Luke 7:25

7:25 What ¹  did you go out to see? A man dressed in fancy ²  clothes? ³  Look, those who wear fancy clothes and live in luxury ⁴  are in kings’ courts! ⁵ 

Luke 8:15

8:15 But as for the seed that landed on good soil, these are the ones who, after hearing ⁶  the word, cling to it ⁷  with an honest and good ⁸  heart, and bear fruit with steadfast endurance. ⁹ 

Luke 8:21

8:21 But he replied ¹⁰  to them, “My mother and my brothers are those ¹¹  who hear the word of God and do it.” ¹² 

Luke 9:27

9:27 But I tell you most certainly, ¹³  there are some standing here who will not ¹⁴  experience ¹⁵  death before they see the kingdom of God.” ¹⁶ 

Luke 18:9

The Parable of the Pharisee and Tax Collector

18:9 Jesus ¹⁷  also told this parable to some who were confident that they were righteous and looked down ¹⁸  on everyone else.

[7:25]  ¹ tn Grk “But what.” Here ἀλλά (alla, a strong contrastive in Greek) produces a somewhat awkward sense in English, and has not been translated. The same situation occurs at the beginning of v. 26.

[7:25]  ² tn Or “soft”; see L&N 79.100.

[7:25]  ³ sn The reference to fancy clothes makes the point that John was not rich or powerful, in that he did not come from the wealthy classes.

[7:25]  ⁴ tn See L&N 88.253, “to revel, to carouse, to live a life of luxury.”

[7:25]  ⁵ tn Or “palaces.”

[8:15]  ⁶ tn The aorist participle ἀκούσαντες (akousante") has been taken temporally, reflecting action antecedent (prior to) that of the main verb.

[8:15]  ⁷ sn There is a tenacity that is a part of spiritual fruitfulness.

[8:15]  ⁸ sn In an ancient context, the qualifier good described the ethical person who possessed integrity. Here it is integrity concerning God’s revelation through Jesus.

[8:15]  ⁹ sn Given the pressures noted in the previous soils, bearing fruit takes time (steadfast endurance), just as it does for the farmer. See Jas 1:2-4.

[8:21]  ¹¹ tn Grk “answering, he said.” This is redundant in contemporary English and has been simplified to “he replied.”

[8:21]  ¹² tn There is some discussion about the grammar of this verse in Greek. If “these” is the subject, then it reads, “These are my mother and brothers, those who.” If “these” is a nominative absolute, which is slightly more likely, then the verse more literally reads, “So my mother and brothers, they are those who.” The sense in either case is the same.

[8:21]  ¹³ sn Hearing and doing the word of God is another important NT theme: Luke 6:47-49; Jas 1:22-25.

[9:27]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “I tell you truly” (λέγω δὲ ὑμῖν ἀληθῶς, legw de Jumin alhqw").

[9:27]  ¹⁷ tn The Greek negative here (οὐ μή, ou mh) is the strongest possible.

[9:27]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “will not taste.” Here the Greek verb does not mean “sample a small amount” (as a typical English reader might infer from the word “taste”), but “experience something cognitively or emotionally; come to know something” (cf. BDAG 195 s.v. γεύομαι 2).

[9:27]  ¹⁹ sn The meaning of the statement that some will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God is clear at one level, harder at another. Jesus predicts some will experience the kingdom before they die. When does this happen? (1) An initial fulfillment is the next event, the transfiguration. (2) It is also possible in Luke’s understanding that all but Judas experience the initial fulfillment of the coming of God’s presence and rule in the work of Acts 2. In either case, the “kingdom of God” referred to here would be the initial rather than the final phase.

[18:9]  ²¹ tn Grk “He”; the referent has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[18:9]  ²² tn Grk “and despised.” This is a second parable with an explanatory introduction.