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And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree of the garden,
This is why a man leaves his father and mother and bonds with his wife, and they become one flesh.
So the Lord God called out to the man and said to him, “Where are you?”
You will eat bread by the sweat of your brow
until you return to the ground,
since you were taken from it.
For you are dust,
and you will return to dust.”
Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let’s go out to the field.” And while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.
Then the Lord said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?”
“I don’t know,” he replied. “Am I my brother’s guardian?”
Then he said, “What have you done? Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground!
God saw how corrupt the earth was, for every creature had corrupted its way on the earth. Then God said to Noah, “I have decided to put an end to every creature, for the earth is filled with wickedness because of them; therefore I am going to destroy them along with the earth.
“Understand that I am bringing a flood—floodwaters on the earth to destroy every creature under heaven with the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish.
Seven days later the floodwaters came on the earth.
In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the sources of the vast watery depths burst open, the floodgates of the sky were opened,
As long as the earth endures,
seedtime and harvest, cold and heat,
summer and winter, and day and night
will not cease.”
And I will require a penalty for your lifeblood; I will require it from any animal and from any human; if someone murders a fellow human, I will require that person’s life.
I establish my covenant with you that never again will every creature be wiped out by floodwaters; there will never again be a flood to destroy the earth.”
I will remember my covenant between me and you and all the living creatures: water will never again become a flood to destroy every creature.
There was a famine in the land, so Abram went down to Egypt to stay there for a while because the famine in the land was severe.
Pharaoh’s officials saw her and praised her to Pharaoh, so the woman was taken to Pharaoh’s household. He treated Abram well because of her, and Abram acquired flocks and herds, male and female donkeys, male and female slaves, and camels.
One of the survivors came and told Abram the Hebrew, who lived near the oaks belonging to Mamre the Amorite, the brother of Eshcol and the brother of Aner. They were bound by a treaty with Abram.
The angel of the Lord said to her, “You have conceived and will have a son. You will name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard your cry of affliction. This man will be like a wild donkey. His hand will be against everyone, and everyone’s hand will be against him; he will settle near all his relatives.”
That is why the well is called Beer-lahai-roi. It is between Kadesh and Bered.
So Hagar gave birth to Abram’s son, and Abram named his son (whom Hagar bore) Ishmael.
He looked up, and he saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the entrance of the tent to meet them, bowed to the ground,
And he said to Sarah, “Look, I am giving your brother one thousand pieces of silver. It is a verification of your honor to all who are with you. You are fully vindicated.”
Then he said, “Do not lay a hand on the boy or do anything to him. For now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your only son from me.” Abraham looked up and saw a ram caught in the thicket by its horns. So Abraham went and took the ram and offered it as a burnt offering in place of his son.
“I am an alien residing among you. Give me burial property among you so that I can bury my dead.”
“My lord, listen to me. Land worth four hundred shekels of silver—what is that between you and me? Bury your dead.” Abraham agreed with Ephron, and Abraham weighed out to Ephron the silver that he had agreed to in the hearing of the Hethites: four hundred standard shekels of silver.
I am standing here at the spring where the daughters of the men of the town are coming out to draw water.
and asked the servant, “Who is that man in the field coming to meet us?”
The servant answered, “It is my master.” So she took her veil and covered herself.
Abraham had taken another wife, whose name was Keturah, and she bore him Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shuah. Jokshan fathered Sheba and Dedan. Dedan’s sons were the Asshurim, Letushim, and Leummim. And Midian’s sons were Ephah, Epher, Hanoch, Abida, and Eldaah. All these were sons of Keturah.
He took his last breath and died at a good old age, old and contented, and he was gathered to his people.
These are the family records of Abraham’s son Ishmael, whom Hagar the Egyptian, Sarah’s slave, bore to Abraham. These are the names of Ishmael’s sons; their names according to the family records are Nebaioth, Ishmael’s firstborn, then Kedar, Adbeel, Mibsam, Mishma, Dumah, Massa, Hadad, Tema, Jetur, Naphish, and Kedemah. These are Ishmael’s sons, and these are their names by their settlements and encampments: twelve leaders of their clans. This is the length of Ishmael’s life: 137 years. He took his last breath and died, and was gathered to his people. And they settled from Havilah to Shur, which is opposite Egypt as you go toward Asshur. He stayed near all his relatives.
Once when Jacob was cooking a stew, Esau came in from the field exhausted.
“Look,” said Esau, “I’m about to die, so what good is a birthright to me?”
There was another famine in the land in addition to the one that had occurred in Abraham’s time. And Isaac went to Abimelech, king of the Philistines, at Gerar. The Lord appeared to him and said, “Do not go down to Egypt. Live in the land that I tell you about;
Go to the flock and bring me two choice young goats, and I will make them into a delicious meal for your father—the kind he loves.
She put the skins of the young goats on his hands and the smooth part of his neck.
Jacob replied to his father, “I am Esau, your firstborn. I have done as you told me. Please sit up and eat some of my game so that you may bless me.”
He did not recognize him, because his hands were hairy like those of his brother Esau; so he blessed him.
May peoples serve you
and nations bow in worship to you.
Be master over your relatives;
may your mother’s sons bow in worship to you.
Those who curse you will be cursed,
and those who bless you will be blessed.
You will live by your sword,
and you will serve your brother.
But when you rebel,
you will break his yoke from your neck.
When the words of her older son Esau were reported to Rebekah, she summoned her younger son Jacob and said to him, “Listen, your brother Esau is consoling himself by planning to kill you. So now, my son, listen to me. Flee at once to my brother Laban in Haran,
so Esau went to Ishmael and married, in addition to his other wives, Mahalath daughter of Ishmael, Abraham’s son. She was the sister of Nebaioth.
And he dreamed: A stairway was set on the ground with its top reaching the sky, and God’s angels were going up and down on it.
Laban said to him, “Yes, you are my own flesh and blood.”
After Jacob had stayed with him a month,
Leah conceived, gave birth to a son, and named him Reuben, for she said, “The Lord has seen my affliction; surely my husband will love me now.”
And she conceived again, gave birth to a son, and said, “This time I will praise the Lord.” Therefore she named him Judah. Then Leah stopped having children.
He fled with all his possessions, crossed the Euphrates, and headed for the hill country of Gilead.
So he took his relatives with him, pursued Jacob for seven days, and overtook him in the hill country of Gilead.
Jacob answered, “I was afraid, for I thought you would take your daughters from me by force. If you find your gods with anyone here, he will not live! Before our relatives, point out anything that is yours and take it.” Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen the idols.
Then Laban answered Jacob, “The daughters are my daughters; the children, my children; and the flocks, my flocks! Everything you see is mine! But what can I do today for these daughters of mine or for the children they have borne?
Laban named the mound Jegar-sahadutha, but Jacob named it Galeed.
Then Jacob offered a sacrifice on the mountain and invited his relatives to eat a meal. So they ate a meal and spent the night on the mountain.
“I have enough, my brother,” Esau replied. “Keep what you have.”
He purchased a section of the field where he had pitched his tent from the sons of Hamor, Shechem’s father, for a hundred pieces of silver.
But Jacob’s sons answered Shechem and his father Hamor deceitfully because he had defiled their sister Dinah.
On the third day, when they were still in pain, two of Jacob’s sons, Simeon and Levi, Dinah’s brothers, took their swords, went into the unsuspecting city, and killed every male. They killed Hamor and his son Shechem with their swords, took Dinah from Shechem’s house, and went away. Jacob’s sons came to the slaughter and plundered the city because their sister had been defiled. They took their flocks, herds, donkeys, and whatever was in the city and in the field. They captured all their possessions, dependents, and wives and plundered everything in the houses.
Then Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, “You have brought trouble on me, making me odious to the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites and the Perizzites. We are few in number; if they unite against me and attack me, I and my household will be destroyed.”
But they answered, “Should he treat our sister like a prostitute?”
Jacob set up a marker on her grave; it is the marker at Rachel’s grave still today.
While Israel was living in that region, Reuben went in and slept with his father’s concubine Bilhah, and Israel heard about it.
Jacob had twelve sons:
Leah’s sons were Reuben (Jacob’s firstborn),
Simeon, Levi, Judah,
Issachar, and Zebulun.
Rachel’s sons were
Joseph and Benjamin.
The sons of Rachel’s slave Bilhah
were Dan and Naphtali.
The sons of Leah’s slave Zilpah
were Gad and Asher.
These are the sons of Jacob, who were born to him in Paddan-aram.
He took his last breath and died, and was gathered to his people, old and full of days. His sons Esau and Jacob buried him.
and Basemath daughter of Ishmael and sister of Nebaioth.
Jacob lived in the land where his father had stayed, the land of Canaan. These are the family records of Jacob.
At seventeen years of age, Joseph tended sheep with his brothers. The young man was working with the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, his father’s wives, and he brought a bad report about them to their father.
Now Israel loved Joseph more than his other sons because Joseph was a son born to him in his old age, and he made a long-sleeved robe for him. When his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not bring themselves to speak peaceably to him.
Then Joseph had a dream. When he told it to his brothers, they hated him even more.
“Are you really going to reign over us?” his brothers asked him. “Are you really going to rule us?” So they hated him even more because of his dream and what he had said.
They saw him in the distance, and before he had reached them, they plotted to kill him. They said to one another, “Oh, look, here comes that dream expert! So now, come on, let’s kill him and throw him into one of the pits. We can say that a vicious animal ate him. Then we’ll see what becomes of his dreams!”
When Reuben heard this, he tried to save him from them. He said, “Let’s not take his life.” Reuben also said to them, “Don’t shed blood. Throw him into this pit in the wilderness, but don’t lay a hand on him”—intending to rescue him from them and return him to his father.
When Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped off Joseph’s robe, the long-sleeved robe that he had on. Then they took him and threw him into the pit. The pit was empty, without water.
They sat down to eat a meal, and when they looked up, there was a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead. Their camels were carrying aromatic gum, balsam, and resin, going down to Egypt.
Judah said to his brothers, “What do we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? Come on, let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay a hand on him, for he is our brother, our own flesh,” and his brothers agreed. When Midianite traders passed by, his brothers pulled Joseph out of the pit and sold him for twenty pieces of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took Joseph to Egypt.
When Reuben returned to the pit and saw that Joseph was not there, he tore his clothes. He went back to his brothers and said, “The boy is gone! What am I going to do?” So they took Joseph’s robe, slaughtered a male goat, and dipped the robe in its blood. They sent the long-sleeved robe to their father and said, “We found this. Examine it. Is it your son’s robe or not?”
His father recognized it. “It is my son’s robe,” he said. “A vicious animal has devoured him. Joseph has been torn to pieces!” Then Jacob tore his clothes, put sackcloth around his waist, and mourned for his son many days. All his sons and daughters tried to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. “No,” he said. “I will go down to Sheol to my son, mourning.” And his father wept for him.
Meanwhile, the Midianites sold Joseph in Egypt to Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh and the captain of the guards.
At that time Judah left his brothers and settled near an Adullamite named Hirah. There Judah saw the daughter of a Canaanite named Shua; he took her as a wife and slept with her. She conceived and gave birth to a son, and he named him Er. She conceived again, gave birth to a son, and named him Onan. She gave birth to another son and named him Shelah. It was at Chezib that she gave birth to him.
Judah got a wife for Er, his firstborn, and her name was Tamar. Now Er, Judah’s firstborn, was evil in the Lord’s sight, and the Lord put him to death. Then Judah said to Onan, “Sleep with your brother’s wife. Perform your duty as her brother-in-law and produce offspring for your brother.” But Onan knew that the offspring would not be his, so whenever he slept with his brother’s wife, he released his semen on the ground so that he would not produce offspring for his brother. What he did was evil in the Lord’s sight, so he put him to death also.
Then Judah said to his daughter-in-law Tamar, “Remain a widow in your father’s house until my son Shelah grows up.” For he thought, “He might die too, like his brothers.” So Tamar went to live in her father’s house.
