Daniel 6:10

6:10 When Daniel realized ¹  that a written decree had been issued, he entered his home, where the windows ²  in his upper room opened toward Jerusalem. ³  Three ⁴  times daily he was ⁵  kneeling ⁶  and offering prayers and thanks to his God just as he had been accustomed to do previously.

Nehemiah 1:4-11

1:4 When I heard these things I sat down abruptly, ⁷  crying and mourning for several days. I continued fasting and praying before the God of heaven. 1:5 Then I said, “Please, O LORD God of heaven, great and awesome God, who keeps his loving covenant ⁸  with those who love him and obey ⁹  his commandments, 1:6 may your ear be attentive and your eyes be open to hear the prayer of your servant that I am praying to you today throughout both day and night on behalf of your servants the Israelites. I am confessing the sins of the Israelites that we have committed ¹⁰  against you – both I myself and my family ¹¹  have sinned. 1:7 We have behaved corruptly against you, not obeying the commandments, the statutes, and the judgments that you commanded your servant Moses. 1:8 Please recall the word you commanded your servant Moses: ‘If you act unfaithfully, I will scatter you among the nations. ¹²  1:9 But if you repent ¹³  and obey ¹⁴  my commandments and do them, then even if your dispersed people are in the most remote location, ¹⁵  I will gather them from there and bring them to the place I have chosen for my name to reside.’ 1:10 They are your servants and your people, whom you have redeemed by your mighty strength and by your powerful hand. 1:11 Please, ¹⁶  O Lord, listen attentively ¹⁷  to the prayer of your servant and to the prayer of your servants who take pleasure in showing respect ¹⁸  to your name. Grant your servant success today and show compassion to me ¹⁹  in the presence of this man.”

Now ²⁰  I was cupbearer for the king.

Psalms 102:13-17

102:13 You will rise up and have compassion on Zion. ²¹ 

For it is time to have mercy on her,

for the appointed time has come.

102:14 Indeed, ²²  your servants take delight in her stones,

and feel compassion for ²³  the dust of her ruins. ²⁴ 

102:15 The nations will respect the reputation of the Lord, ²⁵ 

and all the kings of the earth will respect ²⁶  his splendor,

102:16 when the Lord rebuilds Zion,

and reveals his splendor,

102:17 when he responds to the prayer of the destitute, ²⁷ 

and does not reject ²⁸  their request. ²⁹ 

Jeremiah 29:10-13

29:10 “For the Lord says, ‘Only when the seventy years of Babylonian rule ³⁰  are over will I again take up consideration for you. ³¹  Then I will fulfill my gracious promise to you and restore ³²  you to your homeland. ³³  29:11 For I know what I have planned for you,’ says the Lord. ³⁴  ‘I have plans to prosper you, not to harm you. I have plans to give you ³⁵  a future filled with hope. ³⁶  29:12 When you call out to me and come to me in prayer, ³⁷  I will hear your prayers. ³⁸  29:13 When you seek me in prayer and worship, you will find me available to you. If you seek me with all your heart and soul, ³⁹ 

Jeremiah 33:3

33:3 ‘Call on me in prayer and I will answer you. I will show you great and mysterious ⁴⁰  things which you still do not know about.’

Ezekiel 36:37

36:37 “This is what the sovereign Lord says: I will allow the house of Israel to ask me to do this for them: ⁴¹  I will multiply their people like sheep. ⁴² 

James 5:16-18

5:16 So confess your sins to one another and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great effectiveness. ⁴³  5:17 Elijah was a human being ⁴⁴  like us, and he prayed earnestly ⁴⁵  that it would not rain and there was no rain on the land for three years and six months! 5:18 Then ⁴⁶  he prayed again, and the sky gave rain and the land sprouted with a harvest.

[6:10]  ¹ tn Aram “knew.”

[6:10]  ² sn In later rabbinic thought this verse was sometimes cited as a proof text for the notion that one should pray only in a house with windows. See b. Berakhot 34b.

