1 Chronicles 15:14

15:14 The priests and Levites consecrated themselves so they could bring up the ark of the Lord God of Israel.

Exodus 19:14-15

19:14 Then Moses went down from the mountain to the people and sanctified the people, and they washed their clothes. 19:15 He said to the people, “Be ready for the third day. Do not go near your wives.” ¹ 

Exodus 19:2

19:2 After they journeyed ²  from Rephidim, they came to the Desert of Sinai, and they camped in the desert; Israel camped there in front of the mountain. ³ 

Exodus 5:11

5:11 You ⁴  go get straw for yourselves wherever you can ⁵  find it, because there will be no reduction at all in your workload.’”

Exodus 29:4-5

29:4 “You are to present ⁶  Aaron and his sons at the entrance of the tent of meeting. You are to wash ⁷  them with water 29:5 and take the garments and clothe Aaron with the tunic, ⁸  the robe of the ephod, the ephod, and the breastpiece; you are to fasten the ephod on him by using the skillfully woven waistband. ⁹ 

Exodus 30:15

30:15 The rich are not to increase it, ¹⁰  and the poor are not to pay less than the half shekel when giving ¹¹  the offering of the Lord, to make atonement ¹²  for your lives.

Exodus 35:6

35:6 blue, purple, and scarlet yarn, fine linen, goat’s hair,

Ezekiel 48:11

48:11 This will be for the priests who are set apart from the descendants of Zadok who kept my charge and did not go astray when the people of Israel strayed off, like the Levites did. ¹³ 

John 17:17

17:17 Set them apart ¹⁴  in the truth; your word is truth.

Romans 12:1-2

Consecration of the Believer’s Life

12:1 Therefore I exhort you, brothers and sisters, ¹⁵  by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a sacrifice – alive, holy, and pleasing to God ¹⁶  – which is your reasonable service. 12:2 Do not be conformed ¹⁷  to this present world, ¹⁸  but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may test and approve ¹⁹  what is the will of God – what is good and well-pleasing and perfect.

Revelation 5:9-10

5:9 They were singing a new song: ²⁰ 

“You are worthy to take the scroll

and to open its seals

because you were killed, ²¹ 

and at the cost of your own blood ²²  you have purchased ²³  for God

persons ²⁴  from every tribe, language, ²⁵  people, and nation.

5:10 You have appointed ²⁶  them ²⁷  as a kingdom and priests ²⁸  to serve ²⁹  our God, and they will reign ³⁰  on the earth.”

[19:15]  ¹ tn Heb “do not go near a woman”; NIV “Abstain from sexual relations.”

[19:2]  ² tn The form is a preterite with vav (ו) consecutive, “and they journeyed.” It is here subordinated to the next clause as a temporal clause. But since the action of this temporal clause preceded the actions recorded in v. 1, a translation of “after” will keep the sequence in order. Verse 2 adds details to the summary in v. 1.

[19:2]  ³ sn The mountain is Mount Sinai, the mountain of God, the place where God had met and called Moses and had promised that they would be here to worship him. If this mountain is Jebel Musa, the traditional site of Sinai, then the plain in front of it would be Er-Rahah, about a mile and a half long by half a mile wide, fronting the mountain on the NW side (S. R. Driver, Exodus, 169). The plain itself is about 5000 feet above sea level. A mountain on the west side of the Arabian Peninsula has also been suggested as a possible site.

[5:11]  ⁴ tn The independent personal pronoun emphasizes that the people were to get their own straw, and it heightens the contrast with the king. “You – go get.”

[5:11]  ⁵ tn The tense in this section could be translated as having the nuance of possibility: “wherever you may find it,” or the nuance of potential imperfect: “wherever you are able to find any.”

[29:4]  ⁶ tn Here too the verb is Hiphil (now imperfect) meaning “bring near” the altar. The choice of this verb indicates that they were not merely being brought near, but that they were being formally presented to Yahweh as the offerings were.

[29:4]  ⁷ sn This is the washing referred to in Lev 8:6. This is a complete washing, not just of the hands and feet that would follow in the course of service. It had to serve as a symbolic ritual cleansing or purifying as the initial stage in the consecration. The imagery of washing will be used in the NT for regeneration (Titus 3:5).

[29:5]  ⁸ tn The Hiphil of לָבַשׁ (lavash, “to clothe”) will take double accusatives; so the sign of the accusative is with Aaron, and then with the articles of clothing. The translation will have to treat Aaron as the direct object and the articles as indirect objects, because Aaron receives the prominence in the verse – you will clothe Aaron.

