not to the many peoples of unfamiliar speech and difficult language whose words you cannot understand. Surely if I had sent you to them, they would have listened to you.
Parallel translations
- WEB not to many peoples of a strange speech and of a hard language, whose words you can not understand. Surely, if I sent you to them, they would listen to you.
- KJV Not to many people of a strange speech and of an hard language, whose words thou canst not understand. Surely, had I sent thee to them, they would have hearkened unto thee.
- NKJV not to many people of unfamiliar speech and of hard language, whose words you cannot understand. Surely, had I sent you to them, they would have listened to you.
- NASB nor to many peoples of unintelligible speech or difficult language, whose words you cannot understand. But I have sent you to the people who understand you;
- NLT No, I am not sending you to people with strange and difficult speech. If I did, they would listen!
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Even foreign nations would have listened, God says, more readily than Israel. Israel's resistance is especially culpable.
Overview
God notes that pagan peoples might have heeded the message, intensifying Israel's guilt. Those with the most privilege prove the most resistant. This anticipates Jesus' words that pagan cities would have repented at signs Israel rejected (Matthew 11:21). It warns that nearness to God's truth brings greater accountability, not automatic acceptance.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 6
- Matt 11:20–24Then Jesus began to denounce the cities in which most of His miracles had been performed, because they did not repent.
- Rom 9:30–33What then will we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith;
- Luke 11:30–32For as Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites, so the Son of Man will be a sign to this generation.
- Matt 12:41–42The men of Nineveh will stand at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now One greater than Jonah is here.
- Jonah 3:5–10And the Ninevites believed God. They proclaimed a fast and dressed in sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least.
- Acts 27:28They took soundings and found that the water was twenty fathoms deep. Going a little farther, they took another set of soundings that read fifteen fathoms.
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Original language
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