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November 17, 2021

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Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Daily Bible readings that follow the church liturgical year, with thematically matched Old and New Testament readings.

Duration: 1245 days

Psalm 13

Psalm 13^[a]

For the music director, a psalm of David.

13 How long, Lord, will you continue to ignore me?^[b]
How long will you pay no attention to me?^[c]
²How long must I worry,^[d]
and suffer in broad daylight?^[e]
How long will my enemy gloat over me?^[f]
³Look at me!^[g] Answer me, O Lord my God!
Revive me,^[h] or else I will die.^[i]
⁴Then^[j] my enemy will say, “I have defeated him.”
Then^[k] my foes will rejoice because I am shaken.
⁵But I^[l] trust in your faithfulness.
May I rejoice because of your deliverance.^[m]
⁶I will sing praises^[n] to the Lord
when he vindicates me.^[o]

Footnotes

Psalm 13:1 sn Psalm 13. The psalmist, who is close to death, desperately pleads for God’s deliverance and affirms his trust in God’s faithfulness.
Psalm 13:1 tn Heb “will you forget me continually.”
Psalm 13:1 tn Heb “will you hide your face from me.”
Psalm 13:2 tn Heb “How long will I put counsel in my being?”
Psalm 13:2 tn Heb “[with] grief in my heart by day.”
Psalm 13:2 tn Heb “be exalted over me.” Perhaps one could translate, “How long will my enemy defeat me?”
Psalm 13:3 tn Heb “see.”
Psalm 13:3 tn Heb “Give light [to] my eyes.” The Hiphil of אוּר (ʾur), when used elsewhere with “eyes” as object, refers to the law of God giving moral enlightenment (Ps 19:8), to God the creator giving literal eyesight to all people (Prov 29:13), and to God giving encouragement to his people (Ezra 9:8). Here the psalmist pictures himself as being on the verge of death. His eyes are falling shut and, if God does not intervene soon, he will “fall asleep” for good.
Psalm 13:3 tn Heb “or else I will sleep [in?] the death.” Perhaps the statement is elliptical, “I will sleep [the sleep] of death,” or “I will sleep [with the sleepers in] death.”
Psalm 13:4 tn Heb “or else.”
Psalm 13:4 tn Heb “or else.”
Psalm 13:5 tn The grammatical construction used here (conjunction with independent pronoun) highlights the contrast between the psalmist’s defeated condition envisioned in v. 4 and confident attitude he displays in v. 5.
Psalm 13:5 tn Heb “may my heart rejoice in your deliverance.” The verb form is jussive. Having expressed his trust in God’s faithful character and promises, the psalmist prays that his confidence will prove to be well-placed. “Heart” is used here of the seat of the emotions.
Psalm 13:6 tn The verb form is cohortative, indicating the psalmist’s resolve (or vow) to praise the Lord when deliverance arrives.
Psalm 13:6 tn Or “for he will have vindicated me.” The verb form indicates a future perfect here. The idiom גָמַל עַל (gamal ʿal) means “to repay,” here in a positive sense.

Zechariah 12:1-13

The Repentance of Judah

12 This is an oracle,^[a] the Lord’s message concerning Israel: The Lord—he who stretches out the heavens and lays the foundations of the earth, who forms the human spirit within a person^[b]—says, ²“I am about to make Jerusalem a cup that brings dizziness^[c] to all the surrounding nations; indeed, Judah will also be included when Jerusalem is besieged. ³Moreover, on that day I will make Jerusalem a heavy burden^[d] for all the nations, and all who try to carry it will be seriously injured;^[e] yet all the peoples of the earth will be assembled against it. ⁴On that day,” says the Lord, “I will strike every horse with confusion and its rider with madness. I will pay close attention to the house of Judah, but will strike all the horses^[f] of the nations^[g] with blindness. ⁵Then the leaders of Judah will say to themselves, ‘The inhabitants of Jerusalem are a means of strength to us through their God, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.’ ⁶On that day^[h] I will make the leaders of Judah like an igniter^[i] among sticks and a burning torch among sheaves, and they will burn up all the surrounding nations right and left. Then the people of Jerusalem will settle once more in their place, the city of Jerusalem. ⁷The Lord also will deliver the homes^[j] of Judah first, so that the splendor of the kingship^[k] of David and of the people of Jerusalem may not exceed that of Judah. ⁸On that day the Lord himself will defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the weakest among them will be like mighty David, and the dynasty of David will be like God, like the angel of the Lord before them.^[l] ⁹So on that day I will set out to destroy all the nations^[m] that come against Jerusalem.