[29:5]  ⁹ tn The verb used in this last clause is a denominative verb from the word for ephod. And so “ephod the ephod on him” means “fasten as an ephod the ephod on him” (S. R. Driver, Exodus, 316).

[30:15]  ¹⁰ tn Or “pay more.”

[30:15]  ¹¹ tn The form is לָתֵת (latet), the Qal infinitive construct with the lamed preposition. The infinitive here is explaining the preceding verbs. They are not to increase or diminish the amount “in paying the offering.” The construction approximates a temporal clause.

[30:15]  ¹² tn This infinitive construct (לְכַפֵּר, lÿkhapper) provides the purpose of the giving the offering – to atone.

[48:11]  ¹³ tn Heb “strayed off.”

[17:17]  ¹⁴ tn Or “Consecrate them” or “Sanctify them.”

[12:1]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 1:13.

[12:1]  ¹⁶ tn The participle and two adjectives “alive, holy, and pleasing to God” are taken as predicates in relation to “sacrifice,” making the exhortation more emphatic. See ExSyn 618-19.

[12:2]  ¹⁷ tn Although συσχηματίζεσθε (suschmatizesqe) could be either a passive or middle, the passive is more likely since it would otherwise have to be a direct middle (“conform yourselves”) and, as such, would be quite rare for NT Greek. It is very telling that being “conformed” to the present world is viewed as a passive notion, for it may suggest that it happens, in part, subconsciously. At the same time, the passive could well be a “permissive passive,” suggesting that there may be some consciousness of the conformity taking place. Most likely, it is a combination of both.

[12:2]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “to this age.”

[12:2]  ¹⁹ sn The verb translated test and approve (δοκιμάζω, dokimazw) carries the sense of “test with a positive outcome,” “test so as to approve.”

[5:9]  ²⁰ tn The redundant participle λέγοντες (legontes) has not been translated here.

[5:9]  ²¹ tn Or “slaughtered”; traditionally, “slain.”

[5:9]  ²² tn The preposition ἐν (en) is taken to indicate price here, like the Hebrew preposition ב (bet) does at times. BDAG 329 s.v. ἐν 5.b states, “The ἐν which takes the place of the gen. of price is also instrumental ἠγόρασας ἐν τῷ αἵματί σου Rv 5:9 (cp. 1 Ch 21:24 ἀγοράζω ἐν ἀργυρίῳ).”

[5:9]  ²³ tc The Greek text as it stands above (i.e., the reading τῷ θεῷ [tw qew] alone) is found in codex A. א 2050 2344 Ï sy add the term “us” (ἡμᾶς, Jhmas), either before or after τῷ θεῷ, as an attempt to clarify the object of “purchased” (ἠγόρασας, hgorasa"). A few mss (1 vg^ms) delete the reference to God altogether and simply replace it with “us” (ἡμᾶς). This too is an attempt to remove ambiguity in the phrase and provide an object for “purchased.” The shorter reading, supported by the best witness for Revelation, best accounts for the other readings.

[5:9]  ²⁴ tn The word “persons” is not in the Greek text, but is implied. Direct objects were often omitted in Greek when clear from the context.

[5:9]  ²⁵ tn Grk “and language,” but καί (kai) has not been translated since English normally uses a coordinating conjunction only between the last two elements in a series of three or more.

[5:10]  ²⁶ tn The verb ἐποίησας (epoihsas) is understood to mean “appointed” here. For an example of this use, see Mark 3:14.

[5:10]  ²⁷ tc The vast majority of witnesses have αὐτούς (autous, “them”) here, while the Textus Receptus reads ἡμᾶς (Jhmas, “us”) with insignificant support (pc gig vg^cl sa Prim Bea). There is no question that the original text read αὐτούς here.

[5:10]  ²⁸ tn The reference to “kingdom and priests” may be a hendiadys: “priestly kingdom.”

[5:10]  ²⁹ tn The words “to serve” are not in the Greek text, but are implied by the word “priests.”

[5:10]  ³⁰ tc The textual problem here between the present tense βασιλεύουσιν (basileuousin, “they are reigning”; so A 1006 1611 Ï^K pc) and the future βασιλεύσουσιν (basileusousin, “they will reign”; so א 1854 2053 Ï^A pc lat co) is a difficult one. Both readings have excellent support. On the one hand, the present tense seems to be the harder reading in this context. On the other hand, codex A elsewhere mistakes the future for the present (20:6). Further, the lunar sigma in uncial script could have been overlooked by some scribes, resulting in the present tense. All things considered, there is a slight preference for the future.