[6:10]  ³ map For the location of Jerusalem see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[6:10]  ⁴ sn This is apparently the only specific mention in the OT of prayer being regularly offered three times a day. The practice was probably not unique to Daniel, however.

[6:10]  ⁵ tc Read with several medieval Hebrew MSS and printed editions הֲוָה (havah) rather than the MT הוּא (hu’).

[6:10]  ⁶ tn Aram “kneeling on his knees” (so NASB).

[1:4]  ⁷ tn Heb “sat down.” Context suggests that this was a rather sudden action, resulting from the emotional shock of the unpleasant news, so “abruptly” has been supplied in the present translation.

[1:5]  ⁸ tn Heb “the covenant and loyal love.” The phrase is a hendiadys: the first noun retains its full nominal sense, while the second noun functions adjectivally (“loyal love” = loving). Alternately, the first might function adjectivally and the second noun function as the noun: “covenant and loyal love” = covenant fidelity (see Neh 9:32).

[1:5]  ⁹ tn Heb “keep.” The Hebrew verb שָׁמַר (shamar, “to observe; to keep”) is often used as an idiom that means “to obey” the commandments of God (e.g., Exod 20:6; Deut 5:16; 23:24; 29:8; Judg 2:22; 1 Kgs 2:43; 11:11; Ps 119:8, 17, 34; Jer 35:18; Ezek 17:14; Amos 2:4). See BDB 1036 s.v. 3.c.

[1:6]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “have sinned.” For stylistic reasons – to avoid redundancy in English – this was translated as “committed.”

[1:6]  ¹¹ tn Heb “the house of my father.”

[1:8]  ¹² tn Heb “peoples.”

[1:9]  ¹³ tn Heb “turn to me.”

[1:9]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “keep.” See the note on the word “obey” in Neh 1:5.

[1:9]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “at the end of the heavens.”

[1:11]  ¹⁶ tn The interjection אָנָּא (’anna’) is an emphatic term of entreaty: “please!” (BDB 58 s.v.; HALOT 69-70 s.v.). This term is normally reserved for pleas for mercy from God in life-and-death situations (2 Kgs 20:3 = Isa 38:3; Pss 116:4; 118:25; Jonah 1:14; 4:2) and for forgiveness of heinous sins that would result or have resulted in severe judgment from God (Exod 32:31; Dan 9:4; Neh 1:5, 11).

[1:11]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “let your ear be attentive.”

[1:11]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “fear.”

[1:11]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “grant compassion.” The words “to me” are supplied in the translation for the sake of smoothness and style in English.

[1:11]  ²⁰ tn The vav (ו) on וַאֲנִי (va’ani, “Now, I”) introduces a disjunctive parenthetical clause that provides background information to the reader.

[102:13]  ²¹ tn The imperfect verbal forms are understood as expressing the psalmist’s confidence in God’s intervention. Another option is to take them as expressing the psalmist’s request or wish, “You, rise up and have compassion!”

[102:14]  ²² tn Or “for.”

[102:14]  ²³ tn The Poel of חָנַן (khanan) occurs only here and in Prov 14:21, where it refers to having compassion on the poor.

[102:14]  ²⁴ tn Heb “her dust,” probably referring to the dust of the city’s rubble.

[102:15]  ²⁵ tn Heb “will fear the name of the Lord.” To “fear” God’s name means to have a healthy respect for his revealed reputation which in turn motivates one to obey God’s commands (see Ps 86:11).

[102:15]  ²⁶ tn The verb “will fear” is understood by ellipsis in the second line (see the preceding line).

[102:17]  ²⁷ tn The Hebrew adjective עַרְעָר (’arar, “destitute”) occurs only here in the OT. It is derived from the verbal root ערר (“to strip oneself”).

[102:17]  ²⁸ tn Heb “despise.”

