Exodus 14:14

14:14 The Lord ¹  will fight for you, and you can be still.” ² 

Exodus 14:25

14:25 He jammed ³  the wheels of their chariots so that they had difficulty driving, ⁴  and the Egyptians said, “Let’s flee ⁵  from Israel, for the Lord fights ⁶  for them against Egypt!”

Deuteronomy 1:30

1:30 The Lord your God is about to go ⁷  ahead of you; he will fight for you, just as you saw him do in Egypt ⁸ 

Deuteronomy 3:22

3:22 Do not be afraid of them, for the Lord your God will personally fight for you.”

Deuteronomy 20:4

20:4 for the Lord your God goes with you to fight on your behalf against your enemies to give you victory.” ⁹ 

Joshua 23:10

23:10 One of you makes a thousand run away, ¹⁰  for the Lord your God fights for you ¹¹  as he promised you he would. ¹² 

Zechariah 14:3

14:3 Then the Lord will go to battle ¹³  and fight against those nations, just as he fought battles in ancient days. ¹⁴ 

[14:14]  ¹ tn The word order places emphasis on “the Lord” (Heb “Yahweh”).

[14:14]  ² tn The imperfect tense needs to be interpreted in contrast to all that Yahweh will be doing. It may be given a potential imperfect nuance (as here), or it may be obligatory to follow the command to stand firm: “you must be still.”

[14:25]  ³ tn The word in the text is וַיָּסַר (vayyasar), which would be translated “and he turned aside” with the sense perhaps of removing the wheels. The reading in the LXX, Smr, and Syriac suggests a root אָסַר (’asar, “to bind”). The sense here might be “clogged – presumably by their sinking in the wet sand” (S. R. Driver, Exodus, 120).

[14:25]  ⁴ tn The clause is וַיְנַהֲגֵהוּ בִּכְבֵדֻת (vaynahagehu bikhvedut). The verb means “to drive a chariot”; here in the Piel it means “cause to drive.” The suffix is collective, and so the verbal form can be translated “and caused them to drive.” The idea of the next word is “heaviness” or “hardship”; it recalls the previous uses of related words to describe Pharaoh’s heart. Here it indicates that the driving of the crippled chariots was with difficulty.

[14:25]  ⁵ tn The cohortative has the hortatory use here, “Let’s flee.” Although the form is singular, the sense of it is plural and so hortatory can be used. The form is singular to agree with the singular subject, “Egypt,” which obviously means the Egyptian army. The word for “flee” is used when someone runs from fear of immanent danger and is a different word than the one used in 14:5.

[14:25]  ⁶ tn The form is the Niphal participle; it is used as the predicate here, that is, the verbal use: “the Lord is fighting.” This corresponds to the announcement in v. 14.

[1:30]  ⁷ tn The Hebrew participle indicates imminent future action here, though some English versions treat it as a predictive future (“will go ahead of you,” NCV; cf. also TEV, CEV).

[1:30]  ⁸ tn Heb “according to all which he did for you in Egypt before your eyes.”

[20:4]  ⁹ tn Or “to save you” (so KJV, NASB, NCV); or “to deliver you.”

[23:10]  ¹⁰ tn Or “chases a thousand.”

[23:10]  ¹¹ tn Heb “for the Lord your God, he [is] the one who fights for you.”

[23:10]  ¹² tn Heb “as he said to you.”

[14:3]  ¹³ sn The statement the Lord will go to battle introduces the conflict known elsewhere as the “battle of Armageddon,” a battle in which the Lord delivers his people and establishes his millennial reign (cf. Joel 3:12, 15-16; Ezek 38–39; Rev 16:12-21; 19:19-21).

[14:3]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “as he fights on a day of battle” (similar NASB, NIV, NRSV).