Ezekiel 18:4

18:4 Indeed! All lives are mine – the life of the father as well as the life of the son is mine. The one ¹  who sins will die.

Ezekiel 18:13

18:13 engages in usury and charges interest. Will he live? He will not! Because he has done all these abominable deeds he will certainly die. ²  He will bear the responsibility for his own death. ³ 

Ezekiel 18:20

18:20 The person who sins is the one who will die. A son will not suffer ⁴  for his father’s iniquity, and a father will not suffer ⁵  for his son’s iniquity; the righteous person will be judged according to his righteousness, and the wicked person according to his wickedness. ⁶ 

Ezekiel 33:6

33:6 But suppose the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet to warn the people. Then the sword comes and takes one of their lives. He is swept away for his iniquity, ⁷  but I will hold the watchman accountable for that person’s death.’ ⁸ 

Ezekiel 33:8

33:8 When I say to the wicked, ‘O wicked man, you must certainly die,’ ⁹  and you do not warn ¹⁰  the wicked about his behavior, ¹¹  the wicked man will die for his iniquity, but I will hold you accountable for his death. ¹² 

Genesis 2:17

2:17 but ¹³  you must not eat ¹⁴  from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when ¹⁵  you eat from it you will surely die.” ¹⁶ 

Genesis 3:3-4

3:3 but concerning the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the orchard God said, ‘You must not eat from it, and you must not touch it, ¹⁷  or else you will die.’” ¹⁸  3:4 The serpent said to the woman, “Surely you will not die, ¹⁹ 

Numbers 26:65

26:65 For the Lord had said of them, “They will surely die in the wilderness.” And there was not left a single man of them, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun.

Numbers 26:2

26:2 “Take a census of the whole community of Israelites, from twenty years old and upward, by their clans, ²⁰  everyone who can serve in the army of Israel.” ²¹ 

Numbers 1:4

1:4 And to help you ²²  there is to be a man from each ²³  tribe, each man ²⁴  the head ²⁵  of his family. ²⁶ 

Isaiah 3:11

3:11 Too bad for the wicked sinners!

For they will get exactly what they deserve. ²⁷ 

Luke 13:3

13:3 No, I tell you! But unless you repent, ²⁸  you will all perish as well! ²⁹ 

Luke 13:5

13:5 No, I tell you! But unless you repent ³⁰  you will all perish as well!” ³¹ 

Ephesians 5:5-6

5:5 For you can be confident of this one thing: ³²  that no person who is immoral, impure, or greedy (such a person is an idolater) has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.

Live in the Light

5:6 Let nobody deceive you with empty words, for because of these things God’s wrath comes on the sons of disobedience. ³³ 

[18:4]  ¹ tn Heb “life.”

[18:13]  ² tn Heb “be put to death.” The translation follows an alternative reading that appears in several ancient textual witnesses.

[18:13]  ³ tn Heb “his blood will be upon him.”

[18:20]  ⁴ tn Heb “lift up, bear.”

[18:20]  ⁵ tn Heb “lift up, bear.”

[18:20]  ⁶ tn Heb “the righteousness of the righteous one will be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked one will be upon him.”

[33:6]  ⁷ tn Or “in his punishment.” The phrase “in/for [a person’s] iniquity/punishment” occurs fourteen times in Ezekiel: here and in vv. 8 and 9; 3:18, 19; 4:17; 7:13, 16; 18: 17, 18, 19, 20; 24:23; 39:23. The Hebrew word for “iniquity” may also mean the “punishment” for iniquity or “guilt” of iniquity.

[33:6]  ⁸ tn Heb “his blood from the hand of the watchman I will seek.”

[33:8]  ⁹ tn The same expression occurs in Gen 2:17.

[33:8]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “and you do not speak to warn.”

[33:8]  ¹¹ tn Heb “way.”

[33:8]  ¹² tn Heb “and his blood from your hand I will seek.”

[2:17]  ¹³ tn The disjunctive clause here indicates contrast: “but from the tree of the knowledge….”

[2:17]  ¹⁴ tn The negated imperfect verb form indicates prohibition, “you must not eat.”

[2:17]  ¹⁵ tn Or “in the very day, as soon as.” If one understands the expression to have this more precise meaning, then the following narrative presents a problem, for the man does not die physically as soon as he eats from the tree. In this case one may argue that spiritual death is in view. If physical death is in view here, there are two options to explain the following narrative: (1) The following phrase “You will surely die” concerns mortality which ultimately results in death (a natural paraphrase would be, “You will become mortal”), or (2) God mercifully gave man a reprieve, allowing him to live longer than he deserved.

[2:17]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “dying you will die.” The imperfect verb form here has the nuance of the specific future because it is introduced with the temporal clause, “when you eat…you will die.” That certainty is underscored with the infinitive absolute, “you will surely die.”

[3:3]  ¹⁷ sn And you must not touch it. The woman adds to God’s prohibition, making it say more than God expressed. G. von Rad observes that it is as though she wanted to set a law for herself by means of this exaggeration (Genesis [OTL], 86).

[3:3]  ¹⁸ tn The Hebrew construction is פֶּן (pen) with the imperfect tense, which conveys a negative purpose: “lest you die” = “in order that you not die.” By stating the warning in this way, the woman omits the emphatic infinitive used by God (“you shall surely die,” see 2:17).

[3:4]  ¹⁹ tn The response of the serpent includes the infinitive absolute with a blatant negation equal to saying: “Not – you will surely die” (לֹא מוֹת תִּמֻתען, lo’ mot tÿmutun). The construction makes this emphatic because normally the negative particle precedes the finite verb. The serpent is a liar, denying that there is a penalty for sin (see John 8:44).

[26:2]  ²⁰ tn Heb “house of their fathers.”

[26:2]  ²¹ tn Heb “everyone who goes out in the army in Israel.”

[1:4]  ²² tn Heb “and with you.”

[1:4]  ²³ tn The construction uses the noun in a distributive sense: “a man, a man for a tribe,” meaning a man for each tribe.

[1:4]  ²⁴ tn The clause expresses a distributive function, “a man” means “each man.”

[1:4]  ²⁵ sn See J. R. Bartlett, “The Use of the Word ראשׁ as a Title in the Old Testament,” VT 19 (1969): 1-10.

[1:4]  ²⁶ tn Heb “the house of his fathers.”

[3:11]  ²⁷ tn Heb “for the work of his hands will be done to him.”

[13:3]  ²⁸ sn Jesus was stressing that all stand at risk of death, if they do not repent and receive life.

[13:3]  ²⁹ tn Or “you will all likewise perish,” but this could be misunderstood to mean that they would perish by the same means as the Galileans. Jesus’ point is that apart from repentance all will perish.

[13:5]  ³⁰ sn Jesus’ point repeats v. 3. The circumstances make no difference. All must deal with the reality of what death means.

[13:5]  ³¹ tn Grk “similarly.”

[5:5]  ³² tn Grk “be knowing this.” See also 2 Pet 1:20 for a similar phrase: τοῦτο πρῶτον γινώσκοντες (touto prwton ginwskonte").

[5:6]  ³³ sn The expression sons of disobedience is a Semitic idiom that means “people characterized by disobedience.” In this context it refers to “all those who are disobedient.” Cf. Eph 2:2-3.