Daniel 3:19

3:19 Then Nebuchadnezzar was filled with rage, and his disposition changed ¹  toward Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. He gave orders ²  to heat the furnace seven times hotter than it was normally heated.

Daniel 3:25

3:25 He answered, “But I see four men, untied and walking around in the midst of the fire! No harm has come to them! And the appearance of the fourth is like that of a god!” ³ 

John 11:39-40

11:39 Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” ⁴  Martha, the sister of the deceased, ⁵  replied, “Lord, by this time the body will have a bad smell, ⁶  because he has been buried ⁷  four days.” ⁸  11:40 Jesus responded, ⁹  “Didn’t I tell you that if you believe, you would see the glory of God?”

John 19:33-34

19:33 But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. 19:34 But one of the soldiers pierced ¹⁰  his side with a spear, and blood and water ¹¹  flowed out immediately.

[3:19]  ¹ tn Aram “the appearance of his face was altered”; cf. NLT “his face became distorted with rage”; NAB “[his] face became livid with utter rage.”

[3:19]  ² tn Aram “he answered and said.”

[3:25]  ³ sn The phrase like that of a god is in Aramaic “like that of a son of the gods.” Many patristic writers understood this phrase in a christological sense (i.e., “the Son of God”). But it should be remembered that these are words spoken by a pagan who is seeking to explain things from his own polytheistic frame of reference; for him the phrase “like a son of the gods” is equivalent to “like a divine being.”

[11:39]  ⁴ tn Or “Remove the stone.”

[11:39]  ⁵ tn Grk “the sister of the one who had died.”

[11:39]  ⁶ tn Grk “already he stinks.”

[11:39]  ⁷ tn Or “been there” (in the tomb – see John 11:17).

[11:39]  ⁸ sn He has been buried four days. Although all the details of the miracle itself are not given, those details which are mentioned are important. The statement made by Martha is extremely significant for understanding what actually took place. There is no doubt that Lazarus had really died, because the decomposition of his body had already begun to take place, since he had been dead for four days.

[11:40]  ⁹ tn Grk “Jesus said to her.”

[19:34]  ¹⁰ sn If it was obvious to the soldiers that the victim was already dead it is difficult to see why one of them would try to inflict a wound. The Greek verb pierced (νύσσω, nussw) can indicate anything from a slight prod to a mortal wound. Probably one of the soldiers gave an exploratory stab to see if the body would jerk. If not, he was really dead. This thrust was hard enough to penetrate the side, since the author states that blood and water flowed out immediately.

[19:34]  ¹¹ sn How is the reference to the blood and water that flowed out from Jesus’ side to be understood? This is probably to be connected with the statements in 1 John 5:6-8. In both passages water, blood, and testimony are mentioned. The Spirit is also mentioned in 1 John 5:7 as the source of the testimony, while here the testimony comes from one of the disciples (19:35). The connection between the Spirit and the living water with Jesus’ statement of thirst just before he died in the preceding context has already been noted (see 19:28). For the author, the water which flowed out of Jesus’ side was a symbolic reference to the Holy Spirit who could now be given because Jesus was now glorified (cf. 7:39); Jesus had now departed and returned to that glory which he had with the Father before the creation of the world (cf. 17:5). The mention of blood recalls the motif of the Passover lamb as a sacrificial victim. Later references to sacrificial procedures in the Mishnah appear to support this: m. Pesahim 5:3 and 5:5 state that the blood of the sacrificial animal should not be allowed to congeal but should flow forth freely at the instant of death so that it could be used for sprinkling; m. Tamid 4:2 actually specifies that the priest is to pierce the heart of the sacrificial victim and cause the blood to come forth.