Luke 17:3-4

17:3 Watch ¹  yourselves! If ²  your brother ³  sins, rebuke him. If ⁴  he repents, forgive him. 17:4 Even if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times returns to you saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive ⁵  him.”

Matthew 5:7

5:7 “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.

Matthew 6:14-15

6:14 “For if you forgive others ⁶  their sins, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 6:15 But if you do not forgive others, your Father will not forgive you your sins.

Matthew 18:35

18:35 So also my heavenly Father will do to you, if each of you does not forgive your ⁷  brother ⁸  from your heart.”

Mark 11:25-26

11:25 Whenever you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven will ⁹  also forgive you your sins.”

11:26 [[EMPTY]] ¹⁰ 

Mark 11:1

The Triumphal Entry

11:1 Now ¹¹  as they approached Jerusalem, ¹²  near Bethphage ¹³  and Bethany, at the Mount of Olives, ¹⁴  Jesus ¹⁵  sent two of his disciples

Colossians 1:4-7

1:4 since ¹⁶  we heard about your faith in Christ Jesus and the love that you have for all the saints. 1:5 Your faith and love have arisen ¹⁷  from the hope laid up ¹⁸  for you in heaven, which you have heard about in the message of truth, the gospel ¹⁹  1:6 that has come to you. Just as in the entire world this gospel ²⁰  is bearing fruit and growing, so it has also been bearing fruit and growing ²¹  among you from the first day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth. 1:7 You learned the gospel ²²  from Epaphras, our dear fellow slave ²³  – a ²⁴  faithful minister of Christ on our ²⁵  behalf –

Ephesians 4:32

4:32 Instead, ²⁶  be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ also forgave you. ²⁷ 

Colossians 3:13

3:13 bearing with one another and forgiving ²⁸  one another, if someone happens to have ²⁹  a complaint against anyone else. Just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also forgive others. ³⁰ 

[17:3]  ¹ tn It is difficult to know if this looks back or forward or both. The warning suggests it looks back. For this verb, see Luke 8:18; 12:1, 15; 20:46; 21:8, 34. The present imperative reflects an ongoing spirit of watchfulness.

[17:3]  ² tn Both the “if” clause in this verse and the “if” clause in v. 4 are third class conditions in Greek.

[17:3]  ³ tn Here the term “brother” means “fellow believer” or “fellow Christian” (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 2.a, contra BDAG 19 s.v. 2.c), but with a familial connotation. It refers equally to men, women, or children. However, because of the familial connotations, “brother” has been retained in the translation here in preference to the more generic “fellow believer” (“fellow Christian” would be anachronistic in this context).

[17:3]  ⁴ tn Grk “And if.” Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[17:4]  ⁵ sn You must forgive him. Forgiveness is to be readily given and not withheld. In a community that is to have restored relationships, grudges are not beneficial.

[6:14]  ⁶ tn Here ἄνθρωπος (anqrwpo") is used in a generic sense: “people, others.”

[18:35]  ⁷ tn Grk “his.” The pronoun has been translated to follow English idiom (the last pronoun of the verse [“from your heart”] is second person plural in the original).

[18:35]  ⁸ tn Here the term “brother” means “fellow believer” or “fellow Christian” (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 2.a), whether male or female. Concerning the familial connotations, see also the note on the first occurrence of this term in v. 15.

[11:25]  ⁹ tn Although the Greek subjunctive mood, formally required in a subordinate clause introduced by ἵνα ({ina), is traditionally translated by an English subjunctive (e.g., “may,” so KJV, NAB, NIV, NRSV), changes in the use of the subjunctive in English now result in most readers understanding such a statement as indicating permission (“may” = “has permission to”) or as indicating uncertainty (“may” = “might” or “may or may not”). Thus a number of more recent translations render such instances by an English future tense (“will,” so TEV, CEV, NLT, NASB 1995 update). That approach has been followed here.

[11:26]  ¹⁰ tc A number of significant mss of various texttypes (א B L W Δ Ψ 565 700 892 pc sa) do not include 11:26 “But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father in heaven forgive your sins.” The verse is included in most later mss (A [C D] Θ [Ë^1,13 33] Ï lat) and is not likely to be original. It is probably an assimilation to Matt 6:15. The present translation follows NA²⁷ in omitting the verse number, a procedure also followed by a number of other modern translations.

[11:1]  ¹¹ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “now” to indicate the transition to a new topic.

[11:1]  ¹² map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[11:1]  ¹³ sn The exact location of the village of Bethphage is not known. Most put it on the southeast side of the Mount of Olives and northwest of Bethany, about 1.5 miles (3 km) east of Jerusalem.

[11:1]  ¹⁴ sn “Mountain” in English generally denotes a higher elevation than it often does in reference to places in Palestine. The Mount of Olives is really a ridge running north to south about 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) long, east of Jerusalem across the Kidron Valley. Its central elevation is about 30 meters (100 ft) higher than Jerusalem. It was named for the large number of olive trees which grew on it.