After a long time Judah’s wife, the daughter of Shua, died. When Judah had finished mourning, he and his friend Hirah the Adullamite went up to Timnah to his sheepshearers. Tamar was told, “Your father-in-law is going up to Timnah to shear his sheep.” So she took off her widow’s clothes, veiled her face, covered herself, and sat at the entrance to Enaim, which is on the way to Timnah. For she saw that, though Shelah had grown up, she had not been given to him as a wife. When Judah saw her, he thought she was a prostitute, for she had covered her face.
He went over to her and said, “Come, let me sleep with you,” for he did not know that she was his daughter-in-law.
She said, “What will you give me for sleeping with me?”
“I will send you a young goat from my flock,” he replied.
But she said, “Only if you leave something with me until you send it.”
“What should I give you?” he asked.
She answered, “Your signet ring, your cord, and the staff in your hand.” So he gave them to her and slept with her, and she became pregnant by him. She got up and left, then removed her veil and put her widow’s clothes back on.
When Judah sent the young goat by his friend the Adullamite in order to get back the items he had left with the woman, he could not find her. He asked the men of the place, “Where is the cult prostitute who was beside the road at Enaim?”
“There has been no cult prostitute here,” they answered.
So the Adullamite returned to Judah, saying, “I couldn’t find her, and besides, the men of the place said, ‘There has been no cult prostitute here.’ ”
Judah replied, “Let her keep the items for herself; otherwise we will become a laughingstock. After all, I did send this young goat, but you couldn’t find her.”
About three months later Judah was told, “Your daughter-in-law, Tamar, has been acting like a prostitute, and now she is pregnant.”
“Bring her out,” Judah said, “and let her be burned to death!”
As she was being brought out, she sent her father-in-law this message: “I am pregnant by the man to whom these items belong.” And she added, “Examine them. Whose signet ring, cord, and staff are these?”
Judah recognized them and said, “She is more in the right than I, since I did not give her to my son Shelah.” And he did not know her intimately again.
When the time came for her to give birth, there were twins in her womb. As she was giving birth, one of them put out his hand, and the midwife took it and tied a scarlet thread around it, announcing, “This one came out first.” But then he pulled his hand back, out came his brother, and she said, “What a breakout you have made for yourself!” So he was named Perez. Then his brother, who had the scarlet thread tied to his hand, came out, and was named Zerah.
Now Joseph had been taken to Egypt. An Egyptian named Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh and the captain of the guards, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had brought him there. The Lord was with Joseph, and he became a successful man, serving in the household of his Egyptian master. When his master saw that the Lord was with him and that the Lord made everything he did successful, Joseph found favor with his master and became his personal attendant. Potiphar also put him in charge of his household and placed all that he owned under his authority. From the time that he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the Lord blessed the Egyptian’s house because of Joseph. The Lord’s blessing was on all that he owned, in his house and in his fields. He left all that he owned under Joseph’s authority; he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate.
Now Joseph was well-built and handsome. After some time his master’s wife looked longingly at Joseph and said, “Sleep with me.”
But he refused. “Look,” he said to his master’s wife, “with me here my master does not concern himself with anything in his house, and he has put all that he owns under my authority. No one in this house is greater than I am. He has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. So how could I do this immense evil, and how could I sin against God?”
Although she spoke to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to bed with her. Now one day he went into the house to do his work, and none of the household servants were there. She grabbed him by his garment and said, “Sleep with me!” But leaving his garment in her hand, he escaped and ran outside. When she saw that he had left his garment with her and had run outside, she called her household servants. “Look,” she said to them, “my husband brought a Hebrew man to make fools of us. He came to me so he could sleep with me, and I screamed as loud as I could. When he heard me screaming for help, he left his garment beside me and ran outside.”
She put Joseph’s garment beside her until his master came home. Then she told him the same story: “The Hebrew slave you brought to us came to make a fool of me, but when I screamed for help, he left his garment beside me and ran outside.”
When his master heard the story his wife told him—“These are the things your slave did to me”—he was furious and had him thrown into prison, where the king’s prisoners were confined. So Joseph was there in prison.
But the Lord was with Joseph and extended kindness to him. He granted him favor with the prison warden. The warden put all the prisoners who were in the prison under Joseph’s authority, and he was responsible for everything that was done there. The warden did not bother with anything under Joseph’s authority, because the Lord was with him, and the Lord made everything that he did successful.
Pharaoh was angry with his two officers, the chief cupbearer and the chief baker, and put them in custody in the house of the captain of the guards in the prison where Joseph was confined. The captain of the guards assigned Joseph to them as their personal attendant, and they were in custody for some time.
So he asked Pharaoh’s officers who were in custody with him in his master’s house, “Why do you look so sad today?”
For I was kidnapped from the land of the Hebrews, and even here I have done nothing that they should put me in the dungeon.”
Pharaoh was angry with his servants, and he put me and the chief baker in the custody of the captain of the guards.
Now a young Hebrew, a slave of the captain of the guards, was with us there. We told him our dreams, he interpreted our dreams for us, and each had its own interpretation.
Then Pharaoh sent for Joseph, and they quickly brought him from the dungeon. He shaved, changed his clothes, and went to Pharaoh.
Pharaoh removed his signet ring from his hand and put it on Joseph’s hand, clothed him with fine linen garments, and placed a gold chain around his neck.
Pharaoh gave Joseph the name Zaphenath-paneah and gave him a wife, Asenath daughter of Potiphera, priest at On. And Joseph went throughout the land of Egypt.
Two sons were born to Joseph before the years of famine arrived. Asenath daughter of Potiphera, priest at On, bore them to him.
When the whole land of Egypt was stricken with famine, the people cried out to Pharaoh for food. Pharaoh told all Egypt, “Go to Joseph and do whatever he tells you.” Now the famine had spread across the whole region, so Joseph opened all the storehouses and sold grain to the Egyptians, for the famine was severe in the land of Egypt.
But they replied, “We, your servants, were twelve brothers, the sons of one man in the land of Canaan. The youngest is now with our father, and one is no longer living.”
Then they said to each other, “Obviously, we are being punished for what we did to our brother. We saw his deep distress when he pleaded with us, but we would not listen. That is why this trouble has come to us.”
But Reuben replied, “Didn’t I tell you not to harm the boy? But you wouldn’t listen. Now we must account for his blood!”
Joseph then gave orders to fill their containers with grain, return each man’s silver to his sack, and give them provisions for their journey. This order was carried out.
At the place where they lodged for the night, one of them opened his sack to get feed for his donkey, and he saw his silver there at the top of his bag.
But we told him, ‘We are honest and not spies. We were twelve brothers, sons of the same father. One is no longer living, and the youngest is now with our father in the land of Canaan.’
As they began emptying their sacks, there in each man’s sack was his bag of silver! When they and their father saw their bags of silver, they were afraid.
Their father Jacob said to them, “It’s me that you make childless. Joseph is gone, and Simeon is gone. Now you want to take Benjamin. Everything happens to me!”
But Jacob answered, “My son will not go down with you, for his brother is dead and he alone is left. If anything happens to him on your journey, you will bring my gray hairs down to Sheol in sorrow.”
Then Judah said to his father Israel, “Send the boy with me. We will be on our way so that we may live and not die—neither we, nor you, nor our dependents. I will be responsible for him. You can hold me personally accountable! If I do not bring him back to you and set him before you, I will be guilty before you forever. If we had not delayed, we could have come back twice by now.”
Then their father Israel said to them, “If it must be so, then do this: Put some of the best products of the land in your packs and take them down to the man as a gift—a little balsam and a little honey, aromatic gum and resin, pistachios and almonds.
They were seated before him in order by age, from the firstborn to the youngest. The men looked at each other in astonishment.
Then they tore their clothes, and each one loaded his donkey and returned to the city.
and we answered my lord, ‘We have an elderly father and a younger brother, the child of his old age. The boy’s brother is dead. He is the only one of his mother’s sons left, and his father loves him.’ Then you said to your servants, ‘Bring him to me so that I can see him.’ But we said to my lord, ‘The boy cannot leave his father. If he were to leave, his father would die.’ Then you said to your servants, ‘If your younger brother does not come down with you, you will not see me again.’
One is gone from me—I said he must have been torn to pieces—and I have never seen him again. If you also take this one from me and anything happens to him, you will bring my gray hairs down to Sheol in sorrow.’
“So if I come to your servant my father and the boy is not with us—his life is wrapped up with the boy’s life—when he sees that the boy is not with us, he will die. Then your servants will have brought the gray hairs of your servant our father down to Sheol in sorrow.
Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Please, come near me,” and they came near. “I am Joseph, your brother,” he said, “the one you sold into Egypt. And now don’t be grieved or angry with yourselves for selling me here, because God sent me ahead of you to preserve life.
He gave each of the brothers changes of clothes, but he gave Benjamin three hundred pieces of silver and five changes of clothes.
Then Israel said, “Enough! My son Joseph is still alive. I will go to see him before I die.”
Judah’s sons: Er, Onan, Shelah, Perez, and Zerah; but Er and Onan died in the land of Canaan.
The sons of Perez were Hezron and Hamul.
Manasseh and Ephraim were born to Joseph in the land of Egypt. They were born to him by Asenath daughter of Potiphera, a priest at On.
Israel said to Joseph, “I never expected to see your face again, but now God has even let me see your offspring.”
Reuben, you are my firstborn,
my strength and the firstfruits of my virility,
excelling in prominence, excelling in power.
Turbulent as water, you will not excel,
because you got into your father’s bed
and you defiled it—he got into my bed.
Simeon and Levi are brothers;
their knives are vicious weapons.
May I never enter their council;
may I never join their assembly.
For in their anger they kill men,
and on a whim they hamstring oxen.
Judah, your brothers will praise you.
Your hand will be on the necks of your enemies;
your father’s sons will bow down to you.
Judah is a young lion—
my son, you return from the kill.
He crouches; he lies down like a lion
or a lioness—who dares to rouse him?
The scepter will not depart from Judah
or the staff from between his feet
until he whose right it is comes
and the obedience of the peoples belongs to him.
The archers attacked him,
shot at him, and were hostile toward him.
The blessings of your father excel
the blessings of my ancestors
and the bounty of the ancient hills.
May they rest on the head of Joseph,
on the brow of the prince of his brothers.
They took forty days to complete this, for embalming takes that long, and the Egyptians mourned for him seventy days.
my father made me take an oath, saying, ‘I am about to die. You must bury me there in the tomb that I made for myself in the land of Canaan.’ Now let me go and bury my father. Then I will return.”
When they reached the threshing floor of Atad, which is across the Jordan, they lamented and wept loudly, and Joseph mourned seven days for his father. When the Canaanite inhabitants of the land saw the mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a solemn mourning on the part of the Egyptians.” Therefore the place is named Abel-mizraim. It is across the Jordan.
When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said to one another, “If Joseph is holding a grudge against us, he will certainly repay us for all the suffering we caused him.”
You planned evil against me; God planned it for good to bring about the present result—the survival of many people.
When Pharaoh heard about this, he tried to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in the land of Midian, and sat down by a well.
Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came to draw water and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock.
The Nile will swarm with frogs; they will come up and go into your palace, into your bedroom and on your bed, into the houses of your officials and your people, and into your ovens and kneading bowls.
Then the Lord said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand toward heaven and let there be hail throughout the land of Egypt—on people and animals and every plant of the field in the land of Egypt.”
If the household is too small for a whole animal, that person and the neighbor nearest his house are to select one based on the combined number of people; you should apportion the animal according to what each will eat. You must have an unblemished animal, a year-old male; you may take it from either the sheep or the goats.
Now at midnight the Lord struck every firstborn male in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on his throne to the firstborn of the prisoner who was in the dungeon, and every firstborn of the livestock.
Do not bow in worship to them, and do not serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, bringing the consequences of the fathers’ iniquity on the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me,
If he arrives alone, he is to leave alone; if he arrives with a wife, his wife is to leave with him.
