Ezekiel 3:18

3:18 When I say to the wicked, “You will certainly die,” ¹  and you do not warn him – you do not speak out to warn the wicked to turn from his wicked deed and wicked lifestyle so that he may live – that wicked person will die for his iniquity, ²  but I will hold you accountable for his death. ³ 

Leviticus 19:17

19:17 You must not hate your brother in your heart. You must surely reprove your fellow citizen so that you do not incur sin on account of him. ⁴ 

Leviticus 19:2

19:2 “Speak to the whole congregation of the Israelites and tell them, ‘You must be holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy.

Leviticus 12:7

12:7 The priest ⁵  is to present it before the Lord and make atonement ⁶  on her behalf, and she will be clean ⁷  from her flow of blood. ⁸  This is the law of the one who bears a child, for the male or the female child.

Leviticus 12:2

12:2 “Tell the Israelites, ‘When a woman produces offspring ⁹  and bears a male child, ¹⁰  she will be unclean seven days, as she is unclean during the days of her menstruation. ¹¹ 

Leviticus 19:2-4

19:2 “Speak to the whole congregation of the Israelites and tell them, ‘You must be holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy. 19:3 Each of you must respect his mother and his father, ¹²  and you must keep my Sabbaths. I am the Lord your God. 19:4 Do not turn to idols, ¹³  and you must not make for yourselves gods of cast metal. I am the Lord your God.

Leviticus 25:15

25:15 You may buy it from your fellow citizen according to the number of years since ¹⁴  the last jubilee; he may sell it to you according to the years of produce that are left. ¹⁵ 

Proverbs 25:12

25:12 Like an earring of gold and an ornament of fine gold, ¹⁶ 

so is a wise reprover to the ear of the one who listens. ¹⁷ 

Matthew 18:15

Restoring Christian Relationships

18:15 “If ¹⁸  your brother ¹⁹  sins, ²⁰  go and show him his fault ²¹  when the two of you are alone. If he listens to you, you have regained your brother.

[3:18]  ¹ sn Even though the infinitive absolute is used to emphasize the warning, the warning is still implicitly conditional, as the following context makes clear.

[3:18]  ² tn Or “in his punishment.” The phrase “in/for [a person’s] iniquity” occurs fourteen times in Ezekiel: here and v. 19; 4:17; 7:13, 16; 18: 17, 18, 19, 20; 24:23; 33:6, 8, 9; 39:23. The Hebrew word for “iniquity” may also mean the “punishment for iniquity.”

[3:18]  ³ tn Heb “his blood I will seek from your hand.” The expression “seek blood from the hand” is equivalent to requiring the death penalty (2 Sam 4:11-12).

[19:17]  ⁴ tn Heb “and you will not lift up on him sin.” The meaning of the line is somewhat obscure. It means either (1) that one should rebuke one’s neighbor when he sins lest one also becomes guilty, which is the way it is rendered here (see NIV, NRSV, NEB, JB; see also B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 129-30, and J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 303, and the discussion on pp. 316-17), or (2) one may rebuke one’s neighbor without incurring sin just as long as he does not hate him in his heart (see the first part of the verse; cf. NASB, NAB).

[12:7]  ⁵ tn Heb “and he” (i.e., the priest mentioned at the end of v. 6). The referent has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[12:7]  ⁶ sn See the note on Lev 1:4 “make atonement.” The purpose of sin offering “atonement,” in particular, was to purge impurities from the tabernacle (see Lev 15:31 and 16:5-19, 29-34), whether they were caused by physical uncleannesses or by sins and iniquities. In this case, the woman has not “sinned” morally by having a child. Even Mary brought such offerings for giving birth to Jesus (Luke 2:22-24), though she certainly did not “sin” in giving birth to him. Note that the result of bringing this “sin offering” was “she will be clean,” not “she will be forgiven” (cf. Lev 4:20, 26, 31, 35; 5:10, 13). The impurity of the blood flow has caused the need for this “sin offering,” not some moral or relational infringement of the law (contrast Lev 4:2, “When a person sins by straying unintentionally from any of the commandments of the Lord”).