¹⁰“I will pour out on the kingship^[n] of David and the population of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication so that they will look to me,^[o] the one they have pierced. They will lament for him as one laments for an only son, and there will be a bitter cry for him like the bitter cry for a firstborn.^[p] ¹¹On that day the lamentation in Jerusalem will be as great as the lamentation at Hadad Rimmon^[q] in the plain of Megiddo. ¹²The land will mourn, each clan by itself—the clan of the royal household of David by itself and their wives by themselves; the clan of the family of Nathan^[r] by itself and their wives by themselves; ¹³the clan of the descendants of Levi by itself and their wives by themselves; and the clan of the Shimeites^[s] by itself and their wives by themselves; ¹⁴all the clans that remain, each separately with their wives.

The Refinement of Judah

13 “In that day there will be a fountain opened up for the dynasty^[t] of David and the people of Jerusalem to cleanse them from sin and impurity.^[u]

Footnotes

Zechariah 12:1 tn See note at Isa 13:1.
Zechariah 12:1 tn Heb “who forms the spirit of man within him” (so NIV).
Zechariah 12:2 sn The image of a cup that brings dizziness is that of drunkenness. The Lord will force the nations to drink of his judgment and in doing so they will become so intoxicated by his wrath that they will stumble and become irrational.
Zechariah 12:3 tn Heb “heavy stone” (so NRSV, TEV, NLT); KJV “burdensome stone”; NIV “an immovable rock.”
Zechariah 12:3 sn In Israel’s and Judah’s past they had been uprooted by various conquerors such as the Assyrians and the Babylonians. In the eschaton, however, they will be so “heavy” with God’s glory and so rooted in his promises that no nation will be able to move them.
Zechariah 12:4 tn Heb “every horse.”
Zechariah 12:4 tn Or “peoples” (so NAB, NRSV).
Zechariah 12:6 sn On that day (referring to the day of the Lord) the Davidic monarchy will be restored and the Lord’s people will recognize once more the legitimacy and divine sanction of David’s dynasty. But there will also be a democratizing that will not give Jerusalem and its rulers undue priority over the people of the countryside (v. 7).
Zechariah 12:6 tn Heb “a firepot” (so NASB, NIV); NRSV “a blazing pot”; NLT “a brazier.”
Zechariah 12:7 tn Heb “the tents” (so NAB, NRSV); NIV “the dwellings.”
Zechariah 12:7 tn Heb “house,” referring here to the dynastic line. Cf. NLT “the royal line”; CEV “the kingdom.” The same expression is translated “dynasty” in the following verse.
Zechariah 12:8 sn The statement the dynasty of David will be like God is hyperbole to show the remarkable enhancements that will accompany the inauguration of the millennial age.
Zechariah 12:9 tn Or “peoples.”
Zechariah 12:10 tn Or “dynasty”; Heb “house.”
Zechariah 12:10 tc Because of the difficulty of the concept of the mortal piercing of God, the subject of this clause, and the shift of pronoun from “me” to “him” in the next, some mss read אֶל אֵת אֲשֶׁר or אֱלֵי אֵת אֲשֶׁר (ʾel ʾet ʾasher or ʾele ʾet ʾasher, “to the one whom,” a reading followed by NAB, NRSV) rather than the MT’s אֵלַי אֵת אֲשֶׁר (ʾelay ʾet ʾasher, “to me whom”). The reasons for such alternatives, however, are clear—they are motivated by scribes who found such statements theologically objectionable—and they should be rejected in favor of the more difficult reading (lectio difficilior) of the MT.tn Or “on me.”
Zechariah 12:10 tn The Hebrew term בְּכוֹר (b^ekhor, “firstborn”), translated usually in the LXX by πρωτότοκος (prōtotokos), has unmistakable messianic overtones as the use of the Greek term in the NT to describe Jesus makes clear (cf. Col 1:15, 18). Thus, the idea of God being pierced sets the stage for the fatal wounding of Jesus, the Messiah and the Son of God (cf. John 19:37; Rev 1:7). Note that some English translations supply “son” from the context (e.g., NIV, TEV, NLT).
Zechariah 12:11 tn “Hadad Rimmon” is a compound of the names of two Canaanite deities, the gods of storm and thunder respectively. The grammar (a subjective genitive) allows, and the problem of comparing Israel’s grief at God’s “wounding” with pagan mourning seems to demand, that this be viewed as a place name, perhaps where Judah lamented the death of good king Josiah (cf. 2 Chr 35:25). However, some translations render this as “for” (NRSV, NCV, TEV, CEV), suggesting a person, while others translate as “of” (KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NLT) which is ambiguous.
Zechariah 12:12 sn By the time of Zechariah the line of descent from David had already been transferred from the Solomon branch to the Nathan branch (the clan of the family of Nathan). Nathan was a son of David (2 Sam 5:14) through whom Jesus eventually came (Luke 3:23-31). Matthew traces Jesus’ ancestry back through Solomon (Matt 1:6-16) but apparently this is to tie Joseph into the Davidic (and thus messianic) line. The “official” descent of Jesus may be viewed as passing through Solomon whereas the “physical” descent came through Nathan.
Zechariah 12:13 sn The Shimeites were Levites (Exod 6:16-17; Num 3:17-18) who presumably were prominent in the postexilic era. Just as David and Nathan represented the political leadership of the community, so Levi and Shimei represented the religious leadership. All will lament the piercing of the Messiah.
Zechariah 13:1 tn Heb “house” (so NIV, NRSV), referring to dynastic descendants.
Zechariah 13:1 tn Heb “for sin and for impurity.” The purpose implied here has been stated explicitly in the translation for clarity.sn This reference to the fountain opened up…to cleanse them from sin and impurity is anticipatory of the cleansing from sin that lies at the heart of the NT gospel message (Rom 10:9-10; Titus 3:5). “In that day” throughout the passage (vv. 1, 2, 4) locates this cleansing in the eschatological (church) age (John 19:37).