“Whoever kidnaps a person must be put to death, whether he sells him or the person is found in his possession.
However, if the slave can stand up after a day or two, the owner should not be punished because he is his owner’s property.
“When men get in a fight and hit a pregnant woman so that her children are born prematurely but there is no injury, the one who hit her must be fined as the woman’s husband demands from him, and he must pay according to judicial assessment.
If the ox gores a male or female slave, he must give thirty shekels of silver to the slave’s master, and the ox must be stoned.
“When a man uncovers a pit or digs a pit, and does not cover it, and an ox or a donkey falls into it, the owner of the pit must give compensation; he must pay to its owner, but the dead animal will become his.
If it was actually torn apart by a wild animal, he is to bring it as evidence; he does not have to make restitution for the torn carcass.
God did not harm the Israelite nobles; they saw him, and they ate and drank.
He told the elders, “Wait here for us until we return to you. Aaron and Hur are here with you. Whoever has a dispute should go to them.”
oil for the light; spices for the anointing oil and for the fragrant incense;
“Take for yourself the finest spices: 12½ pounds of liquid myrrh, half as much (6¼ pounds) of fragrant cinnamon, 6¼ pounds of fragrant cane,
When any one of them dies and falls on anything it becomes unclean—any item of wood, clothing, leather, sackcloth, or any implement used for work. It is to be rinsed with water and will remain unclean until evening; then it will be clean.
A spring or cistern containing water will remain clean, but someone who touches a carcass in it will become unclean.
He will present them before the Lord and make atonement on her behalf; she will be clean from her discharge of blood. This is the law for a woman giving birth, whether to a male or female.
“Speak to the Israelites and tell them: When any man has a discharge from his member, he is unclean.
I will give peace to the land, and you will lie down with nothing to frighten you. I will remove dangerous animals from the land, and no sword will pass through your land.
I will send wild animals against you that will deprive you of your children, ravage your livestock, and reduce your numbers until your roads are deserted.
The Lord spoke to Moses: “Speak to the Israelites and tell them: When someone makes a special vow to the Lord that involves the assessment of people, if the assessment concerns a male from twenty to sixty years old, your assessment is fifty silver shekels measured by the standard sanctuary shekel. If the person is a female, your assessment is thirty shekels. If the person is from five to twenty years old, your assessment for a male is twenty shekels and for a female ten shekels. If the person is from one month to five years old, your assessment for a male is five silver shekels, and for a female your assessment is three shekels of silver. If the person is sixty years or more, your assessment is fifteen shekels for a male and ten shekels for a female. But if one is too poor to pay the assessment, he is to present the person before the priest and the priest will set a value for him. The priest will set a value for him according to what the one making the vow can afford.
Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, who were among those who scouted out the land, tore their clothes
‘Since the Lord wasn’t able to bring this people into the land he swore to give them, he has slaughtered them in the wilderness.’
But if the Lord brings about something unprecedented, and the ground opens its mouth and swallows them along with all that belongs to them so that they go down alive into Sheol, then you will know that these men have despised the Lord.”
They went down alive into Sheol with all that belonged to them. The earth closed over them, and they vanished from the assembly.
When the whole community saw that Aaron had passed away, the entire house of Israel mourned for him thirty days.
The name of the slain Midianite woman was Cozbi, the daughter of Zur, a tribal head of a family in Midian.
“Attack the Midianites and strike them dead. For they attacked you with the treachery that they used against you in the Peor incident. They did the same in the case involving their sister Cozbi, daughter of the Midianite leader who was killed the day the plague came at Peor.”
Judah’s sons included Er and
Onan, but they died in the land of
Canaan. Judah’s descendants by
their clans:
the Shelanite clan from Shelah;
the Perezite clan from Perez;
the Zerahite clan from Zerah.
The descendants of Perez:
the Hezronite clan from Hezron;
the Hamulite clan from Hamul.
“Execute vengeance for the Israelites against the Midianites. After that, you will be gathered to your people.”
So Moses spoke to the people, “Equip some of your men for war. They will go against Midian to inflict the Lord’s vengeance on them.
Along with the others slain by them, they killed the Midianite kings—Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba, the five kings of Midian. They also killed Balaam son of Beor with the sword. The Israelites took the Midianite women and their dependents captive, and they plundered all their cattle, flocks, and property.
The Reubenites and Gadites had a very large number of livestock. When they surveyed the lands of Jazer and Gilead, they saw that the region was a good one for livestock.
Our dependents, wives, livestock, and all our animals will remain here in the cities of Gilead,
Moses told them, “If the Gadites and Reubenites cross the Jordan with you, every man in battle formation before the Lord, and the land is subdued before you, you are to give them the land of Gilead as a possession.
The descendants of Machir son of Manasseh went to Gilead, captured it, and drove out the Amorites who were there. So Moses gave Gilead to the clan of Machir son of Manasseh, and they settled in it.
There was no city that was inaccessible to us, from Aroer on the rim of the Arnon Valley, along with the city in the valley, even as far as Gilead. The Lord our God gave everything to us. But you did not go near the Ammonites’ land, all along the bank of the Jabbok River, the cities of the hill country, or any place that the Lord our God had forbidden.
all the cities of the plateau, Gilead, and Bashan as far as Salecah and Edrei, cities of Og’s kingdom in Bashan.
I gave to half the tribe of Manasseh the rest of Gilead and all Bashan, the kingdom of Og. The entire region of Argob, the whole territory of Bashan, used to be called the land of the Rephaim.
I gave Gilead to Machir, and I gave to the Reubenites and Gadites the area extending from Gilead to the Arnon Valley (the middle of the valley was the border) and up to the Jabbok River, the border of the Ammonites.
Bezer in the wilderness on the plateau land, belonging to the Reubenites; Ramoth in Gilead, belonging to the Gadites; or Golan in Bashan, belonging to the Manassites.
houses full of every good thing that you did not fill them with, cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant—and when you eat and are satisfied,
Instead, you must kill him. Your hand is to be the first against him to put him to death, and then the hands of all the people.
“If a case is too difficult for you—concerning bloodshed, lawsuits, or assaults—cases disputed at your city gates, then go up to the place the Lord your God chooses.
Otherwise, the avenger of blood in the heat of his anger might pursue the one who committed manslaughter, overtake him because the distance is great, and strike him dead. Yet he did not deserve to die, since he did not previously hate his neighbor.
But if someone hates his neighbor, lies in ambush for him, attacks him, and strikes him fatally, and flees to one of these cities,
“If a man is discovered kidnapping one of his Israelite brothers, whether he treats him as a slave or sells him, the kidnapper must die. You must purge the evil from you.
“When brothers live on the same property and one of them dies without a son, the wife of the dead man may not marry a stranger outside the family. Her brother-in-law is to take her as his wife, have sexual relations with her, and perform the duty of a brother-in-law for her. The first son she bears will carry on the name of the dead brother, so his name will not be blotted out from Israel. But if the man doesn’t want to marry his sister-in-law, she is to go to the elders at the city gate and say, ‘My brother-in-law refuses to preserve his brother’s name in Israel. He isn’t willing to perform the duty of a brother-in-law for me.’ The elders of his city will summon him and speak with him. If he persists and says, ‘I don’t want to marry her,’ then his sister-in-law will go up to him in the sight of the elders, remove his sandal from his foot, and spit in his face. Then she will declare, ‘This is what is done to a man who will not build up his brother’s house.’ And his family name in Israel will be ‘The house of the man whose sandal was removed.’
For fire has been kindled because of my anger
and burns to the depths of Sheol;
it devours the land and its produce,
and scorches the foundations of the mountains.
They will be weak from hunger,
ravaged by pestilence and bitter plague;
I will unleash on them wild beasts with fangs,
as well as venomous snakes that slither in the dust.
Then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which faces Jericho, and the Lord showed him all the land: Gilead as far as Dan,
The Israelites wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days. Then the days of weeping and mourning for Moses came to an end.
Then Joshua tore his clothes and fell facedown to the ground before the ark of the Lord until evening, as did the elders of Israel; they all put dust on their heads.
they acted deceptively. They gathered provisions and took worn-out sacks on their donkeys and old wineskins, cracked and mended.
On that day Joshua captured Makkedah and struck it down with the sword, including its king. He completely destroyed it and everyone in it, leaving no survivors. So he treated the king of Makkedah as he had the king of Jericho.
King Sihon of the Amorites lived in Heshbon. He ruled from Aroer on the rim of the Arnon River, along the middle of the valley, and half of Gilead up to the Jabbok River (the border of the Ammonites),
He ruled over Mount Hermon, Salecah, all Bashan up to the Geshurite and Maacathite border, and half of Gilead to the border of King Sihon of Heshbon.
also Gilead and the territory of the Geshurites and Maacathites, all Mount Hermon, and all Bashan to Salecah—
this as their territory:
Jazer and all the cities of Gilead, and half the land of the Ammonites to Aroer, near Rabbah;
But half of Gilead, and Og’s royal cities in Bashan—Ashtaroth and Edrei—are for the descendants of Machir son of Manasseh (that is, half the descendants of Machir by their clans).
This was the allotment for the tribe of Manasseh as Joseph’s firstborn. Gilead and Bashan were given to Machir, the firstborn of Manasseh and the father of Gilead, because he was a man of war.
As a result, ten tracts fell to Manasseh, besides the land of Gilead and Bashan, which are beyond the Jordan, because Manasseh’s daughters received an inheritance among his sons. The land of Gilead belonged to the rest of Manasseh’s sons.
Across the Jordan east of Jericho, they selected Bezer on the wilderness plateau from Reuben’s tribe, Ramoth in Gilead from Gad’s tribe, and Golan in Bashan from Manasseh’s tribe.
From the tribe of Gad they gave:
Ramoth in Gilead, the city of refuge for the one who commits manslaughter, with its pasturelands, Mahanaim with its pasturelands,
The Reubenites, Gadites, and half the tribe of Manasseh left the Israelites at Shiloh in the land of Canaan to return to their own land of Gilead, which they took possession of according to the Lord’s command through Moses.
The Israelites sent Phinehas son of Eleazar the priest to the Reubenites, Gadites, and half the tribe of Manasseh, in the land of Gilead.
They went to the Reubenites, Gadites, and half the tribe of Manasseh, in the land of Gilead, and told them,
Then the priest Phinehas son of Eleazar and the leaders returned from the Reubenites and Gadites in the land of Gilead to the Israelites in the land of Canaan and brought back a report to them.
Gilead remained beyond the Jordan.
Dan, why did you linger at the ships?
Asher remained at the seashore
and stayed in his harbors.
The Israelites did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. So the Lord handed them over to Midian seven years, and they oppressed Israel. Because of Midian, the Israelites made hiding places for themselves in the mountains, caves, and strongholds. Whenever the Israelites planted crops, the Midianites, Amalekites, and the people of the east came and attacked them.
Then the Israelites said to Gideon, “Rule over us, you as well as your sons and your grandsons, for you delivered us from the power of Midian.”
But Gideon said to them, “I will not rule over you, and my son will not rule over you; the Lord will rule over you.” Then he said to them, “Let me make a request of you: Everyone give me an earring from his plunder.” Now the enemy had gold earrings because they were Ishmaelites.
They said, “We agree to give them.” So they spread out a cloak, and everyone threw an earring from his plunder on it. The weight of the gold earrings he requested was forty-three pounds of gold, in addition to the crescent ornaments and ear pendants, the purple garments on the kings of Midian, and the chains on the necks of their camels. Gideon made an ephod from all this and put it in Ophrah, his hometown. Then all Israel prostituted themselves by worshiping it there, and it became a snare to Gideon and his household.
So Midian was subdued before the Israelites, and they were no longer a threat. The land had peace for forty years during the days of Gideon.
“Please speak in the hearing of all the citizens of Shechem, ‘Is it better for you that seventy men, all the sons of Jerubbaal, rule over you or that one man rule over you?’ Remember that I am your own flesh and blood.”
