¹ tn Heb “And the advice of Ahithophel which he advised in those days was as when one inquires of the word of God.”

¹ tn This probably refers to those who responded to the call for war. They were “survivors” of the Canaanite oppression (see B. Lindars, Judges 1-5, 250).

² tn Another option is to understand this as referring to “thousands (of generations) of those who love me” (cf. NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT). See Deut 7:9.

¹ tn The Hebrew text uses the preposition “from,” “some of”—“from those men.” The relative pronoun is added to make a smoother reading.

¹ sn The text does not say what the consequences are. Presumably the punishment would come from God, and not from those administering the test.

¹ tc The expression “and his divisions and those numbered of them” is somewhat tautological. The words are synonyms used for statistical purposes, and so neither should be simply deleted.

² sn That is, when the lay people eat portions of offerings that should have been eaten only by priests and those who belonged to priestly households.

² sn The regulations for the “male child” in vv. 2-4 contrast with those for the “female child” in v. 5 (see the note there).

³ tn Heb “shall weep [for] the burning which the Lord has burned”; NIV “may mourn for those the Lord has destroyed by fire.”

¹ tn Heb “wise of heart”; here also “heart” would be a genitive of specification, showing that there were those who could make skillful decisions.

² tn The Greek has “scribes” for this word, perhaps thinking of those lesser officials as keeping records of the slaves and the bricks.

² tn The expression in apposition to נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh) literally says “those who went out from the loins of Jacob.” This distinguishes the entire company as his direct descendants.

¹ tn Heb “the outcry of Sodom,” which apparently refers to the outcry for divine justice from those (unidentified persons) who observe its sinful ways.

⁹ sn Twice dead probably has no relevance to the tree metaphor, but has great applicability to these false teachers. As in Rev 20:6, those who die twice are those who die physically and spiritually. The aphorism is true: “born once, die twice; born twice, die once” (cf. Rev 20:5; John 3, 11).

² tn Grk “those of the circumcision.” Some translations take this to refer to Jewish converts to Christianity (cf. NAB “Jewish Christians”; TEV “converts from Judaism”; CEV “Jewish followers”) while others are less clear (cf. NLT “those who insist on circumcision for salvation”).

¹ sn The various materials described here, both valuable (gold, silver, precious stones) and worthless (wood, hay, or straw) refer to the quality of work built on the foundation, or possibly to the motivation of those doing the building. The materials themselves have been understood (1) as deeds or (2) as people (since ultimately the passage is addressing those who minister to others).

¹ tn BDAG 511 s.v. κατά B.1.a has “τοὺς κ. τὰ ἔθνη ᾿Ιουδαίους the Judeans (dispersed) throughout the nations 21:21.” The Jews in view are not those in Palestine, but those who are scattered throughout the Gentile world.

³ tn The meaning of the genitive participle προσκαρτερούντων (proskarterountōn) could either be “a soldier from the ranks of those who served him” (referring to his entire command) or “a soldier from among his personal staff” (referring to a group of soldiers who were his personal attendants). The translation “from among those who served him” is general enough to cover either possibility.

² tn There is some discussion about the grammar of this verse in Greek. If “these” is the subject, then it reads, “These are my mother and brothers, those who.” If “these” is a nominative absolute, which is slightly more likely, then the verse more literally reads, “So my mother and brothers, they are those who.” The sense in either case is the same.

¹ tn Grk “everyone, as many as had those being sick.” The use of εἶχον (eichon, “had”) suggests that the subject of the accusative participle ἀσθενοῦντας (asthenountas, “those being sick”) is not simply acquaintances, but rather relatives, perhaps immediate family, and certainly close friends.