Mark 13:9-23

Persecution of Disciples

⁹“You must watch out for yourselves. You will be handed over^[a] to councils^[b] and beaten in the synagogues.^[c] You will stand before governors and kings^[d] because of me, as a witness to them. ¹⁰First the gospel must be preached to all nations. ¹¹When they arrest you and hand you over for trial,^[e] do not worry about what to speak. But say whatever is given you at that time,^[f] for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit. ¹²Brother will hand over brother to death, and a father his child. Children will rise against^[g] parents and have them put to death. ¹³You will be hated by everyone because of my name.^[h] But the one who endures to the end will be saved.^[i]

The Abomination of Desolation

¹⁴“But when you see the abomination of desolation^[j] standing where it^[k] should not be” (let the reader understand),^[l] “then those in Judea must flee^[m] to the mountains. ¹⁵The one on the roof^[n] must not come down or go inside to take anything out of his house.^[o] ¹⁶The one in the field must not turn back to get his cloak. ¹⁷Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing their babies in those days! ¹⁸Pray that it may not be in winter. ¹⁹For in those days there will be suffering^[p] unlike anything that has happened^[q] from the beginning of the creation that God created until now, or ever will happen. ²⁰And if the Lord had not cut short those days, no one would be saved. But because of the elect, whom he chose, he has cut them^[r] short. ²¹Then^[s] if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’^[t] or ‘Look, there he is!’ do not believe him. ²²For false messiahs^[u] and false prophets will appear and perform signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, the elect. ²³Be careful! I have told you everything ahead of time.

