Ezra 9:10

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

Now, our God, what shall we say after this? for we have forsaken your commandments,

World English Bible · Public Domain

Download a study sheet

One document with this verse’s original text, its word-by-word gloss line, the meaning frame, cross-references with their text, attributed commentary, and full source and license credits — printable, and it pastes into notes with its structure intact.

This verse Autodidact and up

Study sheet (.html) Plain text (.txt)

A passage Seminary Student

Up to 50 verses in one chapter. A passage sheet keeps up to 6 commentary sources and 12 cross-references per verse, in the order this page ranks them, and says so on the sheet whenever that leaves anything out. Ask for a single verse and you get the Autodidact verse sheet above.

Everything on this page stays free to read, with no account — the sheet is a download of what is already on screen, not access to it.

Want to remove ads? Support Godless Engineer

Word by word

More ways to search: Search by grammar → Find every occurrence → Compare this word →

Practice this passage: Drill this verse → Learn its vocabulary →

מִצְוֺתֶֽיךָ

mitsvâh

H4687

“commandments · your”

Noun, Common, Feminine, Plural, Construct + Suffix, Personal, 2nd Person, Masculine, Singular

Appears 184× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears at Genesis 26:5

Full BDB Definition

Origin: from H6680

TWOT: 1887b

commandment - commandment (of man) - the commandment (of God) - commandment (of code of wisdom)

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

9: words
9: distinct lemmas
Historical: section

Grammatical profile

2 verbs
2 nouns
1 pronoun
1 preposition
1 conjunction
1 adverb
1 particle

Verb forms

נֹּאמַ֥ר Qal · Imperfect
עָזַ֖בְנוּ Qal · Perfect

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 15 words from the Hebrew and 14 from the Septuagint (LXX English) — closely comparable.

A rough comparison of the two English renderings, which tokenize alike — not a word-level alignment.

Word counts can differ between the Hebrew and the Greek without any difference in meaning — e.g. the Hebrew direct-object marker אֵת has no separate Greek word, and Greek often adds the article ὁ.

In the original languages it is 9 Hebrew tokens and 12 Greek tokens — but the two are counted differently (Hebrew bundles its prefixes and suffixes into one token; the Greek is in lemma form), so that isn’t a like-for-like length.

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to Ezra 9:10 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

Genesis 44:16 Judah said, "What will we tell my lord? What will we speak? Or how will we clear ourselves? God has found out the iniquity of your servants. Behold, we are my lord's bondservants, both we, and he also in whose hand the cup is found."
Joshua 7:8 Oh, Lord, what shall I say, after that Israel has turned their backs before their enemies!
Lamentations 3:22 [It is of] Yahweh's loving kindnesses that we are not consumed, because his compassion doesn't fail.
Daniel 9:4–16 I prayed to Yahweh my God, and made confession, and said, Oh, Lord, the great and dreadful God, who keeps covenant and loving kindness with those who love him and keep his commandments,
Romans 3:19 Now we know that whatever things the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be closed, and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God.

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew Ezra 9:10 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

וְעַתָּ֛ה מַה נֹּאמַ֥ר אֱלֹהֵ֖ינוּ אַֽחֲרֵי זֹ֑את כִּ֥י עָזַ֖בְנוּ מִצְוֺתֶֽיךָ

Now, our God, what shall we say after this? for we have forsaken your commandments,

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX Ezra 9:10 Septuagint · lemma form

τίς λέγω ὁ θεός ἐγώ μετά οὗτος ὅτι ἐν καταλείπω ἐντολή σύ

What shall we say, our God, after this? for we have forsaken your commandments,

LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) · Public Domain

In the Septuagint this is one book — Esdras B (2 Esdras): Ezra is chapters 1–10, Nehemiah 11–23.

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) (Public Domain). How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Commentary

Notes on Ezra 9:10 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Trapp's Complete Commentary

John Trapp

Ezr 9:10 And now, O our God, what shall we say after this? for we have forsaken thy commandments,

Ver. 10. And now, O our God, what shall we say after this?] q.d. We have nothing to say for ourselves, wherever thou shouldst not presently pronounce against us, and execute upon us the sentence of utter rejection. We are even speechless, excuseless, and must needs conclude, It is the Lord’s mercy that we are not consumed, that we are at all on this side of hell it is because his compassions fail not, Lam 3:32.

For we have forsaken thy commandments] Better than this Ezra could not have said for himself and his people, whilst he thus confesseth sin, and putteth himself into the hands of justice, in hope of mercy. In the courts of men it is safest to say, Non feci, I did it not (saith Quintilian). But in our addresses unto God it is best to say, Ego feci, miserere, I did it, Oh be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me. Per miserere mei, tollitur ira Dei.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joseph Benson's Commentary

Ezr 9:10. And now, what shall we say after this? — What apology can we make for ourselves, after thou hast conferred such great and high favours upon us, and we have so grossly abused them?

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Adam Clarke's Commentary

Verse 10. What shall we say after this?] Even in the midst of these beginnings of respite and mercy we have begun to provoke thee anew!

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne

10. A sudden apostrophe. God’s mercy has been great; but now, in spite of all, Israel has broken this command: what does she deserve?

And now … after this] It has been very generally supposed that ‘after this’ means ‘after this manifestation of Divine clemency’. But it seems better to suppose that Ezra breaks abruptly off at Ezr_9:9. The thought of God’s favour in the past makes Ezra mentally compare it with the present position of the Jews. ‘And now, at this moment, after this fresh violation of commandment, after this further proof of our guiltiness, what can we say?’

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

And now, O our God, what shall we say after this?.... What apology or excuse can be made for such ingratitude? what can be said in favour of such a people? what kindness can be expected to be shown to a people who had behaved in so base a manner?

for we have forsaken thy commandments: particularly those which related to marriages with people of other nations.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations

What apology can we make for ourselves, after thou hast conferred such great and high favours upon us, and we have so grossly abused them?

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

unfoldingWord translationNotes

Door43 World Missions Community

for all time

"until the end of the ages"

translationWords

command

servant

prophet

possess

clean

abomination

son

peace

children

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

Ezra, in the Historical, opens this verse with 9 words (9 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is mitsvâh (“commandment”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

How does “commandment” (mitsvâh) shape what this verse is saying?
Genesis 44:16 shares this passage’s theme. How do the two illuminate each other?
These translations render this verse differently. What is at stake in choosing one wording over another?
The verb «נֹּאמַ֥ר» is Qal Imperfect. How does its form color the action?
Reading how Trapp's Complete Commentary and Joseph Benson's Commentary read this verse, where do the two commentators agree and where do they part?

Things to notice

This verse counts 9 Hebrew ↔ 12 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 3 words in this verse.
9 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 9 words in this verse.