So they gave him seventy pieces of silver from the temple of Baal-berith. Abimelech used it to hire worthless and reckless men, and they followed him.
He had thirty sons who rode on thirty donkeys. They had thirty towns in Gilead, which are still called Jair’s Villages today.
They shattered and crushed the Israelites that year, and for eighteen years they did the same to all the Israelites who were on the other side of the Jordan in the land of the Amorites in Gilead.
The Ammonites were called together, and they camped in Gilead. So the Israelites assembled and camped at Mizpah. The rulers of Gilead said to one another, “Which man will begin the fight against the Ammonites? He will be the leader of all the inhabitants of Gilead.”
When the Ammonites made war with Israel, the elders of Gilead went to get Jephthah from the land of Tob.
Jephthah replied to the elders of Gilead, “Didn’t you hate me and drive me out of my father’s family? Why then have you come to me now when you’re in trouble?”
They answered Jephthah, “That’s true. But now we turn to you. Come with us, fight the Ammonites, and you will become leader of all the inhabitants of Gilead.”
So Jephthah said to them, “If you are bringing me back to fight the Ammonites and the Lord gives them to me, I will be your leader.”
The elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “The Lord is our witness if we don’t do as you say.” So Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead. The people made him their leader and commander, and Jephthah repeated all his terms in the presence of the Lord at Mizpah.
The Spirit of the Lord came on Jephthah, who traveled through Gilead and Manasseh, and then through Mizpah of Gilead. He crossed over to the Ammonites from Mizpah of Gilead.
When he saw her, he tore his clothes and said, “No! Not my daughter! You have devastated me! You have brought great misery on me. I have given my word to the Lord and cannot take it back.”
Then Jephthah gathered all of the men of Gilead. They fought and defeated Ephraim, because Ephraim had said, “You Gileadites are Ephraimite fugitives in the territories of Ephraim and Manasseh.” The Gileadites captured the fords of the Jordan leading to Ephraim. Whenever a fugitive from Ephraim said, “Let me cross over,” the Gileadites asked him, “Are you an Ephraimite?” If he answered, “No,”
Jephthah judged Israel six years, and when he died, he was buried in one of the cities of Gilead.
The Philistine leaders went to her and said, “Persuade him to tell you where his great strength comes from, so we can overpower him, tie him up, and make him helpless. Each of us will then give you 1,100 pieces of silver.”
All the Israelites from Dan to Beer-sheba and from the land of Gilead came out, and the community assembled as one body before the Lord at Mizpah.
But Naomi replied, “Return home, my daughters. Why do you want to go with me? Am I able to have any more sons who could become your husbands?
Deeply hurt, Hannah prayed to the Lord and wept with many tears.
The Lord brings death and gives life;
he sends some down to Sheol, and he raises others up.
Then the Lord called Samuel, and he answered, “Here I am.”
However, his sons did not walk in his ways—they turned toward dishonest profit, took bribes, and perverted justice.
He can take a tenth of your grain and your vineyards and give them to his officials and servants.
“Look,” the servant said, “there’s a man of God in this city who is highly respected; everything he says is sure to come true. Let’s go there now. Maybe he’ll tell us which way we should go.”
Then Samuel said to the cook, “Get the portion of meat that I gave you and told you to set aside.”
The cook picked up the thigh and what was attached to it and set it before Saul. Then Samuel said, “Notice that the reserved piece is set before you. Eat it because it was saved for you for this solemn event at the time I said, ‘I’ve invited the people.’ ” So Saul ate with Samuel that day.
The men of Israel saw that they were in trouble because the troops were in a difficult situation. They hid in caves, in thickets, among rocks, and in holes and cisterns. Some Hebrews even crossed the Jordan to the land of Gad and Gilead.
Saul, however, was still at Gilgal, and all his troops were gripped with fear.
Saul told David, “Here is my oldest daughter Merab. I’ll give her to you as a wife if you will be a warrior for me and fight the Lord’s battles.” But Saul was thinking, “I don’t need to raise a hand against him; let the hand of the Philistines be against him.”
Saul ordered his son Jonathan and all his servants to kill David. But Saul’s son Jonathan liked David very much,
Then Saul himself went to Ramah. He came to the large cistern at Secu and asked, “Where are Samuel and David?”
“At Naioth in Ramah,” someone said.
Ahimelech replied to the king, “Who among all your servants is as faithful as David? He is the king’s son-in-law, captain of your bodyguard, and honored in your house.
“Now I know for certain you will be king, and the kingdom of Israel will be established in your hand.
So Saul, accompanied by three thousand of the fit young men of Israel, went immediately to the Wilderness of Ziph to search for David there.
Then David took hold of his clothes and tore them, and all the men with him did the same.
For David had said to the Amalekite, “Your blood is on your own head because your own mouth testified against you by saying, ‘I killed the Lord’s anointed.’ ”
He made him king over Gilead, Asher, Jezreel, Ephraim, Benjamin—over all Israel.
Then Joab left David and sent messengers after Abner. They brought him back from the well of Sirah, but David was unaware of it.
David then ordered Joab and all the people who were with him, “Tear your clothes, put on sackcloth, and mourn over Abner.” And King David walked behind the coffin.
When David returned home to bless his household, Saul’s daughter Michal came out to meet him. “How the king of Israel honored himself today!” she said. “He exposed himself today in the sight of the slave girls of his subjects like a vulgar person would expose himself.”
The next morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it with Uriah. In the letter he wrote:
Put Uriah at the front of the fiercest fighting, then withdraw from him so that he is struck down and dies.
When Joab was besieging the city, he put Uriah in the place where he knew the best enemy soldiers were. Then the men of the city came out and attacked Joab, and some of the men from David’s soldiers fell in battle; Uriah the Hethite also died.
Why then have you despised the Lord’s command by doing what I consider evil? You struck down Uriah the Hethite with the sword and took his wife as your own wife—you murdered him with the Ammonite’s sword.
The elders of his house stood beside him to get him up from the ground, but he was unwilling and would not eat anything with them.
But now that he is dead, why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I’ll go to him, but he will never return to me.”
Where could I ever go with my humiliation? And you—you would be like one of the outrageous fools in Israel! Please, speak to the king, for he won’t keep me from you.”
In response the king stood up, tore his clothes, and lay down on the ground, and all his servants stood by with their clothes torn.
So Joab sent someone to Tekoa to bring a wise woman from there. He told her, “Pretend to be in mourning: dress in mourning clothes and don’t put on any oil. Act like a woman who has been mourning for the dead for a long time.
And Israel and Absalom camped in the land of Gilead.
The king was deeply moved and went up to the chamber above the city gate and wept. As he walked, he cried, “My son Absalom! My son, my son Absalom! If only I had died instead of you, Absalom, my son, my son!”
It was reported to Joab, “The king is weeping. He’s mourning over Absalom.”
But the king covered his face and cried loudly, “My son Absalom! Absalom, my son, my son!”
Rizpah, Aiah’s daughter, took sackcloth and spread it out for herself on the rock from the beginning of the harvest until the rain poured down from heaven on the bodies. She kept the birds of the sky from them by day and the wild animals by night.
The ropes of Sheol entangled me;
the snares of death confronted me.
David was extremely thirsty and said, “If only someone would bring me water to drink from the well at the city gate of Bethlehem!” So three of the warriors broke through the Philistine camp and drew water from the well at the gate of Bethlehem. They brought it back to David, but he refused to drink it. Instead, he poured it out to the Lord.
Benaiah son of Jehoiada was the son of a brave man from Kabzeel, a man of many exploits. Benaiah killed two sons of Ariel of Moab, and he went down into a pit on a snowy day and killed a lion.
They went to Gilead and to the land of the Hittites and continued on to Dan-jaan and around to Sidon.
Act according to your wisdom, and do not let his gray head descend to Sheol in peace.
So don’t let him go unpunished, for you are a wise man. You know how to deal with him to bring his gray head down to Sheol with blood.”
Ben-geber, in Ramoth-gilead (he had the villages of Jair son of Manasseh, which are in Gilead, and he had the region of Argob, which is in Bashan, sixty great cities with walls and bronze bars);
Geber son of Uri, in the land of Gilead, the country of King Sihon of the Amorites and of King Og of Bashan.
There was one deputy in the land of Judah.
When he left, a lion attacked him along the way and killed him. His corpse was thrown on the road, and the donkey was standing beside it; the lion was standing beside the corpse too.
Now Elijah the Tishbite, from the Gilead settlers, said to Ahab, “As the Lord God of Israel lives, in whose presence I stand, there will be no dew or rain during these years except by my command!”
His servants said to him, “Consider this: we have heard that the kings of the house of Israel are merciful kings. So let’s put sackcloth around our waists and ropes around our heads, and let’s go out to the king of Israel. Perhaps he will spare your life.”
So they dressed with sackcloth around their waists and ropes around their heads, went to the king of Israel, and said, “Your servant Ben-hadad says, ‘Please spare my life.’ ”
So he said, “Is he still alive? He is my brother.”
When Ahab heard these words, he tore his clothes, put sackcloth over his body, and fasted. He lay down in sackcloth and walked around subdued.
The king of Israel had said to his servants, “Don’t you know that Ramoth-gilead is ours, but we’re doing nothing to take it from the king of Aram?”
So the king of Israel called an officer and said, “Hurry and get Micaiah son of Imlah!”
They replied, “A hairy man with a leather belt around his waist.”
He said, “It’s Elijah the Tishbite.”
As Elisha watched, he kept crying out, “My father, my father, the chariots and horsemen of Israel!”
When he could see him no longer, he took hold of his own clothes, tore them in two,
He turned around, looked at them, and cursed them in the name of the Lord. Then two female bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the children.
Therefore, the king of Aram said, “Go, and I will send a letter with you to the king of Israel.”
So he went and took with him 750 pounds of silver, 150 pounds of gold, and ten sets of clothing.
When the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and asked, “Am I God, killing and giving life, that this man expects me to cure a man of his skin disease? Recognize that he is only picking a fight with me.”
When the king heard the woman’s words, he tore his clothes. Then, as he was passing by on the wall, the people saw that there was sackcloth under his clothes next to his skin.
When the king asked the woman, she told him the story. So the king appointed a court official for her, saying, “Restore all that was hers, along with all the income from the field from the day she left the country until now.”
He looked up toward the window and said, “Who is on my side? Who?” Two or three eunuchs looked down at him,
Then Jehu ordered, “Take them alive.” So they took them alive and then slaughtered them at the pit of Beth-eked—forty-two men. He didn’t spare any of them.
from the Jordan eastward: the whole land of Gilead—the Gadites, the Reubenites, and the Manassites—from Aroer which is by the Arnon Valley through Gilead to Bashan.
She looked, and there was the king standing by the pillar according to the custom. The commanders and the trumpeters were by the king, and all the people of the land were rejoicing and blowing trumpets. Athaliah tore her clothes and screamed “Treason! Treason!”
In the days of King Pekah of Israel, King Tiglath-pileser of Assyria came and captured Ijon, Abel-beth-maacah, Janoah, Kedesh, Hazor, Gilead, and Galilee—all the land of Naphtali—and deported the people to Assyria.
When they first lived there, they did not fear the Lord. So the Lord sent lions among them, which killed some of them.
Then the king of Assyria sent the field marshal, the chief of staff, and his royal spokesman, along with a massive army, from Lachish to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem. They advanced and came to Jerusalem, and they took their position by the aqueduct of the upper pool, by the road to the Launderer’s Field.
“Don’t listen to Hezekiah, for this is what the king of Assyria says: ‘Make peace with me and surrender to me. Then each of you may eat from his own vine and his own fig tree, and each may drink water from his own cistern
When King Hezekiah heard their report, he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the Lord’s temple. He sent Eliakim, who was in charge of the palace, Shebna the court secretary, and the leading priests, who were covered with sackcloth, to the prophet Isaiah son of Amoz.
Hezekiah listened to the letters and showed the envoys his whole treasure house—the silver, the gold, the spices, and the precious oil—and his armory, and everything that was found in his treasuries. There was nothing in his palace and in all his realm that Hezekiah did not show them.
