Proverbs 4:24-27

4:24 Remove perverse speech ¹  from your mouth; ² 

keep devious talk far from your lips. ³ 

4:25 Let your eyes look directly ⁴  in front of you

and let your gaze ⁵  look straight before you.

4:26 Make the path for your feet ⁶  level, ⁷ 

so that ⁸  all your ways may be established. ⁹ 

4:27 Do not turn ¹⁰  to the right or to the left;

turn yourself ¹¹  away from evil. ¹² 

Isaiah 35:8

35:8 A thoroughfare will be there –

it will be called the Way of Holiness. ¹³ 

The unclean will not travel on it;

it is reserved for those authorized to use it ¹⁴  –

fools ¹⁵  will not stray into it.

Acts 10:35

10:35 but in every nation ¹⁶  the person who fears him ¹⁷  and does what is right ¹⁸  is welcomed before him.

Acts 24:16

24:16 This is the reason ¹⁹  I do my best to always ²⁰  have a clear ²¹  conscience toward God and toward people. ²² 

Titus 2:10-14

2:10 not pilfering, but showing all good faith, ²³  in order to bring credit to ²⁴  the teaching of God our Savior in everything.

2:11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all people. ²⁵  2:12 It trains us ²⁶  to reject godless ways ²⁷  and worldly desires and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, 2:13 as we wait for the happy fulfillment of our hope in the glorious appearing ²⁸  of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. ²⁹  2:14 He ³⁰  gave himself for us to set us free from every kind of lawlessness and to purify for himself a people who are truly his, ³¹  who are eager to do good. ³² 

[4:24]  ¹ tn Heb “crookedness.” The noun עִקְּשׁוּת (’iqqÿshut) refers to what is morally twisted or perverted. Here it refers to things that are said (cf. NAB “dishonest talk”; NRSV “crooked speech”). The term “mouth” functions as a metonymy of cause for perverse speech. Such perverse talking could be subtle or blatant.

[4:24]  ² tn Heb “crookedness of mouth.”

[4:24]  ³ tn Heb “deviousness of lips put far from you.”

[4:25]  ⁴ tn The jussives in this verse are both Hiphil, the first from the verb “to gaze; to look intently [or, carefully],” (נָבַט, navat) and the second from the verb “to be smooth, straight” (יָשָׁר, yashar).

[4:25]  ⁵ tn Heb “your eyelids.” The term “eyelids” is often a poetic synonym for “eye” (it is a metonymy of adjunct, something connected with the eye put for the eye that sees); it may intensify the idea as one might squint to gain a clearer look.

[4:26]  ⁶ tn Heb “path of your foot.”

[4:26]  ⁷ sn The verb is a denominative Piel from the word פֶּלֶס (peles), “balance; scale.” In addition to telling the disciple to keep focused on a righteous life, the sage tells him to keep his path level, which is figurative for living the righteous life.

[4:26]  ⁸ tn The vav prefixed to the beginning of this dependent clause denotes purpose/result following the preceding imperative.

[4:26]  ⁹ tn The Niphal jussive from כּוּן (cun, “to be fixed; to be established; to be steadfast”) continues the idiom of walking and ways for the moral sense in life.

[4:27]  ¹⁰ sn The two verbs in this verse are from different roots, but nonetheless share the same semantic domain. The first verb is תֵּט (tet), a jussive from נָטָה (natah), which means “to turn aside” (Hiphil); the second verb is the Hiphil imperative of סוּר (sur), which means “to cause to turn to the side” (Hiphil). The disciple is not to leave the path of righteousness; but to stay on the path he must leave evil.

[4:27]  ¹¹ tn Heb “your foot” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV). The term רַגְלְךָ (raglÿkha, “your foot”) is a synecdoche of part (= foot) for the whole person (= “yourself”).

[4:27]  ¹² tc The LXX adds, “For the way of the right hand God knows, but those of the left hand are distorted; and he himself will make straight your paths and guide your goings in peace.” The ideas presented here are not out of harmony with Proverbs, but the section clearly shows an expansion by the translator. For a brief discussion of whether this addition is Jewish or early Christian, see C. H. Toy, Proverbs (ICC), 99.

[35:8]  ¹³ tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “and there will be there a road and a way, and the Way of Holiness it will be called.” וְדֶרֶךְ (vÿderekh, “and a/the way”) is accidentally duplicated; the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a does not reflect the repetition of the phrase.