[11:1]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “he”; the referent (Jesus) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[1:4]  ¹⁶ tn The adverbial participle ἀκούσαντες (akousante") is understood to be temporal and translated with “since.” A causal idea may also be in the apostle’s mind, but the context emphasizes temporal ideas, e.g., “from the day” (v. 6).

[1:5]  ¹⁷ 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]  ¹⁸ tn BDAG 113 s.v. ἀπόκειμαι 2 renders ἀποκειμένην (apokeimenhn) with the expression “reserved” in this verse.

[1:5]  ¹⁹ 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.

[1:6]  ²⁰ tn Grk “just as in the entire world it is bearing fruit.” The antecedent (“the gospel”) of the implied subject (“it”) of ἐστιν (estin) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[1:6]  ²¹ tn Though the participles are periphrastic with the present tense verb ἐστίν (estin), the presence of the temporal indicator “from the day” in the next clause indicates that this is a present tense that reaches into the past and should be translated as “has been bearing fruit and growing.” For a discussion of this use of the present tense, see ExSyn 519-20.

[1:7]  ²² tn Or “learned it.” The Greek text simply has “you learned” without the reference to “the gospel,” but “the gospel” is supplied to clarify the sense of the clause. Direct objects were frequently omitted in Greek when clear from the context.

[1:7]  ²³ tn The Greek word translated “fellow slave” is σύνδουλος (sundoulo"); the σύν- prefix here denotes association. Though δοῦλος is normally translated “servant,” the word does not bear the connotation of a free individual serving another. BDAG notes that “‘servant’ for ‘slave’ is largely confined to Biblical transl. and early American times…in normal usage at the present time the two words are carefully distinguished” (BDAG 260 s.v.). The most accurate translation is “bondservant” (sometimes found in the ASV for δοῦλος), in that it often indicates one who sells himself into slavery to another. But as this is archaic, few today understand its force.

[1:7]  ²⁴ tn The Greek text has “who (ὅς, Jos) is a faithful minister.” The above translation conveys the antecedent of the relative pronoun quite well and avoids the redundancy with the following substantival participle of v. 8, namely, “who told” (ὁ δηλώσας, Jo dhlwsa").

[1:7]  ²⁵ tc ‡ Judging by the superior witnesses for the first person pronoun ἡμῶν (Jhmwn, “us”; Ì⁴⁶ א* A B D* F G 326* 1505 al) vs. the second person pronoun ὑμῶν (Jumwn, “you”; found in א² C D¹ Ψ 075 33 1739 1881 Ï lat sy co), ἡμῶν should be regarded as original. Although it is possible that ἡμῶν was an early alteration of ὑμῶν (either unintentionally, as dittography, since it comes seventeen letters after the previous ἡμῶν; or intentionally, to conform to the surrounding first person pronouns), this supposition is difficult to maintain in light of the varied and valuable witnesses for this reading. Further, the second person is both embedded in the verb ἐμάθετε (emaqete) and is explicit in v. 8 (ὑμῶν). Hence, the motivation to change to the first person pronoun is counterbalanced by such evidence. The second person pronoun may have been introduced unintentionally via homoioarcton with the ὑπέρ (Juper) that immediately precedes it. As well, the second person reading is somewhat harder for it seems to address Epaphras’ role only in relation to Paul and his colleagues, rather than in relation to the Colossians. Nevertheless, the decision must be based ultimately on external evidence (because the internal evidence can be variously interpreted), and this strongly supports ἡμῶν.

[4:32]  ²⁶ tc ‡ Although most witnesses have either δέ (de; Ì⁴⁹ א A D² Ψ 33 1739^mg Ï lat) or οὖν (oun; D* F G 1175) here, a few important mss lack a conjunction (Ì⁴⁶ B 0278 6 1739* 1881). If either conjunction were originally in the text, it is difficult to explain how the asyndetic construction could have arisen (although the dropping of δέ could have occurred via homoioteleuton). Further, although Hellenistic Greek rarely joined sentences without a conjunction, such does occur in the corpus Paulinum on occasion, especially to underscore a somber point. “Instead” has been supplied in the translation because of stylistic requirements, not textual basis. NA²⁷ places δέ in brackets, indicating some doubt as to its authenticity.

[4:32]  ²⁷ tn Or “forgiving.”

[3:13]  ²⁸ tn For the translation of χαριζόμενοι (carizomenoi) as “forgiving,” see BDAG 1078 s.v. χαρίζομαι 3. The two participles “bearing” (ἀνεχόμενοι, anecomenoi) and “forgiving” (χαριζόμενοι) express the means by which the action of the finite verb “clothe yourselves” is to be carried out.

[3:13]  ²⁹ tn Grk “if someone has”; the term “happens,” though not in the Greek text, is inserted to bring out the force of the third class condition.

[3:13]  ³⁰ tn The expression “forgive others” is not in the Greek text, but is implied. It is included in the translation to make the sentence complete and more comprehensible to the English reader.