Ezekiel 28:2

28:2 “Son of man, say to the prince ¹  of Tyre, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says:

“‘Your heart is proud ²  and you said, “I am a god; ³ 

I sit in the seat of gods, in the heart of the seas” –

yet you are a man and not a god,

though you think you are godlike. ⁴ 

Exodus 9:17

9:17 You are still exalting ⁵  yourself against my people by ⁶  not releasing them.

Job 9:4

9:4 He is wise in heart ⁷  and mighty ⁸  in strength ⁹  –

who has resisted ¹⁰  him and remained safe? ¹¹ 

Job 40:9-12

40:9 Do you have an arm as powerful as God’s, ¹² 

and can you thunder with a voice like his?

40:10 Adorn yourself, then, with majesty and excellency,

and clothe yourself with glory and honor!

40:11 Scatter abroad ¹³  the abundance ¹⁴  of your anger.

Look at every proud man ¹⁵  and bring him low;

40:12 Look at every proud man and abase him;

crush the wicked on the spot! ¹⁶ 

Job 40:1

Job’s Reply to God’s Challenge

40:1 Then the Lord answered Job:

Colossians 1:22

1:22 but now he has reconciled you ¹⁷  by his physical body through death to present you holy, without blemish, and blameless before him –

Colossians 1:2

1:2 to the saints, the faithful ¹⁸  brothers and sisters ¹⁹  in Christ, at Colossae. Grace and peace to you ²⁰  from God our Father! ²¹ 

Colossians 2:4

2:4 I say this so that no one will deceive you through arguments ²²  that sound reasonable. ²³ 

James 1:11

1:11 For the sun rises with its heat and dries up the meadow; the petal of the flower falls off and its beauty is lost forever. ²⁴  So also the rich person in the midst of his pursuits will wither away.

[28:2]  ¹ tn Or “ruler” (NIV, NCV).

[28:2]  ² tn Heb “lifted up.”

[28:2]  ³ tn Or “I am divine.”

[28:2]  ⁴ tn Heb “and you made your heart (mind) like the heart (mind) of gods.”

[9:17]  ⁵ tn מִסְתּוֹלֵל (mistolel) is a Hitpael participle, from a root that means “raise up, obstruct.” So in the Hitpael it means to “raise oneself up,” “elevate oneself,” or “be an obstructionist.” See W. C. Kaiser, Jr., “Exodus,” EBC 2:363; U. Cassuto, Exodus, 116.

[9:17]  ⁶ tn The infinitive construct with lamed here is epexegetical; it explains how Pharaoh has exalted himself – “by not releasing the people.”

[9:4]  ⁷ tn The genitive phrase translated “in heart” would be a genitive of specification, specifying that the wisdom of God is in his intelligent decisions.

[9:4]  ⁸ sn The words אַמִּיץ (’ammits) and כֹּחַ (koakh) are synonyms, the first meaning “sturdy; mighty; robust,” and the second “strength.” It too can be interpreted as a genitive of specification – God is mighty with respect to his power. But that comes close to expressing a superlative idea (like “song of songs” or “anger of his wrath”).

[9:4]  ⁹ tn The first half of the verse simply has “wise of heart and mighty of strength.” The entire line is a casus pendens that will refer to the suffix on אֵלָיו (’elayv) in the second colon. So the question is “Who has resisted the one who is wise of heart and mighty of strength?” Again, the rhetorical question is affirming that no one has done this.

[9:4]  ¹⁰ tn The verb is the Hiphil of the verb קָשָׁה (qashah, “to be hard”). It frequently is found with the word for “neck,” describing people as “stiff-necked,” i.e., stubborn, unbending. So the idea of resisting God fits well. The fact that this word occurs in Exodus with the idea of hardening the heart against God may indicate that there is an allusion to Pharaoh here.

[9:4]  ¹¹ tn The use of שָׁלֵם (shalem) in the Qal is rare. It has been translated “remain safe” by E. Dhorme, “survived” by the NEB, “remained unscathed” by the NAB and NIV, or “succeeded” by KJV, G. R. Driver.

