Exodus 34:15-16

34:15 Be careful ¹  not to make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, for when ²  they prostitute themselves ³  to their gods and sacrifice to their gods, and someone invites you, ⁴  you will eat from his sacrifice; 34:16 and you then take ⁵  his daughters for your sons, and when his daughters prostitute themselves to their gods, they will make your sons prostitute themselves to their gods as well.

Leviticus 17:7

17:7 So they must no longer offer ⁶  their sacrifices to the goat demons, ⁷  acting like prostitutes by going after them. ⁸  This is to be a perpetual statute for them throughout their generations. ⁹ 

Psalms 73:27

73:27 Yes, ¹⁰  look! Those far from you ¹¹  die;

you destroy everyone who is unfaithful to you. ¹² 

Psalms 106:39

106:39 They were defiled by their deeds,

and unfaithful in their actions. ¹³ 

Hosea 2:2

Idolatrous Israel Will Be Punished Like a Prostitute

2:2 Plead earnestly ¹⁴  with your ¹⁵  mother

(for ¹⁶  she is not my wife, and I am not her husband),

so that ¹⁷  she might put an end to her adulterous lifestyle, ¹⁸ 

and turn away from her sexually immoral behavior. ¹⁹ 

Revelation 17:1-5

The Great Prostitute and the Beast

17:1 Then ²⁰  one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and spoke to me. ²¹  “Come,” he said, “I will show you the condemnation and punishment ²²  of the great prostitute who sits on many waters, 17:2 with whom the kings of the earth committed sexual immorality and the earth’s inhabitants got drunk with the wine of her immorality.” ²³  17:3 So ²⁴  he carried me away in the Spirit ²⁵  to a wilderness, ²⁶  and there ²⁷  I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of blasphemous names and had seven heads and ten horns. 17:4 Now ²⁸  the woman was dressed in purple and scarlet clothing, ²⁹  and adorned with gold, ³⁰  precious stones, and pearls. She held ³¹  in her hand a golden cup filled with detestable things and unclean things from her sexual immorality. ³²  17:5 On ³³  her forehead was written a name, a mystery: ³⁴  “Babylon the Great, the Mother of prostitutes and of the detestable things of the earth.”

[34:15]  ¹ tn The sentence begins simply “lest you make a covenant”; it is undoubtedly a continuation of the imperative introduced earlier, and so that is supplied here.

[34:15]  ² tn The verb is a perfect with a vav consecutive. In the literal form of the sentence, this clause tells what might happen if the people made a covenant with the inhabitants of the land: “Take heed…lest you make a covenant…and then they prostitute themselves…and sacrifice…and invite…and you eat.” The sequence lays out an entire scenario.

[34:15]  ³ tn The verb זָנָה (zanah) means “to play the prostitute; to commit whoredom; to be a harlot” or something similar. It is used here and elsewhere in the Bible for departing from pure religion and engaging in pagan religion. The use of the word in this figurative sense is fitting, because the relationship between God and his people is pictured as a marriage, and to be unfaithful to it was a sin. This is also why God is described as a “jealous” or “impassioned” God. The figure may not be merely a metaphorical use, but perhaps a metonymy, since there actually was sexual immorality at the Canaanite altars and poles.

[34:15]  ⁴ tn There is no subject for the verb. It could be rendered “and one invites you,” or it could be made a passive.

[34:16]  ⁵ tn In the construction this verb would follow as a possible outcome of the last event, and so remain in the verbal sequence. If the people participate in the festivals of the land, then they will intermarry, and that could lead to further involvement with idolatry.

[17:7]  ⁶ tn Heb “sacrifice.” This has been translated as “offer” for stylistic reasons to avoid the redundancy of “sacrifice their sacrifices.”

[17:7]  ⁷ tn On “goat demons” of the desert regions see the note on Lev 16:8.

[17:7]  ⁸ tn Heb “which they are committing harlotry after them.”

[17:7]  ⁹ tn Heb “for your generations.”

[73:27]  ¹⁰ tn Or “for.”

[73:27]  ¹¹ sn The following line defines the phrase far from you in a spiritual sense. Those “far” from God are those who are unfaithful and disloyal to him.

[73:27]  ¹² tn Heb “everyone who commits adultery from you.”

[106:39]  ¹³ tn Heb “and they committed adultery in their actions.” This means that they were unfaithful to the Lord (see Ps 73:27).

[2:2]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “Plead with your mother, plead!” The imperative רִיבוּ (rivu, “plead!”) is repeated twice in this line for emphasis. This rhetorical expression is handled in a woodenly literal sense by most English translations: NASB “Contend…contend”; NAB “Protest…protest!”; NIV “Rebuke…rebuke”; NRSV “Plead…plead”; CEV “Accuse! Accuse your mother!”

