Psalms 9:11

9:11 Sing praises to the Lord, who rules ¹  in Zion!

Tell the nations what he has done! ² 

Psalms 18:6

18:6 In my distress I called to the Lord;

I cried out to my God. ³ 

From his heavenly temple ⁴  he heard my voice;

he listened to my cry for help. ⁵ 

Exodus 40:34-35

40:34 Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. 40:35 Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud settled on it and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.

Exodus 40:1

Setting Up the Sanctuary

40:1 ⁶ Then the Lord spoke to Moses: ⁷ 

Exodus 17:5

17:5 The Lord said to Moses, “Go over before the people; ⁸  take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand your staff with which you struck the Nile and go.

Habakkuk 2:20

2:20 But the Lord is in his majestic palace. ⁹ 

The whole earth is speechless in his presence!” ¹⁰ 

Zechariah 2:13

2:13 Be silent in the Lord’s presence, all people everywhere, ¹¹  for he is being moved to action in his holy dwelling place. ¹² 

Zechariah 2:2

2:2 I asked, “Where are you going?” He replied, “To measure Jerusalem ¹³  in order to determine its width and its length.”

Zechariah 2:4

2:4 and said to him, “Hurry, speak to this young man ¹⁴  as follows: ‘Jerusalem will no longer be enclosed by walls ¹⁵  because of the multitude of people and animals there.

¹ tn Heb “sits” (i.e., enthroned, and therefore ruling – see v. 4). Another option is to translate as “lives” or “dwells.”

² tn Heb “declare among the nations his deeds.”

³ tn In this poetic narrative context the four prefixed verbal forms in v. 6 are best understood as preterites indicating past tense, not imperfects.

⁴ tn Heb “from his temple.” Verse 10, which pictures God descending from the sky, indicates that the heavenly temple is in view, not the earthly one.

⁵ tc Heb “and my cry for help before him came into his ears.” 2 Sam 22:7 has a shorter reading, “my cry for help, in his ears.” It is likely that Ps 18:6 MT as it now stands represents a conflation of two readings: (1) “my cry for help came before him,” (2) “my cry for help came into his ears.” See F. M. Cross and D. N. Freedman, Studies in Ancient Yahwistic Poetry (SBLDS), 144, n. 13.

⁶ sn All of Exod 39:32-40:38 could be taken as a unit. The first section (39:32-43) shows that the Israelites had carefully and accurately completed the preparation and brought everything they had made to Moses: The work of the Lord builds on the faithful obedience of the people. In the second section are the instruction and the implementation (40:1-33): The work of the Lord progresses through the unifying of the work. The last part (40:34-38) may take the most attention: When the work was completed, the glory filled the tabernacle: By his glorious presence, the Lord blesses and directs his people in their worship.

⁷ tn Heb “and Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying.”

⁸ tn “Pass over before” indicates that Moses is the leader who goes first, and the people follow him. In other words, לִפְנֵי (lifney) indicates time and not place here (B. Jacob, Exodus, 477-78).

⁹ tn Or “holy temple.” The Lord’s heavenly palace, rather than the earthly temple, is probably in view here (see Ps 11:4; Mic 1:2-3). The Hebrew word ֹקדֶשׁ (qodesh, “holy”) here refers to the sovereign transcendence associated with his palace.

¹⁰ tn Or “Be quiet before him, all the earth!”

¹¹ tn Heb “all flesh”; NAB, NIV “all mankind.”

¹² sn The sense here is that God in heaven is about to undertake an occupation of his earthly realm (v. 12) by restoring his people to the promised land.

¹³ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

¹⁴ sn That is, to Zechariah.

¹⁵ tn Heb “Jerusalem will dwell as open regions (פְּרָזוֹת, pÿrazot)”; cf. NAB “in open country”; CEV “won’t have any boundaries.” The population will be so large as to spill beyond the ancient and normal enclosures. The people need not fear, however, for the Lord will be an invisible but strong wall (v. 5).