Psalms 16:10

16:10 You will not abandon me ¹  to Sheol; ² 

you will not allow your faithful follower ³  to see ⁴  the Pit. ⁵ 

Isaiah 14:9

14:9 Sheol ⁶  below is stirred up about you,

ready to meet you when you arrive.

It rouses ⁷  the spirits of the dead for you,

all the former leaders of the earth; ⁸ 

it makes all the former kings of the nations

rise from their thrones. ⁹ 

Matthew 12:40

12:40 For just as Jonah was in the belly of the huge fish ¹⁰  for three days and three nights, ¹¹  so the Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights.

Acts 2:27

2:27 because you will not leave my soul in Hades, ¹² 

nor permit your Holy One to experience ¹³  decay.

[16:10]  ¹ tn Or “my life.” The suffixed form of נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, “being”) is often equivalent to a pronoun in poetic texts.

[16:10]  ² sn In ancient Israelite cosmology Sheol is the realm of the dead, viewed as being under the earth’s surface. See L. I. J. Stadelmann, The Hebrew Conception of the World, 165-76.

[16:10]  ³ tn A “faithful follower” (חָסִיד [khasid], traditionally rendered “holy one”) is one who does what is right in God’s eyes and remains faithful to God (see Pss 4:3; 12:1; 18:25; 31:23; 37:28; 86:2; 97:10). The psalmist here refers to himself, as the parallel line (“You will not abandon me to Sheol”) indicates.

[16:10]  ⁴ tn That is, “experience.” The psalmist is confident that the Lord will protect him in his present crisis (see v. 1) and prevent him from dying.

[16:10]  ⁵ tn The Hebrew word שָׁחַת (shakhat, “pit”) is often used as a title for Sheol (see Pss 30:9; 49:9; 55:24; 103:4). Note the parallelism with the previous line.

[14:9]  ⁶ sn Sheol is the proper name of the subterranean world which was regarded as the land of the dead.

[14:9]  ⁷ tn Heb “arousing.” The form is probably a Polel infinitive absolute, rather than a third masculine singular perfect, for Sheol is grammatically feminine (note “stirred up”). See GKC 466 §145.t.

[14:9]  ⁸ tn Heb “all the rams of the earth.” The animal epithet is used metaphorically here for leaders. See HALOT 903 s.v. *עַתּוּד.

[14:9]  ⁹ tn Heb “lifting from their thrones all the kings of the nations.” הֵקִים (heqim, a Hiphil perfect third masculine singular) should be emended to an infinitive absolute (הָקֵים, haqem). See the note on “rouses” earlier in the verse.

[12:40]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “large sea creature.”

[12:40]  ¹¹ sn A quotation from Jonah 1:17.

[2:27]  ¹² tn Or “will not abandon my soul to Hades.” Often “Hades” is the equivalent of the Hebrew term Sheol, the place of the dead.

[2:27]  ¹³ tn Grk “to see,” but the literal translation of the phrase “to see decay” could be misunderstood to mean simply “to look at decay,” while here “see decay” is really figurative for “experience decay.”