Deuteronomy 31:23

31:23 and the Lord ¹  commissioned Joshua son of Nun, “Be strong and courageous, for you will take the Israelites to the land I have promised them, and I will be with you.” ² 

Numbers 27:19-20

27:19 set him ³  before Eleazar the priest and before the whole community, and commission ⁴  him publicly. ⁵  27:20 Then you must delegate ⁶  some of your authority ⁷  to him, so that the whole community of the Israelites will be obedient. ⁸ 

Acts 20:28-31

20:28 Watch out for ⁹  yourselves and for all the flock of which ¹⁰  the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, ¹¹  to shepherd the church of God ¹²  that he obtained ¹³  with the blood of his own Son. ¹⁴  20:29 I know that after I am gone ¹⁵  fierce wolves ¹⁶  will come in among you, not sparing the flock. 20:30 Even from among your own group ¹⁷  men ¹⁸  will arise, teaching perversions of the truth ¹⁹  to draw the disciples away after them. 20:31 Therefore be alert, ²⁰  remembering that night and day for three years I did not stop warning ²¹  each one of you with tears.

Acts 20:2

20:2 After he had gone through those regions ²²  and spoken many words of encouragement ²³  to the believers there, ²⁴  he came to Greece, ²⁵ 

Acts 4:1-4

The Arrest and Trial of Peter and John

4:1 While Peter and John ²⁶  were speaking to the people, the priests and the commander ²⁷  of the temple guard ²⁸  and the Sadducees ²⁹  came up ³⁰  to them, 4:2 angry ³¹  because they were teaching the people and announcing ³²  in Jesus the resurrection of the dead. 4:3 So ³³  they seized ³⁴  them and put them in jail ³⁵  until the next day (for it was already evening). 4:4 But many of those who had listened to ³⁶  the message ³⁷  believed, and the number of the men ³⁸  came to about five thousand.

[31:23]  ¹ tn Heb “he.” Since the pronoun could be taken to refer to Moses, the referent has been specified as “the Lord” in the translation for clarity. See also the note on the word “you” later in this verse.

[31:23]  ² tc The LXX reads, “as the Lord promised them, and he will be with you.” This relieves the problem of Moses apparently promising to be with Joshua as the MT reads on the surface (“I will be with you”). However, the reading of the LXX is clearly an attempt to clarify an existing obscurity and therefore is unlikely to reflect the original.

[27:19]  ³ tn This could be translated “position him,” or “have him stand,” since it is the causative stem of the verb “to stand.”

[27:19]  ⁴ tn The verb is the Piel perfect of צִוָּה (tsivvah, literally “to command”). The verb has a wide range of meanings, and so here in this context the idea of instructing gives way to a more general sense of commissioning for duty. The verb in sequence is equal to the imperfect of instruction.

[27:19]  ⁵ tn Heb “in their eyes.”

[27:20]  ⁶ tn The verb is simply “give,” but in this context giving some of Moses’ honor to Joshua in the presence of the people is essentially passing the leadership to him, or delegating the authority to him with the result that people would follow him.

[27:20]  ⁷ tc The Greek, Syriac, and Vulgate read “glory” for this form that occurs only here in the Pentateuch. Elsewhere it is rendered “majesty, splendor” (see Ps 96:6). It could even be “vitality” here. The authority being transferred here is both spiritual and civil.

[27:20]  ⁸ tn Heb “hear.”

[20:28]  ⁹ tn Or “Be on your guard for” (cf. v. 29). Paul completed his responsibility to the Ephesians with this warning.

[20:28]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “in which.”

[20:28]  ¹¹ tn Or “guardians.” BDAG 379-80 s.v. ἐπίσκοπος 2 states, “The term was taken over in Christian communities in ref. to one who served as overseer or supervisor, with special interest in guarding the apostolic tradition…Ac 20:28.” This functional term describes the role of the elders (see v. 17). They were to guard and shepherd the congregation.

[20:28]  ¹² tc The reading “of God” (τοῦ θεοῦ, tou qeou) is found in א B 614 1175 1505 al vg sy; other witnesses have “of the Lord” (τοῦ κυρίου, tou kuriou) here (so Ì⁷⁴ A C* D E Ψ 33 1739 al co), while the majority of the later minuscule mss conflate these two into “of the Lord and God” (τοῦ κυρίου καὶ [τοῦ] θεοῦ, tou kuriou kai [tou] qeou). Although the evidence is evenly balanced between the first two readings, τοῦ θεοῦ is decidedly superior on internal grounds. The final prepositional phrase of this verse, διὰ τοῦ αἵματος τοῦ ἰδίου (dia tou {aimato" tou idiou), could be rendered “through his own blood” or “through the blood of his own.” In the latter translation, the object that “own” modifies must be supplied (see tn below for discussion). But this would not be entirely clear to scribes; those who supposed that ἰδίου modified αἵματος would be prone to alter “God” to “Lord” to avoid the inference that God had blood. In a similar way, later scribes would be prone to conflate the two titles, thereby affirming the deity (with the construction τοῦ κυρίου καὶ θεοῦ following the Granville Sharp rule and referring to a single person [see ExSyn 272, 276-77, 290]) and substitutionary atonement of Christ. For these reasons, τοῦ θεοῦ best explains the rise of the other readings and should be considered authentic.

