Paul's reasoning about 'the judgment to come' echoes Qoheleth's conclusion that 'God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil.' Coherent with the eschatological-accountability theme that unsettles Felix; medium.

For God will bring every work into judgment, with every hidden thing, whether it is good, or whether it is evil.


Felix 'hoped that money would be given to him by Paul' — a corrupt judge angling for a bribe stands in direct contrast to the Torah's prohibition, 'You shall take no bribe, for a bribe blinds the clear-sighted and subverts the cause of the righteous.' Felix embodies the very corruption the law forbids; medium thematic coherence.

“You shall take no bribe, for a bribe blinds those who have sight and perverts the words of the righteous.


Paul preaching righteousness and judgment to the cohabiting Felix and Drusilla (Felix's union with a Jewess he had taken) recalls the prophet confronting a ruler over righteousness and unlawful marriage, as Nathan confronted David ('You are the man'). Figural pattern of bold prophetic confrontation; low, no diction.

Nathan said to David, “You are the man. This is what Yahweh, the God of Israel, says: ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you out of the hand of Saul.


The chief priests press Festus to summon Paul to Jerusalem while 'plotting to kill him on the way' (v.3). The psalter's portrait of the wicked who 'watches the righteous and seeks to slay him' supplies the scriptural type of the ambush against the innocent man; verbal contact is slight, so this is a thematic echo rather than a quotation, and contested.

The wicked watches the righteous, and seeks to kill him.


The lying-in-wait imagery (the wicked 'lurks... to seize the poor') matches the planned roadside ambush of Paul. A stock motif of the persecuted-righteous psalms; flagged contested for low volume.

He lies in wait near the villages. From ambushes, he murders the innocent. His eyes are secretly set against the helpless. He lurks in secret as a lion in his ambush. He lies in wait to catch the helpless. He catches the helpless, when he draws him in his net.


Jeremiah, a prophet brought as a lamb to slaughter against whom his enemies 'devise devices,' is the classic prophetic prototype of the messenger targeted by a covert plot. Luke's Paul stands in this Jeremianic line of the rejected prophet; the link is figural-thematic, contested.

But I was like a gentle lamb that is led to the slaughter; and I didn’t know that they had devised devices against me, saying, Let us destroy the tree with its fruit, and let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be no more remembered.


Enemies who 'take counsel together' against the righteous, saying God has forsaken him so they may pursue and seize him, parallel the priests' conspiracy. Faint, contested.

For my enemies talk about me. Those who watch for my soul conspire together, saying, “God has forsaken him. Pursue and take him, for no one will rescue him.”


'Malicious witnesses rise up; they ask me of things I know not.' The Jews bring 'many and grievous charges which they could not prove' (v.7) — precisely the false, unsubstantiated accusation the persecuted-righteous psalmist faces. The strongest of the chapter's faint OT resonances; the unprovable-charge motif recurs through Luke's passion-and-trial pattern, giving it some thematic coherence. Still an echo rather than a citation.

Unrighteous witnesses rise up. They ask me about things that I don’t know about.


'False witnesses have risen against me, breathing out violence.' Reinforces the accused-but-innocent posture of Paul before the tribunal. Contested, low volume.

Don’t deliver me over to the desire of my adversaries, for false witnesses have risen up against me, such as breathe out cruelty.


Paul's insistence that no one can simply 'give him up' without a true case (v.11), and his demand to be tried where charges can be tested, resonates with the Torah's law of witnesses and diligent inquiry into accusation. The principle surfaces explicitly in Festus' own summary (v.16); here it is the implied legal backdrop. Contested.

One witness shall not rise up against a man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin that he sins. At the mouth of two witnesses, or at the mouth of three witnesses, shall a matter be established. If an unrighteous witness rises up against any man to testify against him of wrongdoing, then both the men, between whom the controversy is, shall stand before Yahweh, before the priests and the judges who shall be in those days; and the judges shall make […]


Paul submits himself to judgment, willing to die if guilty but appealing for vindication if innocent (vv.10-11), echoing the psalmist's plea 'judge me, O LORD, according to my righteousness.' Faint, contested.

Yahweh administers judgment to the peoples. Judge me, Yahweh, according to my righteousness, and to my integrity that is in me. Oh let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end, but establish the righteous; their minds and hearts are searched by the righteous God.


Festus states the Roman rule that one is not handed over 'before the accused has met the accusers face to face, and has had opportunity to make his defense' (v.16). This due-process principle — confrontation of accuser and accused, diligent inquiry — directly mirrors Deuteronomy's law of witnesses, so that Roman custom is narrated in terms a Scripture-shaped reader recognizes. Thematic, not verbal quotation.


The deuterocanonical Susanna dramatizes the same conviction — that no one should be condemned without examination and testing of the accusers — which Festus voices. A loose thematic parallel within the Jewish wisdom-and-justice tradition; contested.

So he standing in the midst of them said, Are you such fools, you sons of Israel, that without examination or knowledge of the truth you have condemned a daughter of Israel? Return again to the place of judgement: for these have borne false witness against her. Wherefore all the people turned again in haste, and the elders said to him, Come, sit down among us, and show it us, seeing God has given you the honor of an elder. Then said Daniel to them, Put […]


Paul, the witness to the risen Christ, stands before a king (Agrippa), a governor (Festus), and the assembled rulers 'with great pomp.' The scene faintly evokes the psalm's kings and rulers gathered before the LORD's anointed and his messengers — a motif Acts has already cited at 4:25-26. Figural and contested; no verbal borrowing.

The kings of the earth take a stand, and the rulers take counsel together, against Yahweh, and against his Anointed, saying,


Paul stands trial 'for the hope of the promise made by God to our fathers.' The covenant promise to the patriarchs — that in Abraham's seed all nations would be blessed — is the substance of that hope. Acts repeatedly anchors the promise to the patriarchs (cf. Acts 3:25; 13:32-33), and the language 'made to our fathers' points back to the Genesis covenant cycle.

All the nations of the earth will be blessed by your seed, because you have obeyed my voice.”


'Our twelve tribes, earnestly serving night and day, hope to attain' it. The 'twelve tribes' is the constitutive self-designation of restored Israel, rooted in the blessing of Jacob's sons; Paul presents the resurrection hope as the goal of the whole covenant people.

All these are the twelve tribes of Israel, and this is what their father spoke to them and blessed them. He blessed everyone according to his blessing.


'Why is it judged incredible with you, if God does raise the dead?' Daniel 12:2 is the clearest OT statement of bodily resurrection ('many of those who sleep in the dust shall awake'), the very Pharisaic hope Paul defends here and the hope shared by the twelve tribes.

Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.


The resurrection hope of v.8 resonates with Ezekiel's vision of the dry bones revived — Israel's national hope cast as God raising the dead, which dovetails with Paul's framing of resurrection as the consummation of the covenant promise to the tribes.

The hand of Yahweh was on me, and he brought me out in the Spirit of Yahweh, and set me down in the midst of the valley; and it was full of bones. He caused me to pass by them all around: and behold, there were very many in the open valley; and behold, they were very dry. He said to me, Son of man, can these bones live? I answered, Lord Yahweh, you know. Again he said to me, Prophesy over these bones, and tell them, you dry bones, hear Yahweh’s word. Thus […]


The doubled vocative 'Saul, Saul' from heaven mirrors the theophanic double-address by which God calls his chosen agents — 'Moses, Moses' from the burning bush. The pattern (light/fire, voice, prostration, commission) frames Paul's conversion as a prophetic call-narrative.

When Yahweh saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the midst of the bush, and said, “Moses! Moses!” He said, “Here I am.”


'Samuel, Samuel' — the doubled name by which the LORD summons the boy Samuel to prophetic service reinforces the call-form behind 'Saul, Saul,' another reluctant or unwitting hearer drafted into divine commission.

Yahweh came, and stood, and called as at other times, “Samuel! Samuel!” Then Samuel said, “Speak; for your servant hears.”


Paul and his companions 'had all fallen to the earth' before a heavenly light and then heard a voice — exactly Ezekiel's response to the glory of the LORD: 'I fell upon my face, and I heard a voice of one that spoke.' The vision-then-voice sequence is the prophetic theophany template.

As the appearance of the rainbow that is in the cloud in the day of rain, so was the appearance of the brightness all around. This was the appearance of the likeness of Yahweh’s glory. When I saw it, I fell on my face, and I heard a voice of one that spoke.


Daniel falls in a deep sleep with his face to the ground at the blinding appearance of the heavenly man, then is addressed and raised — the same overwhelmed prostration before a radiant figure that Paul reports on the Damascus road.

Yet heard I the voice of his words; and when I heard the voice of his words, then was I fallen into a deep sleep on my face, with my face toward the ground.


The 'light from the sky, brighter than the sun' faintly recalls the eschatological intensification of light in Isaiah, where the light of the sun is sevenfold in the day of restoration — supernatural radiance as a sign of God's saving intervention.

Moreover the light of the moon will be like the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be seven times brighter, like the light of seven days, in the day that Yahweh binds up the fracture of his people, and heals the wound they were struck with.


'It is hard for you to kick against the goads' is a proverb of Greek provenance, but some hear an echo of Jeshurun who 'kicked' against the LORD after being fattened — futile rebellion against God by the well-fed. The verbal link is slight and the source debated.

But Jeshurun grew fat, and kicked. You have grown fat. You have grown thick. You have become sleek. Then he abandoned God who made him, and rejected the Rock of his salvation.


'But arise, and stand on your feet' verbally reproduces the LORD's words to Ezekiel ('Son of man, stand upon your feet, and I will speak to you... I send you to the children of Israel'). The commission of Paul is cast as a prophetic sending in Ezekiel's idiom.

He said to me, Son of man, stand on your feet, and I will speak with you. The Spirit entered into me when he spoke to me, and set me on my feet; and I heard him who spoke to me. He said to me, Son of man, I send you to the children of Israel, to a nation of rebels who have rebelled against me. They and their fathers have transgressed against me even to this very day.


