Malachi 1:9

1:9 But now plead for God’s favor ¹  that he might be gracious to us. ²  “With this kind of offering in your hands, how can he be pleased with you?” asks the Lord who rules over all.

Malachi 2:10-11

The Rebellion of the People

2:10 Do we not all have one father? ³  Did not one God create us? Why do we betray one another, in this way making light of the covenant of our ancestors? 2:11 Judah has become disloyal, and unspeakable sins have been committed in Israel and Jerusalem. ⁴  For Judah has profaned ⁵  the holy things that the Lord loves and has turned to a foreign god! ⁶ 

Malachi 2:16

2:16 “I hate divorce,” ⁷  says the Lord God of Israel, “and the one who is guilty of violence,” ⁸  says the Lord who rules over all. “Pay attention to your conscience, and do not be unfaithful.”

Malachi 3:14

3:14 You have said, ‘It is useless to serve God. How have we been helped ⁹  by keeping his requirements and going about like mourners before the Lord who rules over all? ¹⁰ 

Malachi 3:18

3:18 Then once more you will see that I make a distinction between ¹¹  the righteous and the wicked, between the one who serves God and the one who does not.

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¹ tn Heb “seek the face of God.”

² tn After the imperative, the prefixed verbal form with vav conjunction indicates purpose (cf. NASB, NRSV).

³ sn The rhetorical question Do we not all have one father? by no means teaches the “universal fatherhood of God,” that is, that all people equally are children of God. The reference to the covenant in v. 10 as well as to Israel and Judah (v. 11) makes it clear that the referent of “we” is God’s elect people.

⁴ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

⁵ tn Or perhaps “secularized”; cf. NIV “desecrated”; TEV, NLT “defiled”; CEV “disgraced.”

⁶ tn Heb “has married the daughter of a foreign god.” Marriage is used here as a metaphor to describe Judah’s idolatry, that is, her unfaithfulness to the Lord and “remarriage” to pagan gods. But spiritual intermarriage found expression in literal, physical marriage as well, as vv. 14-16 indicate.

⁷ tc The verb שָׂנֵא (sane’) appears to be a third person form, “he hates,” which makes little sense in the context, unless one emends the following word to a third person verb as well. Then one might translate, “he [who] hates [his wife] [and] divorces her…is guilty of violence.” A similar translation is advocated by M. A. Shields, “Syncretism and Divorce in Malachi 2,10-16,” ZAW 111 (1999): 81-85. However, it is possible that the first person pronoun אָנֹכִי (’anokhi, “I”) has accidentally dropped from the text after כִּי (ki). If one restores the pronoun, the form שָׂנֵא can be taken as a participle and the text translated, “for I hate” (so NAB, NASB, NRSV, NLT).

sn Though the statement “I hate divorce” may (and should) be understood as a comprehensive biblical principle, the immediate context suggests that the divorce in view is that of one Jewish person by another in order to undertake subsequent marriages. The injunction here by no means contradicts Ezra’s commands to Jewish men to divorce their heathen wives (Ezra 9–10).

⁸ tn Heb “him who covers his garment with violence” (similar ASV, NRSV). Here “garment” is a metaphor for appearance and “violence” a metonymy of effect for cause. God views divorce as an act of violence against the victim.

⁹ tn Heb “What [is the] profit”; NIV “What did we gain.”

¹⁰ sn The people’s public display of self-effacing piety has gone unrewarded by the Lord. The reason, of course, is that it was blatantly hypocritical.

¹¹ tn Heb “you will see between.” Cf. NRSV, TEV, NLT “see the difference.”