Psalms 73:25

73:25 Whom do I have in heaven but you?

I desire no one but you on earth. ¹ 

Psalms 143:6-7

143:6 I spread my hands out to you in prayer; ² 

my soul thirsts for you in a parched ³  land. ⁴ 

143:7 Answer me quickly, Lord!

My strength is fading. ⁵ 

Do not reject me, ⁶ 

or I will join ⁷  those descending into the grave. ⁸ 

Genesis 32:26-28

32:26 Then the man ⁹  said, “Let me go, for the dawn is breaking.” ¹⁰  “I will not let you go,” Jacob replied, ¹¹  “unless you bless me.” ¹²  32:27 The man asked him, ¹³  “What is your name?” ¹⁴  He answered, “Jacob.” 32:28 “No longer will your name be Jacob,” the man told him, ¹⁵  “but Israel, ¹⁶  because you have fought ¹⁷  with God and with men and have prevailed.”

Genesis 32:2

32:2 When Jacob saw them, he exclaimed, ¹⁸  “This is the camp of God!” So he named that place Mahanaim. ¹⁹ 

Genesis 31:21

31:21 He left ²⁰  with all he owned. He quickly crossed ²¹  the Euphrates River ²²  and headed for ²³  the hill country of Gilead.

The Song of Songs 3:2

3:2 “I will arise ²⁴  and look all around ²⁵  throughout the town,

and throughout the streets ²⁶  and squares;

I will search for my beloved.”

I searched for him but I did not find him. ²⁷ 

Isaiah 26:9

26:9 I ²⁸  look for ²⁹  you during the night,

my spirit within me seeks you at dawn,

for when your judgments come upon the earth,

those who live in the world learn about justice. ³⁰ 

Matthew 11:12

11:12 From ³¹  the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and forceful people lay hold of it. ³² 

Luke 13:24

13:24 “Exert every effort ³³  to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.

Luke 18:5-7

18:5 yet because this widow keeps on bothering me, I will give her justice, or in the end she will wear me out ³⁴  by her unending pleas.’” ³⁵  18:6 And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unrighteous judge says! ³⁶  18:7 Won’t ³⁷  God give justice to his chosen ones, who cry out ³⁸  to him day and night? ³⁹  Will he delay ⁴⁰  long to help them?

[73:25]  ¹ tn Heb “Who [is there] for me in heaven? And besides you I do not desire [anyone] in the earth.” The psalmist uses a merism (heaven/earth) to emphasize that God is the sole object of his desire and worship in the entire universe.

[143:6]  ² tn The words “in prayer” are supplied in the translation to clarify that the psalmist is referring to a posture of prayer.

[143:6]  ³ tn Heb “faint” or “weary.” See Ps 63:1.

[143:6]  ⁴ tc Heb “my soul like a faint land for you.” A verb (perhaps “thirsts”) is implied (see Ps 63:1). The translation assumes an emendation of the preposition -כְּ (kÿ, “like”) to -בְּ (bÿ, “in,” see Ps 63:1; cf. NEB “athirst for thee in a thirsty land”). If the MT is retained, one might translate, “my soul thirsts for you, as a parched land does for water/rain” (cf. NIV, NRSV).

[143:7]  ⁵ tn Heb “my spirit is failing.”

[143:7]  ⁶ tn Heb “do not hide your face from me.” The idiom “hide the face” (1) can mean “ignore” (see Pss 10:11; 13:1; 51:9) or (2) can carry the stronger idea of “reject” (see Pss 30:7; 88:14).

[143:7]  ⁷ tn Heb “I will be equal with.”

[143:7]  ⁸ tn Heb “the pit.” The Hebrew noun בּוֹר (bor, “pit; cistern”) is sometimes used of the grave and/or the realm of the dead. See Ps 28:1.

[32:26]  ⁹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (the man) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[32:26]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “dawn has arisen.”

[32:26]  ¹¹ tn Heb “and he said, ‘I will not let you go.’” The referent of the pronoun “he” (Jacob) has been specified for clarity, and the order of the introductory clause and the direct discourse has been rearranged in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[32:26]  ¹² sn Jacob wrestled with a man thinking him to be a mere man, and on that basis was equal to the task. But when it had gone on long enough, the night visitor touched Jacob and crippled him. Jacob’s request for a blessing can only mean that he now knew that his opponent was supernatural. Contrary to many allegorical interpretations of the passage that make fighting equivalent to prayer, this passage shows that Jacob stopped fighting, and then asked for a blessing.

[32:27]  ¹³ tn Heb “and he said to him.” The referent of the pronoun “he” (the man who wrestled with Jacob) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[32:27]  ¹⁴ sn What is your name? The question is rhetorical, since the Lord obviously knew Jacob’s identity. But since the Lord is going to change Jacob’s name, this question is designed to bring focus Jacob’s attention on all that his name had come to signify.

[32:28]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “and he said.” The referent of the pronoun “he” (the man who wrestled with Jacob) has been specified for clarity, and the order of the introductory clause and the direct discourse has been rearranged in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[32:28]  ¹⁶ sn The name Israel is a common construction, using a verb with a theophoric element (אֵל, ’el) that usually indicates the subject of the verb. Here it means “God fights.” This name will replace the name Jacob; it will be both a promise and a call for faith. In essence, the Lord was saying that Jacob would have victory and receive the promises because God would fight for him.