The heavenly messenger tells the prostrate Daniel to 'stand upright' to receive a revelation — the same raising-up-to-be-commissioned motif behind 'stand on your feet, for I have appeared to you for this purpose.'

He said to me, Daniel, you man greatly beloved, understand the words that I speak to you, and stand upright; for am I now sent to you. When he had spoken this word to me, I stood trembling.


'Delivering you from the people, and from the Gentiles, to whom I send you' closely tracks Jeremiah's call: 'to all that I shall send you, you shall go... be not afraid of their faces: for I am with you to deliver you.' Both the sending and the promise of rescue are drawn from the prophet's commission.

But Yahweh said to me, “Don’t say, ‘I am a child;’ for to whoever I shall send you, you shall go, and whatever I shall command you, you shall speak. Don’t be afraid because of them; for I am with you to deliver you,” says Yahweh.


'To open their eyes, that they may turn from darkness to light' is lifted from the Servant's mandate: 'to open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house.' Paul's mission is the Servant's mission extended.

to open the blind eyes, to bring the prisoners out of the dungeon, and those who sit in darkness out of the prison.


'Turn from darkness to light' echoes Isaiah 42:16, 'I will make darkness light before them' — the LORD leading the blind by a way they knew not, the same darkness-to-light transformation Paul is sent to effect.

I will bring the blind by a way that they don’t know. I will lead them in paths that they don’t know. I will make darkness light before them, and crooked places straight. I will do these things, and I will not forsake them.


'To appoint you a servant and a witness' draws on the Servant Song's 'Behold my servant... I have put my Spirit upon him; he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.' Paul is appointed a servant in the Servant's pattern, with a Gentile commission.

“Behold, my servant, whom I uphold; my chosen, in whom my soul delights— I have put my Spirit on him. He will bring justice to the nations.


'A witness... of the things which you have seen' echoes 'You are my witnesses, says the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen' — the conjunction of 'servant' and 'witness' in Paul's call matches Isaiah's pairing exactly.

“You are my witnesses,” says Yahweh, “With my servant whom I have chosen; that you may know and believe me, and understand that I am he. Before me there was no God formed, neither will there be after me.


'To open their eyes' resonates with the eschatological promise 'then the eyes of the blind shall be opened' — the restoration of sight as a sign of God's coming salvation, here applied to spiritual illumination of Jews and Gentiles.

Then the eyes of the blind will be opened, and the ears of the deaf will be unstopped.


'Turn from darkness to light' recalls 'the people that walked in darkness have seen a great light; they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them has the light shined' — the prophetic image of light dawning on those in darkness.

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who lived in the land of the shadow of death, on them the light has shined.


The cluster 'open their eyes... receive remission of sins' faintly recalls the Servant-Anointed's mission to proclaim liberty to captives and opening of the prison — release and forgiveness as the substance of the sent one's task.

The Spirit of the Lord Yahweh is on me; because Yahweh has anointed me to preach good news to the humble. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to those who are bound;

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me; he has sent me to preach glad tidings to the poor, to heal the broken in heart, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind;


'An inheritance among those who are sanctified' echoes the deuterocanonical 'how is he numbered among the children of God, and his lot is among the saints (holy ones)' — the lot/inheritance among the sanctified as the believer's destiny.

How was he counted among sons of God? And how is his lot among saints?


'Saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses said would happen' invokes Moses as a witness to the coming Christ; the Mosaic promise of a prophet 'like me' whom Israel must heed stands behind the appeal to 'Moses' as testifying to the suffering and risen Messiah.

Yahweh your God will raise up to you a prophet from your midst, of your brothers, like me. You shall listen to him.


'How the Christ must suffer' rests on the Suffering Servant — 'a man of sorrows... wounded for our transgressions.' The necessity of the Messiah's suffering, which Paul says the prophets foretold, is grounded chiefly in this song.

He was despised, and rejected by men; a man of suffering, and acquainted with disease. He was despised as one from whom men hide their face; and we didn’t respect him. Surely he has borne our sickness, and carried our suffering; yet we considered him plagued, struck by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought our peace was on him; and by his wounds we are healed.


'How the Christ must suffer, and how, by the resurrection of the dead' pairs suffering with vindication, matching 'he shall see of the travail of his soul... my righteous servant shall justify many' — the Servant's anguish followed by life and fruitfulness.

After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light and be satisfied. My righteous servant will justify many by the knowledge of himself; and he will bear their iniquities.


'He would be first to proclaim light both to these people and to the Gentiles' draws directly on 'I will also give you for a light to the Gentiles, that you may be my salvation unto the end of the earth' — the same Servant text Paul cites programmatically at Acts 13:47.

yes, he says, “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give you for a light to the nations, that you may be my salvation to the end of the earth.”


'Light both to these people and to the Gentiles' echoes 'I will give you for a covenant of the people, for a light of the Gentiles' — the Servant as light to both Israel and the nations, exactly Paul's twofold audience.

“I, Yahweh, have called you in righteousness, and will hold your hand, and will keep you, and make you a covenant for the people, as a light for the nations;


'Proclaim light... to the Gentiles' resonates with Zion's dawning glory drawing the nations: 'the Gentiles shall come to your light' — the eschatological light to which the nations are summoned, here realized in the risen Christ's proclamation.

“Arise, shine; for your light has come, and Yahweh’s glory is risen on you. For, behold, darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the peoples; but Yahweh will arise on you, and his glory shall be seen on you. Nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising.


'By the resurrection of the dead, he would be first' rests on 'you will not leave my soul in Sheol; neither will you allow your holy one to see corruption' — the psalm Acts uses (2:27-31; 13:35) to prove the Messiah's resurrection.

For you will not leave my soul in Sheol, neither will you allow your holy one to see corruption.


The opening of the sea-voyage sets up the psalm's tableau of those who 'go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters'; here the verbal contact is minimal (mere embarkation and difficult sailing), so the echo is faint and anticipatory, gathering force only when the storm breaks. Thematic coherence is real but volume is near zero at this stage.

Those who go down to the sea in ships, who do business in great waters; These see Yahweh’s works, and his wonders in the deep. For he commands, and raises the stormy wind, which lifts up its waves. They mount up to the sky; they go down again to the depths. Their soul melts away because of trouble. They reel back and forth, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wits’ end. Then they cry to Yahweh in their trouble, and he brings them out of their […]


Like Jonah, who 'found a ship' and boarded for a sea-passage toward a distant destination, Paul is put aboard ship after ship bound westward; the framing of a divinely-directed man embarking on a fraught Mediterranean voyage primes the Jonah typology that the storm scene activates. Verbal borrowing is slight, so this is a low-confidence narrative resonance.

But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of Yahweh. He went down to Joppa, and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid its fare, and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of Yahweh.


Luke dates the danger by noting 'the Fast had now already gone by' — the Day of Atonement, whose fixed autumn date (the tenth of the seventh month) Leviticus prescribes as a day of self-affliction. The detail is a calendar marker rather than a theological citation, but it presupposes the Levitical institution and places the voyage in the perilous post-Atonement sailing season.

“It shall be a statute to you forever: in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, you shall afflict your souls, and shall do no kind of work, the native-born, or the stranger who lives as a foreigner among you: for on this day shall atonement be made for you, to cleanse you; from all your sins you shall be clean before Yahweh. It is a Sabbath of solemn rest to you, and you shall afflict your souls. It is a statute forever.


A second locus for the Day of Atonement 'Fast' that Luke's temporal note assumes; the same calendrical institution underlies the warning that the voyage has become dangerous. Offered as an alternate scriptural anchor for the same allusion.

“However on the tenth day of this seventh month is the day of atonement: it shall be a holy convocation to you, and you shall afflict yourselves; and you shall offer an offering made by fire to Yahweh. You shall do no kind of work in that same day; for it is a day of atonement, to make atonement for you before Yahweh your God. For whoever it is who shall not deny himself in that same day; shall be cut off from his people.


The closest narrative parallel: a violent wind hurled upon the sea, a ship in danger of breaking, terrified mariners, and the casting of cargo overboard to lighten the vessel — all of which recur here (Euroclydon, reinforcing the hull, jettisoning cargo and tackle). The shared storm-script and the act of throwing freight into the sea give real thematic and motif coherence, though Luke borrows the type, not the words.

But Yahweh sent out a great wind on the sea, and there was a mighty storm on the sea, so that the ship was likely to break up. Then the mariners were afraid, and every man cried to his god. They threw the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten the ship. But Jonah had gone down into the innermost parts of the ship, and he was laying down, and was fast asleep.


The psalm's seafarers meet a 'stormy wind' that lifts the waves, so that 'they reel to and fro, and are at their wits' end' — answering precisely to the driven, rudderless ship and the loss of all hope of being saved. The progression from tempest to despair tracks the psalm's movement and is the chapter's strongest figural backbone for the storm.

Those who go down to the sea in ships, who do business in great waters; These see Yahweh’s works, and his wonders in the deep. For he commands, and raises the stormy wind, which lifts up its waves. They mount up to the sky; they go down again to the depths. Their soul melts away because of trouble. They reel back and forth, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wits’ end.


Ezekiel's dirge over Tyre depicts the merchant ship driven into the heart of the seas by the east wind and broken, its mariners and cargo sinking — a literary type of the freighted vessel undone by wind that resonates with the Alexandrian grain ship overwhelmed here. Verbal contact is minimal; the link is thematic.

Your rowers have brought you into great waters: the east wind has broken you in the heart of the seas. Your riches, and your wares, your merchandise, your mariners, and your pilots, your repairers of ship seams, and the dealers in your merchandise, and all your men of war, who are in you, with all your company which is in your midst, shall fall into the heart of the seas in the day of your ruin.


'Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind' supplies a compact scriptural image of a great fleet-vessel shattered by an east wind, matching Euroclydon (the east-northeast gale). A brief, low-volume motif echo rather than a developed allusion.

With the east wind, you break the ships of Tarshish.


The angel's nocturnal 'Don't be afraid' to Paul echoes the formula of the divine reassurance oracle that recurs across the OT, of which God's night-word to Abram ('Fear not... I am thy shield') is the paradigm. The salvation-oracle form (night setting, fear-not, promise of protection and destiny) is well attested; the specific verbal tie is to the formula, not this verse alone.

After these things Yahweh’s word came to Abram in a vision, saying, “Don’t be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward.”


Isaiah's 'Fear not... when thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee' fuses the fear-not oracle with the motif of preservation through the deep — exactly Paul's situation: assured deliverance through the storm, with no loss of life. The combination of formula and water-rescue gives this strong thematic coherence.

But now thus says Yahweh who created you, Jacob, and he who formed you, Israel: “Don’t be afraid, for I have redeemed you. I have called you by your name. You are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned, and flame will not scorch you.


An angelic night visitation that opens with 'Fear not, Daniel' and conveys a divine message of assurance furnishes a close formal parallel to the angel standing by Paul at night saying 'Don't be afraid.' The angelophany-plus-reassurance pattern matches; verbal overlap is the shared fear-not formula.

Then he said to me, Don’t be afraid, Daniel; for from the first day that you set your heart to understand, and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard: and I have come for your words’ sake.


Paul's confident promise that all aboard will be preserved anticipates the psalm's resolution — the distressed cry, God stilling the storm, and the survivors brought safe to harbor. The assurance that 'it will be just as it has been spoken to me' embodies the providential rescue the psalm celebrates.

Then they cry to Yahweh in their trouble, and he brings them out of their distress. He makes the storm a calm, so that its waves are still. Then they are glad because it is calm, so he brings them to their desired haven.


The mariners' nighttime effort to reach land — taking soundings, dropping anchors, and the sailors' attempt to escape in the boat — recalls Jonah's sailors rowing hard to bring the ship to shore against the storm. A faint narrative resonance of seamen straining toward land amid tempest; little verbal contact.

Nevertheless the men rowed hard to get them back to the land; but they could not, for the sea grew more and more stormy against them.


Paul's pledge that 'not a hair will perish from any of your heads' reproduces the OT idiom of total preservation — Israel's oath over Jonathan that 'there shall not one hair of his head fall to the ground' — used to guarantee that no life will be lost. The proverbial formula is distinctive and its sense (life entirely safeguarded) is exactly Paul's.

The people said to Saul, “Shall Jonathan die, who has worked this great salvation in Israel? Far from it! As Yahweh lives, there shall not one hair of his head fall to the ground; for he has worked with God this day!” So the people rescued Jonathan, that he didn’t die.


The same hyperbole of inviolable safety — 'there shall not one hair of thy son fall to the earth' — secured by oath; an alternate locus for the 'not a hair shall perish' assurance Paul gives. Offered as a parallel attestation of the idiom.

Then she said, “Please let the king remember Yahweh your God, that the avenger of blood destroy not any more, lest they destroy my son.” He said, “As Yahweh lives, not one hair of your son shall fall to the earth.”


Paul's taking bread, giving thanks to God before all, breaking and eating it draws on the OT practice of blessing God over food — 'thou shalt eat and be full, and thou shalt bless the LORD thy God.' The act of thanksgiving over bread before a meal coheres with this command, though here it is a custom evoked rather than a text cited.

You shall eat and be full, and you shall bless Yahweh your God for the good land which he has given you.


The chapter's denouement realizes the psalm's climax: after the tempest, God 'bringeth them unto their desired haven' — here all 276 aboard 'escaped safely to the land.' The bringing of every imperiled person out of the storm to dry land is the psalmist's pattern of deliverance enacted in narrative.


Jonah's storm ends with the sea ceasing from its raging and the ship's company spared; likewise the wreck resolves with the violent sea finally beaching the vessel and every soul brought through alive. A typological resonance of storm-to-rescue, with the righteous man's presence proving the means of others' preservation.

So they took up Jonah, and threw him into the sea; and the sea ceased its raging. Then the men feared Yahweh exceedingly; and they offered a sacrifice to Yahweh, and made vows.


Paul gathers sticks, a viper fastens on his hand, yet he shakes it off unharmed. The promise that the righteous one 'will tread on the adder' and trample serpent and viper without harm (LXX Ps 90:13) is the closest scriptural template for the scene: deadly snake, divine protection, no injury. The vocabulary of viper/serpent and the motif of the protected servant give strong thematic coherence at the book's climax.

You will tread on the lion and cobra. You will trample the young lion and the serpent underfoot.


The protoevangelium's enmity between humanity and the serpent — the serpent striking at the heel/hand while the human ultimately prevails — resonates with Paul's hand bitten yet the creature destroyed in the fire. Reversal of the primal serpent-bite is figurally apt for the apostle's vindication.

I will put hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will bruise your head, and you will bruise his heel.”


The fiery serpents that bit Israel in the wilderness and the bronze serpent of deliverance supply a background motif of snakebite and divinely-granted survival; verbal overlap is slight, link is thematic.

Yahweh sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people. Many people of Israel died. The people came to Moses, and said, “We have sinned, because we have spoken against Yahweh, and against you. Pray to Yahweh, that he take away the serpents from us.” Moses prayed for the people. Yahweh said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole. It shall happen, that everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” Moses made a serpent of […]


The wilderness journey 'with its fiery serpents' from which God preserved Israel parallels the survivor of shipwreck preserved from the venomous bite; a faint provision-and-protection echo.

who led you through the great and terrible wilderness, with fiery serpents and scorpions, and thirsty ground where there was no water; who poured water for you out of the rock of flint;


Deuterocanonical reflection on Numbers 21: God's people bitten by serpents are healed not by what they saw but by God the Savior, while their bites were not fatal because of divine mercy. The pattern of harmless venom for the righteous coheres with Paul shaking off the viper unharmed.

For even when terrible raging of wild beasts came upon your people, And they were perishing by the bites of crooked serpents, Your wrath continued not to the uttermost; But for admonition were they troubled for a short space, Having a token of salvation, To put them in remembrance of the commandment of your law: For he that turned toward it was not saved because of that which was seen, But because of you, the Saviour of all. Yes, and in this did you […]


Paul enters in to the sick father of Publius, prays, lays hands on him and heals him; the Elisha pattern of a prophet entering the sickroom and praying for restoration supplies a background healing-narrative template, with the further healings of all the island's sick recalling the prophet's wider miracles.

When Elisha had come into the house, behold, the child was dead, and laid on his bed. He went in therefore, and shut the door on them both, and prayed to Yahweh. He went up, and lay on the child, and put his mouth on his mouth, and his eyes on his eyes, and his hands on his hands. He stretched himself on him; and the flesh of the child grew warm. Then he returned, and walked in the house once back and forth; and went up, and stretched himself on him. Then […]


The islanders 'honored us with many honors' and stocked the ship with provisions; the prophetic vision of the isles/coastlands bringing their wealth and gifts to God's servants offers a faint figural resonance with Gentiles honoring the apostolic party.

Then you shall see and be radiant, and your heart shall thrill and be enlarged; because the abundance of the sea shall be turned to you, the wealth of the nations shall come to you. The multitude of camels shall cover you, the dromedaries of Midian and Ephah; all they from Sheba shall come; they shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall proclaim the praises of Yahweh. All the flocks of Kedar shall be gathered together to you, the rams of Nebaioth shall […]


When the Roman brothers come to meet him 'Paul thanked God and took courage'; the recurrent OT exhortation to 'be strong and take courage' before entering the appointed place colors his renewed resolve on arrival at Rome, though the verbal link is general.

“Be strong and courageous; for you shall cause this people to inherit the land which I swore to their fathers to give them.


Paul declares he is bound 'because of the hope of Israel.' The phrase 'hope of Israel' is a direct Jeremianic title for the LORD ('O hope of Israel, its savior in time of trouble'), giving real verbal coherence to Paul's self-defense.

You hope of Israel, its Savior in the time of trouble, why should you be as a foreigner in the land, and as a wayfaring man who turns aside to stay for a night?


A second Jeremianic occurrence — 'O LORD, the hope of Israel' — reinforces the title behind Paul's claim; recurrence of the phrase across Jeremiah strengthens the allusion.

Yahweh, the hope of Israel, all who forsake you shall be disappointed. Those who depart from me shall be written in the earth, because they have forsaken Yahweh, the spring of living waters.


The climactic citation that seals the book: 'Go to this people and say, In hearing you will hear but not understand... lest they turn and I would heal them.' Acts 28:26-27 reproduces LXX Isaiah 6:9-10 almost verbatim, explicitly attributed ('the Holy Spirit spoke rightly through Isaiah the prophet'). Maximal volume and an introductory formula — the keystone quotation.

He said, “Go, and tell this people, ‘You hear indeed, but don’t understand; and you see indeed, but don’t perceive.’ Make the heart of this people fat. Make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and turn again, and be healed.”


'The salvation of God is sent to the nations' echoes the Servant commission to be 'a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth' — a programmatic Isaianic text Luke uses elsewhere; here it interprets the turn to the Gentiles immediately after the Isaiah 6 hardening oracle.

yes, he says, “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give you for a light to the nations, that you may be my salvation to the end of the earth.”


'That your way may be known on earth, your saving power among all nations' (LXX Ps 66:3) supplies the universal-salvation idiom behind 'the salvation of God is sent to the nations... they will also listen.'

That your way may be known on earth, and your salvation among all nations,


'All the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God' reinforces the Gentile-salvation declaration; the phrase 'salvation of God' coheres closely with Paul's closing words.

Yahweh has made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God.


