Psalms 36:6

36:6 Your justice is like the highest mountains, ¹ 

your fairness like the deepest sea;

you preserve ²  mankind and the animal kingdom. ³ 

Psalms 77:19

77:19 You walked through the sea; ⁴ 

you passed through the surging waters, ⁵ 

but left no footprints. ⁶ 

Psalms 97:2

97:2 Dark clouds surround him;

equity and justice are the foundation of his throne. ⁷ 

Proverbs 30:2-3

30:2 Surely ⁸  I am more brutish ⁹  than any other human being, ¹⁰ 

and I do not have human understanding; ¹¹ 

30:3 I have not learned wisdom,

nor do I have knowledge ¹²  of the Holy One. ¹³ 

Ecclesiastes 8:17

8:17 then I discerned all that God has done: ¹⁴ 

No one really comprehends what happens ¹⁵  on earth. ¹⁶ 

Despite all human ¹⁷  efforts to discover it, no one can ever grasp ¹⁸  it. ¹⁹ 

Even if ²⁰  a wise person claimed ²¹  that he understood,

he would not really comprehend ²²  it. ²³ 

Romans 11:33

11:33 Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how fathomless his ways!

[36:6]  ¹ tn Heb “mountains of God.” The divine name אֵל (’el, “God”) is here used in an idiomatic manner to indicate the superlative.

[36:6]  ² tn Or “deliver.”

[36:6]  ³ sn God’s justice/fairness is firm and reliable like the highest mountains and as abundant as the water in the deepest sea. The psalmist uses a legal metaphor to describe God’s preservation of his creation. Like a just judge who vindicates the innocent, God protects his creation from destructive forces.

[77:19]  ⁴ tn Heb “in the sea [was] your way.”

[77:19]  ⁵ tn Heb “and your paths [were] in the mighty waters.”

[77:19]  ⁶ tn Heb “and your footprints were not known.”

[97:2]  ⁷ sn The Lord’s throne symbolizes his kingship.

[30:2]  ⁸ tn The particle כִּי (ki) functions in an asseverative sense, “surely; indeed; truly” (R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 73, §449).

[30:2]  ⁹ tn The noun בַּעַר (ba’ar) means “brutishness”; here it functions as a predicate adjective. It is followed by מֵאִישׁ (me’ish) expressing comparative degree: “more than a man” or “more than any man,” with “man” used in a generic sense. He is saying that he has fallen beneath the level of mankind. Cf. NRSV “I am too stupid to be human.”

[30:2]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “than man.” The verse is using hyperbole; this individual feels as if he has no intelligence at all, that he is more brutish than any other human. Of course this is not true, or he would not be able to speculate on the God of the universe at all.

[30:2]  ¹¹ tn Heb “the understanding of a man,” with “man” used attributively here.

[30:3]  ¹² sn The construction uses repetition to make the point emphatically: “I do not know the knowledge of the Holy One.” Agur’s claim to being “brutish” is here clarified – he is not one of those who has knowledge or understanding of God. C. H. Toy thinks the speaker is being sarcastic in reference to others who may have claimed such knowledge (Proverbs [ICC], 521).

[30:3]  ¹³ tn The epithet “the Holy One” is the adjective “holy” put in the masculine plural (as in 9:10). This will harmonize with the plural of majesty used to explain the plural with titles for God. However, NRSV takes the plural as a reference to the “holy ones,” presumably referring to angelic beings.

[8:17]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “all the work of God.”

[8:17]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “the work that is done.”

[8:17]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “under the sun.”

[8:17]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “his”; the referent (man, in a generic sense) has been specified in the translation as the adjective “human” for clarity.

[8:17]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “find.”

[8:17]  ¹⁹ tn The term “it” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for smoothness.

[8:17]  ²⁰ tn The particle אִם (’im, “even if”) introduces the protasis in a real conditional clause (“If a wise man …”); see IBHS 636-37 §38.2d; R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 74, §453.

[8:17]  ²¹ tn The imperfect tense verb יֹאמַר (yo’mar, “to say”) functions in a modal sense, denoting possibility (see IBHS 508 §31.4e; R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 31, §169).

[8:17]  ²² tn Heb “he cannot find”; or “he does not find.”

[8:17]  ²³ tn The term “it” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is an implied direct object and has been supplied in the translation for smoothness and stylistic reasons.