Ezekiel 16:4-8

16:4 As for your birth, on the day you were born your umbilical cord was not cut, nor were you washed in water; ¹  you were certainly not rubbed down with salt, nor wrapped with blankets. ²  16:5 No eye took pity on you to do even one of these things for you to spare you; ³  you were thrown out into the open field ⁴  because you were detested on the day you were born.

16:6 “‘I passed by you and saw you kicking around helplessly in your blood. I said to you as you lay there in your blood, “Live!” I said to you as you lay there in your blood, “Live!” ⁵  16:7 I made you plentiful like sprouts in a field; you grew tall and came of age so that you could wear jewelry. Your breasts had formed and your hair had grown, but you were still naked and bare.

16:8 “‘Then I passed by you and watched you, noticing ⁶  that you had reached the age for love. ⁷  I spread my cloak ⁸  over you and covered your nakedness. I swore a solemn oath to you and entered into a marriage covenant with you, declares the sovereign Lord, and you became mine.

Ephesians 2:1-5

New Life Individually

2:1 And although you were ⁹  dead ¹⁰  in your transgressions and sins, 2:2 in which ¹¹  you formerly lived ¹²  according to this world’s present path, ¹³  according to the ruler of the kingdom ¹⁴  of the air, the ruler of ¹⁵  the spirit ¹⁶  that is now energizing ¹⁷  the sons of disobedience, ¹⁸  2:3 among whom ¹⁹  all of us ²⁰  also ²¹  formerly lived out our lives in the cravings of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath ²²  even as the rest… ²³ 

2:4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love with which he loved us, 2:5 even though we were dead in transgressions, made us alive together with Christ – by grace you are saved! ²⁴  –

Colossians 2:13

2:13 And even though you were dead in your ²⁵  transgressions and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, he nevertheless ²⁶  made you alive with him, having forgiven all your transgressions.

Titus 3:3-5

3:3 For we too were once foolish, disobedient, misled, enslaved to various passions and desires, spending our lives in evil and envy, hateful and hating one another. 3:4 ²⁷  But “when the kindness of God our Savior and his love for mankind appeared, 3:5 he saved us not by works of righteousness that we have done but on the basis of his mercy, through the washing of the new birth and the renewing of the Holy Spirit,

[16:4]  ¹ tn Heb “in water you were not washed for cleansing” or “with water you were not washed smooth” (see D. I. Block, Ezekiel [NICOT], 1:473, n. 57, for a discussion of possible meanings of this hapax legomenon).

[16:4]  ² sn Arab midwives still cut the umbilical cords of infants and then proceed to apply salt and oil to their bodies.

[16:5]  ³ sn These verbs, “pity” and “spare,” echo the judgment oracles in 5:11; 7:4, 9; 8:18; 9:5, 10.

[16:5]  ⁴ sn A similar concept is found in Deut 32:10.

[16:6]  ⁵ tc The translation reflects the Hebrew text, which repeats the statement, perhaps for emphasis. However, a few medieval Hebrew manuscripts, the Old Greek, and the Syriac do not include the repetition. The statement could have been accidentally repeated or the second occurrence could have been accidentally omitted. Based on the available evidence it is difficult to know which is more likely.

[16:8]  ⁶ tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something and has been translated here as a participle.

[16:8]  ⁷ tn See similar use of this term in Ezek 23:17; Prov 7:16; Song of Songs 4:10; 7:13.

[16:8]  ⁸ tn Heb “wing” or “skirt.” The gesture symbolized acquiring a woman in early Arabia (similarly, see Deut 22:30; Ruth 3:9).

[2:1]  ⁹ tn The adverbial participle “being” (ὄντας, ontas) is taken concessively.

[2:1]  ¹⁰ sn Chapter 2 starts off with a participle, although you were dead, that is left dangling. The syntax in Greek for vv. 1-3 constitutes one incomplete sentence, though it seems to have been done intentionally. The dangling participle leaves the readers in suspense while they wait for the solution (in v. 4) to their spiritual dilemma.

[2:2]  ¹¹ sn The relative pronoun which is feminine as is sins, indicating that sins is the antecedent.

[2:2]  ¹² tn Grk “walked.”

[2:2]  ¹³ tn Or possibly “Aeon.”

[2:2]  ¹⁴ tn Grk “domain, [place of] authority.”

[2:2]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “of” (but see the note on the word “spirit” later in this verse).

[2:2]  ¹⁶ sn The ruler of the kingdom of the air is also the ruler of the spirit that is now energizing the sons of disobedience. Although several translations regard the ruler to be the same as the spirit, this is unlikely since the cases in Greek are different (ruler is accusative and spirit is genitive). To get around this, some have suggested that the genitive for spirit is a genitive of apposition. However, the semantics of the genitive of apposition are against such an interpretation (cf. ExSyn 100).

[2:2]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “working in.”

[2:2]  ¹⁸ sn Sons of disobedience is a Semitic idiom that means “people characterized by disobedience.” However, it also contains a subtle allusion to vv. 4-10: Some of those sons of disobedience have become sons of God.

[2:3]  ¹⁹ sn Among whom. The relative pronoun phrase that begins v. 3 is identical, except for gender, to the one that begins v. 2 (ἐν αἵς [en Jais], ἐν οἵς [en Jois]). By the structure, the author is building an argument for our hopeless condition: We lived in sin and we lived among sinful people. Our doom looked to be sealed as well in v. 2: Both the external environment (kingdom of the air) and our internal motivation and attitude (the spirit that is now energizing) were under the devil’s thumb (cf. 2 Cor 4:4).

[2:3]  ²⁰ tn Grk “we all.”

[2:3]  ²¹ tn Or “even.”

[2:3]  ²² sn Children of wrath is a Semitic idiom which may mean either “people characterized by wrath” or “people destined for wrath.”

[2:3]  ²³ sn Eph 2:1-3. The translation of vv. 1-3 is very literal, even to the point of retaining the awkward syntax of the original. See note on the word dead in 2:1.

[2:5]  ²⁴ tn Or “by grace you have been saved.” The perfect tense in Greek connotes both completed action (“you have been saved”) and continuing results (“you are saved”).

[2:13]  ²⁵ tn The article τοῖς (tois) with παραπτώμασιν (paraptwmasin) is functioning as a possessive pronoun (ExSyn 215).

[2:13]  ²⁶ tn The word “nevertheless,” though not in the Greek text, was supplied in the translation to bring out the force of the concessive participle ὄντας (ontas).

[3:4]  ²⁷ tn Verses 4-7 are set as poetry in NA²⁶/NA²⁷. These verses probably constitute the referent of the expression “this saying” in v. 8.