Discovery BoxMalachi 4:2-5 
Context4:2 But for you who respect my name, the sun of vindication 1 will rise with healing wings, 2 and you will skip about 3 like calves released from the stall. 4:3 You will trample on the wicked, for they will be like ashes under the soles of your feet on the day which I am preparing,” says the Lord who rules over all.
4:4 “Remember the law of my servant Moses, to whom at Horeb 4 I gave rules and regulations for all Israel to obey. 5 4:5 Look, I will send you Elijah 6 the prophet before the great and terrible day of the Lord arrives.
1 tn Here the Hebrew word צְדָקָה (tsÿdaqah), usually translated “righteousness” (so KJV, NIV, NRSV, NLT; cf. NAB “justice”), has been rendered as “vindication” because it is the vindication of God’s people that is in view in the context. Cf. BDB 842 s.v. צְדָקָה 6; “righteousness as vindicated, justification, salvation, etc.”
sn The expression the sun of vindication will rise is a metaphorical way of describing the day of the
2 sn The point of the metaphor of healing wings is unclear. The sun seems to be compared to a bird. Perhaps the sun’s “wings” are its warm rays. “Healing” may refer to a reversal of the injury done by evildoers (see Mal 3:5).
3 tn Heb “you will go out and skip about.”
4 sn Horeb is another name for Mount Sinai (cf. Exod 3:1).
5 tn Heb “which I commanded him in Horeb concerning all Israel, statutes and ordinances.”
6 sn I will send you Elijah the prophet. In light of the ascension of Elijah to heaven without dying (2 Kgs 2:11), Judaism has always awaited his return as an aspect of the messianic age (see, e.g., John 1:19-28). Jesus identified John the Baptist as Elijah, because he came in the “spirit and power” of his prototype Elijah (Matt 11:14; 17:1-13; Mark 9:2-13; Luke 9:28-36).
