Jeremiah 31:32

31:32 It will not be like the old ¹  covenant that I made with their ancestors ²  when I delivered them ³  from Egypt. For they violated that covenant, even though I was like a faithful husband to them,” ⁴  says the Lord. ⁵ 

Exodus 24:3-8

24:3 Moses came ⁶  and told the people all the Lord’s words ⁷  and all the decisions. All the people answered together, ⁸  “We are willing to do ⁹  all the words that the Lord has said,” 24:4 and Moses wrote down all the words of the Lord. Early in the morning he built ¹⁰  an altar at the foot ¹¹  of the mountain and arranged ¹²  twelve standing stones ¹³  – according to the twelve tribes of Israel. 24:5 He sent young Israelite men, ¹⁴  and they offered burnt offerings and sacrificed young bulls for peace offerings ¹⁵  to the Lord. 24:6 Moses took half of the blood and put it in bowls, and half of the blood he splashed on the altar. ¹⁶  24:7 He took the Book of the Covenant ¹⁷  and read it aloud ¹⁸  to the people, and they said, “We are willing to do and obey ¹⁹  all that the Lord has spoken.” 24:8 So Moses took the blood and splashed it on ²⁰  the people and said, “This is the blood of the covenant ²¹  that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.”

Deuteronomy 5:2-3

5:2 The Lord our God made a covenant with us at Horeb. 5:3 He ²²  did not make this covenant with our ancestors ²³  but with us, we who are here today, all of us living now.

Deuteronomy 29:10-15

29:10 You are standing today, all of you, before the Lord your God – the heads of your tribes, ²⁴  your elders, your officials, every Israelite man, 29:11 your infants, your wives, and the ²⁵  foreigners living in your encampment, those who chop wood and those who carry water – 29:12 so that you may enter by oath into the covenant the Lord your God is making with you today. ²⁶  29:13 Today he will affirm that you are his people and that he is your God, ²⁷  just as he promised you and as he swore by oath to your ancestors ²⁸  Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 29:14 It is not with you alone that I am making this covenant by oath, 29:15 but with whoever stands with us here today before the Lord our God as well as those not with us here today. ²⁹ 

Ezekiel 20:6-12

20:6 On that day I swore ³⁰  to bring them out of the land of Egypt to a land which I had picked out ³¹  for them, a land flowing with milk and honey, ³²  the most beautiful of all lands. 20:7 I said to them, “Each of you must get rid of the detestable idols you keep before you, ³³  and do not defile yourselves with the idols of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.” 20:8 But they rebelled against me, and refused to listen to me; no one got rid of their detestable idols, ³⁴  nor did they abandon the idols of Egypt. Then I decided to pour out ³⁵  my rage on them and fully vent my anger against them in the midst of the land of Egypt. 20:9 I acted for the sake of my reputation, ³⁶  so that I would not be profaned before the nations among whom they lived, ³⁷  before whom I revealed myself by bringing them out of the land of Egypt. ³⁸ 

20:10 “‘So I brought them out of the land of Egypt and led them to the wilderness. 20:11 I gave them my statutes ³⁹  and revealed my regulations to them. The one ⁴⁰  who carries ⁴¹  them out will live by them! ⁴²  20:12 I also gave them my Sabbaths ⁴³  as a reminder of our relationship, ⁴⁴  so that they would know that I, the Lord, sanctify them. ⁴⁵ 

Hebrews 8:8-10

8:8 But ⁴⁶  showing its fault, ⁴⁷  God ⁴⁸  says to them, ⁴⁹ 

“Look, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will complete a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah.

8:9 “It will not be like the covenant ⁵⁰  that I made with their fathers, on the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they did not continue in my covenant and I had no regard for them, says the Lord.

8:10 “For this is the covenant that I will establish with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. I will put ⁵¹  my laws in their minds ⁵²  and I will inscribe them on their hearts. And I will be their God and they will be my people. ⁵³ 

[31:32]  ¹ tn The word “old” is not in the text but is implicit in the use of the word “new.” It is supplied in the translation for greater clarity.

[31:32]  ² tn Heb “fathers.”

[31:32]  ³ tn Heb “when I took them by the hand and led them out.”

[31:32]  ⁴ tn Or “I was their master.” See the study note on 3:14.

[31:32]  ⁵ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[24:3]  ⁶ sn The general consensus among commentators is that this refers to Moses’ coming from the mountain after he made the ascent in 20:21. Here he came and told them the laws (written in 20:22-23:33), and of the call to come up to Yahweh.

