Exodus 24:4

24:4 and Moses wrote down all the words of the Lord. Early in the morning he built ¹  an altar at the foot ²  of the mountain and arranged ³  twelve standing stones ⁴  – according to the twelve tribes of Israel.

Exodus 24:7

24:7 He took the Book of the Covenant ⁵  and read it aloud ⁶  to the people, and they said, “We are willing to do and obey ⁷  all that the Lord has spoken.”

Exodus 34:1

The New Tablets of the Covenant

34:1 ⁸ The Lord said to Moses, “Cut out ⁹  two tablets of stone like the first, and I will write ¹⁰  on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you smashed.

Exodus 34:27

34:27 The Lord said to Moses, “Write down ¹¹  these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.”

Deuteronomy 30:6

30:6 The Lord your God will also cleanse ¹²  your heart and the hearts of your descendants ¹³  so that you may love him ¹⁴  with all your mind and being and so that you may live.

Jeremiah 31:33

31:33 “But I will make a new covenant with the whole nation of Israel ¹⁵  after I plant them back in the land,” ¹⁶  says the Lord. ¹⁷  “I will ¹⁸  put my law within them ¹⁹  and write it on their hearts and minds. ²⁰  I will be their God and they will be my people. ²¹ 

Jeremiah 32:40

32:40 I will make a lasting covenant ²²  with them that I will never stop doing good to them. ²³  I will fill their hearts and minds with respect for me so that ²⁴  they will never again turn ²⁵  away from me.

Ezekiel 11:19

11:19 I will give them one heart and I will put a new spirit within them; ²⁶  I will remove the hearts of stone from their bodies ²⁷  and I will give them tender hearts, ²⁸ 

Ezekiel 36:26-27

36:26 I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. I will remove the heart of stone ²⁹  from your body and give you a heart of flesh. ³⁰  36:27 I will put my Spirit within you; ³¹  I will take the initiative and you will obey my statutes ³²  and carefully observe my regulations. ³³ 

Ezekiel 36:2

36:2 This is what the sovereign Lord says: The enemy has spoken against you, saying “Aha!” and, “The ancient heights ³⁴  have become our property!”’

Colossians 3:3

3:3 for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

Colossians 3:7-8

3:7 You also lived your lives ³⁵  in this way at one time, when you used to live among them. 3:8 But now, put off all such things ³⁶  as anger, rage, malice, slander, abusive language from your mouth.

James 1:18

1:18 By his sovereign plan he gave us birth ³⁷  through the message of truth, that we would be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.

James 1:21

1:21 So put away all filth and evil excess and humbly ³⁸  welcome the message implanted within you, which is able to save your souls.

James 1:1

Salutation

1:1 From James, ³⁹  a slave ⁴⁰  of God and the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes dispersed abroad. ⁴¹  Greetings!

James 1:23

1:23 For if someone merely listens to the message and does not live it out, he is like someone ⁴²  who gazes at his own face ⁴³  in a mirror.

[24:4]  ¹ tn The two preterites quite likely form a verbal hendiadys (the verb “to get up early” is frequently in such constructions). Literally it says, “and he got up early [in the morning] and he built”; this means “early [in the morning] he built.” The first verb becomes the adverb.

[24:4]  ² tn “under.”

[24:4]  ³ tn The verb “arranged” is not in the Hebrew text but has been supplied to clarify exactly what Moses did with the twelve stones.

[24:4]  ⁴ tn The thing numbered is found in the singular when the number is plural – “twelve standing-stone.” See GKC 433 §134.f. The “standing-stone” could be a small piece about a foot high, or a huge column higher than men. They served to commemorate treaties (Gen 32), or visions (Gen 28) or boundaries, or graves. Here it will function with the altar as a place of worship.

[24:7]  ⁵ tn The noun “book” would be the scroll just written containing the laws of chaps. 20-23. On the basis of this scroll the covenant would be concluded here. The reading of this book would assure the people that it was the same that they had agreed to earlier. But now their statement of willingness to obey would be more binding, because their promise would be confirmed by a covenant of blood.

[24:7]  ⁶ tn Heb “read it in the ears of.”

[24:7]  ⁷ tn A second verb is now added to the people’s response, and it is clearly an imperfect and not a cohortative, lending support for the choice of desiderative imperfect in these commitments – “we want to obey.” This was their compliance with the covenant.

[34:1]  ⁸ sn The restoration of the faltering community continues in this chapter. First, Moses is instructed to make new tablets and take them to the mountain (1-4). Then, through the promised theophany God proclaims his moral character (5-8). Moses responds with the reiteration of the intercession (8), and God responds with the renewal of the covenant (10-28). To put these into expository form, as principles, the chapter would run as follows: I. God provides for spiritual renewal (1-4), II. God reminds people of his moral standard (5-9), III. God renews his covenant promises and stipulations (10-28).

[34:1]  ⁹ tn The imperative is followed by the preposition with a suffix expressing the ethical dative; it strengthens the instruction for Moses. Interestingly, the verb “cut out, chisel, hew,” is the same verb from which the word for a “graven image” is derived – פָּסַל (pasal).

[34:1]  ¹⁰ tn The perfect tense with vav consecutive makes the value of this verb equal to an imperfect tense, probably a simple future here.

[34:27]  ¹¹ tn Once again the preposition with the suffix follows the imperative, adding some emphasis to the subject of the verb.