[2:2]  ¹⁵ sn The suffix on the noun אִמְּכֶם (’immékhem, “your mother”) is a plural form (2nd person masculine). The children of Gomer represent the “children” (i.e., people) of Israel; Gomer represents the nation as a whole.

[2:2]  ¹⁶ tn The particle כִּי (ki) introduces a parenthetical explanatory clause (however, cf. NCV “because”).

[2:2]  ¹⁷ tn The dependent volitive sequence of imperative followed by vav + jussive (רִיבוּ, rivu followed by וְתָסֵר, vétaser) creates a purpose clause: “so that she might turn away from” (= “put an end to”); cf. NRSV “that she put away”; KJV “let her therefore put away.” Many English translations begin a new sentence here, presumably to improve the English style (so NAB, NIV, TEV, NLT), but this obscures the connection with the preceding clause.

[2:2]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “put away her adulteries from her face.” The plural noun זְנוּנֶיהָ (zénuneha, “adulteries”) is an example of the plural of repeated (or habitual) action: she has had multiple adulterous affairs.

[2:2]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “[put away] her immoral behavior from between her breasts.” Cf. KJV “her adulteries”; NIV “the unfaithfulness.”

[17:1]  ²⁰ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence within the narrative.

[17:1]  ²¹ tn Grk “with me.” The translation “with me” implies that John was engaged in a dialogue with the one speaking to him (e.g., Jesus or an angel) when in reality it was a one-sided conversation, with John doing all the listening. For this reason, μετ᾿ ἐμοῦ (met’ emou, “with me”) was translated as “to me.”

[17:1]  ²² tn Here one Greek term, κρίμα (krima), has been translated by the two English terms “condemnation” and “punishment.” See BDAG 567 s.v. 4.b, “mostly in an unfavorable sense, of the condemnatory verdict and sometimes the subsequent punishment itself 2 Pt 2:3; Jd 4…τὸ κ. τῆς πόρνης the condemnation and punishment of the prostitute Rv 17:1.”

[17:2]  ²³ tn This is the same word translated “sexual immorality” earlier in the verse, but here the qualifier “sexual” has not been repeated for stylistic reasons.

[17:3]  ²⁴ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “so” to indicate the implied result of the angel’s invitation to witness the fate of the prostitute.

[17:3]  ²⁵ tn Or “in the spirit.” “Spirit” could refer either to the Holy Spirit or the human spirit, but in either case John was in “a state of spiritual exaltation best described as a trance” (R. H. Mounce, Revelation [NICNT], 75).

[17:3]  ²⁶ tn Or “desert.”

[17:3]  ²⁷ tn The word “there” is not in the Greek text, but is supplied for stylistic reasons.

[17:4]  ²⁸ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “now” to indicate the detailed description of the woman, which is somewhat parenthetical in nature.

[17:4]  ²⁹ tn The word “clothing” is supplied to clarify that the words “purple” and “scarlet” refer to cloth or garments rather than colors.

[17:4]  ³⁰ tn Grk “gilded with gold” (an instance of semantic reinforcement, see L&N 49.29).

[17:4]  ³¹ tn Grk “pearls, having in her hand.” Due to the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started here in the translation.

[17:4]  ³² tc Several mss (including 1611 1854 2053 Ï^K pc) read “sexual immorality on/of the earth” (πορνείας τῆς γῆς, porneia" th" gh") instead of “her sexual immorality.” Other mss (א sy^h** [co]) read “her sexual immorality and the earth’s” (πορνείας αὐτῆς καὶ τῆς γῆς, porneia" aujth" kai th" gh"). The translation is a rendering of πορνείας αὐτῆς, found in {A 1006 2344 al}. It seems that the first reading “sexuality immorality on/of the earth” was a scribal mistake in which letters may have been confused (auths would have been read as thsghs), or was perhaps influenced by the presence of “of the world” (τῆς γῆς) at the end of v. 5. The original wording seems to be “her sexual immorality”; codex א has conflated the two readings.

[17:5]  ³³ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[17:5]  ³⁴ tn Some translations consider the word μυστήριον (musthrion, “mystery”) a part of the name written (“Mystery Babylon the Great,” so KJV, NIV), but the gender of both ὄνομα (onoma, “name”) and μυστήριον are neuter, while the gender of “Babylon” is feminine. This strongly suggests that μυστήριον should be understood as an appositive to ὄνομα (“a name, i.e., a mystery”).