[32:28]  ¹⁷ sn You have fought. The explanation of the name Israel includes a sound play. In Hebrew the verb translated “you have fought” (שָׂרִיתָ, sarita) sounds like the name “Israel” (יִשְׂרָאֵל, yisra’el ), meaning “God fights” (although some interpret the meaning as “he fights [with] God”). The name would evoke the memory of the fight and what it meant. A. Dillmann says that ever after this the name would tell the Israelites that, when Jacob contended successfully with God, he won the battle with man (Genesis, 2:279). To be successful with God meant that he had to be crippled in his own self-sufficiency (A. P. Ross, “Jacob at the Jabboq, Israel at Peniel,” BSac 142 [1985]: 51-62).

[32:2]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “and Jacob said when he saw them.”

[32:2]  ¹⁹ sn The name Mahanaim apparently means “two camps.” Perhaps the two camps were those of God and of Jacob.

[31:21]  ²⁰ tn Heb “and he fled.”

[31:21]  ²¹ tn Heb “he arose and crossed.” The first verb emphasizes that he wasted no time in getting across.

[31:21]  ²² tn Heb “the river”; the referent (the Euphrates) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[31:21]  ²³ tn Heb “he set his face.”

[3:2]  ²⁴ sn Three 1st person common singular cohortatives appear in verse 2: אָקוּמָה (’aqumah, “I will arise”), אֲסוֹבְבָה (’asovÿvah, “I will go about”), and אֲבַקְשָׁה (’avaqshah, “I will seek”). These cohortatives have been taken in two basic senses: (1) resolve: “I will arise…I will go about…I will seek” (KJV, NIV) or (2) necessity: “I must arise…I must go about…I must seek” (NASB, NJPS). There is no ethical or moral obligation/necessity, but the context emphasizes her intense determination (e.g., 3:4b). Therefore, they should be classified as cohortatives of resolve, expressing the speaker’s determination to pursue a course of action. The three-fold repetition of the cohortative form emphasizes the intensity of her determination.

[3:2]  ²⁵ tn The root סָבַב (savav) in the Qal stem means “to go around, to do a circuit” (1 Sam 7:16; 2 Chr 17:9; 23:2; Eccl 12:5; Song 3:3; Isa 23:16; Hab 2:16), while the Polel stem means “to prowl around” (Ps 59:7, 15; Song 3:2) (HALOT 739-740 s.v. סבב). The idea here is that the Beloved is determined to “look all around” until she finds her beloved.

[3:2]  ²⁶ sn There is a consonantal wordplay in 3:2 between the roots בּקשׁ and בּשׁק, that is, between אֲבַקְשָׁה (’avaqshah, “I will seek [him]”) and בַּשְּׁוָקִים (bashshÿvaqim, “streets”). The wordplay emphasizes that she searched in every nook and cranny.

[3:2]  ²⁷ sn The statement בִּקַּשְׁתִּיו וְלֹא מְצָאתִיו (biqqashtiv vÿlo’ mÿtsa’tiv, “I sought him but I did not find him”) appears twice in 3:1-2. In both cases it concludes a set of cola. The repetition depicts her mounting disappointment in her failure to locate her beloved. It stands in strong contrast with 3:4.

[26:9]  ²⁸ tn Heb “with my soul I.” This is a figure for the speaker himself (“I”).

[26:9]  ²⁹ tn Or “long for, desire.” The speaker acknowledges that he is eager to see God come in judgment (see vv. 8, 9b).

[26:9]  ³⁰ tn The translation understands צֶדֶק (tsedeq) in the sense of “justice,” but it is possible that it carries the nuance “righteousness,” in which case one might translate, “those who live in the world learn to live in a righteous manner” (cf. NCV).

[11:12]  ³¹ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[11:12]  ³² tn Or “the kingdom of heaven is forcibly entered and violent people take hold of it.” For a somewhat different interpretation of this passage, see the note on the phrase “urged to enter in” in Luke 16:16.

[13:24]  ³³ tn Or “Make every effort” (L&N 68.74; cf. NIV); “Do your best” (TEV); “Work hard” (NLT); Grk “Struggle.” The idea is to exert one’s maximum effort (cf. BDAG 17 s.v. ἀγωνίζομαι 2.b, “strain every nerve to enter”) because of the supreme importance of attaining entry into the kingdom of God.

[18:5]  ³⁴ tn The term ὑπωπιάζω (Jupwpiazw) in this context means “to wear someone out by continual annoying” (L&N 25.245).

[18:5]  ³⁵ tn Grk “by her continual coming,” but the point of annoyance to the judge is her constant pleas for justice (v. 3).

[18:6]  ³⁶ sn Listen to what the unrighteous judge says! The point of the parable is that the judge’s lack of compassion was overcome by the widow’s persistence.

[18:7]  ³⁷ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[18:7]  ³⁸ sn The prayers have to do with the righteous who cry out to him to receive justice. The context assumes the righteous are persecuted.

[18:7]  ³⁹ tn The emphatic particles in this sentence indicate that God will indeed give justice to the righteous.

[18:7]  ⁴⁰ sn The issue of delay has produced a whole host of views for this verse. (1) Does this assume provision to endure in the meantime? Or (2) does it mean God restricts the level of persecution until he comes? Either view is possible.