‘Some of your descendants—who come from you, whom you father—will be taken away, and they will become eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.’ ”
When the king heard the words of the book of the law, he tore his clothes.
He did away with the horses that the kings of Judah had dedicated to the sun. They had been at the entrance of the Lord’s temple in the precincts by the chamber of Nathan-melech, the eunuch. He also burned the chariots of the sun.
King Jehoiachin of Judah, along with his mother, his servants, his commanders, and his officials, surrendered to the king of Babylon.
So the king of Babylon took him captive in the eighth year of his reign.
Nebuchadnezzar deported Jehoiachin to Babylon. He took the king’s mother, the king’s wives, his officials, and the leading men of the land into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon.
On the seventh day of the fifth month—which was the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon—Nebuzaradan, the captain of the guards, a servant of the king of Babylon, entered Jerusalem. He burned the Lord’s temple, the king’s palace, and all the houses of Jerusalem; he burned down all the great houses. The whole Chaldean army with the captain of the guards tore down the walls surrounding Jerusalem. Nebuzaradan, the captain of the guards, deported the rest of the people who remained in the city, the deserters who had defected to the king of Babylon, and the rest of the population. But the captain of the guards left some of the poorest of the land to be vinedressers and farmers.
Now the Chaldeans broke into pieces the bronze pillars of the Lord’s temple, the water carts, and the bronze basin, which were in the Lord’s temple, and carried the bronze to Babylon. They also took the pots, shovels, wick trimmers, dishes, and all the bronze articles used in the priests’ service. The captain of the guards took away the firepans and sprinkling basins—whatever was gold or silver.
As for the two pillars, the one basin, and the water carts that Solomon had made for the Lord’s temple, the weight of the bronze of all these articles was beyond measure. One pillar was twenty-seven feet tall and had a bronze capital on top of it. The capital, encircled by a grating and pomegranates of bronze, stood five feet high. The second pillar was the same, with its own grating.
The captain of the guards also took away Seraiah the chief priest, Zephaniah the priest of the second rank, and the three doorkeepers. From the city he took a court official who had been appointed over the warriors; five trusted royal aides found in the city; the secretary of the commander of the army, who enlisted the people of the land for military duty; and sixty men from the common people who were found within the city. Nebuzaradan, the captain of the guards, took them and brought them to the king of Babylon at Riblah. The king of Babylon put them to death at Riblah in the land of Hamath. So Judah went into exile from its land.
King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon appointed Gedaliah son of Ahikam, son of Shaphan, over the rest of the people he left in the land of Judah. When all the commanders of the armies—they and their men—heard that the king of Babylon had appointed Gedaliah, they came to Gedaliah at Mizpah. The commanders included Ishmael son of Nethaniah, Johanan son of Kareah, Seraiah son of Tanhumeth the Netophathite, and Jaazaniah son of the Maacathite—they and their men. Gedaliah swore an oath to them and their men, assuring them, “Don’t be afraid of the servants of the Chaldeans. Live in the land and serve the king of Babylon, and it will go well for you.”
In the seventh month, however, Ishmael son of Nethaniah, son of Elishama, of the royal family, came with ten men and struck down Gedaliah, and he died. Also, they killed the Judeans and the Chaldeans who were with him at Mizpah. Then all the people, from the youngest to the oldest, and the commanders of the army, left and went to Egypt, for they were afraid of the Chaldeans.
On the twenty-seventh day of the twelfth month of the thirty-seventh year of the exile of Judah’s King Jehoiachin, in the year Evil-merodach became king of Babylon, he pardoned King Jehoiachin of Judah and released him from prison. He spoke kindly to him and set his throne over the thrones of the kings who were with him in Babylon. So Jehoiachin changed his prison clothes, and he dined regularly in the presence of the king of Babylon for the rest of his life. As for his allowance, a regular allowance was given to him by the king, a portion for each day, for the rest of his life.
Judah’s sons: Er, Onan, and Shelah. These three were born to him by Bath-shua the Canaanite woman. Er, Judah’s firstborn, was evil in the Lord’s sight, so he put him to death. Judah’s daughter-in-law Tamar bore Perez and Zerah to him. Judah had five sons in all.
Segub fathered Jair, who possessed twenty-three towns in the land of Gilead.
They also settled in the east as far as the edge of the desert that extends to the Euphrates River, because their herds had increased in the land of Gilead. During Saul’s reign they waged war against the Hagrites, who were defeated by their power. And they lived in their tents throughout the region east of Gilead.
They lived in Gilead, in Bashan and its surrounding villages, and throughout the pasturelands of Sharon.
From the tribe of Gad they received Ramoth in Gilead and its pasturelands, Mahanaim and its pasturelands,
Their father Ephraim mourned a long time, and his relatives came to comfort him.
David was extremely thirsty and said, “If only someone would bring me water to drink from the well at the city gate of Bethlehem!” So the Three broke through the Philistine camp and drew water from the well at the gate of Bethlehem. They brought it back to David, but he refused to drink it. Instead, he poured it out to the Lord.
Benaiah son of Jehoiada was the son of a brave man from Kabzeel, a man of many exploits. Benaiah killed two sons of Ariel of Moab, and he went down into a pit on a snowy day and killed a lion.
When David looked up and saw the angel of the Lord standing between earth and heaven, with his drawn sword in his hand stretched out over Jerusalem, David and the elders, covered in sackcloth, fell facedown.
From the Hebronites: Jerijah was the head of the Hebronites, according to the family records of his ancestors. A search was made in the fortieth year of David’s reign and strong, capable men were found among them at Jazer in Gilead.
for half the tribe of Manasseh in Gilead, Iddo son of Zechariah;
for Benjamin, Jaasiel son of Abner;
Obil the Ishmaelite was in charge of the camels.
Jehdeiah the Meronothite was in charge of the donkeys.
David assembled all the leaders of Israel in Jerusalem: the leaders of the tribes, the leaders of the divisions in the king’s service, the commanders of thousands and the commanders of hundreds, and the officials in charge of all the property and cattle of the king and his sons, along with the court officials, the fighting men, and all the best soldiers.
So the king of Israel called an officer and said, “Hurry and get Micaiah son of Imlah!”
But they conspired against him and stoned him at the king’s command in the courtyard of the Lord’s temple.
Since he had many cattle both in the Judean foothills and the plain, he built towers in the desert and dug many wells. And since he was a lover of the soil, he had farmers and vinedressers in the hills and in the fertile lands.
When I heard this report, I tore my tunic and robe, pulled out some of the hair from my head and beard, and sat down devastated.
Everyone who trembled at the words of the God of Israel gathered around me, because of the unfaithfulness of the exiles, while I sat devastated until the evening offering. At the evening offering, I got up from my time of humiliation, with my tunic and robe torn. Then I fell on my knees and spread out my hands to the Lord my God.
and said, “We have done our best to buy back our Jewish countrymen who were sold to foreigners, but now you sell your own countrymen, and we have to buy them back.” They remained silent and could not say a word.
On the twenty-fourth day of this month the Israelites assembled; they were fasting, wearing sackcloth, and had put dust on their heads.
They captured fortified cities and fertile land
and took possession of well-supplied houses,
cisterns cut out of rock, vineyards,
olive groves, and fruit trees in abundance.
They ate, were filled,
became prosperous, and delighted in your great goodness.
On the seventh day, when the king was feeling good from the wine, Ahasuerus commanded Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, Abagtha, Zethar, and Carkas—the seven eunuchs who personally served him—
But Queen Vashti refused to come at the king’s command that was delivered by his eunuchs. The king became furious and his anger burned within him.
The king asked, “According to the law, what should be done with Queen Vashti, since she refused to obey King Ahasuerus’s command that was delivered by the eunuchs?”
Let the king appoint commissioners in each province of his kingdom, so that they may gather all the beautiful young virgins to the harem at the fortress of Susa. Put them under the supervision of Hegai, the king’s eunuch, keeper of the women, and give them the required beauty treatments.
She would go in the evening, and in the morning she would return to a second harem under the supervision of the king’s eunuch Shaashgaz, keeper of the concubines. She never went to the king again, unless he desired her and summoned her by name.
Esther was the daughter of Abihail, the uncle of Mordecai who had adopted her as his own daughter. When her turn came to go to the king, she did not ask for anything except what Hegai, the king’s eunuch, keeper of the women, suggested. Esther gained favor in the eyes of everyone who saw her.
During those days while Mordecai was sitting at the King’s Gate, Bigthan and Teresh, two of the king’s eunuchs who guarded the entrance, became infuriated and planned to assassinate King Ahasuerus.
The couriers left, spurred on by royal command, and the law was issued in the fortress of Susa. The king and Haman sat down to drink, while the city of Susa was in confusion.
When Mordecai learned all that had occurred, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and ashes, went into the middle of the city, and cried loudly and bitterly. He went only as far as the King’s Gate, since the law prohibited anyone wearing sackcloth from entering the King’s Gate. There was great mourning among the Jewish people in every province where the king’s command and edict reached. They fasted, wept, and lamented, and many lay in sackcloth and ashes.
Esther’s female servants and her eunuchs came and reported the news to her, and the queen was overcome with fear. She sent clothes for Mordecai to wear so that he would take off his sackcloth, but he did not accept them. Esther summoned Hathach, one of the king’s eunuchs who attended her, and dispatched him to Mordecai to learn what he was doing and why.
They found the written report of how Mordecai had informed on Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king’s eunuchs who guarded the entrance, when they planned to assassinate King Ahasuerus.
While they were still speaking with him, the king’s eunuchs arrived and rushed Haman to the banquet Esther had prepared.
Harbona, one of the king’s eunuchs, said, “There is a gallows seventy-five feet tall at Haman’s house that he made for Mordecai, who gave the report that saved the king.”
The king said, “Hang him on it.”
Then Job stood up, tore his robe, and shaved his head. He fell to the ground and worshiped,
Now when Job’s three friends—Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite—heard about all this adversity that had happened to him, each of them came from his home. They met together to go and sympathize with him and comfort him. When they looked from a distance, they could barely recognize him. They wept aloud, and each man tore his robe and threw dust into the air and on his head.
The caravans of Tema look for these streams.
The traveling merchants of Sheba hope for them.
As a cloud fades away and vanishes,
so the one who goes down to Sheol will never rise again.
then you dip me in a pit of mud,
and my own clothes despise me!
They are higher than the heavens—what can you do?
They are deeper than Sheol—what can you know?
Do you really take notice of one like this?
Will you bring me into judgment against you?
If only you would hide me in Sheol
and conceal me until your anger passes.
If only you would appoint a time for me
and then remember me.
Are God’s consolations not enough for you,
even the words that deal gently with you?
Instead, I would encourage you with my mouth,
and the consolation from my lips would bring relief.
I have sewn sackcloth over my skin;
I have buried my strength in the dust.
Earth, do not cover my blood;
may my cry for help find no resting place.
If I await Sheol as my home,
spread out my bed in darkness,
Will it go down to the gates of Sheol,
or will we descend together to the dust?
They spend their days in prosperity
and go down to Sheol in peace.
As dry ground and heat snatch away the melted snow,
so Sheol steals those who have sinned.
Sheol is naked before God,
and Abaddon has no covering.
All his brothers, sisters, and former acquaintances came to him and dined with him in his house. They sympathized with him and comforted him concerning all the adversity the Lord had brought on him. Each one gave him a piece of silver and a gold earring.
For there is no remembrance of you in death;
who can thank you in Sheol?
He dug a pit and hollowed it out
but fell into the hole he had made.
The wicked will return to Sheol—
all the nations that forget God.
Will evildoers never understand?
They consume my people as they consume bread;
they do not call on the Lord.
For you will not abandon me to Sheol;
you will not allow your faithful one to see decay.
The ropes of Sheol entangled me;
the snares of death confronted me.
“He relies on the Lord;
let him save him;
let the Lord rescue him,
since he takes pleasure in him.”