[40:9]  ¹² tn Heb “do you have an arm like God?” The words “as powerful as” have been supplied in the translation to clarify the metaphor.

[40:11]  ¹³ tn The verb was used for scattering lightning (Job 37:11). God is challenging Job to unleash his power and judge wickedness in the world.

[40:11]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “the overflowings.”

[40:11]  ¹⁵ tn The word was just used in the positive sense of excellence or majesty; now the exalted nature of the person refers to self-exaltation, or pride.

[40:12]  ¹⁶ tn The expression translated “on the spot” is the prepositional phrase תַּחְתָּם (takhtam, “under them”). “Under them” means in their place. But it can also mean “where someone stands, on the spot” (see Exod 16:29; Jos 6:5; Judg 7:21, etc.).

[1:22]  ¹⁷ tc Some of the better representatives of the Alexandrian and Western texts have a passive verb here instead of the active ἀποκατήλλαξεν (apokathllaxen, “he has reconciled”): ἀποκατηλλάγητε (apokathllaghte) in (Ì⁴⁶) B, ἀποκατήλλακται [sic] (apokathllaktai) in 33, and ἀποκαταλλαγέντες (apokatallagente") in D* F G. Yet the active verb is strongly supported by א A C D² Ψ 048 075 [0278] 1739 1881 Ï lat sy. Internally, the passive creates an anacoluthon in that it looks back to the accusative ὑμᾶς (Juma", “you”) of v. 21 and leaves the following παραστῆσαι (parasthsai) dangling (“you were reconciled…to present you”). The passive reading is certainly the harder reading. As such, it may well explain the rise of the other readings. At the same time, it is possible that the passive was produced by scribes who wanted some symmetry between the ποτε (pote, “at one time”) of v. 21 and the νυνὶ δέ (nuni de, “but now”) of v. 22: Since a passive periphrastic participle is used in v. 21, there may have a temptation to produce a corresponding passive form in v. 22, handling the ὑμᾶς of v. 21 by way of constructio ad sensum. Since παραστῆσαι occurs ten words later, it may not have been considered in this scribal modification. Further, the Western reading (ἀποκαταλλαγέντες) hardly seems to have arisen from ἀποκατηλλάγητε (contra TCGNT 555). As difficult as this decision is, the preferred reading is the active form because it is superior externally and seems to explain the rise of all forms of the passive readings.

[1:2]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “and faithful.” The construction in Greek (as well as Paul’s style) suggests that the saints are identical to the faithful; hence, the καί (kai) is best left untranslated (cf. Eph 1:1). See ExSyn 281-82.

[1:2]  ¹⁹ tn Grk “brothers,” but the Greek word may be used for “brothers and sisters” or “fellow Christians” as here (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 1, where considerable nonbiblical evidence for the plural ἀδελφοί [adelfoi] meaning “brothers and sisters” is cited).

[1:2]  ²⁰ tn Or “Grace to you and peace.”

[1:2]  ²¹ tc Most witnesses, including some important ones (א A C F G I [P] 075 Ï it bo), read “and the Lord Jesus Christ” at the end of this verse, no doubt to conform the wording to the typical Pauline salutation. However, excellent and early witnesses (B D K L Ψ 33 81 1175 1505 1739 1881 al sa) lack this phrase. Since the omission is inexplicable as arising from the longer reading (otherwise, these mss would surely have deleted the phrase in the rest of the corpus Paulinum), it is surely authentic.

[2:4]  ²² tn BDAG 812 s.v. πιθανολογία states, “persuasive speech, art of persuasion (so Pla., Theaet. 162e) in an unfavorable sense in its only occurrence in our lit. ἐν πιθανολογίᾳ by specious arguments Col 2:4 (cp. PLips 40 III, 7 διὰ πιθανολογίας).”

[2:4]  ²³ sn Paul’s point is that even though the arguments seem to make sense (sound reasonable), they are in the end false. Paul is not here arguing against the study of philosophy or serious thinking per se, but is arguing against the uncritical adoption of a philosophy that is at odds with a proper view of Christ and the ethics of the Christian life.

[1:11]  ²⁴ tn Or “perishes,” “is destroyed.”