[30:6]  ¹² tn Heb “circumcise” (so KJV, NAB, NIV, NRSV); TEV “will give you and your descendents obedient hearts.” See note on the word “cleanse” in Deut 10:16.

[30:6]  ¹³ tn Heb “seed” (so KJV, ASV).

[30:6]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “the Lord your God.” See note on the second occurrence of the word “he” in v. 3.

[31:33]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “with the house of Israel.” All commentators agree that the term here refers to both the whole nation which was divided into the house of Israel and the house of Judah in v. 30.

[31:33]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “after those days.” Commentators are generally agreed that this refers to the return from exile and the repopulation of the land referred to in vv. 27-28 and not to something subsequent to the time mentioned in v. 30. This is the sequencing that is also presupposed in other new covenant passages such as Deut 30:1-6; Ezek 11:17-20; 36:24-28.

[31:33]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[31:33]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “‘But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after these days:’ says the Lord, ‘I will….’” The sentence has been reworded and restructured to avoid the awkwardness of the original style.

[31:33]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “in their inward parts.” The Hebrew word here refers to the seat of the thoughts, emotions, and decisions (Jer 9:8 [9:7 HT]). It is essentially synonymous with “heart” in Hebrew psychological terms.

[31:33]  ²⁰ tn The words “and minds” is not in the text but is supplied in the translation to bring the English psychology more into line with the Hebrew where the “heart” is the center both of knowing/thinking/reflecting and deciding/willing.

[31:33]  ²¹ sn Compare Jer 24:7; 30:22; 31:1 and see the study note on 30:2.

[32:40]  ²² tn Heb “an everlasting covenant.” For the rationale for the rendering “agreement” and the nature of the biblical covenants see the study note on 11:2.

[32:40]  ²³ tn Or “stop being gracious to them” or “stop blessing them with good”; Heb “turn back from them to do good to them.”

[32:40]  ²⁴ tn Or “I will make them want to fear and respect me so much that”; Heb “I will put the fear of me in their hearts.” However, as has been noted several times, “heart” in Hebrew is more the center of the volition (and intellect) than the center of emotions as it is in English. Both translations are intended to reflect the difference in psychology.

[32:40]  ²⁵ tn The words “never again” are not in the text but are implicit from the context and are supplied not only by this translation but by a number of others.

[11:19]  ²⁶ tc The MT reads “you”; many Hebrew mss along with the LXX and other ancient versions read “within them.”

[11:19]  ²⁷ tn Heb “their flesh.”

[11:19]  ²⁸ tn Heb “heart of flesh.”

[36:26]  ²⁹ sn That is, a heart which symbolizes a will that is stubborn and unresponsive (see 1 Sam 25:37). In Rabbinic literature a “stone” was associated with an evil inclination (b. Sukkah 52a).

[36:26]  ³⁰ sn That is, a heart which symbolizes a will that is responsive and obedient to God.

[36:27]  ³¹ tn Or “in the midst of you.” The word “you” is plural.

[36:27]  ³² tn Heb “and I will do that which in my statutes you will walk.” The awkward syntax (verb “to do, act” + accusative sign + relative clause + prepositional phrase + second person verb) is unique, though Eccl 3:14 contains a similar construction. In the last line of that verse we read that “God acts so that (relative pronoun) they fear before him.” However, unlike Ezek 36:27, the statement has no accusative sign before the relative pronoun.

[36:27]  ³³ tn Heb “and my laws you will guard and you will do them.” Jer 31:31-34 is parallel to this passage.

[36:2]  ³⁴ tn Or “high places.”

[3:7]  ³⁵ tn Grk “you also walked.” The verb περιπατέω (peripatew) is commonly used in the NT to refer to behavior or conduct of one’s life (L&N 41.11).

[3:8]  ³⁶ tn The Greek article with τὰ πάντα (ta panta) is anaphoric, referring to the previous list of vices, and has been translated here as “all such things.”

[1:18]  ³⁷ tn Grk “Having willed, he gave us birth.”

[1:21]  ³⁸ tn Or “with meekness.”

[1:1]  ³⁹ tn Grk “James.” The word “From” is not in the Greek text, but has been supplied to indicate the sender of the letter.

[1:1]  ⁴⁰ tn Traditionally, “servant” or “bondservant.” Though δοῦλος (doulos) is normally translated “servant,” the word does not bear the connotation of a free individual serving another. BDAG notes that “‘servant’ for ‘slave’ is largely confined to Biblical transl. and early American times…in normal usage at the present time the two words are carefully distinguished” (BDAG 260 s.v.). The most accurate translation is “bondservant” (sometimes found in the ASV for δοῦλος), in that it often indicates one who sells himself into slavery to another. But as this is archaic, few today understand its force.

[1:1]  ⁴¹ tn Grk “to the twelve tribes in the Diaspora.” The Greek term διασπορά (diaspora, “dispersion”) refers to Jews not living in Palestine but “dispersed” or scattered among the Gentiles.

[1:23]  ⁴² tn The word for “man” or “individual” is ἀνήρ (anhr), which often means “male” or “man (as opposed to woman).” However, as BDAG 79 s.v. 2 says, here it is “equivalent to τὶς someone, a person.”

[1:23]  ⁴³ tn Grk “the face of his beginning [or origin].”