Matthew 9:9

On Worship Anew a couple months ago (11 June, the Second Sunday after Pentecost), the Gospel reading was Matthew 9:9-13.  I was following along in the Latin Vulgate and noticed in verse 9 that what the ESV translates as a finite verb ("rose") is a participle in Latin ("surgens").  Here are the verses in full:

As Jesus passed on from there, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, "Follow me."  And he rose and followed him.

Et cum transiret inde Iesus vidit hominem sedentem in teloneo Mattheum nomine et ait illi sequere me et surgens secutus est eum

It's also a participle (ἀναστὰς) in the Greek:

Καὶ παράγων ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἐκεῖθεν εἶδεν ἄνθρωπον καθήμενον ἐπὶ τὸ τελώνιον, Μαθθαῖον λεγόμενον, καὶ λέγει αὐτῷ· ἀκολούθει μοι. καὶ ἀναστὰς ἠκολούθησεν αὐτῷ.

I have the same comment about this as I had for similar constructions in the calling of the other disciples in Mark 1:18, 20, Matthew 4:20, 22, and Luke 5:11:  I think the participle should remain a participle in the English translation because this results in a greater emphasis on the finite verb ("followed" "secutus est," ἠκολούθησεν), which describes a more significant action.

John 18, 21

In the Daily Dose of Greek video for John 21:9, Dr. Plummer mentions almost as a side note that ἀνθρακιά ("charcoal fire," in the accusative form in the verse) occurs only twice in the Bible:  in this verse and in John 18:18.

At first, I didn't give much thought to this, but the day after I watched the video, I realized that the contexts in which this word appears are related.

In John 18:18, Peter is standing by a charcoal fire while the soldiers take Jesus to Annas.  In the surrounding verses (17, 25-27), Peter three times denies knowing Jesus.

In John 21, after the charcoal fire is mentioned, Jesus three times asks Peter if he loves Him (verses 15-17).  The three instances (three denials and three questions) link these two passages, as John 21:17 makes clear ("Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time, 'Do you love me?'"), and while the charcoal fire isn't nearly as significant, it's a sensory detail that also connects these two accounts.

Matthew 28:20

A couple months ago, the Gospel reading on Worship Anew was Matthew 28:16-20.  I was following along in the Latin Vulgate and noticed the same feature that I saw in Psalm 23 shortly before this.  In verse 20, Jesus says, "ecce ego vobiscum sum omnibus diebus" ("Behold, I am with you in all days").  Because the Latin prepositional phrase "cum vobis" ("with you") is often inverted and combined into a single word ("vobiscum"), the two pronouns are directly next to each other:  "ego vobiscum" ("I you-with").  This proximity provides a greater sense of accompaniment.

Matthew 23:6-7, 12

A few months ago, I watched the CUW chapel service from 8 November 2017 (if I'm not mistaken, this was Pastor Bender's first sermon as associate campus pastor):

The reading was Matthew 23:1-12, and I noticed a couple rhetorical features in it.

"6 And they [the Pharisees] love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues 7 and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others."  These verses exhibit polysyndeton (the repeated "and"), and it emphasizes the abundance that the Pharisees desire.

"12 Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted."  There's a chiastic structure here, and it illustrates this inversion.  (I wrote about this earlier this year, too, with "first" and "last.")

These features are also present in the Greek text:

6 φιλοῦσι δὲ τὴν πρωτοκλισίαν ἐν τοῖς δείπνοις καὶ τὰς πρωτοκαθεδρίας ἐν ταῖς συναγωγαῖς 7 καὶ τοὺς ἀσπασμοὺς ἐν ταῖς ἀγοραῖς καὶ καλεῖσθαι ὑπὸ τῶν ἀνθρώπων ῥαββεί.

12 ὅστις δὲ ὑψώσει ἑαυτὸν ταπεινωθήσεται, καὶ ὅστις ταπεινώσει ἑαυτὸν ὑψωθήσεται.

 and in the Latin Vulgate:

6 amant autem primos recubitus in cenis et primas cathedras in synagogis 7 et salutationes in foro et vocari ab hominibus rabbi

12 qui autem se exaltaverit humiliabitur et qui se humiliaverit exaltabitur