1 Samuel 2:30

2:30 Therefore the Lord, the God of Israel, says, ‘I really did say ¹  that your house and your ancestor’s house would serve ²  me forever.’ But now the Lord says, ‘May it never be! ³  For I will honor those who honor me, but those who despise me will be cursed!

Proverbs 14:1

14:1 Every wise woman ⁴  builds ⁵  her household, ⁶ 

but a foolish woman tears it down with her own hands.

Jeremiah 8:9

8:9 Your wise men will be put to shame.

They will be dumbfounded and be brought to judgment. ⁷ 

Since they have rejected the word of the Lord,

what wisdom do they really have?

Luke 6:49

6:49 But the person who hears and does not put my words into practice ⁸  is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When ⁹  the river burst against that house, ¹⁰  it collapsed immediately, and was utterly destroyed!” ¹¹ 

James 2:20

2:20 But would you like evidence, ¹²  you empty fellow, ¹³  that faith without works is useless? ¹⁴ 

[2:30]  ¹ tn The infinitive absolute appears before the finite verb for emphasis.

[2:30]  ² tn Heb “walk about before.”

[2:30]  ³ tn Heb “may it be far removed from me.”

[14:1]  ⁴ tn Heb “wise ones of women.” The construct phrase חַכְמוֹת נָשִׁים (khakhmot nashim) features a wholistic genitive: “wise women.” The plural functions in a distributive sense: “every wise woman.” The contrast is between wise and foolish women (e.g., Prov 7:10-23; 31:10-31).

[14:1]  ⁵ tn The perfect tense verb in the first colon functions in a gnomic sense, while the imperfect tense in the second colon is a habitual imperfect.

[14:1]  ⁶ tn Heb “house.” This term functions as a synecdoche of container (= house) for contents (= household, family).

[8:9]  ⁷ tn Heb “be trapped.” However, the word “trapped” generally carries with it the connotation of divine judgment. See BDB 540 s.v. לָכַד Niph.2, and compare usage in Jer 6:11 for support. The verbs in the first two lines are again the form of the Hebrew verb that emphasizes that the action is as good as done (Hebrew prophetic perfects).

[6:49]  ⁸ tn Grk “does not do [them].”

[6:49]  ⁹ tn Grk “against which”; because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, the relative clause was converted to a temporal clause in the translation and a new sentence started here.

[6:49]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “it”; the referent (that house) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[6:49]  ¹¹ tn Grk “and its crash was great.”

[2:20]  ¹² tn Grk “do you want to know.”

[2:20]  ¹³ tn Grk “O empty man.” Here the singular vocative ἄνθρωπε (anqrwpe, “man”) means “person” or even “fellow.” Cf. BDAG 82 s.v. ἄνθρωπος 8 which views this as an instance of rhetorical address in a letter; the pejorative sense is also discussed under the previous heading (7).

[2:20]  ¹⁴ tc Most witnesses, including several important ones (א A C² P Ψ 33 Ï sy bo), have νεκρά (nekra, “dead”) here, while Ì⁷⁴ reads κενή (kenh, “empty”). Both variants are most likely secondary, derived from ἀργή (argh, “useless”). The reading of the majority is probably an assimilation to the statements in vv. 17 and 26, while Ì⁷⁴’s reading picks up on κενέ (kene) earlier in the verse. The external evidence (B C* 323 945 1739 sa) for ἀργή is sufficient for authenticity; coupled with the strong internal evidence for the reading (if νεκρά were original, how would ἀργή have arisen here and not in vv. 17 or 26?), it is strongly preferred.