[12:7]  ⁷ tn Or “she will be[come] pure.”

[12:7]  ⁸ tn Heb “from her source [i.e., spring] of blood,” possibly referring to the female genital area, not just the “flow of blood” itself (as suggested by J. Milgrom, Leviticus [AB], 1:761). Cf. ASV “from the fountain of her blood.”

[12:2]  ⁹ tn Heb “produces seed” (Hiphil of זָרַע, zara’; used only elsewhere in Gen 1:11-12 for plants “producing” their own “seed”), referring to the process of childbearing as a whole, from conception to the time of birth (H. D. Preuss, TDOT 4:144; cf. J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 164-65; and J. Milgrom, Leviticus [AB], 1:742-43). Smr and LXX have Niphal “be impregnated” (see, e.g., Num 5:28); note KJV “If a woman have conceived seed” (cf. ASV, NAB, NRSV; also NIV, NLT “becomes pregnant”).

[12:2]  ¹⁰ sn The regulations for the “male child” in vv. 2-4 contrast with those for the “female child” in v. 5 (see the note there).

[12:2]  ¹¹ tn Heb “as the days of the menstrual flow [nom.] of her menstruating [q. inf.] she shall be unclean” (R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 1:925-26; the verb appears only in this verse in the OT). Cf. NASB “as in the days of her menstruation”; NLT “during her menstrual period”; NIV “during her monthly period.”

[19:3]  ¹² tn Heb “A man his mother and his father you [plural] shall fear.” The LXX, Syriac, Vulgate, and certain Targum mss reverse the order, “his father and his mother.” The term “fear” is subject to misunderstanding by the modern reader, so “respect” has been used in the translation. Cf. NAB, NRSV “revere”; NASB “reverence.”

[19:4]  ¹³ sn Regarding the difficult etymology and meaning of the term for “idols” (אֱלִילִים, ’elilim), see B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 126; J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 304; N. H. Snaith, Leviticus and Numbers (NBC), 89; and Judith M. Hadley, NIDOTTE 1:411. It appears to be a diminutive play on words with אֵל (’el, “god; God”) and, perhaps at the same time, recalls a common Semitic word for “worthless; weak; powerless; nothingness.” Snaith suggests a rendering of “worthless godlings.”

[25:15]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “in the number of years after.”

[25:15]  ¹⁵ tn The words “that are left” are not in the Hebrew text, but are implied.

[25:12]  ¹⁶ sn This saying is another example of emblematic parallelism; the first half is the simile, and the second half makes the point from it: A wise rebuke that is properly received is of lasting value. The rebuke in the ear of an obedient student is like ornaments of fine jewelry.

[25:12]  ¹⁷ tn The “ear of the listener” refers to the obedient disciple, the one who complies with the reproof he hears. Cf. KJV, ASV, NAB “an obedient ear.”

[18:15]  ¹⁸ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated. All the “if” clauses in this paragraph are third class conditions in Greek.

[18:15]  ¹⁹ tn The Greek term “brother” can mean “fellow believer” or “fellow Christian” (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 2.a) whether male or female. It can also refer to siblings, though here it is used in a broader sense to connote familial relationships within the family of God. Therefore, because of the familial connotations, “brother” has been retained in the translation here in preference to the more generic “fellow believer” (“fellow Christian” would be anachronistic in this context).

[18:15]  ²⁰ tc ‡ The earliest and best witnesses lack “against you” after “if your brother sins.” It is quite possible that the shorter reading in these witnesses (א B, as well as 0281 ˹ 579 pc sa) occurred when scribes either intentionally changed the text (to make it more universal in application) or unintentionally changed the text (owing to the similar sound of the end of the verb ἁμαρτήσῃ [Jamarthsh] and the prepositional phrase εἰς σέ [eis se]). However, if the mss were normally copied by sight rather than by sound, especially in the early centuries of Christianity, such an unintentional change is not as likely for these mss. And since scribes normally added material rather than deleted it for intentional changes, on balance, the shorter reading appears to be original. NA²⁷ includes the words in brackets, indicating doubts as to their authenticity.

[18:15]  ²¹ tn Grk “go reprove him.”