They divided my garments among themselves,
and they cast lots for my clothing.
Lord, I call to you;
my rock, do not be deaf to me.
If you remain silent to me,
I will be like those going down to the Pit.
Lord, you brought me up from Sheol;
you spared me from among those
going down to the Pit.
“What gain is there in my death,
if I go down to the Pit?
Will the dust praise you?
Will it proclaim your truth?
You turned my lament into dancing;
you removed my sackcloth
and clothed me with gladness,
I have heard the gossip of many;
terror is on every side.
When they conspired against me,
they plotted to take my life.
Lord, do not let me be disgraced when I call on you.
Let the wicked be disgraced;
let them be quiet in Sheol.
You hide them in the protection of your presence;
you conceal them in a shelter
from human schemes,
from quarrelsome tongues.
They hid their net for me without cause;
they dug a pit for me without cause.
Yet when they were sick,
my clothing was sackcloth;
I humbled myself with fasting,
and my prayer was genuine.
The wicked person schemes against the righteous
and gnashes his teeth at him.
The wicked one lies in wait for the righteous
and intends to kill him;
I waited patiently for the Lord,
and he turned to me and heard my cry for help.
He brought me up from a desolate pit,
out of the muddy clay,
and set my feet on a rock,
making my steps secure.
Myrrh, aloes, and cassia perfume all your garments;
from ivory palaces harps bring you joy.
Like sheep they are headed for Sheol;
Death will shepherd them.
The upright will rule over them in the morning,
and their form will waste away in Sheol,
far from their lofty abode.
But God will redeem me
from the power of Sheol,
for he will take me.
Selah
Let death take them by surprise;
let them go down to Sheol alive,
because evil is in their homes and within them.
Gilead is mine, Manasseh is mine,
and Ephraim is my helmet;
Judah is my scepter.
They adopt an evil plan;
they talk about hiding traps and say,
“Who will see them?”
I have sunk in deep mud, and there is no footing;
I have come into deep water,
and a flood sweeps over me.
I wore sackcloth as my clothing,
and I was a joke to them.
Rescue me from the miry mud; don’t let me sink.
Let me be rescued from those who hate me
and from the deep water.
Don’t let the floodwaters sweep over me
or the deep swallow me up;
don’t let the Pit close its mouth over me.
I sought the Lord in my day of trouble.
My hands were continually lifted up
all night long;
I refused to be comforted.
the tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites,
Moab and the Hagrites,
Deal with them as you did with Midian,
as you did with Sisera
and Jabin at the Kishon River.
For your faithful love for me is great,
and you rescue my life from the depths of Sheol.
For I have had enough troubles,
and my life is near Sheol.
I am counted among those going down to the Pit.
I am like a man without strength,
abandoned among the dead.
I am like the slain lying in the grave,
whom you no longer remember,
and who are cut off from your care.
You have put me in the lowest part of the Pit,
in the darkest places, in the depths.
You have distanced my friends from me;
you have made me repulsive to them.
I am shut in and cannot go out.
Do you work wonders for the dead?
Do departed spirits rise up to praise you?
Selah
Will your faithful love be declared in the grave,
your faithfulness in Abaddon?
Will your wonders be known in the darkness
or your righteousness in the land of oblivion?
What courageous person can live and never see death?
Who can save himself from the power of Sheol?
Selah
They band together against the life of the righteous
and condemn the innocent to death.
There the birds make their nests;
storks make their homes in the pine trees.
He had sent a man ahead of them—
Joseph, who was sold as a slave.
whose hearts he turned to hate his people
and to deal deceptively with his servants.
Gilead is mine, Manasseh is mine,
and Ephraim is my helmet;
Judah is my scepter.
In return for my love they accuse me,
but I continue to pray.
It is not the dead who praise the Lord,
nor any of those descending into the silence of death.
The ropes of death were wrapped around me,
and the torments of Sheol overcame me;
I encountered trouble and sorrow.
Out of the depths I call to you, Lord!
Lord, listen to my voice;
let your ears be attentive
to my cry for help.
If I go up to heaven, you are there;
if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.
As when one plows and breaks up the soil,
turning up rocks,
so our bones have been scattered
at the mouth of Sheol.
Answer me quickly, Lord;
my spirit fails.
Don’t hide your face from me,
or I will be like those
going down to the Pit.
My son, if sinners entice you,
don’t be persuaded.
If they say—“Come with us!
Let’s set an ambush and kill someone.
Let’s attack some innocent person just for fun!
Let’s swallow them alive, like Sheol,
whole, like those who go down to the Pit.
because their feet run toward evil
and they hurry to shed blood.
Such are the paths of all who make profit dishonestly;
it takes the lives of those who receive it.
Her feet go down to death;
her steps head straight for Sheol.
Drink water from your own cistern,
water flowing from your own well.
arrogant eyes, a lying tongue,
hands that shed innocent blood,
I’ve perfumed my bed
with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.
Her house is the road to Sheol,
descending to the chambers of death.
But he doesn’t know that the departed spirits are there,
that her guests are in the depths of Sheol.
The mouth of the righteous is a fountain of life,
but the mouth of the wicked conceals violence.
The one who conceals hatred has lying lips,
and whoever spreads slander is a fool.
The inexperienced one believes anything,
but the sensible one watches his steps.
Sheol and Abaddon lie open before the Lord —
how much more, human hearts.
For the prudent the path of life leads upward,
so that he may avoid going down to Sheol.
and put a knife to your throat
if you have a big appetite;
Punish him with a rod,
and you will rescue his life from Sheol.
Fury is cruel, and anger a flood,
but who can withstand jealousy?
Sheol and Abaddon are never satisfied,
and people’s eyes are never satisfied.
The one who conceals his sins
will not prosper,
but whoever confesses and renounces them
will find mercy.
Someone burdened by bloodguilt
will be a fugitive until death.
Let no one help him.
The leech has two daughters: “Give, Give!”
Three things are never satisfied;
four never say, “Enough!”:
Sheol; a childless womb;
earth, which is never satisfied with water;
and fire, which never says, “Enough!”
This is the way of an adulteress:
she eats and wipes her mouth
and says, “I’ve done nothing wrong.”
Whatever your hands find to do, do with all your strength, because there is no work, planning, knowledge, or wisdom in Sheol where you are going.
before the silver cord is snapped,
and the gold bowl is broken,
and the jar is shattered at the spring,
and the wheel is broken into the well;
The one I love is a sachet of myrrh to me,
spending the night between my breasts.
How beautiful you are, my darling.
How very beautiful!
Behind your veil,
your eyes are doves.
Your hair is like a flock of goats
streaming down Mount Gilead.
I have come to my garden—my sister, my bride.
I gather my myrrh with my spices.
I eat my honeycomb with my honey.
I drink my wine with my milk.
Eat, friends!
Drink, be intoxicated with caresses!
Turn your eyes away from me,
for they captivate me.
Your hair is like a flock of goats
streaming down from Gilead.
Set me as a seal on your heart,
as a seal on your arm.
For love is as strong as death;
jealousy is as unrelenting as Sheol.
Love’s flames are fiery flames—
an almighty flame!
Instead of perfume there will be a stench;
instead of a belt, a rope;
instead of beautifully styled hair, baldness;
instead of fine clothes, sackcloth;
instead of beauty, branding.
Therefore Sheol enlarges its throat
and opens wide its enormous jaws,
and down go Zion’s dignitaries, her masses,
her crowds, and those who celebrate in her!
to those who say,
“Let him hurry up and do his work quickly
so that we can see it!
Let the plan of the Holy One of Israel take place
so that we can know it!”
Sheol below is eager to greet your coming,
stirring up the spirits of the departed for you—
all the rulers of the earth—
making all the kings of the nations
rise from their thrones.
Your splendor has been brought down to Sheol,
along with the music of your harps.
Maggots are spread out under you,
and worms cover you.”
But you will be brought down to Sheol
into the deepest regions of the Pit.
But you are thrown out without a grave,
like a worthless branch,
covered by those slain with the sword
and dumped into a rocky pit like a trampled corpse.
In its streets they wear sackcloth;
on its rooftops and in its public squares everyone wails,
falling down and weeping.
during that time the Lord had spoken through Isaiah son of Amoz, saying, “Go, take off your sackcloth and remove the sandals from your feet,” and he did that, going stripped and barefoot—
A pronouncement concerning Arabia:
In the desert brush
you will camp for the night,
you caravans of Dedanites.
Therefore I said,
“Look away from me! Let me weep bitterly!
Do not try to comfort me
about the destruction of my dear people.”
On that day the Lord God of Armies
called for weeping, for wailing, for shaven heads,
and for the wearing of sackcloth.
But look: joy and gladness,
butchering of cattle, slaughtering of sheep and goats,
eating of meat, and drinking of wine—
“Let’s eat and drink, for tomorrow we die!”
They will be gathered together
like prisoners in a pit.
They will be confined to a dungeon;
after many days they will be punished.
For look, the Lord is coming from his place
to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity.
The earth will reveal the blood shed on it
and will no longer conceal her slain.
For you said, “We have made a covenant with Death,
and we have an agreement with Sheol;
when the overwhelming catastrophe passes through,
it will not touch us,
because we have made falsehood our refuge
and have hidden behind treachery.”
Your covenant with Death will be dissolved,
and your agreement with Sheol will not last.
When the overwhelming catastrophe passes through,
you will be trampled.
Shudder, you complacent ones;
tremble, you overconfident ones!
Strip yourselves bare
and put sackcloth around your waists.
Don’t listen to Hezekiah, for this is what the king of Assyria says: “Make peace with me and surrender to me. Then every one of you may eat from his own vine and his own fig tree and drink water from his own cistern
Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was in charge of the palace, Shebna the court secretary, and Joah son of Asaph, the court historian, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and reported to him the words of the royal spokesman.
When King Hezekiah heard their report, he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth, and went to the Lord’s temple. He sent Eliakim, who was in charge of the palace, Shebna the court secretary, and the leading priests, who were covered with sackcloth, to the prophet Isaiah son of Amoz.
The king had heard concerning King Tirhakah of Cush, “He has set out to fight against you.” So when he heard this, he sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,
I said: In the prime of my life
I must go to the gates of Sheol;
I am deprived of the rest of my years.
Indeed, it was for my own well-being
that I had such intense bitterness;
but your love has delivered me
from the Pit of destruction,
for you have thrown all my sins behind your back.
For Sheol cannot thank you;
Death cannot praise you.
Those who go down to the Pit
cannot hope for your faithfulness.
‘Some of your descendants—who come from you, whom you father—will be taken away, and they will become eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.’ ”
I dress the heavens in black
and make sackcloth their covering.
Look, all you who kindle a fire,
who encircle yourselves with torches;
walk in the light of your fire
and of the torches you have lit!
This is what you’ll get from my hand:
you will lie down in a place of torment.
Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness,
you who seek the Lord:
Look to the rock from which you were cut,
and to the quarry from which you were dug.
We all went astray like sheep;
we all have turned to our own way;
and the Lord has punished him
for the iniquity of us all.
No foreigner who has joined himself to the Lord
should say,
“The Lord will exclude me from his people,”
and the eunuch should not say,
“Look, I am a dried-up tree.”
For the Lord says this:
“For the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths,
and choose what pleases me,
and hold firmly to my covenant,
You went to the king with oil
and multiplied your perfumes;
you sent your envoys far away
and sent them down even to Sheol.
Will the fast I choose be like this:
A day for a person to deny himself,
to bow his head like a reed,
and to spread out sackcloth and ashes?
Will you call this a fast
and a day acceptable to the Lord?
Caravans of camels will cover your land—
young camels of Midian and Ephah—
all of them will come from Sheba.
They will carry gold and frankincense
and proclaim the praises of the Lord.
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor,
and the day of our God’s vengeance;
to comfort all who mourn,
Because of this, put on sackcloth;
mourn and wail,
for the Lord’s burning anger
has not turned away from us.
Hear this,
you foolish and senseless people.