[24:3]  ⁷ sn The Decalogue may not be included here because the people had heard those commands themselves earlier.

[24:3]  ⁸ tn The text simply has “one voice” (קוֹל אֶחָד, qol ’ekhad); this is an adverbial accusative of manner, telling how the people answered – “in one voice,” or unanimously (see GKC 375 §118.q).

[24:3]  ⁹ tn The verb is the imperfect tense (נַעֲשֶׂה, na’aseh), although the form could be classified as a cohortative. If the latter, they would be saying that they are resolved to do what God said. If it is an imperfect, then the desiderative would make the most sense: “we are willing to do.” They are not presumptuously saying they are going to do all these things.

[24:4]  ¹⁰ tn The two preterites quite likely form a verbal hendiadys (the verb “to get up early” is frequently in such constructions). Literally it says, “and he got up early [in the morning] and he built”; this means “early [in the morning] he built.” The first verb becomes the adverb.

[24:4]  ¹¹ tn “under.”

[24:4]  ¹² tn The verb “arranged” is not in the Hebrew text but has been supplied to clarify exactly what Moses did with the twelve stones.

[24:4]  ¹³ tn The thing numbered is found in the singular when the number is plural – “twelve standing-stone.” See GKC 433 §134.f. The “standing-stone” could be a small piece about a foot high, or a huge column higher than men. They served to commemorate treaties (Gen 32), or visions (Gen 28) or boundaries, or graves. Here it will function with the altar as a place of worship.

[24:5]  ¹⁴ tn The construct has “young men of the Israelites,” and so “Israelite” is a genitive that describes them.

[24:5]  ¹⁵ tn The verbs and their respective accusatives are cognates. First, they offered up burnt offerings (see Lev 1), which is וַיַּעֲלוּ עֹלֹת (vayya’alu ’olot); then they sacrificed young bulls as peace sacrifices (Lev 3), which is in Hebrew וַיִּזְבְּחוּ זְבָחִים (vayyizbÿkhu zÿvakhim). In the first case the cognate accusative is the direct object; in the second it is an adverbial accusative of product. See on this covenant ritual H. M. Kamsler, “The Blood Covenant in the Bible,” Dor le Dor 6 (1977): 94-98; E. W. Nicholson, “The Covenant Ritual in Exodus 24:3-8,” VT 32 (1982): 74-86.

[24:6]  ¹⁶ sn The people and Yahweh through this will be united by blood, for half was spattered on the altar and the other half spattered on/toward the people (v. 8).

[24:7]  ¹⁷ tn The noun “book” would be the scroll just written containing the laws of chaps. 20-23. On the basis of this scroll the covenant would be concluded here. The reading of this book would assure the people that it was the same that they had agreed to earlier. But now their statement of willingness to obey would be more binding, because their promise would be confirmed by a covenant of blood.

[24:7]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “read it in the ears of.”

[24:7]  ¹⁹ tn A second verb is now added to the people’s response, and it is clearly an imperfect and not a cohortative, lending support for the choice of desiderative imperfect in these commitments – “we want to obey.” This was their compliance with the covenant.

[24:8]  ²⁰ tn Given the size of the congregation, the preposition might be rendered here “toward the people” rather than on them (all).

[24:8]  ²¹ sn The construct relationship “the blood of the covenant” means “the blood by which the covenant is ratified” (S. R. Driver, Exodus, 254). The parallel with the inauguration of the new covenant in the blood of Christ is striking (see, e.g., Matt 26:28, 1 Cor 11:25). When Jesus was inaugurating the new covenant, he was bringing to an end the old.

[5:3]  ²² tn Heb “the Lord.” The pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons to avoid redundancy.

[5:3]  ²³ tn Heb “fathers.”

[29:10]  ²⁴ tc Heb “your heads, your tribes.” The Syriac presupposes either “heads of your tribes” or “your heads, your judges,” etc. (reading שֹׁפְטֵכֶם [shofÿtekhem] for שִׁבְטֵיכֶם [shivtekhem]). Its comparative difficulty favors the originality of the MT reading. Cf. KJV “your captains of your tribes”; NRSV “the leaders of your tribes”; NLT “your tribal leaders.”

[29:11]  ²⁵ tn Heb “your.”

[29:12]  ²⁶ tn Heb “for you to pass on into the covenant of the Lord your God and into his oath, which the Lord your God is cutting with you today.”

