Genesis 7:1-24

7:1 The Lord said to Noah, “Come into the ark, you and all your household, for I consider you godly among this generation. ¹  7:2 You must take with you seven ²  of every kind of clean animal, ³  the male and its mate, ⁴  two of every kind of unclean animal, the male and its mate, 7:3 and also seven ⁵  of every kind of bird in the sky, male and female, ⁶  to preserve their offspring ⁷  on the face of the earth. 7:4 For in seven days ⁸  I will cause it to rain ⁹  on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the ground every living thing that I have made.”

7:5 And Noah did all ¹⁰  that the Lord commanded him.

7:6 Noah ¹¹  was 600 years old when the floodwaters engulfed ¹²  the earth. 7:7 Noah entered the ark along with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives because ¹³  of the floodwaters. 7:8 Pairs ¹⁴  of clean animals, of unclean animals, of birds, and of everything that creeps along the ground, 7:9 male and female, came into the ark to Noah, ¹⁵  just as God had commanded him. ¹⁶  7:10 And after seven days the floodwaters engulfed the earth. ¹⁷ 

7:11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month – on that day all the fountains of the great deep ¹⁸  burst open and the floodgates of the heavens ¹⁹  were opened. 7:12 And the rain fell ²⁰  on the earth forty days and forty nights.

7:13 On that very day Noah entered the ark, accompanied by his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, along with his wife and his sons’ three wives. ²¹  7:14 They entered, ²²  along with every living creature after its kind, every animal after its kind, every creeping thing that creeps on the earth after its kind, and every bird after its kind, everything with wings. ²³  7:15 Pairs ²⁴  of all creatures ²⁵  that have the breath of life came into the ark to Noah. 7:16 Those that entered were male and female, ²⁶  just as God commanded him. Then the Lord shut him in.

7:17 The flood engulfed the earth for forty days. As the waters increased, they lifted the ark and raised it above the earth. 7:18 The waters completely overwhelmed ²⁷  the earth, and the ark floated ²⁸  on the surface of the waters. 7:19 The waters completely inundated ²⁹  the earth so that even ³⁰  all the high mountains under the entire sky were covered. 7:20 The waters rose more than twenty feet ³¹  above the mountains. ³²  7:21 And all living things ³³  that moved on the earth died, including the birds, domestic animals, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all humankind. 7:22 Everything on dry land that had the breath of life ³⁴  in its nostrils died. 7:23 So the Lord ³⁵  destroyed ³⁶  every living thing that was on the surface of the ground, including people, animals, creatures that creep along the ground, and birds of the sky. ³⁷  They were wiped off the earth. Only Noah and those who were with him in the ark survived. ³⁸  7:24 The waters prevailed over ³⁹  the earth for 150 days.

Genesis 18:12

18:12 So Sarah laughed to herself, thinking, ⁴⁰  “After I am worn out will I have pleasure, ⁴¹  especially when my husband is old too?” ⁴² 

Isaiah 5:7

5:7 Indeed ⁴³  Israel ⁴⁴  is the vineyard of the Lord who commands armies,

the people ⁴⁵  of Judah are the cultivated place in which he took delight.

He waited for justice, but look what he got – disobedience! ⁴⁶ 

He waited for fairness, but look what he got – cries for help! ⁴⁷ 

Isaiah 10:2

10:2 to keep the poor from getting fair treatment,

and to deprive ⁴⁸  the oppressed among my people of justice,

so they can steal what widows own,

and loot what belongs to orphans. ⁴⁹ 

Isaiah 59:3-7

59:3 For your hands are stained with blood

and your fingers with sin;

your lips speak lies,

your tongue utters malicious words.

59:4 No one is concerned about justice; ⁵⁰ 

no one sets forth his case truthfully.

They depend on false words ⁵¹  and tell lies;

they conceive of oppression ⁵² 

and give birth to sin.

59:5 They hatch the eggs of a poisonous snake

and spin a spider’s web.

Whoever eats their eggs will die,

a poisonous snake is hatched. ⁵³ 

59:6 Their webs cannot be used for clothing;

they cannot cover themselves with what they make.

Their deeds are sinful;

they commit violent crimes. ⁵⁴ 

59:7 They are eager to do evil, ⁵⁵ 

quick to shed innocent blood. ⁵⁶ 

Their thoughts are sinful;

they crush and destroy. ⁵⁷ 

Jeremiah 5:26-28

5:26 “Indeed, there are wicked scoundrels among my people.