They have eyes, but they don’t see.
They have ears, but they don’t hear.
As a well gushes out its water,
so she pours out her evil.
Violence and destruction resound in her.
Sickness and wounds keep coming to my attention.
My dear people, dress yourselves in sackcloth
and roll in the dust.
Mourn as you would for an only son,
a bitter lament,
for suddenly the destroyer will come on us.
Is there no balm in Gilead?
Is there no physician there?
So why has the healing of my dear people
not come about?
The Lord informed me, so I knew.
Then you helped me to see their deeds,
for I was like a docile lamb led to slaughter.
I didn’t know that they had devised plots against me:
“Let’s destroy the tree with its fruit;
let’s cut him off from the land of the living
so that his name will no longer be remembered.”
But, Lord of Armies, who judges righteously,
who tests heart and mind,
let me see your vengeance on them,
for I have presented my case to you.
Therefore, here is what the Lord says concerning the people of Anathoth who intend to take your life. They warn, “Do not prophesy in the name of the Lord, or you will certainly die at our hand.”
Even your brothers—your own father’s family—
even they were treacherous to you;
even they have cried out loudly after you.
Do not have confidence in them,
though they speak well of you.
For this is what the Lord says concerning the house of the king of Judah:
“You are like Gilead to me,
or the summit of Lebanon,
but I will certainly turn you into a wilderness,
uninhabited cities.
Do not weep for the dead;
do not mourn for him.
Weep bitterly for the one who has gone away,
for he will never return again
and see his native land.
This is the text of the letter that the prophet Jeremiah sent from Jerusalem to the remaining exiled elders, the priests, the prophets, and all the people Nebuchadnezzar had deported from Jerusalem to Babylon. This was after King Jeconiah, the queen mother, the court officials, the officials of Judah and Jerusalem, the craftsmen, and the metalsmiths had left Jerusalem.
This is what the Lord says:
A voice was heard in Ramah,
a lament with bitter weeping—
Rachel weeping for her children,
refusing to be comforted for her children
because they are no more.
This is what the Lord says:
Keep your voice from weeping
and your eyes from tears,
for the reward for your work will come—
this is the Lord’s declaration—
and your children will return from the enemy’s land.
There is hope for your future—
this is the Lord’s declaration—
and your children will return to their own territory.
The officials of Judah and Jerusalem, the court officials, the priests, and all the people of the land who passed between the pieces of the calf—
As they heard all these words, the king and all his servants did not become terrified or tear their clothes.
So Jeremiah went into a cell in the dungeon and stayed there many days.
The officials then said to the king, “This man ought to die, because he is weakening the morale of the warriors who remain in this city and of all the people by speaking to them in this way. This man is not pursuing the welfare of this people, but their harm.”
So they took Jeremiah and dropped him into the cistern of Malchiah the king’s son, which was in the guard’s courtyard, lowering Jeremiah with ropes. There was no water in the cistern, only mud, and Jeremiah sank in the mud.
But Ebed-melech, a Cushite court official in the king’s palace, heard Jeremiah had been put into the cistern. While the king was sitting at the Benjamin Gate,
“My lord the king, these men have been evil in all they have done to the prophet Jeremiah. They have dropped him into the cistern where he will die from hunger, because there is no more bread in the city.”
So the king commanded Ebed-melech, the Cushite, “Take from here thirty men under your authority and pull the prophet Jeremiah up from the cistern before he dies.”
So Ebed-melech took the men under his authority and went to the king’s palace to a place below the storehouse. From there he took old rags and worn-out clothes and lowered them by ropes to Jeremiah in the cistern.
They pulled him up with the ropes and lifted him out of the cistern, but he remained in the guard’s courtyard.
In the ninth year of King Zedekiah of Judah, in the tenth month, King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon advanced against Jerusalem with his entire army and laid siege to it. In the fourth month of Zedekiah’s eleventh year, on the ninth day of the month, the city was broken into. All the officials of the king of Babylon entered and sat at the Middle Gate: Nergal-sharezer, Samgar, Nebusarsechim the chief of staff, Nergal-sharezer the chief soothsayer, and all the rest of the officials of Babylon’s king.
When King Zedekiah of Judah and all the fighting men saw them, they fled. They left the city at night by way of the king’s garden through the city gate between the two walls. They left along the route to the Arabah. However, the Chaldean army pursued them and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho. They arrested him and brought him up to Nebuchadnezzar, Babylon’s king, at Riblah in the land of Hamath. The king passed sentence on him there.
At Riblah the king of Babylon slaughtered Zedekiah’s sons before his eyes, and he also slaughtered all Judah’s nobles. Then he blinded Zedekiah and put him in bronze chains to take him to Babylon. The Chaldeans next burned down the king’s palace and the people’s houses and tore down the walls of Jerusalem. Nebuzaradan, the captain of the guards, deported the rest of the people to Babylon—those who had remained in the city and those deserters who had defected to him along with the rest of the people who remained. However, Nebuzaradan, the captain of the guards, left in the land of Judah some of the poor people who owned nothing, and he gave them vineyards and fields at that time.
Speaking through Nebuzaradan, captain of the guards, King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon gave orders concerning Jeremiah: “Take him and look after him. Don’t do him any harm, but do for him whatever he says.” Nebuzaradan, captain of the guards, Nebushazban the chief of staff, Nergal-sharezer the chief soothsayer, and all the captains of Babylon’s king had Jeremiah brought from the guard’s courtyard and turned him over to Gedaliah son of Ahikam, son of Shaphan, to take him home. So he settled among his own people.
Now the word of the Lord had come to Jeremiah when he was confined in the guard’s courtyard: “Go tell Ebed-melech the Cushite, ‘This is what the Lord of Armies, the God of Israel, says: I am about to fulfill my words for disaster and not for good against this city. They will take place before your eyes on that day. But I will rescue you on that day—this is the Lord’s declaration—and you will not be handed over to the men you dread. Indeed, I will certainly deliver you so that you do not fall by the sword. Because you have trusted in me, you will retain your life like the spoils of war. This is the Lord’s declaration.’ ”
This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord after Nebuzaradan, captain of the guards, released him at Ramah. When he found him, he was bound in chains with all the exiles of Jerusalem and Judah who were being exiled to Babylon. The captain of the guards took Jeremiah and said to him, “The Lord your God decreed this disaster on this place, and the Lord has fulfilled it. He has done just what he decreed. Because you people have sinned against the Lord and have not obeyed him, this thing has happened. Now pay attention: Today I am setting you free from the chains that were on your hands. If it pleases you to come with me to Babylon, come, and I will take care of you. But if it seems wrong to you to come with me to Babylon, go no farther. Look—the whole land is in front of you. Wherever it seems good and right for you to go, go there.” When Jeremiah had not yet turned to go, Nebuzaradan said to him, “Return to Gedaliah son of Ahikam, son of Shaphan, whom the king of Babylon has appointed over the cities of Judah, and stay with him among the people or go wherever it seems right for you to go.” So the captain of the guards gave him a ration and a gift and released him. Jeremiah therefore went to Gedaliah son of Ahikam at Mizpah, and he stayed with him among the people who remained in the land.
All the commanders of the armies that were in the countryside—they and their men—heard that the king of Babylon had appointed Gedaliah son of Ahikam over the land. He had been put in charge of the men, women, and children from among the poorest of the land, who had not been deported to Babylon. So they came to Gedaliah at Mizpah. The commanders included Ishmael son of Nethaniah, Johanan and Jonathan the sons of Kareah, Seraiah son of Tanhumeth, the sons of Ephai the Netophathite, and Jezaniah son of the Maacathite—they and their men.
Gedaliah son of Ahikam, son of Shaphan, swore an oath to them and their men, assuring them, “Don’t be afraid to serve the Chaldeans. Live in the land and serve the king of Babylon, and it will go well for you. As for me, I am going to live in Mizpah to represent you before the Chaldeans who come to us. As for you, gather wine, summer fruit, and oil, place them in your storage jars, and live in the cities you have captured.”
When all the Judeans in Moab and among the Ammonites and in Edom and in all the other lands also heard that the king of Babylon had left a remnant in Judah and had appointed Gedaliah son of Ahikam, son of Shaphan, over them, they all returned from all the places where they had been banished and came to the land of Judah, to Gedaliah at Mizpah, and harvested a great amount of wine and summer fruit.
Meanwhile, Johanan son of Kareah and all the commanders of the armies in the countryside came to Gedaliah at Mizpah and warned him, “Don’t you realize that Baalis, king of the Ammonites, has sent Ishmael son of Nethaniah to kill you?” But Gedaliah son of Ahikam would not believe them. Then Johanan son of Kareah suggested to Gedaliah in private at Mizpah, “Let me go kill Ishmael son of Nethaniah. No one will know it. Why should he kill you and allow all of Judah that has gathered around you to scatter and the remnant of Judah to perish?”
But Gedaliah son of Ahikam responded to Johanan son of Kareah, “Don’t do that! What you’re saying about Ishmael is a lie.”
eighty men came from Shechem, Shiloh, and Samaria who had shaved their beards, torn their clothes, and gashed themselves, and who were carrying grain and incense offerings to bring to the temple of the Lord.
But when they came into the city, Ishmael son of Nethaniah and the men with him slaughtered them and threw them into a cistern.
However, there were ten men among them who said to Ishmael, “Don’t kill us, for we have hidden treasure in the field—wheat, barley, oil, and honey!” So he stopped and did not kill them along with their companions. Now the cistern where Ishmael had thrown all the corpses of the men he had struck down was a large one that King Asa had made in the encounter with King Baasha of Israel. Ishmael son of Nethaniah filled it with the slain.
Johanan son of Kareah and all the commanders of the armies with him then took from Mizpah all the remnant of the people whom he had recovered from Ishmael son of Nethaniah after Ishmael had killed Gedaliah son of Ahikam—men, soldiers, women, children, and court officials whom he brought back from Gibeon.
Go up to Gilead and get balm,
Virgin Daughter Egypt!
You have multiplied remedies in vain;
there is no healing for you.
Come down from glory; sit on parched ground,
resident of the daughter of Dibon,
for the destroyer of Moab has come against you;
he has destroyed your fortresses.
Indeed, every head is bald and every beard is chopped short. On every hand is a gash and sackcloth around the waist.
Wail, Heshbon, for Ai is devastated;
cry out, daughters of Rabbah!
Clothe yourselves with sackcloth, and lament;
run back and forth within your walls,
because Milcom will go into exile
together with his priests and officials.
I will return Israel to his grazing land,
and he will feed on Carmel and Bashan;
he will be satisfied
in the hill country of Ephraim and of Gilead.
Suddenly Babylon fell and was shattered.
Wail for her;
get balm for her wound—
perhaps she can be healed.
On the tenth day of the fifth month—which was the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon—Nebuzaradan, the captain of the guards, entered Jerusalem as the representative of the king of Babylon.
From the city he took a court official who had been appointed over the warriors; seven trusted royal aides found in the city; the secretary of the commander of the army, who enlisted the people of the land for military duty; and sixty men from the common people who were found within the city.
The elders of Daughter Zion
sit on the ground in silence.
They have thrown dust on their heads
and put on sackcloth.
The young women of Jerusalem
have bowed their heads to the ground.
For no reason, my enemies
hunted me like a bird.
They smothered my life in a pit
and threw stones on me.
Water flooded over my head,
and I thought, “I’m going to die!”
I called on your name, Lord,
from the depths of the pit.
The Lord’s anointed, the breath of our life,
was captured in their traps.
We had said about him,
“We will live under his protection among the nations.”
Our ancestors sinned; they no longer exist,
but we bear their punishment.
They will put on sackcloth,
and horror will overwhelm them.
Shame will cover all their faces,
and all their heads will be bald.
“Her officials within her are like wolves tearing their prey, shedding blood, and destroying lives in order to make profit dishonestly.
For the blood she shed is still within her.
She put it out on the bare rock;
she didn’t pour it on the ground
to cover it with dust.
