Matthew 27:39-43

27:39 Those ¹  who passed by defamed him, shaking their heads 27:40 and saying, “You who can destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself! ²  If you are God’s Son, come down ³  from the cross!” 27:41 In ⁴  the same way even the chief priests – together with the experts in the law ⁵  and elders ⁶  – were mocking him: ⁷  27:42 “He saved others, but he cannot save himself! He is the king of Israel! If he comes down ⁸  now from the cross, we will believe in him! 27:43 He trusts in God – let God, if he wants to, deliver him now ⁹  because he said, ‘I am God’s Son’!”

Psalms 22:6-7

22:6 But I ¹⁰  am a worm, ¹¹  not a man; ¹² 

people insult me and despise me. ¹³ 

22:7 All who see me taunt ¹⁴  me;

they mock me ¹⁵  and shake their heads. ¹⁶ 

Isaiah 49:7

49:7 This is what the Lord,

the protector ¹⁷  of Israel, their Holy One, ¹⁸  says

to the one who is despised ¹⁹  and rejected ²⁰  by nations, ²¹ 

a servant of rulers:

“Kings will see and rise in respect, ²² 

princes will bow down,

because of the faithful Lord,

the Holy One of Israel who has chosen you.”

Isaiah 53:3

53:3 He was despised and rejected by people, ²³ 

one who experienced pain and was acquainted with illness;

people hid their faces from him; ²⁴ 

he was despised, and we considered him insignificant. ²⁵ 

[27:39]  ¹ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[27:40]  ² sn There is rich irony in the statements of those who were passing by, “save yourself!” and “come down from the cross!” In summary, they wanted Jesus to come down from the cross and save his physical life, but it was indeed his staying on the cross and giving his physical life that led to the fact that they could experience a resurrection from death to life.

[27:40]  ³ tc ‡ Many important witnesses (א* A D pc it sy^[s],p) read καί (kai, here with the force of “then”) before κατάβηθι (katabhqi, “come down”). The shorter reading may well be due to homoioarcton, but judging by the diverse external evidence (א² B L W Θ 0250 Ë^1,13 33 Ï lat) it is equally possible that the shorter reading is original (and is so considered for this translation). NA²⁷ puts the καί in brackets, indicating doubts as to its authenticity.

[27:41]  ⁴ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated.

[27:41]  ⁵ tn Or “with the scribes.” See the note on the phrase “experts in the law” in 2:4.

[27:41]  ⁶ tn Only “chief priests” is in the nominative case; this sentence structure attempts to capture this emphasis.

[27:41]  ⁷ tn Grk “Mocking him, the chief priests…said.”

[27:42]  ⁸ tn Here the aorist imperative καταβάτω (katabatw) has been translated as a conditional imperative. This fits the pattern of other conditional imperatives (imperative + καί + future indicative) outlined by ExSyn 489.

[27:43]  ⁹ sn An allusion to Ps 22:8.

[22:6]  ¹⁰ tn The grammatical construction (conjunction + pronoun) highlights the contrast between the psalmist’s experience and that of his ancestors. When he considers God’s past reliability, it only heightens his despair and confusion, for God’s present silence stands in stark contrast to his past saving acts.

[22:6]  ¹¹ tn The metaphor expresses the psalmist’s self-perception, which is based on how others treat him (see the following line).

[22:6]  ¹² tn Or “not a human being.” The psalmist perceives himself as less than human.

[22:6]  ¹³ tn Heb “a reproach of man and despised by people.”

[22:7]  ¹⁴ tn Or “scoff at, deride, mock.”

[22:7]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “they separate with a lip.” Apparently this refers to their verbal taunting.

[22:7]  ¹⁶ sn Shake their heads. Apparently this refers to a taunting gesture. See also Job 16:4; Ps 109:25; Lam 2:15.

[49:7]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “redeemer.” See the note at 41:14.

[49:7]  ¹⁸ sn See the note on the phrase “the Holy One of Israel” in 1:4.

[49:7]  ¹⁹ tc The Hebrew text reads literally “to [one who] despises life.” It is preferable to read with the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a לבזוי, which should be vocalized as a passive participle, לִבְזוּי (livzuy, “to the one despised with respect to life” [נֶפֶשׁ is a genitive of specification]). The consonantal sequence וי was probably misread as ה in the MT tradition. The contextual argument favors the 1QIsa^a reading. As J. N. Oswalt (Isaiah [NICOT], 2:294) points out, the three terse phrases “convey a picture of lowliness, worthlessness, and helplessness.”

[49:7]  ²⁰ tn MT’s Piel participle (“to the one who rejects”) does not fit contextually. The form should be revocalized as a Pual, “to the one rejected.”

[49:7]  ²¹ tn Parallelism (see “rulers,” “kings,” “princes”) suggests that the singular גּוֹי (goy) be emended to a plural or understood in a collective sense (see 55:5).

[49:7]  ²² tn For this sense of קוּם (qum), see Gen 19:1; 23:7; 33:10; Lev 19:32; 1 Sam 20:41; 25:41; 1 Kgs 2:19; Job 29:8.

[53:3]  ²³ tn Heb “lacking of men.” If the genitive is taken as specifying (“lacking with respect to men”), then the idea is that he lacked company because he was rejected by people. Another option is to take the genitive as indicating genus or larger class (i.e., “one lacking among men”). In this case one could translate, “he was a transient” (cf. the use of חָדֵל [khadel] in Ps 39:5 HT [39:4 ET]).

[53:3]  ²⁴ tn Heb “like a hiding of the face from him,” i.e., “like one before whom the face is hidden” (see BDB 712 s.v. מַסְתֵּר).

[53:3]  ²⁵ sn The servant is likened to a seriously ill person who is shunned by others because of his horrible disease.