They lie in wait like bird catchers hiding in ambush. ⁵⁸ 

They set deadly traps ⁵⁹  to catch people.

5:27 Like a cage filled with the birds that have been caught, ⁶⁰ 

their houses are filled with the gains of their fraud and deceit. ⁶¹ 

That is how they have gotten so rich and powerful. ⁶² 

5:28 That is how ⁶³  they have grown fat and sleek. ⁶⁴ 

There is no limit to the evil things they do. ⁶⁵ 

They do not plead the cause of the fatherless in such a way as to win it.

They do not defend the rights of the poor.

Jeremiah 5:31

5:31 The prophets prophesy lies.

The priests exercise power by their own authority. ⁶⁶ 

And my people love to have it this way.

But they will not be able to help you when the time of judgment comes! ⁶⁷ 

Jeremiah 6:13

6:13 “That is because, from the least important to the most important of them,

all of them are greedy for dishonest gain.

Prophets and priests alike,

all of them practice deceit.

Amos 3:10

3:10 “They do not know how to do what is right.” (The Lord is speaking.)

“They store up ⁶⁸  the spoils of destructive violence ⁶⁹  in their fortresses.

Micah 2:2

2:2 They confiscate the fields they desire,

and seize the houses they want. ⁷⁰ 

They defraud people of their homes, ⁷¹ 

and deprive people of the land they have inherited. ⁷² 

Micah 3:3

3:3 You ⁷³  devour my people’s flesh,

strip off their skin,

and crush their bones.

You chop them up like flesh in a pot ⁷⁴  –

like meat in a kettle.

James 5:4

5:4 Look, the pay you have held back from the workers who mowed your fields cries out against you, and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts.

[7:1]  ¹ tn Heb “for you I see [as] godly before me in this generation.” The direct object (“you”) is placed first in the clause to give it prominence. The verb “to see” here signifies God’s evaluative discernment.

[7:2]  ² tn Or “seven pairs” (cf. NRSV).

[7:2]  ³ sn For a study of the Levitical terminology of “clean” and “unclean,” see L. E. Toombs, IDB 1:643.

[7:2]  ⁴ tn Heb “a male and his female” (also a second time at the end of this verse). The terms used here for male and female animals (אִישׁ, ’ish) and אִשָּׁה, ’ishah) normally refer to humans.

[7:3]  ⁵ tn Or “seven pairs” (cf. NRSV).

[7:3]  ⁶ tn Here (and in v. 9) the Hebrew text uses the normal generic terms for “male and female” (זָכָר וּנְקֵבָה, zakhar unÿqevah).

[7:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “to keep alive offspring.”

[7:4]  ⁸ tn Heb “for seven days yet,” meaning “after [or “in”] seven days.”

[7:4]  ⁹ tn The Hiphil participle מַמְטִיר (mamtir, “cause to rain”) here expresses the certainty of the act in the imminent future.

[7:5]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “according to all.”

[7:6]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Now Noah was.” The disjunctive clause (conjunction + subject + predicate nominative after implied “to be” verb) provides background information. The age of Noah receives prominence.

[7:6]  ¹² tn Heb “and the flood was water upon.” The disjunctive clause (conjunction + subject + verb) is circumstantial/temporal in relation to the preceding clause. The verb הָיָה (hayah) here carries the nuance “to come” (BDB 225 s.v. הָיָה). In this context the phrase “come upon” means “to engulf.”

[7:7]  ¹³ tn The preposition מִן (min) is causal here, explaining why Noah and his family entered the ark.

[7:8]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “two two” meaning “in twos.”

[7:9]  ¹⁵ tn The Hebrew text of vv. 8-9a reads, “From the clean animal[s] and from the animal[s] which are not clean and from the bird[s] and everything that creeps on the ground, two two they came to Noah to the ark, male and female.”

[7:9]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Noah”; the pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[7:10]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “came upon.”

[7:11]  ¹⁸ tn The Hebrew term תְּהוֹם (tÿhom, “deep”) refers to the watery deep, the salty ocean – especially the primeval ocean that surrounds and underlies the earth (see Gen 1:2).

