85:10 Loyal love and faithfulness meet; 1
deliverance and peace greet each other with a kiss. 2
89:14 Equity and justice are the foundation of your throne. 3
Loyal love and faithfulness characterize your rule. 4
98:3 He remains loyal and faithful to the family of Israel. 5
All the ends of the earth see our God deliver us. 6
32:4 As for the Rock, 7 his work is perfect,
for all his ways are just.
He is a reliable God who is never unjust,
he is fair 8 and upright.
32:2 My teaching will drop like the rain,
my sayings will drip like the dew, 9
as rain drops upon the grass,
and showers upon new growth.
“Great and astounding are your deeds,
Lord God, the All-Powerful! 15
Just 16 and true are your ways,
King over the nations! 17
15:4 Who will not fear you, O Lord,
and glorify 18 your name, because you alone are holy? 19
All nations 20 will come and worship before you
for your righteous acts 21 have been revealed.”
1 tn The psalmist probably uses the perfect verbal forms in v. 10 in a dramatic or rhetorical manner, describing what he anticipates as if it were already occurring or had already occurred.
2 sn Deliverance and peace greet each other with a kiss. The psalmist personifies these abstract qualities to emphasize that God’s loyal love and faithfulness will yield deliverance and peace for his people.
3 sn The Lord’s throne symbolizes his kingship.
4 tn Heb “are in front of your face.” The idiom can mean “confront” (Ps 17:13) or “meet, enter the presence of” (Ps 95:2).
5 tn Heb “he remembers his loyal love and his faithfulness to the house of Israel.”
6 tn Heb “the deliverance of our God,” with “God” being a subjective genitive (= God delivers).
7 tc The LXX reads Θεός (qeos, “God”) for the MT’s “Rock.”
8 tn Or “just” (KJV, NAB, NRSV, NLT) or “righteous” (NASB).
9 tn Or “mist,” “light drizzle.” In some contexts the term appears to refer to light rain, rather than dew.
10 sn Wadi Zered. Now known as Wadi el-H£esa, this valley marked the boundary between Moab to the north and Edom to the south.
11 tn Heb “we crossed the Wadi Zered.” This has been translated as “we did so” for stylistic reasons, to avoid redundancy.
12 tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated.
13 tn See the note on the word “servants” in 1:1.
14 tn Grk “saying.” The participle λέγοντες (legontes) is redundant in contemporary English and has not been translated.
15 tn On this word BDAG 755 s.v. παντοκράτωρ states, “the Almighty, All-Powerful, Omnipotent (One) only of God…(ὁ) κύριος ὁ θεὸς ὁ π. …Rv 1:8; 4:8; 11:17; 15:3; 16:7; 21:22.”
16 tn Or “righteous,” although the context favors justice as the theme.
17 tc Certain
18 tn Or “and praise.”
19 sn Because you alone are holy. In the Greek text the sentence literally reads “because alone holy.” Three points can be made in connection with John’s language here: (1) Omitting the second person, singular verb “you are” lays stress on the attribute of God’s holiness. (2) The juxtaposition of alone with holy stresses the unique nature of God’s holiness and complete “otherness” in relationship to his creation. It is not just moral purity which is involved in the use of the term holy, though it certainly includes that. It is also the pervasive OT idea that although God is deeply involved in the governing of his creation, he is to be regarded as separate and distinct from it. (3) John’s use of the term holy is also intriguing since it is the term ὅσιος (Josios) and not the more common NT term ἅγιος (Jagios). The former term evokes images of Christ’s messianic status in early Christian preaching. Both Peter in Acts 2:27 and Paul in Acts 13:35 apply Psalm 16:10 (LXX) to Jesus, referring to him as the “holy one” (ὅσιος). It is also the key term in Acts 13:34 (Isa 55:3 [LXX]) where it refers to the “holy blessings” (i.e., forgiveness and justification) brought about through Jesus in fulfillment of Davidic promise. Thus, in Rev 15:3-4, when John refers to God as “holy,” using the term ὅσιος in a context where the emphasis is on both God and Christ, there might be an implicit connection between divinity and the Messiah. This is bolstered by the fact that the Lamb is referred to in other contexts as the King of Kings and Lord of Lords (cf. 1:5; 17:14; 19:16 and perhaps 11:15; G. K. Beale, Revelation [NIGTC], 796-97).
20 tn Or “all the Gentiles” (the same Greek word may be translated “Gentiles” or “nations”).
21 tn Or perhaps, “your sentences of condemnation.” On δικαίωμα (dikaiwma) in this context BDAG 249 s.v. 2. states, “righteous deed…δι᾿ ἑνὸς δικαιώματος (opp. παράπτωμα) Ro 5:18. – B 1:2 (cp. Wengst, Barnabas-brief 196, n.4); Rv 15:4 (here perh.= ‘sentence of condemnation’ [cp. Pla., Leg. 9, 864e; ins fr. Asia Minor: LBW 41, 2 [κατὰ] τὸ δι[καί]ωμα τὸ κυρω[θέν]= ‘acc. to the sentence which has become valid’]; difft. Wengst, s. above); 19:8.”