Exodus 6:6-7

6:6 Therefore, tell the Israelites, ‘I am the Lord. I will bring you out ¹  from your enslavement to ²  the Egyptians, I will rescue you from the hard labor they impose, ³  and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments. 6:7 I will take you to myself for a people, and I will be your God. ⁴  Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from your enslavement to ⁵  the Egyptians.

Exodus 19:4-6

19:4 ‘You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt and how I lifted you on eagles’ wings ⁶  and brought you to myself. ⁷  19:5 And now, if you will diligently listen to me ⁸  and keep ⁹  my covenant, then you will be my ¹⁰  special possession ¹¹  out of all the nations, for all the earth is mine, 19:6 and you will be to me ¹²  a kingdom of priests ¹³  and a holy nation.’ ¹⁴  These are the words that you will speak to the Israelites.”

Deuteronomy 4:37

4:37 Moreover, because he loved ¹⁵  your ancestors, he chose their ¹⁶  descendants who followed them and personally brought you out of Egypt with his great power

Deuteronomy 7:6

7:6 For you are a people holy ¹⁷  to the Lord your God. He ¹⁸  has chosen you to be his people, prized ¹⁹  above all others on the face of the earth.

Deuteronomy 14:2

14:2 For you are a people holy ²⁰  to the Lord your God. He ²¹  has chosen you to be his people, prized ²²  above all others on the face of the earth.

Psalms 33:12

33:12 How blessed ²³  is the nation whose God is the Lord,

the people whom he has chosen to be his special possession. ²⁴ 

Isaiah 41:8-9

The Lord Encourages His People

41:8 “You, my servant Israel,

Jacob whom I have chosen,

offspring of Abraham my friend, ²⁵ 

41:9 you whom I am bringing back ²⁶  from the earth’s extremities,

and have summoned from the remote regions –

I told you, “You are my servant.”

I have chosen you and not rejected you.

Isaiah 43:10

43:10 You are my witnesses,” says the Lord,

“my servant whom I have chosen,

so that you may consider ²⁷  and believe in me,

and understand that I am he.

No god was formed before me,

and none will outlive me. ²⁸ 

Isaiah 44:1-2

The Lord Will Renew Israel

44:1 “Now, listen, Jacob my servant,

Israel whom I have chosen!”

44:2 This is what the Lord, the one who made you, says –

the one who formed you in the womb and helps you:

“Don’t be afraid, my servant Jacob,

Jeshurun, ²⁹  whom I have chosen!

Jeremiah 33:24

33:24 “You have surely noticed what these people are saying, haven’t you? They are saying, ³⁰  ‘The Lord has rejected the two families of Israel and Judah ³¹  that he chose.’ So they have little regard that my people will ever again be a nation. ³² 

Mark 13:20

13:20 And if the Lord had not cut short those days, no one would be saved. But because of the elect, whom he chose, he has cut them ³³  short.

[6:6]  ¹ sn The verb וְהוֹצֵאתִי (vÿhotse’ti) is a perfect tense with the vav (ו) consecutive, and so it receives a future translation – part of God’s promises. The word will be used later to begin the Decalogue and other covenant passages – “I am Yahweh who brought you out….”

[6:6]  ² tn Heb “from under the burdens of” (so KJV, NASB); NIV “from under the yoke of.”

[6:6]  ³ tn Heb “from labor of them.” The antecedent of the pronoun is the Egyptians who have imposed slave labor on the Hebrews.

[6:7]  ⁴ sn These covenant promises are being reiterated here because they are about to be fulfilled. They are addressed to the nation, not individuals, as the plural suffixes show. Yahweh was their God already, because they had been praying to him and he is acting on their behalf. When they enter into covenant with God at Sinai, then he will be the God of Israel in a new way (19:4-6; cf. Gen 17:7-8; 28:20-22; Lev 26:11-12; Jer 24:7; Ezek 11:17-20).

[6:7]  ⁵ tn Heb “from under the burdens of” (so KJV, NASB); NIV “from under the yoke of.”

[19:4]  ⁶ tn The figure compares the way a bird would teach its young to fly and leave the nest with the way Yahweh brought Israel out of Egypt. The bird referred to could be one of several species of eagles, but more likely is the griffin-vulture. The image is that of power and love.

[19:4]  ⁷ sn The language here is the language of a bridegroom bringing the bride to the chamber. This may be a deliberate allusion to another metaphor for the covenant relationship.

[19:5]  ⁸ tn Heb “listen to my voice.” The construction uses the imperfect tense in the conditional clause, preceded by the infinitive absolute from the same verb. The idiom “listen to the voice of” implies obedience, not just mental awareness of sound.

[19:5]  ⁹ tn The verb is a perfect tense with vav (ו) consecutive; it continues the idea in the protasis of the sentence: “and [if you will] keep.”

[19:5]  ¹⁰ tn The lamed preposition expresses possession here: “to me” means “my.”

[19:5]  ¹¹ tn The noun is סְגֻלָּה (sÿgullah), which means a special possession. Israel was to be God’s special possession, but the prophets will later narrow it to the faithful remnant. All the nations belong to God, but Israel was to stand in a place of special privilege and enormous responsibility. See Deut 7:6; 14:2; 26:18; Ps 135:4; and Mal 3:17. See M. Greenburg, “Hebrew sÿgulla: Akkadian sikiltu,” JAOS 71 (1951): 172ff.

[19:6]  ¹² tn Or “for me” (NIV, NRSV), or, if the lamed (ל) preposition has a possessive use, “my kingdom” (so NCV).

