Genesis 32:20

32:20 You must also say, ‘In fact your servant Jacob is behind us.’” ¹  Jacob thought, ²  “I will first appease him ³  by sending a gift ahead of me. ⁴  After that I will meet him. ⁵  Perhaps he will accept me.” ⁶ 

Genesis 33:11

33:11 Please take my present ⁷  that was brought to you, for God has been generous ⁸  to me and I have all I need.” ⁹  When Jacob urged him, he took it. ¹⁰ 

Genesis 33:1

Jacob Meets Esau

33:1 Jacob looked up ¹¹  and saw that Esau was coming ¹²  along with four hundred men. So he divided the children among Leah, Rachel, and the two female servants.

Genesis 25:27

25:27 When the boys grew up, Esau became a skilled ¹³  hunter, a man of the open fields, but Jacob was an even-tempered man, living in tents. ¹⁴ 

Genesis 25:2

25:2 She bore him Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shuah.

Genesis 8:6

8:6 At the end of forty days, ¹⁵  Noah opened the window he had made in the ark ¹⁶ 

Genesis 8:2

8:2 The fountains of the deep and the floodgates of heaven were closed, ¹⁷  and the rain stopped falling from the sky.

Genesis 5:15

5:15 When Mahalalel had lived 65 years, he became the father of Jared.

Genesis 18:31

18:31 Abraham ¹⁸  said, “Since I have undertaken to speak to the Lord, what if only twenty are found there?” He replied, “I will not destroy it for the sake of the twenty.”

Genesis 18:2

18:2 Abraham ¹⁹  looked up ²⁰  and saw ²¹  three men standing across ²²  from him. When he saw them ²³  he ran from the entrance of the tent to meet them and bowed low ²⁴  to the ground. ²⁵ 

Colossians 1:5

1:5 Your faith and love have arisen ²⁶  from the hope laid up ²⁷  for you in heaven, which you have heard about in the message of truth, the gospel ²⁸ 

[32:20]  ¹ tn Heb “and look, your servant Jacob [is] behind us.”

[32:20]  ² tn Heb “for he said.” The referent (Jacob) has been specified in the translation for clarity. The Hebrew word מַקֵל (maqel), traditionally represents Jacob’s thought or reasoning, and is therefore translated “thought.”

[32:20]  ³ tn Heb “I will appease his face.” The cohortative here expresses Jacob’s resolve. In the Book of Leviticus the Hebrew verb translated “appease” has the idea of removing anger due to sin or guilt, a nuance that fits this passage very well. Jacob wanted to buy Esau off with a gift of more than five hundred and fifty animals.

[32:20]  ⁴ tn Heb “with a gift going before me.”

[32:20]  ⁵ tn Heb “I will see his face.”

[32:20]  ⁶ tn Heb “Perhaps he will lift up my face.” In this context the idiom refers to acceptance.

[33:11]  ⁷ tn Heb “blessing.” It is as if Jacob is trying to repay what he stole from his brother twenty years earlier.

[33:11]  ⁸ tn Or “gracious,” but in the specific sense of prosperity.

[33:11]  ⁹ tn Heb “all.”

[33:11]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “and he urged him and he took.” The referent of the first pronoun in the sequence (“he”) has been specified as “Jacob” in the translation for clarity.

[33:1]  ¹¹ tn Heb “and Jacob lifted up his eyes.”

[33:1]  ¹² tn Or “and look, Esau was coming.” By the use of the particle הִנֵּה (hinneh, “look”), the narrator invites the reader to view the scene through Jacob’s eyes.

[25:27]  ¹³ tn Heb “knowing.”

[25:27]  ¹⁴ tn The disjunctive clause juxtaposes Jacob with Esau and draws attention to the striking contrasts. In contrast to Esau, a man of the field, Jacob was civilized, as the phrase “living in tents” signifies. Whereas Esau was a skillful hunter, Jacob was calm and even-tempered (תָּם, tam), which normally has the idea of “blameless.”

[8:6]  ¹⁵ tn The introductory verbal form וַיְהִי (vayÿhi), traditionally rendered “and it came to pass,” serves as a temporal indicator and has not been translated here.

[8:6]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “opened the window in the ark which he had made.” The perfect tense (“had made”) refers to action preceding the opening of the window, and is therefore rendered as a past perfect. Since in English “had made” could refer to either the ark or the window, the order of the phrases was reversed in the translation to clarify that the window is the referent.

[8:2]  ¹⁷ tn Some (e.g., NIV) translate the preterite verb forms in this verse as past perfects (e.g., “had been closed”), for it seems likely that the sources of the water would have stopped before the waters receded.

[18:31]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Abraham) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[18:2]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Abraham) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[18:2]  ²⁰ tn Heb “lifted up his eyes.”

[18:2]  ²¹ tn Heb “and saw, and look.” The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh) draws attention to what he saw. The drawn-out description focuses the reader’s attention on Abraham’s deliberate, fixed gaze and indicates that what he is seeing is significant.

[18:2]  ²² tn The Hebrew preposition עַל (’al) indicates the three men were nearby, but not close by, for Abraham had to run to meet them.

[18:2]  ²³ tn The pronoun “them” has been supplied in the translation for clarification. In the Hebrew text the verb has no stated object.

[18:2]  ²⁴ tn The form וַיִּשְׁתַּחוּ (vayyishtakhu, “and bowed low”) is from the verb הִשְׁתַּחֲוָה (hishtakhavah, “to worship, bow low to the ground”). It is probably from a root חָוָה (khavah), though some derive it from שָׁחָה (shakhah).

[18:2]  ²⁵ sn The reader knows this is a theophany. The three visitors are probably the Lord and two angels (see Gen 19:1). It is not certain how soon Abraham recognized the true identity of the visitors. His actions suggest he suspected this was something out of the ordinary, though it is possible that his lavish treatment of the visitors was done quite unwittingly. Bowing down to the ground would be reserved for obeisance of kings or worship of the Lord. Whether he was aware of it or not, Abraham’s action was most appropriate.

[1:5]  ²⁶ tn Col 1:3-8 form one long sentence in the Greek text and have been divided at the end of v. 4 and v. 6 and within v. 6 for clarity, in keeping with the tendency in contemporary English toward shorter sentences. Thus the phrase “Your faith and love have arisen from the hope” is literally “because of the hope.” The perfect tense “have arisen” was chosen in the English to reflect the fact that the recipients of the letter had acquired this hope at conversion in the past, but that it still remains and motivates them to trust in Christ and to love one another.

[1:5]  ²⁷ tn BDAG 113 s.v. ἀπόκειμαι 2 renders ἀποκειμένην (apokeimenhn) with the expression “reserved” in this verse.

[1:5]  ²⁸ tn The term “the gospel” (τοῦ εὐαγγελίου, tou euangeliou) is in apposition to “the word of truth” (τῷ λόγῳ τῆς ἀληθείας, tw logw th" alhqeia") as indicated in the translation.