Isaiah 49:6

49:6 he says, “Is it too insignificant a task for you to be my servant,

to reestablish the tribes of Jacob,

and restore the remnant ¹  of Israel? ² 

I will make you a light to the nations, ³ 

so you can bring ⁴  my deliverance to the remote regions of the earth.”

Isaiah 52:10

52:10 The Lord reveals ⁵  his royal power ⁶ 

in the sight of all the nations;

the entire ⁷  earth sees

our God deliver. ⁸ 

Isaiah 66:16

66:16 For the Lord judges all humanity ⁹ 

with fire and his sword;

the Lord will kill many. ¹⁰ 

Isaiah 66:23

66:23 From one month ¹¹  to the next and from one Sabbath to the next, all people ¹²  will come to worship me,” ¹³  says the Lord.

Jeremiah 32:27

32:27 “I am the Lord, the God of all humankind. There is, indeed, nothing too difficult for me. ¹⁴ 

Joel 2:28

An Outpouring of the Spirit

2:28 (3:1) ¹⁵  After all of this ¹⁶ 

I will pour out my Spirit ¹⁷  on all kinds of people. ¹⁸ 

Your sons and daughters will prophesy.

Your elderly will have revelatory dreams; ¹⁹ 

your young men will see prophetic visions.

Zechariah 2:13

2:13 Be silent in the Lord’s presence, all people everywhere, ²⁰  for he is being moved to action in his holy dwelling place. ²¹ 

Luke 2:32

2:32 a light, ²² 

for revelation to the Gentiles,

and for glory ²³  to your people Israel.”

Luke 3:6

3:6 and all humanity ²⁴  will see the salvation of God.’” ²⁵ 

John 17:2

17:2 just as you have given him authority over all humanity, ²⁶  so that he may give eternal life to everyone you have given him. ²⁷ 

Acts 2:17

2:17 ‘And in the last days ²⁸  it will be,’ God says,

‘that I will pour out my Spirit on all people, ²⁹ 

and your sons and your daughters will prophesy,

and your young men will see visions,

and your old men will dream dreams.

[49:6]  ¹ tn Heb “the protected [or “preserved”] ones.”

[49:6]  ² sn The question is purely rhetorical; it does not imply that the servant was dissatisfied with his commission or that he minimized the restoration of Israel.

[49:6]  ³ tn See the note at 42:6.

[49:6]  ⁴ tn Heb “be” (so KJV, ASV); CEV “you must take.”

[52:10]  ⁵ tn Heb “lays bare”; NLT “will demonstrate.”

[52:10]  ⁶ tn Heb “his holy arm.” This is a metonymy for his power.

[52:10]  ⁷ tn Heb “the remote regions,” which here stand for the extremities and everything in between.

[52:10]  ⁸ tn Heb “the deliverance of our God.” “God” is a subjective genitive here.

[66:16]  ⁹ tn Heb “flesh” (so KJV, NASB, NRSV); NIV “upon all men”; TEV “all the people of the world.”

[66:16]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “many are the slain of the Lord.”

[66:23]  ¹¹ tn Heb “new moon.” The verb that introduces this verse serves as a discourse particle and is untranslated; see note on “in the future” in 2:2.

[66:23]  ¹² tn Heb “all flesh” (so KJV, ASV, NRSV); NAB, NASB, NIV “all mankind”; NLT “All humanity.”

[66:23]  ¹³ tn Or “bow down before” (NASB).

[32:27]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh. Is anything too hard for me?” The question is rhetorical expecting an emphatic negative answer (cf. E. W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech, 949, citing the parallel in Gen 18:14). The Hebrew particle “Behold” (הִנֵּה, hinneh) introduces the grounds for this rhetorical negative (cf. T. O. Lambdin, Introduction to Biblical Hebrew, 170, §135 [3]), i.e., “Since I am the Lord, the God of all mankind, there is indeed nothing too hard for me [or is there anything too hard for me?].”

[2:28]  ¹⁵ sn Beginning with 2:28, the verse numbers through 3:21 in the English Bible differ from the verse numbers in the Hebrew text (BHS), with 2:28 ET = 3:1 HT, 2:29 ET = 3:2 HT, 2:30 ET = 3:3 HT, 2:31 ET = 3:4 HT, 2:32 ET = 3:5 HT, 3:1 ET = 4:1 HT, etc., through 3:21 ET = 4:21 HT. Thus Joel in the Hebrew Bible has 4 chapters, the 5 verses of ch. 3 being included at the end of ch. 2 in the English Bible.

[2:28]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Now it will be after this.”

[2:28]  ¹⁷ sn This passage plays a key role in the apostolic explanation of the coming of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost recorded in Acts 2:17-21. Peter introduces his quotation of this passage with “this is that spoken by the prophet Joel” (Acts 2:16; cf. the similar pesher formula used at Qumran). The New Testament experience at Pentecost is thus seen in some sense as a fulfillment of this Old Testament passage, even though that experience did not exhaustively fulfill Joel’s words. Some portions of Joel’s prophecy have no precise counterpart in that experience. For example, there is nothing in the experience recorded in Acts 2 that exactly corresponds to the earthly and heavenly signs described in Joel 3:3-4. But inasmuch as the messianic age had already begun and the “last days” had already commenced with the coming of the Messiah (cf. Heb 1:1-2), Peter was able to point to Joel 3:1-5 as a text that was relevant to the advent of Jesus and the bestowal of the Spirit. The equative language that Peter employs (“this is that”) stresses an incipient fulfillment of the Joel passage without precluding or minimizing a yet future and more exhaustive fulfillment in events associated with the return of Christ.

[2:28]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “all flesh.” As a term for humanity, “flesh” suggests the weakness and fragility of human beings as opposed to God who is “spirit.” The word “all” refers not to all human beings without exception (cf. NAB, NASB “all mankind”; NLT “all people”), but to all classes of human beings without distinction (cf. NCV).

[2:28]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “your old men will dream dreams.”

[2:13]  ²⁰ tn Heb “all flesh”; NAB, NIV “all mankind.”

[2:13]  ²¹ sn The sense here is that God in heaven is about to undertake an occupation of his earthly realm (v. 12) by restoring his people to the promised land.

[2:32]  ²² tn The syntax of this verse is disputed. Most read “light” and “glory” in parallelism, so Jesus is a light for revelation to the Gentiles and is glory to the people for Israel. Others see “light” (1:78-79) as a summary, while “revelation” and “glory” are parallel, so Jesus is light for all, but is revelation for the Gentiles and glory for Israel. Both readings make good sense and either could be correct, but Luke 1:78-79 and Acts 26:22-23 slightly favor this second option.

[2:32]  ²³ sn In other words, Jesus is a special cause for praise and honor (“glory”) for the nation.

[3:6]  ²⁴ tn Grk “all flesh.”

[3:6]  ²⁵ sn A quotation from Isa 40:3-5. Though all the synoptic gospels use this citation from Isaiah, only Luke cites the material of vv. 5-6. His goal may well be to get to the declaration of v. 6, where all humanity (i.e., all nations) see God’s salvation (see also Luke 24:47).

[17:2]  ²⁶ tn Or “all people”; Grk “all flesh.”

[17:2]  ²⁷ tn Grk “so that to everyone whom you have given to him, he may give to them eternal life.”

[2:17]  ²⁸ sn The phrase in the last days is not quoted from Joel, but represents Peter’s interpretive explanation of the current events as falling “in the last days.”

[2:17]  ²⁹ tn Grk “on all flesh.”