Proverbs 1:28

1:28 Then they will call to me, but I will not answer;

they will diligently seek ¹  me, but they will not find me.

Isaiah 49:8

49:8 This is what the Lord says:

“At the time I decide to show my favor, I will respond to you;

in the day of deliverance I will help you;

I will protect you ²  and make you a covenant mediator for people, ³ 

to rebuild ⁴  the land ⁵ 

and to reassign the desolate property.

Isaiah 55:6

55:6 Seek the Lord while he makes himself available; ⁶ 

call to him while he is nearby!

Luke 19:42-44

19:42 saying, “If you had only known on this day, ⁷  even you, the things that make for peace! ⁸  But now they are hidden ⁹  from your eyes. 19:43 For the days will come upon you when your enemies will build ¹⁰  an embankment ¹¹  against you and surround you and close in on you from every side. 19:44 They will demolish you ¹²  – you and your children within your walls ¹³  – and they will not leave within you one stone ¹⁴  on top of another, ¹⁵  because you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God.” ¹⁶ 

John 7:34

7:34 You will look for me ¹⁷  but will not find me, and where I am you cannot come.”

John 7:2

7:2 Now the Jewish feast of Tabernacles ¹⁸  was near. ¹⁹ 

Colossians 1:2

1:2 to the saints, the faithful ²⁰  brothers and sisters ²¹  in Christ, at Colossae. Grace and peace to you ²²  from God our Father! ²³ 

[1:28]  ¹ tn Heb “look to.” The verb שָׁחַר (shakhar, “to look”) is used figuratively of intensely looking (=seeking) for deliverance out of trouble (W. L. Holladay, Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon, 366); cf. NLT “anxiously search for.” It is used elsewhere in parallelism with בָּקַשׁ (baqash, “to seek rescue”; Hos 5:15). It does not mean “to seek early” (cf. KJV) as is popularly taught due to etymological connections with the noun שַׁחַר (shakhar, “dawn”; so BDB 1007 s.v. שָׁחַר).

[49:8]  ² tn The translation assumes the verb is derived from the root נָצָר (natsar, “protect”). Some prefer to derive it from the root יָצָר (yatsar, “form”).

[49:8]  ³ tn Heb “a covenant of people.” A person cannot literally be a covenant; בְּרִית (bÿrit) is probably metonymic here, indicating a covenant mediator. Here עָם (’am, “people”) appears to refer to Israel. See the note at 42:6.

[49:8]  ⁴ tn The Hiphil of קוּם (qum, “arise”) is probably used here in the sense of “rebuild.”

[49:8]  ⁵ tn The “land” probably stands by metonymy for the ruins within it.

[55:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “while he allows himself to be found.” The Niphal form has a tolerative force here.

[19:42]  ⁷ sn On this day. They had missed the time of Messiah’s coming; see v. 44.

[19:42]  ⁸ tn Grk “the things toward peace.” This expression seems to mean “the things that would ‘lead to,’ ‘bring about,’ or ‘make for’ peace.”

[19:42]  ⁹ sn But now they are hidden from your eyes. This becomes an oracle of doom in the classic OT sense; see Luke 13:31-35; 11:49-51; Jer 9:2; 13:7; 14:7. They are now blind and under judgment (Jer 15:5; Ps 122:6).

[19:43]  ¹⁰ sn Jesus now predicted the events that would be fulfilled in the fall of Jerusalem in a.d. 70. The details of the siege have led some to see Luke writing this after Jerusalem’s fall, but the language of the verse is like God’s exilic judgment for covenant unfaithfulness (Hab 2:8; Jer 6:6, 14; 8:13-22; 9:1; Ezek 4:2; 26:8; Isa 29:1-4). Specific details are lacking and the procedures described (build an embankment against you) were standard Roman military tactics.

[19:43]  ¹¹ sn An embankment refers to either wooden barricades or earthworks, or a combination of the two.

[19:44]  ¹² tn Grk “They will raze you to the ground.”

[19:44]  ¹³ tn Grk “your children within you.” The phrase “[your] walls” has been supplied in the translation to clarify that the city of Jerusalem, metaphorically pictured as an individual, is spoken of here.

[19:44]  ¹⁴ sn (Not) one stone on top of another is an idiom for total destruction.

[19:44]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “leave stone on stone.”

[19:44]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “the time of your visitation.” To clarify what this refers to, the words “from God” are supplied at the end of the verse, although they do not occur in the Greek text.

[7:34]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “seek me.”

[7:2]  ¹⁸ tn Or “feast of the Tents” (the feast where people lived in tents or shelters, which was celebrated in the autumn after harvest). John’s use of σκηνοπηγία (skhnophgia) for the feast of Tabernacles constitutes the only use of this term in the New Testament.

[7:2]  ¹⁹ sn Since the present verse places these incidents at the feast of Tabernacles (a.d. 29 or 32, depending on whether one dates the crucifixion in a.d. 30 or 33) there would have been a 6-month interval during which no events are recorded. The author is obviously selective in his approach; he is not recording an exhaustive history (as he will later tell the reader in John 21:25). After healing the paralytic on the Sabbath in Jerusalem (John 5:1-47), Jesus withdrew again to Galilee because of mounting opposition. In Galilee the feeding of the 5,000 took place, which marked the end of the Galilean ministry for all practical purposes. John 7:1-9 thus marks Jesus’ final departure from Galilee.

[1:2]  ²⁰ tn Grk “and faithful.” The construction in Greek (as well as Paul’s style) suggests that the saints are identical to the faithful; hence, the καί (kai) is best left untranslated (cf. Eph 1:1). See ExSyn 281-82.

[1:2]  ²¹ tn Grk “brothers,” but the Greek word may be used for “brothers and sisters” or “fellow Christians” as here (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 1, where considerable nonbiblical evidence for the plural ἀδελφοί [adelfoi] meaning “brothers and sisters” is cited).

[1:2]  ²² tn Or “Grace to you and peace.”

[1:2]  ²³ tc Most witnesses, including some important ones (א A C F G I [P] 075 Ï it bo), read “and the Lord Jesus Christ” at the end of this verse, no doubt to conform the wording to the typical Pauline salutation. However, excellent and early witnesses (B D K L Ψ 33 81 1175 1505 1739 1881 al sa) lack this phrase. Since the omission is inexplicable as arising from the longer reading (otherwise, these mss would surely have deleted the phrase in the rest of the corpus Paulinum), it is surely authentic.