23:21 He 5 has not looked on iniquity in Jacob, 6
nor has he seen trouble 7 in Israel.
The Lord their God is with them;
his acclamation 8 as king is among them.
1 tn The verse begins with the perfect tense of עָבַד (’avad) with vav (ו) consecutive, making the form equal to the instructions preceding it. As its object the verb has the cognate accusative “service.”
2 sn The Levites have the care of the tent of meeting, and so they are responsible for any transgressions against it.
3 tn Heb “they”; the referent (the Levites) has been supplied in the translation for clarity.
4 tn The Hebrew text uses both the verb and the object from the same root to stress the point: They will not inherit an inheritance. The inheritance refers to land.
5 tn These could be understood as impersonal and so rendered “no one has discovered.”
6 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.
7 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.
8 tn The people are blessed because God is their king. In fact, the shout of acclamation is among them – they are proclaiming the