Isaiah 45:22

45:22 Turn to me so you can be delivered, ¹ 

all you who live in the earth’s remote regions!

For I am God, and I have no peer.

Zechariah 12:10

12:10 “I will pour out on the kingship ²  of David and the population of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication so that they will look to me, ³  the one they have pierced. They will lament for him as one laments for an only son, and there will be a bitter cry for him like the bitter cry for a firstborn. ⁴ 

John 1:29

1:29 On the next day John ⁵  saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God ⁶  who takes away the sin of the world!

Hebrews 12:2

12:2 keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. For the joy set out for him he endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God. ⁷ 

Hebrews 12:1

The Lord’s Discipline

12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, ⁸  we must get rid of every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and run with endurance the race set out for us,

Hebrews 3:8

3:8 “Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, in the day of testing in the wilderness.

[45:22]  ¹ tn The Niphal imperative with prefixed vav (ו) indicates purpose after the preceding imperative. The Niphal probably has a tolerative sense, “allow yourselves to be delivered, accept help.”

[12:10]  ² tn Or “dynasty”; Heb “house.”

[12:10]  ³ tc Because of the difficulty of the concept of the mortal piercing of God, the subject of this clause, and the shift of pronoun from “me” to “him” in the next, many mss read אַלֵי אֵת אֲשֶׁר (’ale ’et ’asher, “to the one whom,” a reading followed by NAB, NRSV) rather than the MT’s אֵלַי אֵת אֲשֶׁר (’ela ’et ’asher, “to me whom”). The reasons for such alternatives, however, are clear – they are motivated by scribes who found such statements theologically objectionable – and they should be rejected in favor of the more difficult reading (lectio difficilior) of the MT.

[12:10]  ⁴ tn The Hebrew term בְּכוֹר (bÿkhor, “firstborn”), translated usually in the LXX by πρωτότοκος (prwtotokos), has unmistakable messianic overtones as the use of the Greek term in the NT to describe Jesus makes clear (cf. Col 1:15, 18). Thus, the idea of God being pierced sets the stage for the fatal wounding of Jesus, the Messiah and the Son of God (cf. John 19:37; Rev 1:7). Note that some English translations supply “son” from the context (e.g., NIV, TEV, NLT).

[1:29]  ⁵ tn Grk “he”; the referent (John) has been supplied in the translation for clarity.

[1:29]  ⁶ sn Gen 22:8 is an important passage in the background of the title Lamb of God as applied to Jesus. In Jewish thought this was held to be a supremely important sacrifice. G. Vermès stated: “For the Palestinian Jew, all lamb sacrifice, and especially the Passover lamb and the Tamid offering, was a memorial of the Akedah with its effects of deliverance, forgiveness of sin and messianic salvation” (Scripture and Tradition in Judaism [StPB], 225).

[12:2]  ⁷ sn An allusion to Ps 110:1.

[12:1]  ⁸ tn Grk “having such a great cloud of witnesses surrounding us.”