Ezekiel 17:13-16

17:13 He took one from the royal family, ¹  made a treaty with him, and put him under oath. ²  He then took the leaders of the land 17:14 so it would be a lowly kingdom which could not rise on its own but must keep its treaty with him in order to stand. 17:15 But this one from Israel’s royal family ³  rebelled against the king of Babylon ⁴  by sending his emissaries to Egypt to obtain horses and a large army. Will he prosper? Will the one doing these things escape? Can he break the covenant and escape?

17:16 “‘As surely as I live, declares the sovereign Lord, surely in the city ⁵  of the king who crowned him, whose oath he despised and whose covenant he broke – in the middle of Babylon he will die!

Exodus 24:1-8

The Lord Ratifies the Covenant

24:1 ⁶ But to Moses the Lord ⁷  said, “Come up ⁸  to the Lord, you and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel, and worship from a distance. ⁹  24:2 Moses alone may come ¹⁰  near the Lord, but the others ¹¹  must not come near, ¹²  nor may the people go up with him.”

24:3 Moses came ¹³  and told the people all the Lord’s words ¹⁴  and all the decisions. All the people answered together, ¹⁵  “We are willing to do ¹⁶  all the words that the Lord has said,” 24:4 and Moses wrote down all the words of the Lord. Early in the morning he built ¹⁷  an altar at the foot ¹⁸  of the mountain and arranged ¹⁹  twelve standing stones ²⁰  – according to the twelve tribes of Israel. 24:5 He sent young Israelite men, ²¹  and they offered burnt offerings and sacrificed young bulls for peace offerings ²²  to the Lord. 24:6 Moses took half of the blood and put it in bowls, and half of the blood he splashed on the altar. ²³  24:7 He took the Book of the Covenant ²⁴  and read it aloud ²⁵  to the people, and they said, “We are willing to do and obey ²⁶  all that the Lord has spoken.” 24:8 So Moses took the blood and splashed it on ²⁷  the people and said, “This is the blood of the covenant ²⁸  that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.”

Deuteronomy 29:10-15

29:10 You are standing today, all of you, before the Lord your God – the heads of your tribes, ²⁹  your elders, your officials, every Israelite man, 29:11 your infants, your wives, and the ³⁰  foreigners living in your encampment, those who chop wood and those who carry water – 29:12 so that you may enter by oath into the covenant the Lord your God is making with you today. ³¹  29:13 Today he will affirm that you are his people and that he is your God, ³²  just as he promised you and as he swore by oath to your ancestors ³³  Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 29:14 It is not with you alone that I am making this covenant by oath, 29:15 but with whoever stands with us here today before the Lord our God as well as those not with us here today. ³⁴ 

Deuteronomy 29:25

29:25 Then people will say, “Because they abandoned the covenant of the Lord, the God of their ancestors, which he made with them when he brought them out of the land of Egypt.

Deuteronomy 29:2

The Exodus, Wandering, and Conquest Reviewed

29:2 Moses proclaimed to all Israel as follows: “You have seen all that the Lord did ³⁵  in the land of Egypt to Pharaoh, all his servants, and his land.

Deuteronomy 34:1

The Death of Moses

34:1 Then Moses ascended from the deserts of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the summit of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho. ³⁶  The Lord showed him the whole land – Gilead to Dan,

Deuteronomy 34:1

The Death of Moses

34:1 Then Moses ascended from the deserts of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the summit of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho. ³⁷  The Lord showed him the whole land – Gilead to Dan,

Isaiah 24:5

24:5 The earth is defiled by ³⁸  its inhabitants, ³⁹ 

for they have violated laws,

disregarded the regulation, ⁴⁰ 

and broken the permanent treaty. ⁴¹ 

Jeremiah 22:9

22:9 The answer will come back, “It is because they broke their covenant with the Lord their God and worshiped and served other gods.”

Jeremiah 31:32

31:32 It will not be like the old ⁴²  covenant that I made with their ancestors ⁴³  when I delivered them ⁴⁴  from Egypt. For they violated that covenant, even though I was like a faithful husband to them,” ⁴⁵  says the Lord. ⁴⁶ 

[17:13]  ¹ tn Or “descendants”; Heb “seed” (cf. v. 5).

[17:13]  ² tn Heb “caused him to enter into an oath.”

[17:15]  ³ tn Heb “he”; the referent (the member of the royal family, v. 13) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[17:15]  ⁴ tn Heb “him”; the referent (the king of Babylon) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[17:16]  ⁵ tn Heb “place.”

[24:1]  ⁶ sn Exod 24 is the high point of the book in many ways, but most importantly, here Yahweh makes a covenant with the people – the Sinaitic Covenant. The unit not only serves to record the event in Israel’s becoming a nation, but it provides a paradigm of the worship of God’s covenant people – entering into the presence of the glory of Yahweh. See additionally W. A. Maier, “The Analysis of Exodus 24 According to Modern Literary, Form, and Redaction Critical Methodology,” Springfielder 37 (1973): 35-52. The passage may be divided into four parts for exposition: vv. 1-2, the call for worship; vv. 3-8, the consecration of the worshipers; vv. 9-11, the confirmation of the covenant; and vv. 12-18, the communication with Yahweh.

[24:1]  ⁷ tn Heb “And he;” the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[24:1]  ⁸ sn They were to come up to the Lord after they had made the preparations that are found in vv. 3-8.

[24:1]  ⁹ sn These seventy-four people were to go up the mountain to a certain point. Then they were to prostrate themselves and worship Yahweh as Moses went further up into the presence of Yahweh. Moses occupies the lofty position of mediator (as Christ in the NT), for he alone ascends “to Yahweh” while everyone waits for his return. The emphasis of “bowing down” and that from “far off” stresses again the ominous presence that was on the mountain. This was the holy God – only the designated mediator could draw near to him.