[7:11]  ¹⁹ sn On the prescientific view of the sky reflected here, see L. I. J. Stadelmann, The Hebrew Conception of the World (AnBib), 46.

[7:12]  ²⁰ tn Heb “was.”

[7:13]  ²¹ tn Heb “On that very day Noah entered, and Shem and Ham and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and the wife of Noah, and the three wives of his sons with him into the ark.”

[7:14]  ²² tn The verb “entered” is not in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[7:14]  ²³ tn Heb “every bird, every wing.”

[7:15]  ²⁴ tn Heb “two two” meaning “in twos.”

[7:15]  ²⁵ tn Heb “flesh.”

[7:16]  ²⁶ tn Heb “Those that went in, male and female from all flesh they went in.”

[7:18]  ²⁷ tn Heb “and the waters were great and multiplied exceedingly.” The first verb in the sequence is וַיִּגְבְּרוּ (vayyigbÿru, from גָּבַר, gavar), meaning “to become great, mighty.” The waters did not merely rise; they “prevailed” over the earth, overwhelming it.

[7:18]  ²⁸ tn Heb “went.”

[7:19]  ²⁹ tn Heb “and the waters were great exceedingly, exceedingly.” The repetition emphasizes the depth of the waters.

[7:19]  ³⁰ tn Heb “and.”

[7:20]  ³¹ tn Heb “rose fifteen cubits.” Since a cubit is considered by most authorities to be about eighteen inches, this would make the depth 22.5 feet. This figure might give the modern reader a false impression of exactness, however, so in the translation the phrase “fifteen cubits” has been rendered “more than twenty feet.”

[7:20]  ³² tn Heb “the waters prevailed fifteen cubits upward and they covered the mountains.” Obviously, a flood of twenty feet did not cover the mountains; the statement must mean the flood rose about twenty feet above the highest mountain.

[7:21]  ³³ tn Heb “flesh.”

[7:22]  ³⁴ tn Heb “everything which [has] the breath of the spirit of life in its nostrils from all which is in the dry land.”

[7:23]  ³⁵ tn Heb “and he”; the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[7:23]  ³⁶ tn Heb “wiped away” (cf. NRSV “blotted out”).

[7:23]  ³⁷ tn Heb “from man to animal to creeping thing and to the bird of the sky.”

[7:23]  ³⁸ tn The Hebrew verb שָׁאָר (sha’ar) means “to be left over; to survive” in the Niphal verb stem. It is the word used in later biblical texts for the remnant that escapes judgment. See G. F. Hasel, “Semantic Values of Derivatives of the Hebrew Root só’r,” AUSS 11 (1973): 152-69.

[7:24]  ³⁹ sn The Hebrew verb translated “prevailed over” suggests that the waters were stronger than the earth. The earth and everything in it were no match for the return of the chaotic deep.

[18:12]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “saying.”

[18:12]  ⁴¹ tn It has been suggested that this word should be translated “conception,” not “pleasure.” See A. A. McIntosh, “A Third Root ‘adah in Biblical Hebrew,” VT 24 (1974): 454-73.

[18:12]  ⁴² tn The word “too” has been added in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[5:7]  ⁴³ tn Or “For” (KJV, ASV, NASB, NRSV).

[5:7]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “the house of Israel” (so NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[5:7]  ⁴⁵ tn Heb “men,” but in a generic sense.

[5:7]  ⁴⁶ tn Heb “but, look, disobedience.” The precise meaning of מִשְׂפָּח (mishpakh), which occurs only here in the OT, is uncertain. Some have suggested a meaning “bloodshed.” The term is obviously chosen for its wordplay value; it sounds very much like מִשְׁפָּט (mishpat, “justice”). The sound play draws attention to the point being made; the people have not met the Lord’s expectations.

[5:7]  ⁴⁷ tn Heb “but, look, a cry for help.” The verb (“he waited”) does double duty in the parallelism. צְעָקָה (tsa’qah) refers to the cries for help made by the oppressed. It sounds very much like צְדָקָה (tsÿdaqah, “fairness”). The sound play draws attention to the point being made; the people have not met the Lord’s expectations.

[10:2]  ⁴⁸ tn Or “rob” (ASV, NASB, NCV, NRSV); KJV “take away the right from the poor.”

[10:2]  ⁴⁹ tn Heb “so that widows are their plunder, and they can loot orphans.”

