Proverbs 16:7

16:7 When a person’s ¹  ways are pleasing to the Lord, ² 

he ³  even reconciles his enemies to himself. ⁴ 

Proverbs 19:21

19:21 There are many plans ⁵  in a person’s mind, ⁶ 

but it ⁷  is the counsel ⁸  of the Lord which will stand.

Proverbs 21:1

21:1 The king’s heart ⁹  is in the hand ¹⁰  of the Lord like channels of water; ¹¹ 

he turns it wherever he wants.

Genesis 43:14

43:14 May the sovereign God ¹²  grant you mercy before the man so that he may release ¹³  your other brother ¹⁴  and Benjamin! As for me, if I lose my children I lose them.” ¹⁵ 

Ezra 7:27-28

7:27 ¹⁶ Blessed be the Lord God of our fathers, who so moved in the heart of the king to so honor the temple of the Lord which is in Jerusalem! 7:28 He has also conferred his favor on me before the king, his advisers, and all the influential leaders of the king. I gained strength as the hand of the Lord my God was on me, and I gathered leaders from Israel to go up with me.

Nehemiah 1:11

1:11 Please, ¹⁷  O Lord, listen attentively ¹⁸  to the prayer of your servant and to the prayer of your servants who take pleasure in showing respect ¹⁹  to your name. Grant your servant success today and show compassion to me ²⁰  in the presence of this man.”

Now ²¹  I was cupbearer for the king.

Esther 4:16

4:16 “Go, assemble all the Jews who are found in Susa and fast in my behalf. Don’t eat and don’t drink for three days, night or day. My female attendants and I ²²  will also fast in the same way. Afterward I will go to the king, even though it violates the law. ²³  If I perish, I perish!”

Psalms 20:9

20:9 The Lord will deliver the king; ²⁴ 

he will answer us ²⁵  when we call to him for help! ²⁶ 

Psalms 62:12

62:12 and you, O Lord, demonstrate loyal love. ²⁷ 

For you repay men for what they do. ²⁸ 

Isaiah 46:9-11

46:9 Remember what I accomplished in antiquity! ²⁹ 

Truly I am God, I have no peer; ³⁰ 

I am God, and there is none like me,

46:10 who announces the end from the beginning

and reveals beforehand ³¹  what has not yet occurred,

who says, ‘My plan will be realized,

I will accomplish what I desire,’

46:11 who summons an eagle ³²  from the east,

from a distant land, one who carries out my plan.

Yes, I have decreed, ³³ 

yes, I will bring it to pass;

I have formulated a plan,

yes, I will carry it out.

Daniel 4:35

4:35 All the inhabitants of the earth are regarded as nothing. ³⁴ 

He does as he wishes with the army of heaven

and with those who inhabit the earth.

No one slaps ³⁵  his hand

and says to him, ‘What have you done?’

[16:7]  ¹ tn Heb “ways of a man.”

[16:7]  ² tn The first line uses an infinitive in a temporal clause, followed by its subject in the genitive case: “in the taking pleasure of the Lord” = “when the Lord is pleased with.” So the condition set down for the second colon is a lifestyle that is pleasing to God.

[16:7]  ³ tn The referent of the verb in the second colon is unclear. The straightforward answer is that it refers to the person whose ways please the Lord – it is his lifestyle that disarms his enemies. W. McKane comments that the righteous have the power to mend relationships (Proverbs [OTL], 491); see, e.g., 10:13; 14:9; 15:1; 25:21-22). The life that is pleasing to God will be above reproach and find favor with others. Some would interpret this to mean that God makes his enemies to be at peace with him (cf. KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NLT). This is workable, but in this passage it would seem God would do this through the pleasing life of the believer (cf. NCV, TEV, CEV).

[16:7]  ⁴ tn Heb “even his enemies he makes to be at peace with him.”

[19:21]  ⁵ sn The plans (from the Hebrew verb חָשַׁב [khashav], “to think; to reckon; to devise”) in the human heart are many. But only those which God approves will succeed.

[19:21]  ⁶ tn Heb “in the heart of a man” (cf. NAB, NIV). Here “heart” is used for the seat of thoughts, plans, and reasoning, so the translation uses “mind.” In contemporary English “heart” is more often associated with the seat of emotion than with the seat of planning and reasoning.

[19:21]  ⁷ tn Heb “but the counsel of the Lord, it will stand.” The construction draws attention to the “counsel of the Lord”; it is an independent nominative absolute, and the resumptive independent pronoun is the formal subject of the verb.

[19:21]  ⁸ tn The antithetical parallelism pairs “counsel” with “plans.” “Counsel of the Lord” (עֲצַת יְהוָה, ’atsat yehvah) is literally “advice” or “counsel” with the connotation of “plan” in this context (cf. NIV, NRSV, NLT “purpose”; NCV “plan”; TEV “the Lord’s will”).

