Ezekiel 36:17

36:17 “Son of man, when the house of Israel was living on their own land, they defiled it by their behavior ¹  and their deeds. In my sight their behavior was like the uncleanness of a woman having her monthly period.

Ezekiel 36:29

36:29 I will save you from all your uncleanness. I will call for the grain and multiply it; I will not bring a famine on you.

Ezekiel 37:23

37:23 They will not defile themselves with their idols, their detestable things, and all their rebellious deeds. I will save them from all their unfaithfulness ²  by which they sinned. I will purify them; they will become my people and I will become their God.

Psalms 51:2

51:2 Wash away my wrongdoing! ³ 

Cleanse me of my sin! ⁴ 

Proverbs 30:12

30:12 There is a generation who are pure in their own eyes

and yet are not washed ⁵  from their filthiness. ⁶ 

Isaiah 4:4

4:4 At that time ⁷  the sovereign master ⁸  will wash the excrement ⁹  from Zion’s women,

he will rinse the bloodstains from Jerusalem’s midst, ¹⁰ 

as he comes to judge

and to bring devastation. ¹¹ 

Jeremiah 33:8

33:8 I will purify them from all the sin that they committed against me. I will forgive all their sins which they committed in rebelling against me. ¹² 

Zechariah 13:1

The Refinement of Judah

13:1 “In that day there will be a fountain opened up for the dynasty ¹³  of David and the people of Jerusalem ¹⁴  to cleanse them from sin and impurity. ¹⁵ 

Acts 22:16

22:16 And now what are you waiting for? ¹⁶  Get up, ¹⁷  be baptized, and have your sins washed away, ¹⁸  calling on his name.’ ¹⁹ 

Acts 22:1

Paul’s Defense

22:1 “Brothers and fathers, listen to my defense ²⁰  that I now ²¹  make to you.”

Colossians 1:11

1:11 being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might for the display of ²²  all patience and steadfastness, joyfully

Colossians 1:2

1:2 to the saints, the faithful ²³  brothers and sisters ²⁴  in Christ, at Colossae. Grace and peace to you ²⁵  from God our Father! ²⁶ 

Colossians 1:1

Salutation

1:1 From Paul, ²⁷  an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,

Ephesians 5:26-27

5:26 to sanctify her by cleansing her ²⁸  with the washing of the water by the word, 5:27 so that he ²⁹  may present the church to himself as glorious – not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless. ³⁰ 

Titus 2:14

2:14 He ³¹  gave himself for us to set us free from every kind of lawlessness and to purify for himself a people who are truly his, ³²  who are eager to do good. ³³ 

Titus 2:1

Conduct Consistent with Sound Teaching

2:1 But as for you, communicate the behavior that goes with ³⁴  sound teaching.

Titus 1:7

1:7 For the overseer ³⁵  must be blameless as one entrusted with God’s work, ³⁶  not arrogant, not prone to anger, not a drunkard, not violent, not greedy for gain.

Revelation 1:5

1:5 and from Jesus Christ – the faithful ³⁷  witness, ³⁸  the firstborn from among the dead, the ruler over the kings of the earth. To the one who loves us and has set us free ³⁹  from our sins at the cost of ⁴⁰  his own blood

Revelation 7:14

7:14 So ⁴¹  I said to him, “My lord, you know the answer.” ⁴²  Then ⁴³  he said to me, “These are the ones who have come out of the great tribulation. They ⁴⁴  have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb!

[36:17]  ¹ tn Heb “way.”

[37:23]  ² tc Heb “their dwellings.” The text as it stands does not make sense. Based on the LXX, a slight emendation of two vowels, including a mater, yields the reading “from their turning,” a reference here to their turning from God and deviating from his commandments. See BDB 1000 s.v. מְשׁוּבָה, and D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 2:407.

[51:2]  ³ tn Heb “Thoroughly wash me from my wrongdoing.”

[51:2]  ⁴ sn In vv. 1b-2 the psalmist uses three different words to emphasize the multifaceted character and degree of his sin. Whatever one wants to call it (“rebellious acts,” “wrongdoing,” “sin”), he has done it and stands morally polluted in God’s sight. The same three words appear in Exod 34:7, which emphasizes that God is willing to forgive sin in all of its many dimensions. In v. 2 the psalmist compares forgiveness and restoration to physical cleansing. Perhaps he likens spiritual cleansing to the purification rites of priestly law.