[59:4]  ⁵⁰ tn Heb “no one pleads with justice.”

[59:4]  ⁵¹ tn Heb “nothing”; NAB “emptiness.”

[59:4]  ⁵² tn Or “trouble” (NIV), or “harm.”

[59:5]  ⁵³ tn Heb “that which is pressed in hatches [as] a snake.”

[59:6]  ⁵⁴ tn Heb “their deeds are deeds of sin, and the work of violence [is] in their hands.”

[59:7]  ⁵⁵ tn Heb “their feet run to evil.”

[59:7]  ⁵⁶ tn Heb “they quickly pour out innocent blood.”

[59:7]  ⁵⁷ tn Heb “their thoughts are thoughts of sin, destruction and crushing [are] in their roadways.”

[5:26]  ⁵⁸ tn The meaning of the last three words is uncertain. The pointing and meaning of the Hebrew word rendered “hiding in ambush” is debated. BDB relates the form (כְּשַׁךְ, kÿshakh) to a root שָׁכַךְ (shakhakh), which elsewhere means “decrease, abate” (cf. BDB 1013 s.v. שָׁכַךְ), and notes that this is usually understood as “like the crouching of fowlers,” but they say this meaning is dubious. HALOT 1345 s.v. I שׁוֹר questions the validity of the text and offers three proposals; the second appears to create the least textual modification, i.e., reading כְּשַׂךְ (kesakh, “as in the hiding place of (bird catchers)”; for the word שַׂךְ (sakh) see HALOT 1236 s.v. שׂךְ 4 and compare Lam 2:6 for usage. The versions do not help. The Greek does not translate the first two words of the line. The proposal given in HALOT is accepted with some hesitancy.

[5:26]  ⁵⁹ tn Heb “a destroying thing.”

[5:27]  ⁶⁰ tn The words, “that have been caught” are not in the text but are implicit in the comparison.

[5:27]  ⁶¹ tn Heb “are filled with deceit.” The translation assumes a figure of speech of cause for effect (metonymy). Compare the same word in the same figure in Zeph 1:9.

[5:27]  ⁶² tn Heb “therefore they have gotten great and rich.”

[5:28]  ⁶³ tn These words are not in the text but are supplied in the translation to show that this line is parallel with the preceding.

[5:28]  ⁶⁴ tn The meaning of this word is uncertain. This verb occurs only here. The lexicons generally relate it to the word translated “plate” in Song 5:14 and understand it to mean “smooth, shiny” (so BDB 799 s.v. I עֶשֶׁת) or “fat” (so HALOT 850 s.v. II עֶשֶׁת). The word in Song 5:14 more likely means “smooth” than “plate” (so TEV). So “sleek” is most likely here.

[5:28]  ⁶⁵ tn Heb “they cross over/transgress with respect to matters of evil.”

[5:31]  ⁶⁶ tn Heb “they shall rule at their hands.” Since the word “hand” can be used figuratively for authority or mean “side” and the pronoun “them” can refer to the priests themselves or the prophets, the following translations have also been suggested: “the priests rule under their [the prophets’] directions,” or “the priests rule in league with them [the prophets].” From the rest of the book it would appear that the prophets did not exercise authority over the priests nor did they exercise the same authority over the people that the priests did. Hence it probably mean “by their own hand/power/authority.”

[5:31]  ⁶⁷ tn Heb “But what will you do at its end?” The rhetorical question implies a negative answer: “Nothing!”

[3:10]  ⁶⁸ tn Heb “those who.”

[3:10]  ⁶⁹ tn Heb “violence and destruction.” The expression “violence and destruction” stand metonymically for the goods the oppressors have accumulated by their unjust actions.

[2:2]  ⁷⁰ tn Heb “they desire fields and rob [them], and houses and take [them] away.”

[2:2]  ⁷¹ tn Heb “and they oppress a man and his home.”

[2:2]  ⁷² tn Heb “and a man and his inheritance.” The verb עָשַׁק (’ashaq, “to oppress”; “to wrong”) does double duty in the parallel structure and is understood by ellipsis in the second line.

[3:3]  ⁷³ tn Heb “who.”

[3:3]  ⁷⁴ tc The MT reads “and they chop up as in a pot.” The translation assumes an emendation of כַּאֲשֶׁר (ka’asher, “as”) to כִּשְׁאֵר (kish’er, “like flesh”).