Genesis 17:19

17:19 God said, “No, Sarah your wife is going to bear you a son, and you will name him Isaac. ¹  I will confirm my covenant with him as a perpetual ²  covenant for his descendants after him.

Genesis 17:21

17:21 But I will establish my covenant with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you at this set time next year.”

Genesis 18:10

18:10 One of them ³  said, “I will surely return ⁴  to you when the season comes round again, ⁵  and your wife Sarah will have a son!” ⁶  (Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, not far behind him. ⁷ 

Jude 1:3

Condemnation of the False Teachers

1:3 Dear friends, although I have been eager to write to you ⁸  about our common salvation, I now feel compelled ⁹  instead to write to encourage ¹⁰  you to contend earnestly ¹¹  for the faith ¹²  that was once for all ¹³  entrusted to the saints. ¹⁴ 

Jude 1:2

1:2 May mercy, peace, and love be lavished on you! ¹⁵ 

Jude 1:16-17

1:16 These people are grumblers and ¹⁶  fault-finders who go ¹⁷  wherever their desires lead them, ¹⁸  and they give bombastic speeches, ¹⁹  enchanting folks ²⁰  for their own gain. ²¹ 

Exhortation to the Faithful

1:17 But you, dear friends – recall the predictions ²²  foretold by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ. ²³ 

Luke 1:13

1:13 But the angel said to him, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard, ²⁴  and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son; you ²⁵  will name him John. ²⁶ 

Luke 1:35-36

1:35 The angel replied, ²⁷  “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow ²⁸  you. Therefore the child ²⁹  to be born ³⁰  will be holy; ³¹  he will be called the Son of God.

1:36 “And look, ³²  your relative ³³  Elizabeth has also become pregnant with ³⁴  a son in her old age – although she was called barren, she is now in her sixth month! ³⁵ 

[17:19]  ¹ tn Heb “will call his name Isaac.” The name means “he laughs,” or perhaps “may he laugh” (see the note on the word “laughed” in v. 17).

[17:19]  ² tn Or “as an eternal.”

[18:10]  ³ tn Heb “he”; the referent (one of the three men introduced in v. 2) has been specified in the translation for clarity. Some English translations have specified the referent as the Lord (cf. RSV, NIV) based on vv. 1, 13, but the Hebrew text merely has “he said” at this point, referring to one of the three visitors. Aside from the introductory statement in v. 1, the incident is narrated from Abraham’s point of view, and the suspense is built up for the reader as Abraham’s elaborate banquet preparations in the preceding verses suggest he suspects these are important guests. But not until the promise of a son later in this verse does it become clear who is speaking. In v. 13 the Hebrew text explicitly mentions the Lord.

[18:10]  ⁴ tn The Hebrew construction is emphatic, using the infinitive absolute with the imperfect tense.

[18:10]  ⁵ tn Heb “as/when the time lives” or “revives,” possibly referring to the springtime.

[18:10]  ⁶ tn Heb “and there will be (הִנֵּה, hinneh) a son for Sarah.”

[18:10]  ⁷ tn This is the first of two disjunctive parenthetical clauses preparing the reader for Sarah’s response (see v. 12).

[1:3]  ⁸ tn Grk “while being quite diligent to write to you,” or “while making all haste to write to you.” Two issues are at stake: (1) whether σπουδή (spoudh) here means diligence, eagerness, or haste; (2) whether ποιούμενος γράφειν (poioumeno" grafein) is to be taken conatively (“I was about to write”) or progressively (“I was writing”). Without knowing more of the background, it is difficult to tell which option is to be preferred.

[1:3]  ⁹ tn Grk “I had the necessity.” The term ἀνάγκη (anankh, “necessity”) often connotes urgency or distress. In this context, Jude is indicating that the more comprehensive treatment about the faith shared between himself and his readers was not nearly as urgent as the letter he found it now necessary to write.

[1:3]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “encouraging.” Παρακαλῶν (parakalwn) is most likely a telic participle. In keeping with other participles of purpose, it is present tense and occurs after the main verb.

[1:3]  ¹¹ tn the verb ἐπαγωνίζομαι (epagwnizomai) is an intensive form of ἀγωνίζομαι (agwnizomai). As such, the notion of struggling, fighting, contending, etc. is heightened.

[1:3]  ¹² tn Τῇ πίστει (th pistei) here is taken as a dative of advantage (“on behalf of the faith”). Though rare (see BDAG 820 s.v. 3), it is not unexampled and must have this meaning here.

[1:3]  ¹³ sn The adverb once for all (ἅπαξ, Japax) seems to indicate that the doctrinal convictions of the early church had been substantially codified. That is to say, Jude could appeal to written documents of the Christian faith in his arguments with the false teachers. Most likely, these documents were the letters of Paul and perhaps one or more gospels. First and Second Peter may also have been among the documents Jude has in mind (see also the note on the phrase entrusted to the saints in this verse).

