Job 20:11

20:11 His bones ¹  were full of his youthful vigor, ² 

but that vigor will lie down with him in the dust.

Psalms 25:7

25:7 Do not hold against me ³  the sins of my youth ⁴  or my rebellious acts!

Because you are faithful to me, extend to me your favor, O Lord! ⁵ 

Proverbs 5:11-13

5:11 And at the end of your life ⁶  you will groan ⁷ 

when your flesh and your body are wasted away. ⁸ 

5:12 And you will say, “How I hated discipline!

My heart spurned reproof!

5:13 For ⁹  I did not obey my teachers ¹⁰ 

and I did not heed ¹¹  my instructors. ¹² 

Jeremiah 31:19

31:19 For after we turned away from you we repented.

After we came to our senses ¹³  we beat our breasts in sorrow. ¹⁴ 

We are ashamed and humiliated

because of the disgraceful things we did previously.’ ¹⁵ 

John 5:5

5:5 Now a man was there who had been disabled for thirty-eight years. ¹⁶ 

John 5:14

5:14 After this Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, “Look, you have become well. Don’t sin any more, ¹⁷  lest anything worse happen to you.”

[20:11]  ¹ tn “Bones” is often used metonymically for the whole person, the bones being the framework, meaning everything inside, as well as the body itself.

[20:11]  ² sn This line means that he dies prematurely – at the height of his youthful vigor.

[25:7]  ³ tn Heb “do not remember,” with the intention of punishing.

[25:7]  ⁴ sn That is, the sins characteristic of youths, who lack moral discretion and wisdom.

[25:7]  ⁵ tn Heb “according to your faithfulness, remember me, you, for the sake of your goodness, O Lord.”

[5:11]  ⁶ tn Heb “at your end.”

[5:11]  ⁷ tn The form is the perfect tense with the vav consecutive; it is equal to a specific future within this context.

[5:11]  ⁸ tn Heb “in the finishing of your flesh and your body.” The construction uses the Qal infinitive construct of כָּלָה (calah) in a temporal clause; the verb means “be complete, at an end, finished, spent.”

[5:13]  ⁹ tn The vav that introduces this clause functions in an explanatory sense.

[5:13]  ¹⁰ tn The Hebrew term מוֹרַי (moray) is the nominal form based on the Hiphil plural participle with a suffix, from the root יָרָה (yarah). The verb is “to teach,” the common noun is “instruction, law [torah],” and this participle form is teacher (“my teachers”).

[5:13]  ¹¹ sn The idioms are vivid: This expression is “incline the ear”; earlier in the first line is “listen to the voice,” meaning “obey.” Such detailed description emphasizes the importance of the material.

[5:13]  ¹² tn The form is the Piel plural participle of לָמַד (lamad) used substantivally.

[31:19]  ¹³ tn For this meaning of the verb see HAL 374 s.v. יָדַע Nif 5 or W. L. Holladay, Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon, 129. REB translates “Now that I am submissive” relating the verb to a second root meaning “be submissive.” (See HALOT 375 s.v. II יָדַע and J. Barr, Comparative Philology and the Text of the Old Testament, 19-21, for evidence for this verb. Other passages cited with this nuance are Judg 8:16; Prov 10:9; Job 20:20.)

[31:19]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “I struck my thigh.” This was a gesture of grief and anguish (cf. Ezek 21:12 [21:17 HT]). The modern equivalent is “to beat the breast.”

[31:19]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “because I bear the reproach of my youth.” For the plural referents see the note at the beginning of v. 18.

[5:5]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “who had had thirty-eight years in his disability.”

[5:14]  ¹⁷ tn Since this is a prohibition with a present imperative, the translation “stop sinning” is sometimes suggested. This is not likely, however, since the present tense is normally used in prohibitions involving a general condition (as here) while the aorist tense is normally used in specific instances. Only when used opposite the normal usage (the present tense in a specific instance, for example) would the meaning “stop doing what you are doing” be appropriate.