'The LORD has made known his salvation... all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God' is another psalmic source for the 'salvation of God' to the nations motif behind v.28.

Yahweh has made known his salvation. He has openly shown his righteousness in the sight of the nations. He has remembered his loving kindness and his faithfulness toward the house of Israel. All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God.


Paul's unhindered preaching of the Kingdom of God in the imperial capital, with all who come received, gives a faint figural fulfillment of the nations streaming to learn God's ways; the link is thematic, not verbal.

It shall happen in the latter days, that the mountain of Yahweh’s house shall be established on the top of the mountains, and shall be raised above the hills; and all nations shall flow to it. Many peoples shall go and say, “Come, let’s go up to the mountain of Yahweh, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths.” For out of Zion the law shall go out, and Yahweh’s word from Jerusalem.


The gospel 'promised before' (v.2) and the apostolic 'set apart' echo the prophetic-promise schema; faint thematic link to the awaited word that surely comes. Low volume, no verbal borrowing here, but coheres with the Hab 2:4 citation in 1:17.

For the vision is yet for the appointed time, and it hurries toward the end, and won’t prove false. Though it takes time, wait for it; because it will surely come. It won’t delay.

For the vision is yet for a time, and it shall shoot forth at the end, and not in vain: though he should tarry, wait for him; for he will surely come, and will not tarry.


'Good News of God' (euangelion) draws on the Isaianic herald who announces good tidings; Paul's gospel vocabulary recurrently leans on Isaiah's heralding of salvation. Thematic coherence high with Romans' Isaiah-saturated argument; volume moderate.

How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of good, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns!”


Set-apart, Spirit-anointed proclamation of good news. Faint; supports the euangelizo background but little distinctive verbal contact.

The Spirit of the Lord Yahweh is on me; because Yahweh has anointed me to preach good news to the humble. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to those who are bound;


'Born of the seed of David' and 'declared Son of God' (vv.3-4) invoke the Nathan oracle: Davidic seed whom God will establish and call son. High thematic coherence (royal-messianic sonship) and strong conceptual recurrence in early Christian use.

When your days are fulfilled, and you shall sleep with your fathers, I will set up your seed after you, who shall proceed out of your bowels, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be his father, and he shall be my son. If he commits iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men;


'Declared to be the Son of God with power... by the resurrection' echoes the enthronement decree 'You are my Son'; standard messianic proof-text read of Christ's vindication. Strong thematic coherence with Davidic sonship; satisfaction high.

I will tell of the decree. Yahweh said to me, “You are my son. Today I have become your father.


Resurrection-enthronement of 'our Lord' faintly invokes the royal session psalm pervasive in NT Christology. Low verbal volume here.

Yahweh says to my Lord, “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool for your feet.”


Davidic shoot bringing the nations to obedience; 'obedience of faith among all the nations' coheres with the root-of-Jesse hope (cf. Rom 15:12 quoting Isa 11:10). Anticipatory, faint here.

A shoot will come out of the stock of Jesse, and a branch out of his roots will bear fruit. The Spirit of Yahweh will rest on him: the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of Yahweh. His delight will be in the fear of Yahweh. He will not judge by the sight of his eyes, neither decide by the hearing of his ears; but with righteousness he will judge the poor, and decide with equity for […]


Formula-marked ('As it is written') verbatim citation: 'the righteous shall live by faith.' The thesis-text of Romans. Highest volume and satisfaction; Paul reads ho dikaios ek pisteos against the LXX/MT to ground righteousness-by-faith.

Behold, his soul is puffed up. It is not upright in him, but the righteous will live by his faith.


'God's righteousness... revealed' echoes the psalmist's 'The LORD has made known his salvation; he has revealed his righteousness (dikaiosyne) in the sight of the nations.' Strong conceptual pairing of revealed righteousness + salvation to the nations; moderate volume.

Yahweh has made known his salvation. He has openly shown his righteousness in the sight of the nations.


Isaiah's coupling of God's 'righteousness' and 'salvation' going forth to the peoples grounds Paul's revealed dikaiosyne theou unto salvation. Recurrent in Romans; thematic coherence high.

“Attend to me, my people; and give ear to me, my nation: for a law shall go out from me, and I will establish my justice for a light of the peoples. My righteousness is near, my salvation has gone out, and my arms shall judge the peoples; the islands shall wait for me, and on my arm shall they trust. Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look on the earth beneath; for the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment; […]


'Everyone who believes' / not being put to shame anticipates Paul's later quotation of Isa 28:16 (Rom 9:33; 10:11); 'not ashamed' may already lean on this shame-vindication motif. Faint here, recurrence elsewhere.

Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh, “Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone of a sure foundation. He who believes shall not act hastily.


'I am not ashamed' to speak of God's testimonies before kings; possible background to 'not ashamed of the gospel.' Low volume, contested.

I will also speak of your statutes before kings, and will not be disappointed.


'Traded the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image' closely reworks 'they exchanged their glory for the image of an ox that eats grass' (golden calf). High verbal volume on exchange-of-glory; the calf episode is the paradigm of idolatrous substitution.

Thus they exchanged their glory for an image of a bull that eats grass.


'My people have exchanged their glory for that which does not profit' — same exchange-of-glory idiom Paul deploys (allasso/doxa). Strong verbal and conceptual parallel; recurrence reinforces Ps 106:20.

Has a nation changed its gods, which really are no gods? But my people have changed their glory for that which does not profit.


Paul's natural theology — God's invisible power/divinity perceived through created things, leaving idolaters 'without excuse,' yet they failed to know the Maker — closely tracks Wisdom 13's argument that those who study creation are 'without excuse' for not finding its Artisan. High volume; Paul demonstrably leans on Wisdom here.

For verily all men by nature were but vain who had no perception of God, And from the good things that are seen they gained not power to know him that is, Neither by giving heed to the works did they recognize the architect; But either fire, or wind, or swift air, Or circling stars, or raging water, or luminaries of heaven, They thought to be gods that rule the world. And if it was through delight in their beauty that they took them to be gods, Let them […]


The catalogue of images (corruptible man, birds, beasts, creeping things) parallels Wisdom's mockery of those who fashion likenesses of corruptible things. Strong lexical/conceptual overlap; satisfaction high.

But miserable were they, and in dead things were their hopes, Who called them gods which are works of men’s hands, Gold and silver, wrought with careful are, and likenesses of animals, Or a useless stone, the work of an ancient hand. Yes and if some woodcutter, having sawn down a tree that is easily moved, Skilfully strippeth away all its bark, And fashioning it in comely form makes a vessel useful for the service of life; And burning the refuse of his […]


The taxonomy 'man... birds... four-footed animals... creeping things' inverts the Genesis creation order; idolatry as anti-creation, worshipping the made over the Maker. Moderate verbal echo of the creature-categories; thematic coherence high.

God said, “Let the waters abound with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth in the open expanse of sky.” God created the large sea creatures and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarmed, after their kind, and every winged bird after its kind. God saw that it was good. God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” There was evening and there […]


Moses' aniconic warning lists the very classes of image (likeness of male/female, beast, bird, creeping thing, heavenly bodies) Paul echoes; the LXX vocabulary of 'homoioma' overlaps. Strong verbal and conceptual support for the image-list.

Be very careful, for you saw no kind of form on the day that Yahweh spoke to you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire, lest you corrupt yourselves, and make yourself an engraved image in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female, the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged bird that flies in the sky, the likeness of anything that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water under the […]


'Since the creation of the world' (apo ktiseos kosmou) and 'the things that are made' invoke the creation narrative as the ground of natural revelation. Moderate thematic coherence.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.


Classic prophetic satire on idol-makers who become as senseless as their idols; 'became vain in their reasoning' and 'darkened heart' parallel Isaiah's blinded idolater. Moderate volume; recurrent idol-polemic.

Everyone who makes an engraved image is vain. The things that they delight in will not profit. Their own witnesses don’t see, nor know, that they may be disappointed. Who has fashioned a god, or molds an image that is profitable for nothing? Behold, all his fellows will be disappointed; and the workmen are mere men. Let them all be gathered together. Let them stand up. They will fear. They will be put to shame together. The blacksmith takes an ax, works […]


'The heavens declare the glory of God' grounds Paul's claim that God's eternal power is 'clearly seen' through creation, leaving humanity without excuse. Thematic coherence high; moderate verbal contact.

The heavens declare the glory of God. The expanse shows his handiwork. Day after day they pour out speech, and night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard. Their voice has gone out through all the earth, their words to the end of the world. In them he has set a tent for the sun,


Creation itself teaches the hand of God; supports natural revelation but faint verbal contact.

“But ask the animals, now, and they shall teach you; the birds of the sky, and they shall tell you. Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach you. The fish of the sea shall declare to you. Who doesn’t know that in all these, the hand of Yahweh has done this,


'Every man is become brutish in his knowledge' / idols are vanity — parallels 'became vain in their reasoning, professing wise they became fools.' Moderate recurrence within idol-polemic.

Every man has become brutish and without knowledge; every goldsmith is disappointed by his engraved image; for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.


'The LORD knows the thoughts of man, that they are vanity' faintly underlies 'became vain (emataiothesan) in their reasoning.' Low verbal volume.

Yahweh knows the thoughts of man, that they are futile.


'They went after vanity and became vain' — same root for futility tied to idolatry; reinforces the exchange motif of Jer 2:11. Faint additional contact.

Thus says Yahweh, “What unrighteousness have your fathers found in me, that they have gone far from me, and have walked after vanity, and are become vain?


'The idea of making idols was the beginning of fornication' — Wisdom 14 ties idolatry causally to sexual corruption and a flood of vices, exactly Paul's logic ('God gave them up... to uncleanness... vile passions'). High volume; the strongest single subtext for this pericope.