[30:12]  ⁵ tn The verb רָחַץ (rakhats) means “to wash; to wash off; to wash away; to bathe.” It is used of physical washing, ceremonial washings, and hence figuratively of removing sin and guilt through confession (e.g., Isa 1:16). Here the form is the Pual perfect (unless it is a rare old Qal passive, since there is no Piel and no apparent change of meaning from the Qal).

[30:12]  ⁶ sn Filthiness often refers to physical uncleanness, but here it refers to moral defilement. Zech 3:3-4 uses it metaphorically as well for the sin of the nation (e.g., Isa 36:12).

[4:4]  ⁷ tn Heb “when” (so KJV, NAB, NASB); CEV “after”; NRSV “once.”

[4:4]  ⁸ tn The Hebrew term translated “sovereign master” here is אֲדֹנָי (’adonai).

[4:4]  ⁹ tn The word refers elsewhere to vomit (Isa 28:8) and fecal material (Isa 36:12). Many English versions render this somewhat euphemistically as “filth” (e.g., NAB, NIV, NRSV). Ironically in God’s sight the beautiful jewelry described earlier is nothing but vomit and feces, for it symbolizes the moral decay of the city’s residents (cf. NLT “moral filth”).

[4:4]  ¹⁰ sn See 1:21 for a related concept.

[4:4]  ¹¹ tn Heb “by a spirit of judgment and by a spirit of burning.” The precise meaning of the second half of the verse is uncertain. רוּחַ (ruakh) can be understood as “wind” in which case the passage pictures the Lord using a destructive wind as an instrument of judgment. However, this would create a mixed metaphor, for the first half of the verse uses the imagery of washing and rinsing to depict judgment. Perhaps the image would be that of a windstorm accompanied by heavy rain. רוּחַ can also mean “spirit,” in which case the verse may be referring to the Lord’s Spirit or, more likely, to a disposition that the Lord brings to the task of judgment. It is also uncertain if בָּעַר (ba’ar) here means “burning” or “sweeping away, devastating.”

[33:8]  ¹² sn Compare Jer 31:34; Ezek 36:25, 33.

[13:1]  ¹³ tn Heb “house” (so NIV, NRSV), referring to dynastic descendants.

[13:1]  ¹⁴ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[13:1]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “for sin and for impurity.” The purpose implied here has been stated explicitly in the translation for clarity.

[22:16]  ¹⁶ tn L&N 67.121 has “to extend time unduly, with the implication of lack of decision – ‘to wait, to delay.’ νῦν τί μέλλεις… ἀναστὰς βάπτισαι ‘what are you waiting for? Get up and be baptized’ Ac 22:16.”

[22:16]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “getting up.” The participle ἀναστάς (anasta") is an adverbial participle of attendant circumstance and has been translated as a finite verb.

[22:16]  ¹⁸ sn The expression have your sins washed away means “have your sins purified” (the washing is figurative).

[22:16]  ¹⁹ sn The expression calling on his name describes the confession of the believer: Acts 2:17-38, esp. v. 38; Rom 10:12-13; 1 Cor 1:2.

[22:1]  ²⁰ sn Listen to my defense. This is the first of several speeches Paul would make in his own defense: Acts 24:10ff.; 25:8, 16; and 26:1ff. For the use of such a speech (“apologia”) in Greek, see Josephus, Ag. Ap. 2.15 [2.147]; Wis 6:10.

[22:1]  ²¹ tn The adverb νυνί (nuni, “now”) is connected with the phrase τῆς πρὸς ὑμᾶς νυνὶ ἀπολογίας (th" pro" Juma" nuni apologia") rather than the verb ἀκούσατε (akousate), and the entire construction (prepositional phrase plus adverb) is in first attributive position and thus translated into English by a relative clause.

[1:11]  ²² tn The expression “for the display of” is an attempt to convey in English the force of the Greek preposition εἰς (eis) in this context.

[1:2]  ²³ 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]  ²⁴ 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]  ²⁵ tn Or “Grace to you and peace.”

[1:2]  ²⁶ 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.