[20:28]  ¹³ tn Or “acquired.”

[20:28]  ¹⁴ tn Or “with his own blood”; Grk “with the blood of his own.” The genitive construction could be taken in two ways: (1) as an attributive genitive (second attributive position) meaning “his own blood”; or (2) as a possessive genitive, “with the blood of his own.” In this case the referent is the Son, and the referent has been specified in the translation for clarity. See further C. F. DeVine, “The Blood of God,” CBQ 9 (1947): 381-408.

[20:29]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “after my departure.”

[20:29]  ¹⁶ tn That is, people like fierce wolves. See BDAG 167-68 s.v. βαρύς 4 on the term translated “fierce.” The battle that will follow would be a savage one.

[20:30]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “from among yourselves.”

[20:30]  ¹⁸ tn The Greek term here is ἀνήρ (anhr), which only rarely is used in a generic sense to refer to both males and females. Since Paul is speaking to the Ephesian elders at this point and there is nothing in the context to suggest women were included in that group (“from among your own group”), it is most likely Paul was not predicting that these false teachers would include women.

[20:30]  ¹⁹ tn Grk “speaking crooked things”; BDAG 237 s.v. διαστρέφω 2 has “λαλεῖν διεστραμμένα teach perversions (of the truth) Ac 20:30.”

[20:31]  ²⁰ tn Or “be watchful.”

[20:31]  ²¹ tn Or “admonishing.”

[20:2]  ²² tn BDAG 633 s.v. μέρος 1.b.γ gives the meanings “the parts (of a geographical area), region, district,” but the use of “district” in this context probably implies too much specificity.

[20:2]  ²³ tn Grk “and encouraging them with many words.” The participle παρακαλέσας (parakalesa", “encouraging”) has been translated by the phrase “spoken…words of encouragement” because the formal equivalent is awkward in contemporary English.

[20:2]  ²⁴ tn Grk “[to] them”; the referent (the believers there) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[20:2]  ²⁵ tn In popular usage the term translated “Greece” here could also refer to the Roman province officially known as Achaia (BDAG 318 s.v. ῾Ελλάς).

[4:1]  ²⁶ tn Grk “While they”; the referents (Peter and John) have been specified in the translation for clarity.

[4:1]  ²⁷ tn Or “captain.”

[4:1]  ²⁸ tn Grk “the official of the temple,” a title for the commander of the Jewish soldiers guarding the temple (thus the translation, “the commander of the temple guard”). See L&N 37.91.

[4:1]  ²⁹ sn The Sadducees controlled the official political structures of Judaism at this time, being the majority members of the Sanhedrin. They were known as extremely strict on law and order issues (Josephus, J. W. 2.8.2 [2.119], 2.8.14 [2.164-166]; Ant. 13.5.9 [13.171-173], 13.10.6 [13.293-298], 18.1.2 [18.11], 18.1.4 [18.16-17], 20.9.1 [20.199]; Life 2 [10-11]). See also Matt 3:7; 16:1-12; 22:23-34; Mark 12:18-27; Luke 20:27-38; Acts 5:17; 23:6-8.

[4:1]  ³⁰ tn Or “approached.” This verb often denotes a sudden appearing (BDAG 418 s.v. ἐφίστημι 1).

[4:2]  ³¹ tn Or “greatly annoyed,” “provoked.”

[4:2]  ³² tn Or “proclaiming.”

[4:3]  ³³ tn Grk “And” Here καί (kai) has been translated as “so” to indicate the logical sequence of events.

[4:3]  ³⁴ tn Or “they arrested”; Grk “they laid hands on.”

[4:3]  ³⁵ tn Or “prison,” “custody.”

[4:4]  ³⁶ tn Or “had heard.”

[4:4]  ³⁷ tn Or “word.”

[4:4]  ³⁸ tn In the historical setting it is likely that only men are referred to here. The Greek term ἀνήρ (anhr) usually refers to males or husbands rather than people in general. Thus to translate “of the people” would give a false impression of the number, since any women and children were apparently not included in the count.