[24:2]  ¹⁰ tn The verb is a perfect tense with a vav (ו) consecutive; it and the preceding perfect tense follow the imperative, and so have either a force of instruction, or, as taken here, are the equivalent of an imperfect tense (of permission).

[24:2]  ¹¹ tn Heb “they.”

[24:2]  ¹² tn Now the imperfect tense negated is used; here the prohibition would fit (“they will not come near”), or the obligatory (“they must not”) in which the subjects are obliged to act – or not act in this case.

[24:3]  ¹³ sn The general consensus among commentators is that this refers to Moses’ coming from the mountain after he made the ascent in 20:21. Here he came and told them the laws (written in 20:22-23:33), and of the call to come up to Yahweh.

[24:3]  ¹⁴ sn The Decalogue may not be included here because the people had heard those commands themselves earlier.

[24:3]  ¹⁵ tn The text simply has “one voice” (קוֹל אֶחָד, qol ’ekhad); this is an adverbial accusative of manner, telling how the people answered – “in one voice,” or unanimously (see GKC 375 §118.q).

[24:3]  ¹⁶ tn The verb is the imperfect tense (נַעֲשֶׂה, na’aseh), although the form could be classified as a cohortative. If the latter, they would be saying that they are resolved to do what God said. If it is an imperfect, then the desiderative would make the most sense: “we are willing to do.” They are not presumptuously saying they are going to do all these things.

[24:4]  ¹⁷ 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]  ¹⁸ tn “under.”

[24:4]  ¹⁹ 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]  ²⁰ 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.

[24:5]  ²¹ tn The construct has “young men of the Israelites,” and so “Israelite” is a genitive that describes them.

[24:5]  ²² tn The verbs and their respective accusatives are cognates. First, they offered up burnt offerings (see Lev 1), which is וַיַּעֲלוּ עֹלֹת (vayya’alu ’olot); then they sacrificed young bulls as peace sacrifices (Lev 3), which is in Hebrew וַיִּזְבְּחוּ זְבָחִים (vayyizbÿkhu zÿvakhim). In the first case the cognate accusative is the direct object; in the second it is an adverbial accusative of product. See on this covenant ritual H. M. Kamsler, “The Blood Covenant in the Bible,” Dor le Dor 6 (1977): 94-98; E. W. Nicholson, “The Covenant Ritual in Exodus 24:3-8,” VT 32 (1982): 74-86.

[24:6]  ²³ sn The people and Yahweh through this will be united by blood, for half was spattered on the altar and the other half spattered on/toward the people (v. 8).

[24:7]  ²⁴ 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]  ²⁵ tn Heb “read it in the ears of.”

[24:7]  ²⁶ 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.

[24:8]  ²⁷ tn Given the size of the congregation, the preposition might be rendered here “toward the people” rather than on them (all).

[24:8]  ²⁸ sn The construct relationship “the blood of the covenant” means “the blood by which the covenant is ratified” (S. R. Driver, Exodus, 254). The parallel with the inauguration of the new covenant in the blood of Christ is striking (see, e.g., Matt 26:28, 1 Cor 11:25). When Jesus was inaugurating the new covenant, he was bringing to an end the old.

[29:10]  ²⁹ tc Heb “your heads, your tribes.” The Syriac presupposes either “heads of your tribes” or “your heads, your judges,” etc. (reading שֹׁפְטֵכֶם [shofÿtekhem] for שִׁבְטֵיכֶם [shivtekhem]). Its comparative difficulty favors the originality of the MT reading. Cf. KJV “your captains of your tribes”; NRSV “the leaders of your tribes”; NLT “your tribal leaders.”

[29:11]  ³⁰ tn Heb “your.”

[29:12]  ³¹ tn Heb “for you to pass on into the covenant of the Lord your God and into his oath, which the Lord your God is cutting with you today.”

[29:13]  ³² tn Heb “in order to establish you today to him for a people and he will be to you for God.” Verses 10-13 are one long sentence in Hebrew. The translation divides this into two sentences for stylistic reasons.

[29:13]  ³³ tn Heb “fathers” (also in v. 25).

[29:15]  ³⁴ tn This is interpreted by some English versions as a reference to generations not yet born (cf. TEV, CEV, NLT).

[29:2]  ³⁵ tn The Hebrew text includes “to your eyes,” but this is redundant in English style (cf. the preceding “you have seen”) and is omitted in the translation.

[34:1]  ³⁶ sn For the geography involved, see note on the term “Pisgah” in Deut 3:17.

[34:1]  ³⁷ sn For the geography involved, see note on the term “Pisgah” in Deut 3:17.

[24:5]  ³⁸ tn Heb “beneath”; cf. KJV, ASV, NRSV “under”; NAB “because of.”

[24:5]  ³⁹ sn Isa 26:21 suggests that the earth’s inhabitants defiled the earth by shedding the blood of their fellow human beings. See also Num 35:33-34, which assumes that bloodshed defiles a land.

[24:5]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “moved past [the?] regulation.”

[24:5]  ⁴¹ tn Or “everlasting covenant” (KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT); NAB “the ancient covenant”; CEV “their agreement that was to last forever.”

[31:32]  ⁴² tn The word “old” is not in the text but is implicit in the use of the word “new.” It is supplied in the translation for greater clarity.

[31:32]  ⁴³ tn Heb “fathers.”

[31:32]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “when I took them by the hand and led them out.”

[31:32]  ⁴⁵ tn Or “I was their master.” See the study note on 3:14.

[31:32]  ⁴⁶ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”