[102:17]  ²⁹ tn The perfect verbal forms in vv. 16-17 are functioning as future perfects, indicating future actions that will precede the future developments described in v. 15.

[29:10]  ³⁰ sn See the study note on Jer 25:11 for the reckoning of the seventy years.

[29:10]  ³¹ tn See the translator’s note on Jer 27:22 for this term.

[29:10]  ³² tn Verse 10 is all one long sentence in the Hebrew original: “According to the fullness of Babylon seventy years I will take thought of you and I will establish my gracious word to you by bringing you back to this place.” The sentence has been broken up to conform better to contemporary English style.

[29:10]  ³³ tn Heb “this place.” The text has probably been influenced by the parallel passage in 27:22. The term appears fifteen times in Jeremiah and is invariably a reference to Jerusalem or Judah.

[29:11]  ³⁴ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[29:11]  ³⁵ tn Heb “I know the plans that I am planning for you, oracle of the Lord, plans of well-being and not for harm to give to you….”

[29:11]  ³⁶ tn Or “the future you hope for”; Heb “a future and a hope.” This is a good example of hendiadys where two formally coordinated nouns (adjectives, verbs) convey a single idea where one of the terms functions as a qualifier of the other. For this figure see E. W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech, 658-72. This example is discussed on p. 661.

[29:12]  ³⁷ tn Heb “come and pray to me.” This is an example of verbal hendiadys where two verb formally joined by “and” convey a main concept with the second verb functioning as an adverbial qualifier.

[29:12]  ³⁸ tn Or “You will call out to me and come to me in prayer and I will hear your prayers.” The verbs are vav consecutive perfects and can be taken either as unconditional futures or as contingent futures. See GKC 337 §112.kk and 494 §159.g and compare the usage in Gen 44:22 for the use of the vav consecutive perfects in contingent futures. The conditional clause in the middle of 29:13 and the deuteronomic theology reflected in both Deut 30:1-5 and 1 Kgs 8:46-48 suggest that the verbs are continent futures here. For the same demand for wholehearted seeking in these contexts which presuppose exile see especially Deut 30:2, 1 Kgs 8:48.

[29:13]  ³⁹ tn Or “If you wholeheartedly seek me”; Heb “You will seek me and find [me] because you will seek me with all your heart.” The translation attempts to reflect the theological nuances of “seeking” and “finding” and the psychological significance of “heart” which refers more to intellectual and volitional concerns in the OT than to emotional ones.

[33:3]  ⁴⁰ tn This passive participle or adjective is normally used to describe cities or walls as “fortified” or “inaccessible.” All the lexicons, however, agree in seeing it used here metaphorically of “secret” or “mysterious” things, things that Jeremiah could not know apart from the Lord’s revelation. G. L. Keown, P. J. Scalise, and T. G. Smothers (Jeremiah 26-52 [WBC], 170) make the interesting observation that the word is used here in a context in which the fortifications of Jerusalem are about to fall to the Babylonians; the fortified things in God’s secret counsel fall through answer to prayer.

[36:37]  ⁴¹ tn The Niphal verb may have a tolerative function here, “Again (for) this I will allow myself to be sought by the house of Israel to act for them.” Or it may be reflexive: “I will reveal myself to the house of Israel by doing this also.”

[36:37]  ⁴² sn Heb “I will multiply them like sheep, human(s).”

[5:16]  ⁴³ tn Or “the fervent prayer of a righteous person is very powerful”; Grk “is very powerful in its working.”

[5:17]  ⁴⁴ tn Although it is certainly true that Elijah was a “man,” here ἄνθρωπος (anqrwpo") has been translated as “human being” because the emphasis in context is not on Elijah’s masculine gender, but on the common humanity he shared with the author and the readers.

[5:17]  ⁴⁵ tn Grk “he prayed with prayer” (using a Hebrew idiom to show intensity).

[5:18]  ⁴⁶ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events.