Psalms 30:12

30:12 So now ¹  my heart ²  will sing to you and not be silent;

O Lord my God, I will always ³  give thanks to you.

Psalms 57:8

57:8 Awake, my soul! ⁴ 

Awake, O stringed instrument and harp!

I will wake up at dawn! ⁵ 

Acts 2:26

2:26 Therefore my heart was glad and my tongue rejoiced;

my body ⁶  also will live in hope,

James 3:5-9

3:5 So too the tongue is a small part of the body, ⁷  yet it has great pretensions. ⁸  Think ⁹  how small a flame sets a huge forest ablaze. 3:6 And the tongue is a fire! The tongue represents ¹⁰  the world of wrongdoing among the parts of our bodies. It ¹¹  pollutes the entire body and sets fire to the course of human existence – and is set on fire by hell. ¹² 

3:7 For every kind of animal, bird, reptile, and sea creature ¹³  is subdued and has been subdued by humankind. ¹⁴  3:8 But no human being can subdue the tongue; it is a restless ¹⁵  evil, full of deadly poison. 3:9 With it we bless the Lord ¹⁶  and Father, and with it we curse people ¹⁷  made in God’s image.

¹ tn Heb “so that”; or “in order that.”

² tn Heb “glory.” Some view כָבוֹד (khavod, “glory”) here as a metonymy for man’s inner being (see BDB 459 s.v. II כָּבוֹד 5), but it is preferable to emend the form to כְּבֵדִי (kÿvediy, “my liver”). Like the heart, the liver is viewed as the seat of one’s emotions. See also Pss 16:9; 57:9; 108:1, as well as H. W. Wolff, Anthropology of the Old Testament, 64, and M. Dahood, Psalms (AB), 1:90. For an Ugaritic example of the heart/liver as the source of joy, see G. R. Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends, 47-48: “her [Anat’s] liver swelled with laughter, her heart was filled with joy, the liver of Anat with triumph.” “Heart” is used in the translation above for the sake of English idiom; the expression “my liver sings” would seem odd indeed to the modern reader.

³ tn Or “forever.”

⁴ tn Heb “glory,” but that makes little sense in the context. Some view כָּבוֹד (kavod, “glory”) here as a metonymy for man’s inner being (see BDB 459 s.v. II כָּבוֹד 5), but it is preferable to emend the form to כְּבֵדִי (kÿvediy, “my liver”). Like the heart, the liver is viewed as the seat of one’s emotions. See also Pss 16:9; 30:12; 108:1, as well as H. W. Wolff, Anthropology of the Old Testament, 64, and M. Dahood, Psalms (AB), 1:90. For an Ugaritic example of the heart/liver as the source of joy, see G. R. Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends, 47-48: “her [Anat’s] liver swelled with laughter, her heart was filled with joy, the liver of Anat with triumph.”

⁵ tn BDB 1007 s.v. שַׁחַר takes “dawn” as an adverbial accusative, though others understand it as a personified direct object. “Dawn” is used metaphorically for the time of deliverance and vindication the psalmist anticipates. When salvation “dawns,” the psalmist will “wake up” in praise.

⁶ tn Grk “my flesh.”

⁷ tn Grk “a small member.”

⁸ tn Grk “boasts of great things.”

⁹ tn Grk “Behold.”

¹⁰ tn Grk “makes itself,” “is made.”

¹¹ tn Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started here in the translation.

¹² sn The word translated hell is “Gehenna” (γέεννα, geenna), a Greek transliteration of the Hebrew words ge hinnom (“Valley of Hinnom”). This was the valley along the south side of Jerusalem. In OT times it was used for human sacrifices to the pagan god Molech (cf. Jer 7:31; 19:5-6; 32:35), and it came to be used as a place where human excrement and rubbish were disposed of and burned. In the intertestamental period, it came to be used symbolically as the place of divine punishment (cf. 1 En. 27:2, 90:26; 4 Ezra 7:36).

¹³ tn Grk (plurals), “every kind of animals and birds, of reptiles and sea creatures.”

¹⁴ tn Grk “the human species.”

¹⁵ tc Most mss (C Ψ 1739^c Ï as well as a few versions and fathers) read “uncontrollable” (ἀκατασχετόν, akatasceton), while the most important witnesses (א A B K P 1739* latt) have “restless” (ἀκατάστατον, akatastaton). Externally, the latter reading should be preferred. Internally, however, things get a bit more complex. The notion of being uncontrollable is well suited to the context, especially as a counterbalance to v. 8a, though for this very reason scribes may have been tempted to replace ἀκατάστατον with ἀκατασχετόν. However, in a semantically parallel early Christian text, ἀκατάστατος (akatastato") was considered strong enough of a term to denounce slander as “a restless demon” (Herm. 27:3). On the other hand, ἀκατάστατον may have been substituted for ἀκατασχετόν by way of assimilation to 1:8 (especially since both words were relatively rare, scribes may have replaced the less familiar with one that was already used in this letter). On internal evidence, it is difficult to decide, though ἀκατασχετόν is slightly preferred. However, in light of the strong support for ἀκατάστατον, and the less-than-decisive internal evidence, ἀκατάστατον is preferred instead.

¹⁶ tc Most later mss (Ï), along with several versional witnesses, have θεόν (qeon, “God”) here instead of κύριον (kurion, “Lord”). Such is a predictable variant since nowhere else in the NT is God described as “Lord and Father,” but he is called “God and Father” on several occasions. Further, the reading κύριον is well supported by early and diversified witnesses (̲⁰ א A B C P Ψ 33 81 945 1241 1739), rendering it as the overwhelmingly preferred reading.

¹⁷ tn Grk “men”; but here ἀνθρώπους (anqrwpous) has generic force, referring to both men and women.