For the devising of idols was the beginning of fornication, And the invention of them the corruption of life: For neither were they from the beginning, neither will they be forever; For by the vaingloriousness of men they entered into the world, And therefore was a speedy end devised for them. For a father worn with untimely grief, Making an image of the child quickly taken away, Now honored him as a god which was then a dead man, And delivered to those […]


'Male and female' / 'natural function' presupposes the created-gender order of Genesis; sexual disorder figured as inversion of creation. Moderate verbal echo (physis vs. the Genesis pattern); thematic coherence high.

God created man in his own image. In God’s image he created him; male and female he created them.


Same-sex relations as 'against nature' resonates with the Holiness Code prohibition tied to Gentile/Canaanite abomination. Conceptual coherence strong; verbal contact via LXX vocabulary moderate.

“‘You shall not lie with a man, as with a woman. That is detestable.


'So I gave them up (paredoka) to their own hearts' lust' is the divine-handing-over formula Paul triples ('God gave them up'). Strong verbal parallel to the paredoken auta refrain; judicial abandonment.

So I let them go after the stubbornness of their hearts, that they might walk in their own counsels.


Sodom as the archetype of disordered desire under judgment; figural background to the inflamed-lust description. Little verbal borrowing, contested.

But before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, both young and old, all the people from every quarter. They called to Lot, and said to him, “Where are the men who came in to you this night? Bring them out to us, that we may have sex with them.” Lot went out to them to the door, and shut the door after him. He said, “Please, my brothers, don’t act so wickedly. See now, I have two virgin daughters. Please let me bring […]


Sirach's catalogue of sexual sins and 'burning' desire offers a Second Temple parallel to 'burned in their lust.' Faint, contested verbal contact.

Two sorts of men multiply sins, And the third will bring wrath: A hot mind, as a burning fire, will not be quenched till it be consumed: A fornicator in the body of his flesh will never cease till he has burned out the fire. All bread is sweet to a fornicator: He will not leave off till he die. A man that goes astray from his own bed, Saying in his heart, Who sees me? Darkness is round about me, and the walls hide me, And no man sees me; of whom am I […]


Wisdom's vice-catalogue flowing from idolatry (murder, deceit, corruption, faithlessness, defiling of life) closely parallels Paul's list and its idolatry-to-vice causal chain. High volume and recurrence; Paul's clearest model for the catalogue.

Afterward it was not enough for them to go astray as touching the knowledge of God; But also, while they live in sore conflict through ignorance of him. That multitude of evils they call peace. For either slaughtering children in solemn rites, or celebrating secret mysteries, Or holding frantic revels of strange ordinances, No longer do they guard either life or purity of marriage, But one brings upon another either death by treachery, or anguish by […]


Third 'God gave them up (to a reprobate mind)' continues the divine-abandonment formula of Ps 81:12 (LXX 80:13). Moderate verbal, strong thematic recurrence within the pericope-cluster.


'Slanderers... corrupters all' — prophetic vice description of a rebellious people; faint catalogue parallel.

They are all grievous rebels, going about with slanders; they are brass and iron: they all of them deal corruptly.


'No faithfulness... swearing, lying, murder, stealing, adultery' — prophetic indictment listing covenant breakdown, paralleling Paul's catalogue of murder/strife/deceit/covenant-breakers. Moderate conceptual coherence with the prophetic rib-pattern.

Hear Yahweh’s word, you children of Israel; for Yahweh has a charge against the inhabitants of the land: “Indeed there is no truth, nor goodness, nor knowledge of God in the land. There is cursing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery; they break boundaries, and bloodshed causes bloodshed.


'Every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil' as the flood-era summary of total depravity; faint background to 'filled with all unrighteousness.' Little verbal contact, contested.

Yahweh saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of man’s heart was continually only evil.


Song of Moses' description of a 'crooked and perverse generation... no faith in them' echoes the covenant-breaking, faithless terms of vv.31. Faint; Deut 32 recurs later in Romans.

They have dealt corruptly with him. They are not his children, because of their defect. They are a perverse and crooked generation.


Second Temple moral-decline rhetoric pairing idolatry with comprehensive licentiousness; supports the 'approve of those who practice them' communal-corruption note. Faint parallel.

For the temple was filled with riot and revellings by the heathen, who dallied with harlots, and had to do with women within the sacred precincts, and moreover brought inside things that were not befitting;


2:6 'who will pay back to everyone according to their works' is a near-verbatim citation of Ps 62:12 (LXX 61:13), 'for you repay to each according to his work' — the foundational judgment maxim Paul deploys against the presumptuous judge.

Also to you, Lord, belongs loving kindness, for you reward every man according to his work.


2:6 equally cites Prov 24:12, 'will he not repay each according to his deeds?' — joint source with Ps 62:12; Prov adds the 'God who weighs the heart / does he not know?' frame that suits Paul's argument about secret motives (cf. 2:16).

If you say, “Behold, we didn’t know this”; doesn’t he who weighs the hearts consider it? He who keeps your soul, doesn’t he know it? Shall he not render to every man according to his work?


2:11 'there is no partiality with God' echoes Deut 10:17, 'God of gods... who shows no partiality (ou thaumazei prosopon) and takes no bribe' — the classic OT divine-impartiality formula underwriting Jew-and-Greek equality before judgment.

For Yahweh your God, he is God of gods, and Lord of lords, the great God, the mighty, and the awesome, who doesn’t respect persons, nor takes reward.


2:11 also reflects Jehoshaphat's charge, 'with the LORD our God there is no injustice or partiality (prosopolempsia) or taking of bribes' — a near-technical Greek precedent for Paul's coined prosopolempsia.

Now therefore let the fear of Yahweh be on you. Take heed and do it: for there is no iniquity with Yahweh our God, nor respect of persons, nor taking of bribes.”


2:4 'riches of his goodness, forbearance, and patience' draws on the covenant self-revelation 'a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger (makrothymos), abounding in steadfast love' — the divine attribute of forbearance Paul says should lead to repentance, not presumption.

Yahweh passed by before him, and proclaimed, “Yahweh! Yahweh, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness and truth,


2:4 'goodness... forbearance... leads to repentance' closely tracks Wisdom of Solomon 11:23, 'you overlook the sins of men so that they may repent,' and 12:10's gift of 'space for repentance' — Second Temple theology of divine patience Paul reuses and then turns critically against Israel.

But you have mercy on all men, because you have power to do all things, And you overlookest the sins of men to the end they may repent.


2:5 'treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath' echoes the Song of Moses, 'Is not this laid up in store with me, sealed up in my treasuries? Vengeance is mine,' the image of stored-up requital for a day of reckoning (Paul quotes the same verse at 12:19).

“Isn’t this laid up in store with me, sealed up among my treasures? Vengeance is mine, and recompense, at the time when their foot slides; for the day of their calamity is at hand. Their doom rushes at them.”


2:5 'day of wrath, revelation, and of the righteous judgment of God' draws on the Day-of-the-LORD oracle, 'that day is a day of wrath... of distress and anguish,' whose vocabulary (wrath, distress/anguish, cf. 2:9) saturates Paul's judgment scene.

The great day of Yahweh is near. It is near, and hurries greatly, the voice of the day of Yahweh. The mighty man cries there bitterly. That day is a day of wrath, a day of distress and anguish, a day of trouble and ruin, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and blackness, a day of the trumpet and alarm, against the fortified cities, and against the high battlements. I will bring distress on men, that they will walk like blind men, because they […]


2:5 'your hardness and unrepentant heart' may evoke the recurrent indictment of Israel's stubbornness (sklerokardia / hard neck), e.g. Deut 9:6,13,27; an echo Paul ironically applies to the self-confident judge.

Remember your servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Don’t look at the stubbornness of this people, nor at their wickedness, nor at their sin,


2:6 repayment 'according to works' is reinforced by Jer 17:10, 'I the LORD search the heart... to give to each according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds' — joining heart-searching to works-recompense, both themes operative in Rom 2.

I, Yahweh, search the mind, I try the heart, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings.


2:6 'according to their works' resonates with Jer 32:19 (LXX 39:19), 'whose eyes are open to all the ways of men, to reward every man according to his ways and the fruit of his deeds' — another witness to the judgment-by-works topos.

great in counsel, and mighty in work; whose eyes are open to all the ways of the sons of men, to give everyone according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings:


2:6 recompense by works also appears in Elihu's speech, 'for according to the work of a man he will repay him,' immediately followed (34:19) by God showing no partiality to princes — a striking pairing of Paul's two themes (works + impartiality).

For the work of a man he will render to him, and cause every man to find according to his ways.


2:6 'according to works' is closely paralleled by Sirach 16:12-14, 'he judges a man according to his deeds... he makes room for every act of mercy; everyone receives according to his deeds' — Second Temple crystallization of the same recompense doctrine.

As his mercy is great, so is his correction also: He judges a man according to his works. The sinner will not escape with his plunder; And the perseverance of the godly will not be frustrated. He will make room for every work of mercy; Each man will find according to his works.


2:11 'no partiality' is anticipated by Sirach 35:12-13 (LXX 35:15-16), 'the Lord is the judge, and with him is no partiality; he will not show partiality to the poor' — Second Temple restatement of the impartiality formula in a judgment context.

Think not to corrupt with gifts; for he will not receive them: And set not your mind on an unrighteous sacrifice; For the Lord is judge, And with him is no respect of persons. He will not accept any person against a poor man; And he will listen to the prayer of him that is wronged.


2:13 'the doers of the law will be justified' echoes the Torah principle 'the person who does them shall live by them' — the do-and-live logic (which Paul cites directly at 10:5; Gal 3:12) standing behind 'doers' over 'hearers.'

You shall therefore keep my statutes and my ordinances; which if a man does, he shall live in them. I am Yahweh.


2:13 hearing-versus-doing reflects Moses' charge to 'listen (hear) to the statutes... and do them, that you may live,' the Deuteronomic pairing of shema and asah that Paul splits to indict mere hearers.