Footnotes

Mark 13:9 tn Grk “They will hand you over.” “They” is an indefinite plural, referring to people in general. The parallel in Matt 10:17 makes this explicit.
Mark 13:9 sn Councils in this context has a non-technical sense referring to local judicial bodies (courts) attached to the Jewish synagogue (cf. BDAG 967 s.v. συνέδριον 1.a). These courts would be responsible for meting out justice and discipline within the Jewish community.
Mark 13:9 sn See the note on synagogue in 1:21.
Mark 13:9 sn These statements look at persecution both from a Jewish context as the mention of councils and synagogues suggests, and from a Gentile one as the reference to governors and kings suggests. Some fulfillment of Jewish persecution can be seen in Acts.
Mark 13:11 tn Or “hand you over into custody,” in particular “as a t.t. of police and courts ‘hand over into [the] custody [of]’” (BDAG 762 s.v. παραδίδωμι 1.b). In context some sort of trial is implied (cf. Luke 12:11).
Mark 13:11 tn Grk “in that hour.”
Mark 13:12 tn Or “will rebel against.”
Mark 13:13 sn See 1 Cor 1:25-31.
Mark 13:13 sn But the one who endures to the end will be saved. Jesus was not claiming here that salvation is by works, because he had already taught that it is by grace (cf. 10:15). He was simply arguing that genuine faith evidences itself in persistence through even the worst of trials.
Mark 13:14 sn The reference to the abomination of desolation is an allusion to Dan 9:27. Though some have seen the fulfillment of Daniel’s prophecy in the actions of Antiochus IV (or a representative of his) in 167 b.c., the words of Jesus seem to indicate that Antiochus was not the final fulfillment, but that there was (from Jesus’ perspective) still another fulfillment yet to come. Some argue that this was realized in a.d. 70, while others claim that it refers specifically to Antichrist and will not be fully realized until the period of the great tribulation at the end of the age (cf. Mark 13:19, 24; Matt 24:21; Rev 3:10).
Mark 13:14 tn Or perhaps “he.” Those who see the participle ἑστηκότα as masculine singular generally understand it to refer to the individual known as the Antichrist, often citing 2 Thess 2:3-4 as a related passage. By grammatical form the participle ἑστηκότα can also be neuter plural, however, and this is sometimes interpreted as referring to various abominations or atrocities committed during the intertestamental period, or to a statue set up in the temple, or to an altar constructed on top of the altar of burnt offering for the purpose of pagan sacrifices. Each of these views is not without difficulties. Confining the issue merely to the grammatical problem, the interpreter is forced to choose between a discrepancy in grammatical gender (the participle ἑστηκότα is masculine singular but the word it modifies, βδέλυγμα, is neuter singular) or a discrepancy in number (the participle ἑστηκότα is neuter plural but the word it modifies, βδέλυγμα, is neuter singular. Given that the issue is one of grammatical gender, however, it is still possible for the neuter head noun (βδέλυγμα) to refer to a masculine individual rather than a set of circumstances or a thing. The present translation uses “it” for the following pronoun, allowing a degree of ambiguity to remain for the English reader.
Mark 13:14 sn This parenthetical comment is generally regarded as a command by the author made directly to the readers, not as part of Jesus’ original speech. For this reason the statement is not placed within quotation marks.
Mark 13:14 sn Fleeing to the mountains is a key OT image: Gen 19:17; Judg 6:2; Isa 15:5; Jer 16:16; Zech 14:5.
Mark 13:15 sn Most of the roofs in the NT were flat roofs made of pounded dirt, sometimes mixed with lime or stones, supported by heavy wooden beams. They generally had an easy means of access, either a sturdy wooden ladder or stone stairway, sometimes on the outside of the house.
Mark 13:15 sn The nature of the judgment coming upon them will be so quick and devastating that one will not have time to come down or go inside to take anything out of his house. It is best just to escape as quickly as possible.
Mark 13:19 tn Traditionally, “tribulation.”
Mark 13:19 sn Suffering unlike anything that has happened. Some refer this event to the destruction of Jerusalem in a.d. 70. While the events of a.d. 70 may reflect somewhat the comments Jesus makes here, the reference to the scope and severity of this judgment strongly suggest that much more is in view. Most likely Jesus is referring to the great end-time judgment on Jerusalem in the great tribulation.
Mark 13:20 tn Grk “the days.”
Mark 13:21 tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the narrative.
Mark 13:21 tn Or “the Messiah”; both “Christ” (Greek) and “Messiah” (Hebrew and Aramaic) mean “one who has been anointed.”sn See the note on Christ in 8:29.
Mark 13:22 tn Or “false christs”; both “Christ” (Greek) and “Messiah” (Hebrew and Aramaic) mean “one who has been anointed.”

New English Translation (NET)

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Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Psalm 13[a]

For the music director, a psalm of David.

Footnotes

The Repentance of Judah

The Refinement of Judah

Footnotes

Persecution of Disciples

The Abomination of Desolation

Footnotes

Psalm 13^[a]