Psalms 35:27

35:27 May those who desire my vindication shout for joy and rejoice!

May they continually say, ¹  “May the Lord be praised, ²  for he wants his servant to be secure.” ³ 

Luke 1:46-47

Mary’s Hymn of Praise

1:46 And Mary ⁴  said, ⁵ 

“My soul exalts ⁶  the Lord, ⁷ 

1:47 and my spirit has begun to rejoice ⁸  in God my Savior,

Acts 19:17

19:17 This became known to all who lived in Ephesus, ⁹  both Jews and Greeks; fear came over ¹⁰  them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was praised. ¹¹ 

¹ tn The prefixed verbal forms in v. 27a are understood as jussives (see vv. 24b-26).

² tn The prefixed verbal form is taken as a jussive, “may the Lord be magnified [in praise].” Another option is to take the verb as an imperfect, “the Lord is great.”

³ tn Heb “the one who desires the peace of his servant.”

⁴ tc A few witnesses, especially Latin mss, (a b l* Ir^arm Or^lat mss Nic) read “Elizabeth” here, since she was just speaking, but the ms evidence overwhelmingly supports “Mary” as the speaker.

⁵ sn The following passage has been typeset as poetry because many scholars regard this passage as poetic or hymnic. These terms are used broadly to refer to the genre of writing, not to the content. There are two broad criteria for determining if a passage is poetic or hymnic: “(a) stylistic: a certain rhythmical lilt when the passages are read aloud, the presence of parallelismus membrorum (i.e., an arrangement into couplets), the semblance of some metre, and the presence of rhetorical devices such as alliteration, chiasmus, and antithesis; and (b) linguistic: an unusual vocabulary, particularly the presence of theological terms, which is different from the surrounding context” (P. T. O’Brien, Philippians [NIGTC], 188-89). Classifying a passage as hymnic or poetic is important because understanding this genre can provide keys to interpretation. However, not all scholars agree that the above criteria are present in this passage, so the decision to typeset it as poetry should be viewed as a tentative decision about its genre.

⁶ tn Or “lifts up the Lord in praise.”

⁷ sn This psalm (vv. 46-55) is one of the few praise psalms in the NT. Mary praises God and then tells why both in terms of his care for her (vv. 46-49) and for others, including Israel (vv. 50-55). Its traditional name, the “Magnificat,” comes from the Latin for the phrase My soul magnifies the Lord at the hymn’s start.

⁸ tn Or “rejoices.” The translation renders this aorist, which stands in contrast to the previous line’s present tense, as ingressive, which highlights Mary’s joyous reaction to the announcement. A comprehensive aorist is also possible here.

⁹ map For location see JP1-D2; JP2-D2; JP3-D2; JP4-D2.

¹⁰ tn Grk “fell on.” BDAG 377 s.v. ἐπιπίπτω 2 has “φόβος ἐ. ἐπί τινα fear came upon someone…Ac 19:17.”

¹¹ tn Or “exalted.”