Now, Israel, listen to the statutes and to the ordinances, which I teach you, to do them; that you may live, and go in and possess the land which Yahweh, the God of your fathers, gives you.


2:14-15 Gentiles 'a law to themselves' with the law's work 'in their hearts' faintly recalls Deut 30:11-14, 'the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it' — the nearness/internality of the commandment (Paul quotes this at 10:6-8), here generalized to conscience.

For this commandment which I command you this day is not too hard for you or too distant. It is not in heaven, that you should say, “Who will go up for us to heaven, and bring it to us, and proclaim it to us, that we may do it?” Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, “Who will go over the sea for us, and bring it to us, and proclaim it to us, that we may do it?” But the word is very near to you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may do […]


2:15 'the work of the law written in their hearts' verbally echoes the new-covenant promise 'I will put my law within them, and on their hearts I will write it' — though Paul applies the imagery to Gentiles' moral intuition rather than Israel's eschatological renewal, the borrowing is deliberate and ironic.

But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says Yahweh: I will put my law in their inward parts, and in their heart will I write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people:


2:16 'God will judge the secrets of men' draws on Qoheleth's conclusion, 'God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil' — secret-deed judgment as the climax of the wisdom tradition.

For God will bring every work into judgment, with every hidden thing, whether it is good, or whether it is evil.


2:16 judging 'the secrets of men' echoes Ps 44:21 (LXX 43:22), 'would not God discover this? For he knows the secrets of the heart' — divine knowledge of hidden things grounding the verdict.

won’t God search this out? For he knows the secrets of the heart.


2:16 'judge the secrets' parallels Wisdom of Solomon 1:6-9, 'God is witness of his inmost feelings... a hearing reaches the Lord... and the report of his words comes to the Lord to convict him of his lawless deeds' — Second Temple scrutiny of inner thoughts at judgment.

For wisdom is a spirit that loves man, And she will not hold a blasphemer guiltless for his lips; Because God bears witness of his reins, And is a true overseer of his heart, And a hearer of his tongue: Because the spirit of the Lord has filled the world, And that which holds all things together has knowledge of every voice. Therefore no man that utters unrighteous things will be unseen; Neither will Justice, when it convicts, pass him by. For in the […]


2:16 God judging hidden 'secrets' resonates with 'man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart' — the principle of inward divine sight underlying Paul's contrast between outward and inward (developed at 2:28-29).

But Yahweh said to Samuel, “Don’t look on his face, or on the height of his stature; because I have rejected him: for I see not as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but Yahweh looks at the heart.”


2:16 secret-judgment overlaps with Jer 17:10, 'I the LORD search the heart and test the mind' — heart-searching paired with works-recompense, already noted at 2:6 and reinforcing the pericope's frame.


2:24 'the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you, just as it is written' is an explicit formula-citation of Isa 52:5 LXX, 'because of you my name is continually blasphemed among the nations' — Paul's clinching scriptural proof of the indictment.

“Now therefore, what do I do here,” says Yahweh, “seeing that my people are taken away for nothing? Those who rule over them mock,” says Yahweh, “and my name continually all the day is blasphemed.


2:24 the profaning of God's name among the nations is reinforced by Ezek 36:20-23, 'they profaned my holy name... wherever they came among the nations' — the same prophetic logic (Israel's conduct dishonoring God before the Gentiles), and Ezek 36's heart/spirit renewal also feeds 2:29.

When they came to the nations, where they went, they profaned my holy name; in that men said of them, These are the people of Yahweh, and are gone out of his land. But I had respect for my holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the nations, where they went. Therefore tell the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: I don’t do this for your sake, house of Israel, but for my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations, where […]


2:21-22 'you who teach another, don't you teach yourself? You who preach don't steal, do you steal?... commit adultery?' closely mirrors Ps 50:16-21 (LXX 49), 'what right have you to recite my statutes...? you keep company with thieves... and with adulterers' — God's rebuke of the hypocrite who recites the law while breaking it.

But to the wicked God says, “What right do you have to declare my statutes, that you have taken my covenant on your lips, since you hate instruction, and throw my words behind you? When you saw a thief, you consented with him, and have participated with adulterers. “You give your mouth to evil. Your tongue frames deceit. You sit and speak against your brother. You slander your own mother’s son. You have done these things, and I kept silent. You thought […]


2:19 'a guide of the blind, a light to those in darkness' draws on the Servant's vocation 'a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out... those who sit in darkness' — Israel's self-understanding as light to the Gentiles, which Paul ironizes.

“I, Yahweh, have called you in righteousness, and will hold your hand, and will keep you, and make you a covenant for the people, as a light for the nations; to open the blind eyes, to bring the prisoners out of the dungeon, and those who sit in darkness out of the prison.


2:19 'a light to those in darkness' also echoes Isa 49:6, 'I will make you a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth' — the Servant-Israel light-to-Gentiles motif Paul invokes only to expose the teacher's failure.

yes, he says, “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give you for a light to the nations, that you may be my salvation to the end of the earth.”


2:19 the irony deepens with Isa 42:19, 'who is blind but my servant... who is blind as the dedicated one?' — the would-be guide of the blind is himself the blind servant; a faint counter-echo within the same Isaianic context.

Who is blind, but my servant? Or who is as deaf as my messenger whom I send? Who is as blind as he who is at peace, and as blind as Yahweh’s servant?


2:22 'you who abhor idols, do you rob temples?' reflects Deut 7:25-26, 'the carved images of their gods you shall burn... you shall utterly abhor it (bdelysse), for it is an abomination' — the very verb of abhorring idols (bdelyssomenos) Paul uses, sharpening the charge of temple-robbing inconsistency.

You shall burn the engraved images of their gods with fire. You shall not covet the silver or the gold that is on them, nor take it for yourself, lest you be snared in it; for it is an abomination to Yahweh your God. You shall not bring an abomination into your house, and become a devoted thing like it. You shall utterly detest it, and you shall utterly abhor it; for it is a devoted thing.


2:29 'circumcision is that of the heart' directly echoes Moses' command 'circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stubborn' — the foundational text spiritualizing circumcision (note the proximity to Deut 10:17's impartiality, used at 2:11).

Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked.


2:29 heart-circumcision in the Spirit draws on Deut 30:6, 'the LORD your God will circumcise your heart... so that you will love the LORD' — the promised divine (eschatological, Spirit-effected) circumcision, matching Paul's 'in the spirit not the letter.'

Yahweh your God will circumcise your heart, and the heart of your seed, to love Yahweh your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, that you may live.


2:29 'circumcision of the heart' echoes Jer 4:4, 'circumcise yourselves to the LORD; remove the foreskin of your hearts' — prophetic demand for inward circumcision lest wrath go forth, fitting Paul's wrath-and-heart argument.

Circumcise yourselves to Yahweh, and take away the foreskins of your heart, you men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem; lest my wrath go out like fire, and burn so that no one can quench it, because of the evil of your doings.


2:25-29 the worthlessness of fleshly circumcision without obedience reflects Jer 9:25-26, 'I will punish all who are circumcised merely in the flesh... for all these nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel is uncircumcised in heart' — exactly Paul's leveling of circumcised and uncircumcised by the heart criterion.

Behold, the days come, says Yahweh, that I will punish all those who are circumcised in uncircumcision: Egypt, and Judah, and Edom, and the children of Ammon, and Moab, and all that have the corners of their hair cut off, who dwell in the wilderness; for all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart.


2:29 inward circumcision recalls Lev 26:41, 'if then their uncircumcised heart is humbled and they make amends for their iniquity' — the Holiness Code's notion of an uncircumcised heart needing humbling, a Torah basis for the heart/flesh distinction.

I also walked contrary to them, and brought them into the land of their enemies; if then their uncircumcised heart is humbled, and they then accept the punishment of their iniquity;


2:25-29 the pairing 'uncircumcised in heart and flesh' appears in Ezek 44:7-9 barring those 'uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh' from the sanctuary — the dual (heart/flesh) circumcision distinction Paul exploits.

in that you have brought in foreigners, uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh, to be in my sanctuary, to profane it, even my house, when you offer my bread, the fat and the blood, and they have broken my covenant, to add to all your abominations. You have not performed the duty of my holy things; but you have set performers of my duty in my sanctuary for yourselves. Thus says the Lord Yahweh, No foreigner, uncircumcised in heart and […]


2:29 'in the spirit, not in the letter' echoes the new-heart promise, 'I will give you a new heart... and put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes' — Spirit-wrought interior obedience over external observance.

I will also give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and you shall keep my ordinances, and do them.


2:25-29 the whole argument presupposes and reinterprets the Abrahamic covenant of circumcision in the flesh (Gen 17, 'every male shall be circumcised... in your flesh an everlasting covenant') — Paul figurally relocates the 'everlasting covenant' sign from flesh to heart/Spirit.

God said to Abraham, “As for you, you will keep my covenant, you and your seed after you throughout their generations. This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your seed after you. Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskin. It will be a token of the covenant between me and you. He who is eight days old will be circumcised among you, every male throughout your generations, he […]


2:29 'whose praise is not from men but from God' likely plays on the etymology of 'Jew' (Judah/Yehudah), named in Gen 29:35 when Leah says 'this time I will praise the LORD' — the true Jew is the one of genuine praise, a Hebrew wordplay (Judah = praise; cf. Gen 49:8).

She conceived again, and bore a son. She said, “This time will I praise Yahweh.” Therefore she named him Judah. Then she stopped bearing.


Verbatim citation introduced by 'as it is written' in 3:4: 'that you might be justified in your words, and might prevail when you come into judgment' = LXX Psalm 50:6, David's confession in the Miserere. Paul deploys it to vindicate God's righteousness against human faithlessness: God is justified (proven right) precisely when humans are shown liars.

Against you, and you only, have I sinned, and done that which is evil in your sight; that you may be proved right when you speak, and justified when you judge.