[35:8]  ¹⁴ tn The precise meaning of this line is uncertain. The text reads literally “and it is for them, the one who walks [on the] way.” In this context those authorized to use the Way of Holiness would be morally upright people who are the recipients of God’s deliverance, in contrast to the morally impure and foolish who are excluded from the new covenant community.

[35:8]  ¹⁵ tn In this context “fools” are those who are morally corrupt, not those with limited intellectual capacity.

[10:35]  ¹⁶ sn See Luke 24:47.

[10:35]  ¹⁷ tn Or “shows reverence for him.”

[10:35]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “works righteousness”; the translation “does what is right” for this phrase in this verse is given by L&N 25.85.

[24:16]  ¹⁹ tn BDAG 329 s.v. ἐν 9.a, “ἐν τούτῳ πιστεύομεν this is the reason why we believe Jn 16:30; cp. Ac 24:16.”

[24:16]  ²⁰ tn BDAG 224 s.v. διά 2.a, “διὰ παντός…always, continually, constantly…Ac 2:25 (Ps 15:8); 10:2; 24:16.” However, the positioning of the adverb “always” in the English translation is difficult; the position used is one of the least awkward.

[24:16]  ²¹ tn BDAG 125 s.v. ἀπρόσκοπος 1 has “ἀ. συνείδησις a clear conscience Ac 24:16.”

[24:16]  ²² tn Grk “men,” but this is a generic use (Paul does not have only males in view).

[2:10]  ²³ tn Or “showing that genuine faith is productive.” At issue between these two translations is the force of ἀγαθήν (agaqhn): Is it attributive (as the text has it) or predicate (as in this note)? A number of considerations point in the direction of a predicate ἀγαθήν (e.g., separation from the noun πίστιν (pistin) by the verb, the possibility that the construction is an object-complement, etc.), though is not usually seen as an option in either translations or commentaries. Cf. ExSyn 188-89, 312-13, for a discussion. Contextually, it makes an intriguing statement, for it suggests a synthetic or synonymous parallel: “‘Slaves should be wholly subject to their masters…demonstrating that all [genuine] faith is productive, with the result [ecbatic ἵνα] that they will completely adorn the doctrine of God.’ The point of the text, then, if this understanding is correct, is an exhortation to slaves to demonstrate that their faith is sincere and results in holy behavior. If taken this way, the text seems to support the idea that saving faith does not fail, but even results in good works” (ExSyn 312-13). The translation of ἀγαθήν as an attributive adjective, however, also makes good sense.

[2:10]  ²⁴ tn Or “adorn,” “show the beauty of.”

[2:11]  ²⁵ tn Grk “all men”; but ἀνθρώποις (anqrwpois) is generic here, referring to both men and women.

[2:12]  ²⁶ tn Grk “training us” (as a continuation of the previous clause). Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started at the beginning of v. 12 by translating the participle παιδεύουσα (paideuousa) as a finite verb and supplying the pronoun “it” as subject.

[2:12]  ²⁷ tn Grk “ungodliness.”

[2:13]  ²⁸ tn Grk “the blessed hope and glorious appearing.”

[2:13]  ²⁹ tn The terms “God and Savior” both refer to the same person, Jesus Christ. This is one of the clearest statements in the NT concerning the deity of Christ. The construction in Greek is known as the Granville Sharp rule, named after the English philanthropist-linguist who first clearly articulated the rule in 1798. Sharp pointed out that in the construction article-noun-καί-noun (where καί [kai] = “and”), when two nouns are singular, personal, and common (i.e., not proper names), they always had the same referent. Illustrations such as “the friend and brother,” “the God and Father,” etc. abound in the NT to prove Sharp’s point. The only issue is whether terms such as “God” and “Savior” could be considered common nouns as opposed to proper names. Sharp and others who followed (such as T. F. Middleton in his masterful The Doctrine of the Greek Article) demonstrated that a proper name in Greek was one that could not be pluralized. Since both “God” (θεός, qeos) and “savior” (σωτήρ, swthr) were occasionally found in the plural, they did not constitute proper names, and hence, do fit Sharp’s rule. Although there have been 200 years of attempts to dislodge Sharp’s rule, all attempts have been futile. Sharp’s rule stands vindicated after all the dust has settled. For more information on Sharp’s rule see ExSyn 270-78, esp. 276. See also 2 Pet 1:1 and Jude 4.

[2:14]  ³⁰ tn Grk “who” (as a continuation of the previous clause).

[2:14]  ³¹ tn Or “a people who are his very own.”

[2:14]  ³² tn Grk “for good works.”