[29:13]  ²⁷ tn Heb “in order to establish you today to him for a people and he will be to you for God.” Verses 10-13 are one long sentence in Hebrew. The translation divides this into two sentences for stylistic reasons.

[29:13]  ²⁸ tn Heb “fathers” (also in v. 25).

[29:15]  ²⁹ tn This is interpreted by some English versions as a reference to generations not yet born (cf. TEV, CEV, NLT).

[20:6]  ³⁰ tn Heb “I lifted up my hand to them.”

[20:6]  ³¹ tn Or “searched out.” The Hebrew word is used to describe the activity of the spies in “spying out” the land of Canaan (Num 13-14); cf. KJV “I had espied for them.”

[20:6]  ³² sn The phrase “a land flowing with milk and honey,” a figure of speech describing the land’s abundant fertility, occurs in v. 15 as well as Exod 3:8, 17; 13:5; 33:3; Lev 20:24; Num 13:27; Deut 6:3; 11:9; 26:9; 27:3; Josh 5:6; Jer 11:5; 32:23 (see also Deut 1:25; 8:7-9).

[20:7]  ³³ tn Heb “each one, the detestable things of his eyes, throw away.” The Pentateuch does not refer to the Israelites worshiping idols in Egypt, but Josh 24:14 appears to suggest that they did so.

[20:8]  ³⁴ tn Heb “each one, the detestable things of their eyes did not throw away.”

[20:8]  ³⁵ tn Heb “and I said/thought to pour out.”

[20:9]  ³⁶ tn Heb “for the sake of my name.”

[20:9]  ³⁷ tn Heb “before the eyes of the nations in whose midst they were.”

[20:9]  ³⁸ tn Heb “to whom I made myself known before their eyes to bring them out from the land of Egypt.” The translation understands the infinitive construct (“to bring them out”) as indicating manner. God’s deliverance of his people from Egypt was an act of self-revelation in that it displayed his power and his commitment to his promises.

[20:11]  ³⁹ sn The laws were given at Mount Sinai.

[20:11]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “the man.”

[20:11]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “does.”

[20:11]  ⁴² tn The wording and the concept is contained in Lev 18:5 and Deut 30:15-19.

[20:12]  ⁴³ sn Ezekiel’s contemporary, Jeremiah, also stressed the importance of obedience to the Sabbath law (Jer 17).

[20:12]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “to become a sign between me and them.”

[20:12]  ⁴⁵ tn Or “set them apart.” The last phrase of verse 12 appears to be a citation of Exod 31:13.

[8:8]  ⁴⁶ tn Grk “for,” but providing an explanation of the God-intended limitation of the first covenant from v. 7.

[8:8]  ⁴⁷ sn The “fault” or limitation in the first covenant was not in its inherent righteousness, but in its design from God himself. It was never intended to be his final revelation or provision for mankind; it was provisional, always pointing toward the fulfillment to come in Christ.

[8:8]  ⁴⁸ tn Grk “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[8:8]  ⁴⁹ tc ‡ Several witnesses (א* A D* I K P Ψ 33 81 326 365 1505 2464 al latt co Cyr) have αὐτούς (autous) here, “[in finding fault with] them, [he says],” alluding to Israel’s failings mentioned in v. 9b. (The verb μέμφομαι [memfomai, “to find fault with”] can take an accusative or dative direct object.) The reading behind the text above (αὐτοίς, autoi"), supported by Ì⁴⁶ א² B D² 0278 1739 1881 Ï, is perhaps a harder reading theologically, and is more ambiguous in meaning. If αὐτοίς goes with μεμφόμενος (memfomeno", here translated “showing its fault”), the clause could be translated “in finding fault with them” or “in showing [its] faults to them.” If αὐτοίς goes with the following λέγει (legei, “he says”), the clause is best translated, “in finding/showing [its] faults, he says to them.” The accusative pronoun suffers no such ambiguity, for it must be the object of μεμφόμενος rather than λέγει. Although a decision is difficult, the dative form of the pronoun best explains the rise of the other reading and is thus more likely to be original.

[8:9]  ⁵⁰ tn Grk “not like the covenant,” continuing the description of v. 8b.

[8:10]  ⁵¹ tn Grk “putting…I will inscribe.”

[8:10]  ⁵² tn Grk “mind.”

[8:10]  ⁵³ tn Grk “I will be to them for a God and they will be to me for a people,” following the Hebrew constructions of Jer 31.