my firstborn sons I redeem.’
38:19 The living person, the living person, he gives you thanks,
as I do today.
A father tells his sons about your faithfulness.
1:3 Tell your children 27 about it,
have your children tell their children,
and their children the following generation. 28
1 tn Heb “his righteousness.” Here the noun צִדָקָה (tsidaqah) refers to the Lord’s saving deeds whereby he vindicates the oppressed.
2 tn Heb “to a people [to be] born that he has acted.” The words “they will tell” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.
3 tn Heb “and even unto old age and gray hair.”
4 tn Heb “until I declare your arm to a generation, to everyone who comes your power.” God’s “arm” here is an anthropomorphism that symbolizes his great strength.
5 tn Or “known.”
6 tn Heb “fathers” (also in vv. 5, 8, 12, 57).
7 tn The pronominal suffix refers back to the “fathers” (“our ancestors,” v. 3).
8 tn Heb “to a following generation telling the praises of the
9 tn The Hebrew noun עֵדוּת (’edut) refers here to God’s command that the older generation teach their children about God’s mighty deeds in the nation’s history (see Exod 10:2; Deut 4:9; 6:20-25).
10 tn Heb “which he commanded our fathers to make them known to their sons.” The plural suffix “them” probably refers back to the
11 tn Heb “in order that they might know, a following generation, sons [who] will be born, they will arise and will tell to their sons.”
12 sn Psalm 105. The psalmist summons Israel to praise God because he delivered his people from Egypt in fulfillment of his covenantal promises to Abraham. A parallel version of vv. 1-15 appears in 1 Chr 16:8-22.
13 tn The verb used here and at the beginning of v. 24 is שָׁמַר (shamar); it can be translated “watch, keep, protect,” but in this context the point is to “observe” the religious customs and practices set forth in these instructions.
14 tn Heb “what is this service to you?”
15 sn This expression “the sacrifice of Yahweh’s Passover” occurs only here. The word זֶבַח (zevakh) means “slaughtering” and so a blood sacrifice. The fact that this word is used in Lev 3 for the peace offering has linked the Passover as a kind of peace offering, and both the Passover and the peace offerings were eaten as communal meals.
16 tn The verb means “to strike, smite, plague”; it is the same verb that has been used throughout this section (נָגַף, nagaf). Here the construction is the infinitive construct in a temporal clause.
17 tn The two verbs form a verbal hendiadys: “and the people bowed down and they worshiped.” The words are synonymous, and so one is taken as the adverb for the other.
18 sn As with v. 8, the Law now requires that the children be instructed on the meaning of this observance. It is a memorial of the deliverance from bondage and the killing of the firstborn in Egypt.
19 tn Heb “tomorrow.”
20 tn Heb “and it will be when your son will ask you.”
21 tn The question is cryptic; it simply says, “What is this?” but certainly refers to the custom just mentioned. It asks, “What does this mean?” or “Why do we do this?”
22 tn The expression is “with strength of hand,” making “hand” the genitive of specification. In translation “strength” becomes the modifier, because “hand” specifies where the strength was. But of course the whole expression is anthropomorphic for the power of God.
23 tn Heb “house of slaves.”
24 tn Heb “dealt hardly in letting us go” or “made it hard to let us go” (see S. R. Driver, Exodus, 110). The verb is the simple Hiphil perfect הִקְשָׁה (hiqshah, “he made hard”); the infinitive construct לְשַׁלְּחֵנוּ (lÿshallÿkhenu, “to release us”) could be taken epexegetically, meaning “he made releasing us hard.” But the infinitive more likely gives the purpose or the result after the verb “hardened himself.” The verb is figurative for “be stubborn” or “stubbornly refuse.”
25 tn The text uses “man” and “beast.”
26 tn The form is the active participle.
27 tn Heb “sons.” This word occurs several times in this verse.
28 sn The circumstances that precipitated the book of Joel surrounded a locust invasion in Palestine that was of unprecedented proportions. The locusts had devastated the country’s agrarian economy, with the unwelcome consequences extending to every important aspect of commercial, religious, and national life. To further complicate matters, a severe drought had exhausted water supplies, causing life-threatening shortages for animal and human life (cf. v. 20). Locust invasions occasionally present significant problems in Palestine in modern times. The year 1865 was commonly known among Arabic-speaking peoples of the Near East as sent el jarad, “year of the locust.” The years 1892, 1899, and 1904 witnessed significant locust invasions in Palestine. But in modern times there has been nothing equal in magnitude to the great locust invasion that began in Palestine in February of 1915. This modern parallel provides valuable insight into the locust plague the prophet Joel points to as a foreshadowing of the day of the Lord. For an eyewitness account of the 1915 locust invasion of Palestine see J. D. Whiting, “Jerusalem’s Locust Plague,” National Geographic 28 (December 1915): 511-50.