Against thee only have I sinned, and done evil before thee: that thou mightest be justified in thy sayings, and mightest overcome when thou art judged.


The 'advantage of the Jew' and being 'entrusted with the oracles of God' (3:1-2) echoes Israel's unique covenantal privilege of possessing God's statutes and nearness, the defining boast of Deuteronomy 4:7-8. Paul concedes this advantage before relativizing it.

For what great nation is there, that has a god so near to them, as Yahweh our God is whenever we call on him? What great nation is there, that has statutes and ordinances so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day?


Israel as guardian of 'the oracles/words of God' (3:2) faintly recalls Levi keeping God's word and covenant; the 'logia tou theou' language draws on the deposit-of-the-law tradition.

He said of his father, and of his mother, ‘I have not seen him.’ He didn’t acknowledge his brothers, nor did he know his own children; for they have observed your word, and keep your covenant.


'Let God be found true, but every man a liar' (3:4) restates Balaam's axiom that God is not a man that he should lie; the contrast between divine truthfulness and human falsehood is the same theological commitment.

God is not a man, that he should lie, nor the son of man, that he should repent. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not make it good?


'Every man a liar' (3:4) is the psalmist's verbatim verdict, 'all men are liars' (LXX Psalm 115:2). Paul fuses it with the Psalm 51 citation to dramatize the truth-of-God / lie-of-humanity antithesis.

I said in my haste, “All men are liars.”


'How will God judge the world?' (3:6) invokes Abraham's appeal to the Judge of all the earth who must do right; God's universal judicial competence is the unquestionable premise that secures his righteousness.

Be it far from you to do things like that, to kill the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous should be like the wicked. May that be far from you. Shouldn’t the Judge of all the earth do right?”


The faithfulness-of-God-despite-Israel's-faithlessness theme (3:3) anticipates the Hosea citations Paul will marshal in Romans 9; God's covenant fidelity outlasts the people's apistia.

Yet the number of the children of Israel will be as the sand of the sea, which can’t be measured nor numbered; and it will come to pass that, in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’


Head of the catena (3:10-12): 'There is none righteous... none who understands... none who seeks God; all have turned aside, together become worthless; none does good, not one.' This is a near-verbatim chain from LXX Psalm 13:1-3, the fool who says there is no God. Paul opens his 'as it is written' string here.

The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt. They have done abominable works. There is no one who does good. Yahweh looked down from heaven on the children of men, to see if there were any who understood, who sought after God. They have all gone aside. They have together become corrupt. There is no one who does good, no, not one.


'There is no righteous man on earth who does good and never sins' supplies the same universal-sin thesis as the catena's opening 'none righteous... none does good' (3:10-12); a wisdom-tradition reinforcement of the Psalm 14 verdict.

Surely there is not a righteous man on earth, who does good and doesn’t sin.


Catena member at 3:13a: 'Their throat is an open tomb; with their tongues they have practiced deceit' = LXX Psalm 5:10, verbatim. Begins the catena's catalogue of speech-organs (throat, tongue, lips, mouth).

For there is no faithfulness in their mouth. Their heart is destruction. Their throat is an open tomb. They flatter with their tongue.


Catena member at 3:13b: 'The poison of asps/vipers is under their lips' = LXX Psalm 139:4, verbatim. Continues the speech catalogue from lips.

They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent. Viper’s poison is under their lips. Selah.


Catena member at 3:14: 'whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness' draws on LXX Psalm 9:28 (Psalm 10:7 MT), 'his mouth is full of cursing and deceit and oppression.' Completes the mouth-cursing item of the speech catalogue.

His mouth is full of cursing, deceit, and oppression. Under his tongue is mischief and iniquity.


Catena member at 3:15-17: 'Their feet are swift to shed blood; destruction and misery are in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known' = Isaiah 59:7-8, the prophet's indictment that justice and peace are absent. The lone prophetic link in the otherwise psalmic chain; shifts from speech to feet/ways.

Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood: their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; desolation and destruction are in their paths. The way of peace they don’t know; and there is no justice in their goings: they have made them crooked paths; whoever goes therein does not know peace.


'Their feet run to evil and make haste to shed blood' parallels 3:15 ('their feet are swift to shed blood') and overlaps Isaiah 59:7; some hold Proverbs 1:16 contributes to or doubles the source of the feet-shedding-blood clause.

for their feet run to evil. They hurry to shed blood.


Catena's climactic capstone at 3:18: 'There is no fear of God before their eyes' = LXX Psalm 35:2, verbatim. The chain closes by returning the indictment to its root (fear of God / eyes), inclusio with the opening 'none seeks God.'

An oracle is within my heart about the disobedience of the wicked: “There is no fear of God before his eyes.”


3:20: 'by works of the law no flesh will be justified in his sight' adapts LXX Psalm 142:2, 'do not enter into judgment with your servant, for in your sight no living one shall be justified.' Paul adds 'by works of the law' but the 'no flesh justified before you' core is verbatim from the psalmist.

Don’t enter into judgment with your servant, for in your sight no man living is righteous.


'All have turned aside, together become corrupt/worthless' (3:12) faintly recalls the Flood verdict that all flesh had corrupted its way on earth; both render a totalizing 'all flesh' depravity.

God saw the earth, and saw that it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.


Beyond the quoted 59:7-8, the wider Isaiah 59 oracle ('none calls for justice... they conceive mischief') colors the catena's portrait; Paul likely has the whole indictment-of-no-righteousness pericope in view.

No one sues in righteousness, and no one pleads in truth: they trust in vanity, and speak lies; they conceive mischief, and give birth to iniquity.


'How can a man be righteous before God?' anticipates 3:20's 'no flesh justified in his sight'; the forensic impossibility of human self-justification before God is a shared wisdom premise.

“Truly I know that it is so, but how can man be just with God?


The thesis of 'righteousness of God through faith' (3:21-22) carries forward the programmatic citation of 1:17, 'the righteous shall live by faith'; the faith-righteousness axis here is governed by Habakkuk even without re-quotation.

Behold, his soul is puffed up. It is not upright in him, but the righteous will live by his faith.


'A righteousness of God has been revealed' (3:21) echoes Deutero-Isaiah's repeated proclamation that God's righteousness/salvation 'draws near' and 'is revealed'; the apocalyptic unveiling of divine sedaqah is Isaianic.

My righteousness is near, my salvation has gone out, and my arms shall judge the peoples; the islands shall wait for me, and on my arm shall they trust. Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look on the earth beneath; for the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment; and those who dwell therein shall die in the same way: but my salvation shall be forever, and my righteousness shall not be abolished. “Listen to me, […]


'The LORD has made known his salvation; he has revealed his righteousness in the sight of the nations' is a close template for 3:21-22: God's righteousness now revealed to all who believe, Jew and Gentile alike.

Yahweh has made known his salvation. He has openly shown his righteousness in the sight of the nations.


Christ set forth as 'hilasterion' / atoning sacrifice 'in his blood' (3:25) typologically fulfills the Day of Atonement mercy seat (kapporeth, LXX hilasterion) sprinkled with blood; the temple atonement apparatus prefigures the cross.

and he shall put the incense on the fire before Yahweh, that the cloud of the incense may cover the mercy seat that is on the testimony, so that he will not die. He shall take some of the blood of the bull, and sprinkle it with his finger on the mercy seat on the east; and before the mercy seat he shall sprinkle some of the blood with his finger seven times. “Then he shall kill the goat of the sin offering, that is for the people, and bring his blood […]


The 'hilasterion' of 3:25 is the very term LXX uses for the mercy seat / cover of the ark where God meets Israel; Paul presents Christ as the eschatological place of propitiation, fulfilling the ark typology.

You shall make a mercy seat of pure gold. Two and a half cubits shall be its length, and a cubit and a half its breadth. You shall make two cherubim of hammered gold. You shall make them at the two ends of the mercy seat. Make one cherub at the one end, and one cherub at the other end. You shall make the cherubim on its two ends of one piece with the mercy seat. The cherubim shall spread out their wings upward, covering the mercy seat with their wings, […]


Justification 'freely by his grace through the redemption in Christ Jesus' and the atoning-blood demonstration of righteousness (3:24-25) echoes the Servant who 'makes many righteous' by bearing sin; the vicarious sin-bearing undergirds Paul's atonement language.

After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light and be satisfied. My righteous servant will justify many by the knowledge of himself; and he will bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the plunder with the strong; because he poured out his soul to death, and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.


'There is one God who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith' (3:30) grounds itself in the Shema's 'the LORD is one'; Paul turns Israel's monotheistic confession into the warrant for one way of justification for Jew and Gentile.

Hear, Israel: Yahweh is our God. Yahweh is one.


The circumcised/uncircumcised distinction relativized in 3:29-30 presupposes the Abrahamic circumcision covenant; Paul prepares the ground for Romans 4's argument that Abraham was reckoned righteous before circumcision.

God said to Abraham, “As for you, you will keep my covenant, you and your seed after you throughout their generations. This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your seed after you. Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskin. It will be a token of the covenant between me and you. He who is eight days old will be circumcised among you, every male throughout your generations, he […]


God's 'forbearance' and 'passing over of former sins' (3:25-26) draws on the covenant formula of the LORD slow to anger, forgiving iniquity yet not clearing the guilty; Paul shows how God can pass over sins and still be just.

Yahweh passed by before him, and proclaimed, “Yahweh! Yahweh, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness and truth, keeping loving kindness for thousands, forgiving iniquity and disobedience and sin; and that will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, and on the children’s children, on the third and on the fourth generation.”


'Where then is boasting? It is excluded' (3:27) echoes Jeremiah's prohibition of boasting in wisdom, might, or riches, allowing boasting only in knowing the LORD who does righteousness; Paul transposes the anti-boast theme to works of law.