[1:3]  ¹⁴ sn I now feel compelled instead…saints. Apparently news of some crisis has reached Jude, prompting him to write a different letter than what he had originally planned. A plausible scenario (assuming authenticity of 2 Peter or at least that there are authentic Petrine snippets in it) is that after Peter’s death, Jude intended to write to the same Gentile readers that Peter had written to (essentially, Paul’s churches). Jude starts by affirming that the gospel the Gentiles had received from Paul was the same as the one the Jewish Christians had received from the other apostles (our common salvation). But in the midst of writing this letter, Jude felt that the present crisis deserved another, shorter piece. The crisis, as the letter reveals, is that the false teachers whom Peter prophesied have now infiltrated the church. The letter of Jude is thus an ad hoc letter, intended to confirm the truth of Peter’s letter and encourage the saints to ground their faith in the written documents of the nascent church, rather than listen to the twisted gospel of the false teachers. In large measure, the letter of Jude illustrates the necessity of clinging to the authority of scripture as opposed to those who claim to be prophets.

[1:2]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “may mercy and peace and love be multiplied to you.”

[1:16]  ¹⁶ tn “And” is not in Greek, but is supplied for the sake of English style.

[1:16]  ¹⁷ tn Or “going.” Though the participle is anarthrous, so also is the subject. Thus, the participle could be either adverbial or adjectival.

[1:16]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “(who go/going) according to their own lusts.”

[1:16]  ¹⁹ tn Grk “and their mouth speaks bombastic things.”

[1:16]  ²⁰ sn Enchanting folks (Grk “awing faces”) refers to the fact that the speeches of these false teachers are powerful and seductive.

[1:16]  ²¹ tn Or “to their own advantage.”

[1:17]  ²² tn Grk “words.” In conjunction with προεῖπον (proeipon), however, the meaning of the construction is that the apostles uttered prophecies.

[1:17]  ²³ sn This verse parallels 2 Pet 3:2 both conceptually and in much of the verbiage. There is one important difference, however: In 2 Pet 3:2 the prophets and apostles speak; here, just the apostles speak. This makes good sense if Jude is using 2 Peter as his main source and is urging his readers to go back to the authoritative writings, both OT and now especially NT.

[1:13]  ²⁴ tn The passive means that the prayer was heard by God.

[1:13]  ²⁵ tn Grk “a son, and you”; καί (kai) has not been translated. Instead a semicolon is used in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[1:13]  ²⁶ tn Grk “you will call his name John.” The future tense here functions like a command (see ExSyn 569-70). This same construction occurs in v. 31.

[1:35]  ²⁷ tn Grk “And the angel said to her.” Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style. The pronoun αὐτῇ (auth, “to her”) has not been included in the translation since it is redundant in contemporary English.

[1:35]  ²⁸ sn The phrase will overshadow is a reference to God’s glorious presence at work (Exod 40:34-35; Ps 91:4).

[1:35]  ²⁹ tn Or “the one born holy will be called the Son of God.” The wording of this phrase depends on whether the adjective is a predicate adjective, as in the text, or is an adjective modifying the participle serving as the subject. The absence of an article with the adjective speaks for a predicate position. Other less appealing options supply a verb for “holy”; thus “the one who is born will be holy”; or argue that both “holy” and “Son of God” are predicates, so “The one who is born will be called holy, the Son of God.”

[1:35]  ³⁰ tc A few mss (C* Θ Ë¹ 33 pc) add “by you” here. This looks like a scribal addition to bring symmetry to the first three clauses of the angel’s message (note the second person pronoun in the previous two clauses), and is too poorly supported to be seriously considered as authentic.

[1:35]  ³¹ tn Or “Therefore the holy child to be born will be called the Son of God.” There are two ways to understand the Greek phrase τὸ γεννώμενον ἅγιον (to gennwmenon {agion) here. First, τὸ γεννώμενον could be considered a substantival participle with ἅγιον as an adjective in the second predicate position, thus making a complete sentence; this interpretation is reflected in the translation above. Second, τὸ ἅγιον could be considered a substantival adjective with γεννώμενον acting as an adjectival participle, thus making the phrase the subject of the verb κληθήσεται (klhqhsetai); this interpretation is reflected in the alternative reading. Treating the participle γεννώμενον as adjectival is a bit unnatural for the very reason that it forces one to understand ἅγιον as substantival; this introduces a new idea in the text with ἅγιον when an already new topic is being introduced with γεννώμενον. Semantically this would overload the new subject introduced at this point. For this reason the first interpretation is preferred.

[1:36]  ³² tn Grk “behold.”

[1:36]  ³³ tn Some translations render the word συγγενίς (sungeni") as “cousin” (so Phillips) but the term is not necessarily this specific.

[1:36]  ³⁴ tn Or “has conceived.”

[1:36]  ³⁵ tn Grk “and this is the sixth month for her who was called barren.” Yet another note on Elizabeth’s loss of reproach also becomes a sign of the truth of the angel’s declaration.