Psalms 78:65

78:65 But then the Lord awoke from his sleep; ¹ 

he was like a warrior in a drunken rage. ² 

Numbers 23:21

23:21 He ³  has not looked on iniquity in Jacob, ⁴ 

nor has he seen trouble ⁵  in Israel.

The Lord their God is with them;

his acclamation ⁶  as king is among them.

Numbers 23:2

23:2 So Balak did just as Balaam had said. Balak and Balaam then offered on each ⁷  altar a bull and a ram.

Numbers 6:15

6:15 and a basket of bread made without yeast, cakes of fine flour mixed with olive oil, wafers made without yeast and smeared with olive oil, and their ⁸  grain offering and their drink offerings. ⁹ 

Numbers 6:1

The Nazirite Vow

6:1 ¹⁰ Then the Lord spoke to Moses:

Numbers 15:28

15:28 And the priest must make atonement for the person who sins unintentionally – when he sins unintentionally before the Lord – to make atonement for him, and he will be forgiven.

[78:65]  ¹ tn Heb “and the master awoke like one sleeping.” The Lord’s apparent inactivity during the time of judgment is compared to sleep.

[78:65]  ² tn Heb “like a warrior overcome with wine.” The Hebrew verb רוּן (run, “overcome”) occurs only here in the OT. The phrase “overcome with wine” could picture a drunken warrior controlled by his emotions and passions (as in the present translation), or it could refer to a warrior who awakes from a drunken stupor.

[23:21]  ³ tn These could be understood as impersonal and so rendered “no one has discovered.”

[23:21]  ⁴ sn The line could mean that God has regarded Israel as the ideal congregation without any blemish or flaw. But it could also mean that God has not looked on their iniquity, meaning, held it against them.

[23:21]  ⁵ tn The word means “wrong, misery, trouble.” It can mean the idea of “disaster” as well, for that too is trouble. Here it is parallel to “iniquity” and so has the connotation of something that would give God reason to curse them.

[23:21]  ⁶ tn The people are blessed because God is their king. In fact, the shout of acclamation is among them – they are proclaiming the Lord God as their king. The word is used normally for the sound of the trumpet, but also of battle shouts, and then here acclamation. This would represent their conviction that Yahweh is king. On the usage of this Hebrew word see further BDB 929-30 s.v. תְּרוּעָה; HALOT 1790-91 s.v.

[23:2]  ⁷ tn The Hebrew text has “on the altar,” but since there were seven of each animal and seven altars, the implication is that this means on each altar.

[6:15]  ⁸ tn The suffixes in the MT are plural in this verse, whereas in v. 17 they are singular. This seems to be a matter of stylistic choice, referring to whomever may be taking the vow.

[6:15]  ⁹ sn The offerings for the termination of the Nazirite vow would not have been inexpensive. This indicates that the person making the short term vow may have had income, or have come from a wealthier section of society. Short term vows had to be considered carefully as this ruling required a good amount of food to be brought.

[6:1]  ¹⁰ sn This chapter can be divided into five sections: The vow is described in vv. 1-8, then the contingencies for defilement are enumerated in vv. 9-12, then there is a discussion of discharging the vows in vv. 13-20, and then a summary in v. 21; after this is the high priestly blessing (vv. 22-27). For information on the vow, see G. B. Gray, “The Nazirite,” JTS 1 (1899-1900): 201-11; Z. Weisman, “The Biblical Nazirite, Its Types and Roots,” Tarbiz 36 (1967): 207-20; and W. Eichrodt, Theology of the Old Testament (OTL), 1:303-6.