Thus says Yahweh, Don’t let the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, don’t let the rich man glory in his riches; but let him who glories glory in this, that he has understanding, and knows me, that I am Yahweh who exercises loving kindness, justice, and righteousness, in the earth: for in these things I delight, says Yahweh.


'A righteous God and a Savior... in the LORD all the offspring of Israel shall be justified,' with every nation turning to the one God, undergirds 3:26-30: God just and justifier, one God of Jews and Gentiles.

Declare and present it. Yes, let them take counsel together. Who has shown this from ancient time? Who has declared it of old? Haven’t I, Yahweh? There is no other God besides me, a just God and a Savior; There is no one besides me. “Look to me, and be saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is no other. I have sworn by myself, the word has gone out of my mouth in righteousness, and will not return, that to me every knee shall bow, every […]


'Justified by faith apart from works of the law' (3:28) anticipates and is governed by the Abraham-reckoned-righteous text Paul will quote in 4:3; the faith-reckoning principle is already operative here.

He believed in Yahweh; and he reckoned it to him for righteousness.


The governing text of the entire chapter, quoted verbatim in 4:3 ('Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness'). Paul launches a sustained midrash on this single verse, returning to its key term 'accounted/reckoned' (LXX elogisthe) throughout. Maximum volume and recurrence.


Quoted verbatim in 4:7-8 ('Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven... Blessed is the man whom the Lord will by no means charge with sin'). Paul attributes it to David and links it to Genesis 15:6 by gezerah shawah on the shared verb 'reckon/charge' (logizomai): the man to whom the Lord does NOT reckon sin = the man to whom God reckons righteousness apart from works.

Blessed is he whose disobedience is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man to whom Yahweh doesn’t impute iniquity, in whose spirit there is no deceit.


Paul's argument from 'reward' (misthos) in 4:4 ('to him who works, the reward is not counted as grace') draws on the immediate context of Genesis 15:6, where God tells Abraham in 15:1 'your reward shall be very great.' Paul reads the surrounding promise narrative, not just the proof-text.

After these things Yahweh’s word came to Abram in a vision, saying, “Don’t be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward.”


God's self-description as one who 'justifies the ungodly' (4:5) deliberately inverts the legal maxim of Exodus 23:7 LXX, 'you shall not justify the ungodly' (ou dikaioseis ton asebe). Paul scandalously predicates of God the very act forbidden to human judges, signaling that justification is grace, not legal verdict on merit.

“Keep far from a false charge, and don’t kill the innocent and righteous: for I will not justify the wicked.


Reinforces the same forensic reversal: Proverbs 17:15 calls 'he who justifies the wicked' an abomination to the Lord. Paul's phrase 'justifies the ungodly' (4:5) is a calculated provocation against this wisdom commonplace. Thematically coherent but verbally less direct than Exodus 23:7; marked contested.

He who justifies the wicked, and he who condemns the righteous, both of them alike are an abomination to Yahweh.


Second Temple reception of Abraham: 'Abraham was the great father of a multitude of nations... he kept the law of the Most High... therefore the Lord assured him by an oath that nations would be blessed through his offspring.' Sirach reads Abraham's righteousness as covenant-keeping/Torah-obedience, the very reading Paul argues against. A contested background echo: Paul writes with such Second Temple Abraham-as-law-keeper tradition in view.

Abraham was a great father of a multitude of nations; And there was none found like him in glory; Who kept the law of the Most High, And was taken into covenant with him: In his flesh he established the covenant; And when he was proved, he was found faithful. Therefore he assured him by an oath, That the nations should be blessed in his seed; That he would multiply him as the dust of the earth, And exalt his seed as the stars, And cause them to inherit […]


1 Maccabees 2:52 ('Was not Abraham found faithful when tested, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness?') itself cites Genesis 15:6 but fuses it with the Aqedah (Genesis 22) to make faith = proven works/faithfulness under testing. This is the foil for Paul's whole argument that the reckoning preceded and excluded works. Strong verbal overlap with the catchphrase 'reckoned... as righteousness'; marked contested as reception-background rather than source.

Was not Abraham found faithful in temptation, and it was reckoned to him for righteousness?


'Abraham, our forefather' (4:1) may echo Isaiah 51:2, 'Look to Abraham your father... for he was but one when I called him,' a text about Abraham as progenitor of a numerous people from a single ancestor — the theme Paul develops in 4:16-18. Faint; thematic only.

Look to Abraham your father, and to Sarah who bore you; for when he was but one I called him, and I blessed him, and made him many.


Paul's argument that Abraham 'received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith' (4:11) directly invokes Genesis 17:10-11, where circumcision is instituted as 'a sign of the covenant.' Paul takes the Genesis term 'sign' and subordinates it to the faith of Genesis 15, which chronologically preceded it.

This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your seed after you. Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskin. It will be a token of the covenant between me and you.


The pericope hangs entirely on the chronology of Genesis: faith reckoned (15:6) came BEFORE circumcision (chapter 17). 4:9-10 re-quotes 'faith was accounted to Abraham for righteousness' and asks whether the reckoning happened in circumcision or uncircumcision — recurrence of the governing text used as a temporal argument.


'That he might be the father of all those who believe' (4:11) and 'the father of circumcision' (4:12) anticipate the quotation of Genesis 17:5 in 4:17, reading Abraham's universal fatherhood out of the Genesis covenant promise. The 'father of many nations' motif governs the circumcised/uncircumcised dual fatherhood here.

Neither will your name any more be called Abram, but your name will be Abraham; for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.


'The promise to Abraham and to his seed that he should be heir of the world' (4:13) universalizes the land-inheritance promises of Genesis (17:8 'I will give to you and your offspring... all the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession'; cf. 13:15; 15:7). Paul expands the territorial 'land' to 'the world' (kosmos), a move grounded in the cosmic scope of the promise.

I will give to you, and to your seed after you, the land where you are traveling, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession. I will be their God.”


The promise to Abraham 'and to his seed' (4:13) echoes the oath of Genesis 22:17-18, 'I will multiply your seed... and in your seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed,' which links seed, multiplication, and universal blessing — the basis for 'heir of the world.' The word 'seed' (sperma) is the Genesis catchword Paul foregrounds.

that I will bless you greatly, and I will multiply your seed greatly like the stars of the heavens, and like the sand which is on the seashore. Your seed will possess the gate of his enemies. All the nations of the earth will be blessed by your seed, because you have obeyed my voice.”


The 'heir of the world' expansion has a Second Temple precedent in Sirach 44:21, where God promises Abraham 'to give them an inheritance from sea to sea and from the River to the ends of the earth' — already enlarging the land to global scope. A contested background echo for Paul's kosmos language.

Therefore he assured him by an oath, That the nations should be blessed in his seed; That he would multiply him as the dust of the earth, And exalt his seed as the stars, And cause them to inherit from sea to sea, And from the River to the utmost part of the earth.


Genesis 15:7 ('I am the Lord who brought you out... to give you this land to inherit it'), within the same chapter as 15:6, supplies the inheritance vocabulary Paul universalizes in 'heir of the world.' Faint; reinforces that Paul reads the whole Genesis 15 unit.

He said to him, “I am Yahweh who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give you this land to inherit it.”


Quoted verbatim with the introductory formula 'As it is written' in 4:17: 'I have made you a father of many nations' (Genesis 17:5 LXX, 'patera pollon ethnon tetheika se'). Paul reads the perfect tense ('I HAVE made') as already-accomplished divine speech that calls the not-yet into being.


Quoted verbatim in 4:18: 'So will your seed be' (Genesis 15:5 LXX, 'houtos estai to sperma sou'), the star-promise spoken immediately before Genesis 15:6. Paul binds the two halves of Genesis 15 together: the promise (v.5) and Abraham's believing response reckoned as righteousness (v.6).

Yahweh brought him outside, and said, “Look now toward the sky, and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” He said to Abram, “So will your seed be.”


'He being about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah's womb' (4:19) draws directly on Genesis 17:17, where Abraham, told he will have a son, says 'Shall a child be born to him who is a hundred years old? And shall Sarah, who is ninety, bear?' Paul reuses the numeric detail and the implied biological impossibility.

Then Abraham fell on his face, and laughed, and said in his heart, “Will a child be born to him who is one hundred years old? Will Sarah, who is ninety years old, give birth?”


'The deadness of Sarah's womb' and Abraham's 'body already worn out' (4:19) echo Genesis 18:11-12: 'it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women,' and Sarah's words 'After I am worn out (LXX katetribe), shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?' Paul's 'worn out' (nenekromenon/already dead) language tracks the Genesis 18 description of both spouses' exhaustion.

Now Abraham and Sarah were old, well advanced in age. Sarah had passed the age of childbearing. Sarah laughed within herself, saying, “After I have grown old will I have pleasure, my lord being old also?”


Abraham 'being fully assured that what he had promised, he was also able to perform' (4:21) answers the rhetorical question of Genesis 18:14, 'Is anything too hard for the Lord? At the appointed time I will return... and Sarah shall have a son.' Paul converts the LORD's question into Abraham's confident assent — God's power over the impossible.

Is anything too hard for Yahweh? At the set time I will return to you, when the season comes round, and Sarah will have a son.”


'God, who gives life to the dead' (4:17) draws on the scriptural confession of God as life-giver, e.g. 1 Samuel 2:6 (Hannah), 'The Lord kills and makes alive; he brings down to Sheol and raises up.' This is the standard OT idiom Paul applies to both Isaac's miraculous conception and the resurrection.

“Yahweh kills, and makes alive. He brings down to Sheol, and brings up.


'God, who gives life to the dead' (4:17) also resonates with Deuteronomy 32:39, 'I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal,' a foundational text for God's sole power over death and life. Reinforces the same divine attribute Paul predicates.

“See now that I myself am he. There is no god with me. I kill and I make alive. I wound and I heal. There is no one who can deliver out of my hand.