[19:6]  ¹³ tn The construction “a kingdom of priests” means that the kingdom is made up of priests. W. C. Kaiser (“Exodus,” EBC 2:417) offers four possible renderings of the expression: 1) apposition, viz., “kings, that is, priests; 2) as a construct with a genitive of specification, “royal priesthood”; 3) as a construct with the genitive being the attribute, “priestly kingdom”; and 4) reading with an unexpressed “and” – “kings and priests.” He takes the latter view that they were to be kings and priests. (Other references are R. B. Y. Scott, “A Kingdom of Priests (Exodus xix. 6),” OTS 8 [1950]: 213-19; William L. Moran, “A Kingdom of Priests,” The Bible in Current Catholic Thought, 7-20). However, due to the parallelism of the next description which uses an adjective, this is probably a construct relationship. This kingdom of God will be composed of a priestly people. All the Israelites would be living wholly in God’s service and enjoying the right of access to him. And, as priests, they would have the duty of representing God to the nations, following what they perceived to be the duties of priests – proclaiming God’s word, interceding for people, and making provision for people to find God through atonement (see Deut 33:9,10).

[19:6]  ¹⁴ tn They are also to be “a holy nation.” They are to be a nation separate and distinct from the rest of the nations. Here is another aspect of their duty. It was one thing to be God’s special possession, but to be that they had to be priestly and holy. The duties of the covenant will specify what it would mean to be a holy nation. In short, they had to keep themselves free from everything that characterized pagan people (S. R. Driver, Exodus, 171). So it is a bilateral covenant: they received special privileges but they must provide special services by the special discipline. See also H. Kruse, “Exodus 19:5 and the Mission of Israel,” North East Asian Journal of Theology 24/25 (1980): 239-42.

[4:37]  ¹⁵ tn The concept of love here is not primarily that of emotional affection but of commitment or devotion. This verse suggests that God chose Israel to be his special people because he loved the patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, Jacob) and had promised to bless their descendants. See as well Deut 7:7-9.

[4:37]  ¹⁶ tc The LXX, Smr, Syriac, Targum, and Vulgate read a third person masculine plural suffix for the MT’s 3rd person masculine singular, “his descendants.” Cf. Deut 10:15. Quite likely the MT should be emended in this instance.

[7:6]  ¹⁷ tn That is, “set apart.”

[7:6]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “the Lord your God.” The pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons to avoid redundancy.

[7:6]  ¹⁹ tn Or “treasured” (so NIV, NRSV); NLT “his own special treasure.” The Hebrew term סְגֻלָּה (sÿgullah) describes Israel as God’s choice people, those whom he elected and who are most precious to him (cf. Exod 19:4-6; Deut 14:2; 26:18; 1 Chr 29:3; Ps 135:4; Eccl 2:8 Mal 3:17). See E. Carpenter, NIDOTTE 3:224.

[14:2]  ²⁰ tn Or “set apart.”

[14:2]  ²¹ tn Heb “The Lord.” The pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons to avoid redundancy.

[14:2]  ²² tn Or “treasured.” The Hebrew term סְגֻלָּה (sÿgullah) describes Israel as God’s choice people, those whom he elected and who are most precious to him (cf. Exod 19:4-6; Deut 14:2; 26:18; 1 Chr 29:3; Ps 135:4; Eccl 2:8 Mal 3:17). See E. Carpenter, NIDOTTE 3:224.

[33:12]  ²³ tn The Hebrew noun is an abstract plural. The word often refers metonymically to the happiness that God-given security and prosperity produce (see Pss 1:1; 2:12; 34:9; 41:1; 65:4; 84:12; 89:15; 106:3; 112:1; 127:5; 128:1; 144:15).

[33:12]  ²⁴ tn Heb “inheritance.”

[41:8]  ²⁵ tn Or perhaps, “covenantal partner” (see 1 Kgs 5:15 HT [5:1 ET]; 2 Chr 20:7).

[41:9]  ²⁶ tn Heb “whom I have taken hold of [i.e., to lead back].”

[43:10]  ²⁷ tn Or “know” (KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[43:10]  ²⁸ tn Heb “and after me, there will not be”; NASB “there will be none after Me.”

[44:2]  ²⁹ sn Jeshurun is a poetic name for Israel; it occurs here and in Deut 32:15; 33:5, 26.

[33:24]  ³⁰ tn Heb “Have you not seen what this people have said, saying.” The question is rhetorical and expects a positive answer. The sentence has been broken in two to better conform with contemporary English style.

[33:24]  ³¹ tn Heb “The two families which the Lord chose, he has rejected them.” This is an example of an object prepositioned before the verb and resumed by a redundant pronoun to throw emphasis of focus on it (called casus pendens in the grammars; cf. GKC 458 §143.d). Some commentators identify the “two families” as those of David and Levi mentioned in the previous verses, and some identify them as the families of the Israelites and of David mentioned in the next verse. However, the next clause in this verse and the emphasis on the restoration and regathering of Israel and Judah in this section (cf. 33:7, 14) show that the reference is to Israel and Judah (see also 30:3, 4; 31:27, 31 and 3:18).

[33:24]  ³² tn Heb “and my people [i.e., Israel and Judah] they disdain [or look down on] from being again a nation before them.” The phrase “before them” refers to their estimation, their mental view (cf. BDB s.v. פָּנֶה II.4.a[g]). Hence it means they look with disdain on the people being a nation again (cf. BDB s.v. עוֹד 1.a[b] for the usage of עוֹד [’od] here).

[13:20]  ³³ tn Grk “the days.”