Psalms 58:3

58:3 The wicked turn aside from birth; ¹ 

liars go astray as soon as they are born. ² 

Genesis 5:3

5:3 When ³  Adam had lived 130 years he fathered a son in his own likeness, according to his image, and he named him Seth.

Genesis 8:21

8:21 And the Lord smelled the soothing aroma ⁴  and said ⁵  to himself, ⁶  “I will never again curse ⁷  the ground because of humankind, even though ⁸  the inclination of their minds ⁹  is evil from childhood on. ¹⁰  I will never again destroy everything that lives, as I have just done.

Job 14:4

14:4 Who can make ¹¹  a clean thing come from an unclean? ¹² 

No one!

Job 15:14-16

15:14 What is man that he should be pure,

or one born of woman, that he should be righteous?

15:15 If God places no trust in his holy ones, ¹³ 

if even the heavens ¹⁴  are not pure in his eyes,

15:16 how much less man, who is abominable and corrupt, ¹⁵ 

who drinks in evil like water! ¹⁶ 

John 3:6

3:6 What is born of the flesh is flesh, ¹⁷  and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.

Romans 5:12

The Amplification of Justification

5:12 So then, just as sin entered the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all people ¹⁸  because ¹⁹  all sinned –

Ephesians 2:3

2:3 among whom ²⁰  all of us ²¹  also ²²  formerly lived out our lives in the cravings of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath ²³  even as the rest… ²⁴ 

[58:3]  ¹ tn Heb “from the womb.”

[58:3]  ² tn Heb “speakers of a lie go astray from the womb.”

[5:3]  ³ tn Heb “and Adam lived 130 years.” In the translation the verb is subordinated to the following verb, “and he fathered,” and rendered as a temporal clause.

[8:21]  ⁴ tn The Lord “smelled” (וַיָּרַח, vayyarakh) a “soothing smell” (רֵיחַ הַנִּיהֹחַ, reakh hannihoakh). The object forms a cognate accusative with the verb. The language is anthropomorphic. The offering had a sweet aroma that pleased or soothed. The expression in Lev 1 signifies that God accepts the offering with pleasure, and in accepting the offering he accepts the worshiper.

[8:21]  ⁵ tn Heb “and the Lord said.”

[8:21]  ⁶ tn Heb “in his heart.”

[8:21]  ⁷ tn Here the Hebrew word translated “curse” is קָלָל (qalal), used in the Piel verbal stem.

[8:21]  ⁸ tn The Hebrew particle כִּי (ki) can be used in a concessive sense (see BDB 473 s.v. כִּי), which makes good sense in this context. Its normal causal sense (“for”) does not fit the context here very well.

[8:21]  ⁹ tn Heb “the inclination of the heart of humankind.”

[8:21]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “from his youth.”

[14:4]  ¹¹ tn The expression is מִי־יִתֵּן (mi-yitten, “who will give”; see GKC 477 §151.b). Some commentators (H. H. Rowley and A. B. Davidson) wish to take this as the optative formula: “O that a clean might come out of an unclean!” But that does not fit the verse very well, and still requires the addition of a verb. The exclamation here simply implies something impossible – man is unable to attain purity.

[14:4]  ¹² sn The point being made is that the entire human race is contaminated by sin, and therefore cannot produce something pure. In this context, since man is born of woman, it is saying that the woman and the man who is brought forth from her are impure. See Ps 51:5; Isa 6:5; and Gen 6:5.

[15:15]  ¹³ tn Eliphaz here reiterates the point made in Job 4:18.

[15:15]  ¹⁴ sn The question here is whether the reference is to material “heavens” (as in Exod 24:10 and Job 25:5), or to heavenly beings. The latter seems preferable in this context.

[15:16]  ¹⁵ tn The two descriptions here used are “abominable,” meaning “disgusting” (a Niphal participle with the value of a Latin participle [see GKC 356-57 §116.e]), and “corrupt” (a Niphal participle which occurs only in Pss 14:3 and 53:4), always in a moral sense. On the significance of the first description, see P. Humbert, “Le substantif toáe„ba„ et le verbe táb dans l’Ancien Testament,” ZAW 72 [1960]: 217ff.). On the second word, G. R. Driver suggests from Arabic, “debauched with luxury, corrupt” (“Some Hebrew Words,” JTS 29 [1927/28]: 390-96).

[15:16]  ¹⁶ sn Man commits evil with the same ease and facility as he drinks in water – freely and in large quantities.

[3:6]  ¹⁷ sn What is born of the flesh is flesh, i.e., what is born of physical heritage is physical. (It is interesting to compare this terminology with that of the dialogue in John 4, especially 4:23, 24.) For John the “flesh” (σάρξ, sarx) emphasizes merely the weakness and mortality of the creature – a neutral term, not necessarily sinful as in Paul. This is confirmed by the reference in John 1:14 to the Logos becoming “flesh.” The author avoids associating sinfulness with the incarnate Christ.

[5:12]  ¹⁸ tn Here ἀνθρώπους (anqrwpou") has been translated as a generic (“people”) since both men and women are clearly intended in this context.

[5:12]  ¹⁹ tn The translation of the phrase ἐφ᾿ ᾧ (ef Jw) has been heavily debated. For a discussion of all the possibilities, see C. E. B. Cranfield, “On Some of the Problems in the Interpretation of Romans 5.12,” SJT 22 (1969): 324-41. Only a few of the major options can be mentioned here: (1) the phrase can be taken as a relative clause in which the pronoun refers to Adam, “death spread to all people in whom [Adam] all sinned.” (2) The phrase can be taken with consecutive (resultative) force, meaning “death spread to all people with the result that all sinned.” (3) Others take the phrase as causal in force: “death spread to all people because all sinned.”

[2:3]  ²⁰ sn Among whom. The relative pronoun phrase that begins v. 3 is identical, except for gender, to the one that begins v. 2 (ἐν αἵς [en Jais], ἐν οἵς [en Jois]). By the structure, the author is building an argument for our hopeless condition: We lived in sin and we lived among sinful people. Our doom looked to be sealed as well in v. 2: Both the external environment (kingdom of the air) and our internal motivation and attitude (the spirit that is now energizing) were under the devil’s thumb (cf. 2 Cor 4:4).

[2:3]  ²¹ tn Grk “we all.”

[2:3]  ²² tn Or “even.”

[2:3]  ²³ sn Children of wrath is a Semitic idiom which may mean either “people characterized by wrath” or “people destined for wrath.”

[2:3]  ²⁴ sn Eph 2:1-3. The translation of vv. 1-3 is very literal, even to the point of retaining the awkward syntax of the original. See note on the word dead in 2:1.