Oh that my ways may be established to keep Your statutes! Psalm 119:5 NASB 1995 Oh that – Pay attention to the first word in this aleph sequence: ʾaḥlâ אַחלָה It’s an emotional outburst. “Ah that!” is the TWOT rendering. Alter renders the verse: “Would that my ways be firm to observe Your statutes!” But notice the…
You have removed my acquaintances far from me; You have made me an object of loathing to them; I am shut up and cannot go out. Psalm 88:8 NASB An object of loathing – How do you effectively destroy what makes us human without killing the body? Isolation! There’s a very good reason why prisons employ isolation…
And I went back and saw all the oppression that is done under the sun: the tears of the oppressed who have none to console them, and from the hand of their violent oppressors there is none to console them. And I praised the dead, who have already died, more than the living, who are…
The Lord God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may freely eat; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for on the day that you eat from it you will certainly die.” Genesis 2:16-17 NASB The man – I’ve put “the man” in bold to call your…
Then God said, “Let Us make mankind in Our image, according to Our likeness; Genesis 1:26a Image – Biblical words about the creator of humanity have occupied theologians for centuries. Most of that time has been spent trying to determine what precisely is meant by the term “human.” Since the Bible uses both ṣelem (translated “image”) and dĕmût…
Then God said, “Let Us make man in in Our image, according to Our likeness;” Genesis 1:26a NASB Make – The striking difference between Christian and Jewish thought begins right here, with the creation of human beings. You might think that the two great religions share a common view of what it means to be human, but…
So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and…
You have granted me life and goodness; and Your care has guarded my spirit. Job 10:12 NASB Goodness – As we discovered the last time we examined this verse, the translation “goodness” just misses the point. God doesn’t grant us goodness, at least not in this verse. What He grants is ḥesed—relationship, reciprocity, transitivity, and action. …
God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” Genesis 1:28 NASB To them – This is the first time…
This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made earth and heaven. Genesis 2:4 NASB The account of – The King James renders this verse as “these are the generations of.” This represents the Hebrew tôlēdôt, but it misdirects us in English. The English word…