[1:1]  ²⁷ tn Grk “Paul.” The word “from” is not in the Greek text, but has been supplied to indicate the sender of the letter.

[5:26]  ²⁸ tn The direct object “her” is implied, but not found in the Greek text. It has been supplied in the English translation to clarify the sense of the passage.

[5:27]  ²⁹ tn The use of the pronoun αὐτός (autos) is intensive and focuses attention on Christ as the one who has made the church glorious.

[5:27]  ³⁰ tn Grk “but in order that it may be holy and blameless.”

[2:14]  ³¹ tn Grk “who” (as a continuation of the previous clause).

[2:14]  ³² tn Or “a people who are his very own.”

[2:14]  ³³ tn Grk “for good works.”

[2:1]  ³⁴ tn Grk “say what is fitting for sound teaching” (introducing the behavior called for in this chapter.).

[1:7]  ³⁵ sn The overseer is another term for the same official position of leadership as the “elder.” This is seen in the interchange of the two terms in this passage and in Acts 20:17, 28, as well as in the parallels between these verses and 1 Tim 3:1-7.

[1:7]  ³⁶ tn Grk “as God’s steward.”

[1:5]  ³⁷ tn Or “Jesus Christ – the faithful one, the witness…” Some take ὁ πιστός (Jo pistos) as a second substantive in relation to ὁ μάρτυς (Jo martus). In the present translation, however, ὁ πιστός was taken as an adjective in attributive position to ὁ μάρτυς. The idea of martyrdom and faithfulness are intimately connected. See BDAG 820 s.v. πιστός 1.a.α: “ὁ μάρτυς μου ὁ πιστός μου Rv 2:13 (μάρτυς 3); in this ‘book of martyrs’ Christ is ὁ μάρτυς ὁ πιστὸς (καὶ ὁ ἀληθινός) 1:5; 3:14; cp. 19:11 (the combination of ἀληθινός and πιστός in the last two passages is like 3 Macc 2:11). Cp. Rv 17:14.”

[1:5]  ³⁸ sn The Greek term translated witness can mean both “witness” and “martyr.”

[1:5]  ³⁹ tc The reading “set free” (λύσαντι, lusanti) has better ms support (̹⁸ א A C 1611 2050 2329 2351 Ï^A sy) than its rival, λούσαντι (lousanti, “washed”; found in P 1006 1841 1854 2053 2062 Ï^K lat bo). Internally, it seems that the reading “washed” could have arisen in at least one of three ways: (1) as an error of hearing (both “released” and “washed” are pronounced similarly in Greek); (2) an error of sight (both “released” and “washed” look very similar – a difference of only one letter – which could have resulted in a simple error during the copying of a ms); (3) through scribal inability to appreciate that the Hebrew preposition ב can be used with a noun to indicate the price paid for something. Since the author of Revelation is influenced significantly by a Semitic form of Greek (e.g., 13:10), and since the Hebrew preposition “in” (ב) can indicate the price paid for something, and is often translated with the preposition “in” (ἐν, en) in the LXX, the author may have tried to communicate by the use of ἐν the idea of a price paid for something. That is, John was trying to say that Christ delivered us at the price of his own blood. This whole process, however, may have been lost on a later scribe, who being unfamiliar with Hebrew, found the expression “delivered in his blood” too difficult, and noticing the obvious similarities between λύσαντι and λούσαντι, assumed an error and then proceeded to change the text to “washed in his blood” – a thought more tolerable in his mind. Both readings, of course, are true to scripture; the current question is what the author wrote in this verse.

[1:5]  ⁴⁰ tn The style here is somewhat Semitic, with the use of the ἐν (en) + the dative to mean “at the price of.” The addition of “own” in the English is stylistic and is an attempt to bring out the personal nature of the statement and the sacrificial aspect of Jesus’ death – a frequent refrain in the Apocalypse.

[7:14]  ⁴¹ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “so” to indicate the implied result of the previous question.

[7:14]  ⁴² tn Though the expression “the answer” is not in the Greek text, it is clearly implied. Direct objects in Greek were frequently omitted when clear from the context.

[7:14]  ⁴³ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the vision.

[7:14]  ⁴⁴ tn Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started here in the translation. Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.