[21:1]  ⁹ sn “Heart” is a metonymy of subject; it signifies the ability to make decisions, if not the decisions themselves.

[21:1]  ¹⁰ sn “Hand” in this passage is a personification; the word is frequently used idiomatically for “power,” and that is the sense intended here.

[21:1]  ¹¹ tn “Channels of water” (פַּלְגֵי, palge) is an adverbial accusative, functioning as a figure of comparison – “like channels of water.” Cf. NAB “Like a stream”; NIV “watercourse”; NRSV, NLT “a stream of water.”

[43:14]  ¹² tn Heb “El Shaddai.” See the extended note on the phrase “sovereign God” in Gen 17:1.

[43:14]  ¹³ tn Heb “release to you.” After the jussive this perfect verbal form with prefixed vav (ו) probably indicates logical consequence, as well as temporal sequence.

[43:14]  ¹⁴ sn Several Jewish commentators suggest that the expression your other brother refers to Joseph. This would mean that Jacob prophesied unwittingly. However, it is much more likely that Simeon is the referent of the phrase “your other brother” (see Gen 42:24).

[43:14]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “if I am bereaved I am bereaved.” With this fatalistic sounding statement Jacob resolves himself to the possibility of losing both Benjamin and Simeon.

[7:27]  ¹⁶ sn At this point the language of the book reverts from Aramaic (7:12-26) back to Hebrew.

[1:11]  ¹⁷ tn The interjection אָנָּא (’anna’) is an emphatic term of entreaty: “please!” (BDB 58 s.v.; HALOT 69-70 s.v.). This term is normally reserved for pleas for mercy from God in life-and-death situations (2 Kgs 20:3 = Isa 38:3; Pss 116:4; 118:25; Jonah 1:14; 4:2) and for forgiveness of heinous sins that would result or have resulted in severe judgment from God (Exod 32:31; Dan 9:4; Neh 1:5, 11).

[1:11]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “let your ear be attentive.”

[1:11]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “fear.”

[1:11]  ²⁰ tn Heb “grant compassion.” The words “to me” are supplied in the translation for the sake of smoothness and style in English.

[1:11]  ²¹ tn The vav (ו) on וַאֲנִי (va’ani, “Now, I”) introduces a disjunctive parenthetical clause that provides background information to the reader.

[4:16]  ²² tn Heb “I and my female attendants.” The translation reverses the order for stylistic reasons.

[4:16]  ²³ tn Heb “which is not according to the law” (so KJV, NASB); NAB “contrary to the law.”

[20:9]  ²⁴ tc This translation assumes an emendation of the verbal form הוֹשִׁיעָה (hoshi’ah). As it stands, the form is an imperative. In this case the people return to the petitionary mood with which the psalm begins (“O Lord, deliver”). But the immediate context is one of confidence (vv. 6-8), not petition (vv. 1-5). If one takes the final he on the verb “deliver” as dittographic (note the initial he (ה) on the following phrase, “the king”), one can repoint the verbal form as a perfect and understand it as expressing the people’s confidence, “the Lord will deliver the king” (see v. 6). The Hebrew scribal tradition takes “the king” with the following line, in which case it would be best interpreted as a divine title, “may the King answer us” or “the king will answer us” (see Pss 98:6; 145:1). However, the poetic parallelism is better balanced if “the king” is taken with the first line. In this case the referent is the Davidic king, who is earlier called the Lord’s “anointed one” (cf. note on “chosen king” in v. 6; see Pss 21:7; 45:5, 11; 63:11).

[20:9]  ²⁵ tn If the imperative is retained in the preceding line, then the prefixed verbal form is best taken as a jussive of prayer, “may he answer us.” However, if the imperative in the previous line is emended to a perfect, the prefixed form is best taken as imperfect, “he will answer us” (see the note on the word “king” at the end of the previous line).

[20:9]  ²⁶ tn Heb “in the day we call.”

[62:12]  ²⁷ tn Heb “and to you, O Master, [is] loyal love.”

[62:12]  ²⁸ tn Heb “for you pay back to a man according to his deed.” Another option is to understand vv. 11b and 12a as the first principle and v. 12b as the second. In this case one might translate, “God has declared one principle, two principles I have heard, namely, that God is strong, and you, O Lord, demonstrate loyal love, and that you repay men for what they do.”

[46:9]  ²⁹ tn Heb “remember the former things, from antiquity”; KJV, ASV “the former things of old.”

[46:9]  ³⁰ tn Heb “and there is no other” (so NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[46:10]  ³¹ tn Or “from long ago”; KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV “from ancient times.”

[46:11]  ³² tn Or, more generally, “a bird of prey” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV; see 18:6).

[46:11]  ³³ tn Heb “spoken”; KJV “I have spoken it.”

[4:35]  ³⁴ tc The present translation reads כְּלָא (kÿla’), with many medieval Hebrew MSS, rather than כְּלָה (kÿlah) of BHS.

[4:35]  ³⁵ tn Aram “strikes against.”