In order to stir up wrath and take vengeance,
I have put her blood on the bare rock,
so that it would not be covered.
then I will bring you down to be with those who descend to the Pit, to the people of antiquity. I will make you dwell in the underworld like the ancient ruins, with those who descend to the Pit, so that you will no longer be inhabited or display your splendor in the land of the living.
Judah and the land of Israel were your merchants. They exchanged wheat from Minnith, meal, honey, oil, and balm, for your goods.
They shave their heads because of you
and wrap themselves in sackcloth.
They weep over you
with deep anguish and bitter mourning.
This happened so that no trees planted beside water would become great in height and set their tops among the clouds, and so that no other well-watered trees would reach them in height. For they have all been consigned to death, to the underworld, among the people who descend to the Pit.
“ ‘This is what the Lord God says: I caused grieving on the day the cedar went down to Sheol. I closed off the underground deep because of it: I held back the rivers of the deep, and its abundant water was restrained. I made Lebanon mourn on account of it, and all the trees of the field fainted because of it. I made the nations quake at the sound of its downfall, when I threw it down to Sheol to be with those who descend to the Pit. Then all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all the well-watered trees, were comforted in the underworld. They too descended with it to Sheol, to those slain by the sword. As its allies they had lived in its shade among the nations.
“Son of man, wail over the hordes of Egypt and bring Egypt and the daughters of mighty nations down to the underworld, to be with those who descend to the Pit:
Warrior leaders will speak
from the middle of Sheol
about him and his allies:
‘They have come down;
the uncircumcised lie
slain by the sword.’
Her graves are set in the deepest regions of the Pit,
and her assembly is all around her burial place.
All of them are slain, fallen by the sword—
those who once spread terror
in the land of the living.
Among the slain
they prepare a bed for Elam
with all her hordes.
Her graves are all around her.
All of them are uncircumcised,
slain by the sword,
although their terror was once spread
in the land of the living.
They bear their disgrace
with those who descend to the Pit.
They are placed among the slain.
They do not lie down
with the fallen warriors of the uncircumcised,
who went down to Sheol
with their weapons of war,
whose swords were placed under their heads
and their shields
rested on their bones,
although the terror of these warriors
was once in the land of the living.
“Edom is there, her kings and all her princes,
who, despite their strength, have been placed
among those slain by the sword.
They lie down with the uncircumcised,
with those who descend to the Pit.
All the leaders of the north
and all the Sidonians are there.
They went down in shame with the slain,
despite the terror their strength inspired.
They lie down uncircumcised
with those slain by the sword.
They bear their disgrace
with those who descend to the Pit.
“ ‘I will make a covenant of peace with them and eliminate dangerous creatures from the land, so that they may live securely in the wilderness and sleep in the forest.
On the east side it will run between Hauran and Damascus, along the Jordan between Gilead and the land of Israel; you will measure from the northern border to the eastern sea. This will be the eastern side.
The king ordered Ashpenaz, his chief eunuch, to bring some of the Israelites from the royal family and from the nobility—
The chief eunuch gave them names; he gave the name Belteshazzar to Daniel, Shadrach to Hananiah, Meshach to Mishael, and Abednego to Azariah.
Daniel determined that he would not defile himself with the king’s food or with the wine he drank. So he asked permission from the chief eunuch not to defile himself.
yet he said to Daniel, “I fear my lord the king, who assigned your food and drink. What if he sees your faces looking thinner than the other young men your age? You would endanger my life with the king.”
So Daniel said to the guard whom the chief eunuch had assigned to Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah,
At the end of the time that the king had said to present them, the chief eunuch presented them to Nebuchadnezzar.
Then Daniel responded with tact and discretion to Arioch, the captain of the king’s guard, who had gone out to execute the wise men of Babylon.
So I turned my attention to the Lord God to seek him by prayer and petitions, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes.
Gilead is a city of evildoers,
tracked with bloody footprints.
Since Gilead is full of evil,
they will certainly come to nothing.
They sacrifice bulls in Gilgal;
even their altars will be like piles of rocks
on the furrows of a field.
I will ransom them from the power of Sheol.
I will redeem them from death.
Death, where are your barbs?
Sheol, where is your sting?
Compassion is hidden from my eyes.
Grieve like a young woman dressed in sackcloth,
mourning for the husband of her youth.
Dress in sackcloth and lament, you priests;
wail, you ministers of the altar.
Come and spend the night in sackcloth,
you ministers of my God,
because grain and drink offerings
are withheld from the house of your God.
Tear your hearts,
not just your clothes,
and return to the Lord your God.
For he is gracious and compassionate,
slow to anger, abounding in faithful love,
and he relents from sending disaster.
The Lord says:
I will not relent from punishing Damascus
for three crimes, even four,
because they threshed Gilead with iron sledges.
The Lord says:
I will not relent from punishing Gaza
for three crimes, even four,
because they exiled a whole community,
handing them over to Edom.
The Lord says:
I will not relent from punishing the Ammonites
for three crimes, even four,
because they ripped open
the pregnant women of Gilead
in order to enlarge their territory.
They lie on beds inlaid with ivory,
sprawled out on their couches,
and dine on lambs from the flock
and calves from the stall.
They drink wine by the bowlful
and anoint themselves with the finest oils
but do not grieve over the ruin of Joseph.
I will turn your feasts into mourning
and all your songs into lamentation;
I will cause everyone to wear sackcloth
and every head to be shaved.
I will make that grief
like mourning for an only son
and its outcome like a bitter day.
If they dig down to Sheol,
from there my hand will take them;
if they climb up to heaven,
from there I will bring them down.
People from the Negev will possess
the hill country of Esau;
those from the Judean foothills will possess
the land of the Philistines.
They will possess
the territories of Ephraim and Samaria,
while Benjamin will possess Gilead.
I called to the Lord in my distress,
and he answered me.
I cried out for help from deep inside Sheol;
you heard my voice.
Then the people of Nineveh believed God. They proclaimed a fast and dressed in sackcloth—from the greatest of them to the least.
When word reached the king of Nineveh, he got up from his throne, took off his royal robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. Then he issued a decree in Nineveh:
By order of the king and his nobles: No person or animal, herd or flock, is to taste anything at all. They must not eat or drink water. Furthermore, both people and animals must be covered with sackcloth, and everyone must call out earnestly to God. Each must turn from his evil ways and from his wrongdoing.
Shepherd your people with your staff,
the flock that is your possession.
They live alone in a woodland
surrounded by pastures.
Let them graze in Bashan and Gilead
as in ancient times.
Moreover, wine betrays;
an arrogant man is never at rest.
He enlarges his appetite like Sheol,
and like Death he is never satisfied.
He gathers all the nations to himself;
he collects all the peoples for himself.
As for you,
because of the blood of your covenant,
I will release your prisoners
from the waterless cistern.
I will bring them back from the land of Egypt
and gather them from Assyria.
I will bring them to the land of Gilead
and to Lebanon,
but it will not be enough for them.
Then I said to them, “If it seems right to you, give me my wages; but if not, keep them.” So they weighed my wages, thirty pieces of silver.
“Throw it to the potter,” the Lord said to me—this magnificent price I was valued by them. So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw it into the house of the Lord, to the potter.
saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star at its rising and have come to worship him.”
When King Herod heard this, he was deeply disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. So he assembled all the chief priests and scribes of the people and asked them where the Messiah would be born.
“In Bethlehem of Judea,” they told him, “because this is what was written by the prophet:
And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah:
Because out of you will come a ruler
who will shepherd my people Israel.”
Then Herod secretly summoned the wise men and asked them the exact time the star appeared. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the child. When you find him, report back to me so that I too can go and worship him.”
After hearing the king, they went on their way. And there it was—the star they had seen at its rising. It led them until it came and stopped above the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overwhelmed with joy. Entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother, and falling to their knees, they worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And being warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their own country by another route.
After they were gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream, saying, “Get up! Take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you. For Herod is about to search for the child to kill him.” So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night, and escaped to Egypt. He stayed there until Herod’s death, so that what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet might be fulfilled: Out of Egypt I called my Son.
Then Herod, when he realized that he had been outwitted by the wise men, flew into a rage. He gave orders to massacre all the boys in and around Bethlehem who were two years old and under, in keeping with the time he had learned from the wise men.
As for the one who wants to sue you and take away your shirt, let him have your coat as well.
So the disciples came and woke him up, saying, “Lord, save us! We’re going to die!”
And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the skins burst, the wine spills out, and the skins are ruined. No, they put new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved.”
Don’t fear those who kill the body but are not able to kill the soul; rather, fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.
“Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles that were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented in sackcloth and ashes long ago.
But the Pharisees went out and plotted against him, how they might kill him.
Knowing their thoughts, he told them, “Every kingdom divided against itself is headed for destruction, and no city or house divided against itself will stand.
For what will it benefit someone if he gains the whole world yet loses his life? Or what will anyone give in exchange for his life?
In the same way, it is not the will of your Father in heaven that one of these little ones perish.
After agreeing with the workers on one denarius, he sent them into his vineyard for the day.
“But when the tenant farmers saw the son, they said to each other, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him and take his inheritance.’
“He will completely destroy those terrible men,” they told him, “and lease his vineyard to other farmers who will give him his fruit at the harvest.”
The king was enraged, and he sent out his troops, killed those murderers, and burned down their city.
So they sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians. “Teacher,” they said, “we know that you are truthful and teach truthfully the way of God. You don’t care what anyone thinks nor do you show partiality.
“Teacher, Moses said, if a man dies, having no children, his brother is to marry his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.
Fill up, then, the measure of your ancestors’ sins!
Then the chief priests and the elders of the people assembled in the courtyard of the high priest, who was named Caiaphas, and they conspired to arrest Jesus in a treacherous way and kill him.
When the disciples saw it, they were indignant. “Why this waste?” they asked.
Then one of the Twelve, the man called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and said, “What are you willing to give me if I hand him over to you?” So they weighed out thirty pieces of silver for him.
Then Jesus told him, “Put your sword back in its place because all who take up the sword will perish by the sword.
The chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin were looking for false testimony against Jesus so that they could put him to death, but they could not find any, even though many false witnesses came forward. Finally, two who came forward stated, “This man said, ‘I can destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days.’ ”
Then the high priest tore his robes and said, “He has blasphemed! Why do we still need witnesses? See, now you’ve heard the blasphemy.
When daybreak came, all the chief priests and the elders of the people plotted against Jesus to put him to death.
So he threw the silver into the temple and departed. Then he went and hanged himself.
The chief priests took the silver and said, “It’s not permitted to put it into the temple treasury, since it is blood money.”
Then what was spoken through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: They took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of him whose price was set by the Israelites,
The chief priests and the elders, however, persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas and to execute Jesus.
When Pilate saw that he was getting nowhere, but that a riot was starting instead, he took some water, washed his hands in front of the crowd, and said, “I am innocent of this man’s blood. See to it yourselves!”
They stripped him and dressed him in a scarlet robe. They twisted together a crown of thorns, put it on his head, and placed a staff in his right hand. And they knelt down before him and mocked him: “Hail, king of the Jews!”
Then they sat down and were guarding him there.
and saying, “You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross!” In the same way the chief priests, with the scribes and elders, mocked him and said, “He saved others, but he cannot save himself! He is the King of Israel! Let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God; let God rescue him now—if he takes pleasure in him! For he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’ ”
Suddenly, the curtain of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom, the earth quaked, and the rocks were split.
The king immediately sent for an executioner and commanded him to bring John’s head. So he went and beheaded him in prison,
But those tenant farmers said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’
“Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife behind but no child, that man should take the wife and raise up offspring for his brother.
It was two days before the Passover and the Festival of Unleavened Bread. The chief priests and the scribes were looking for a cunning way to arrest Jesus and kill him.
Pilate said to them, “Why? What has he done wrong?”
But they shouted all the more, “Crucify him!”
They tried to give him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it.
Those who passed by were yelling insults at him, shaking their heads, and saying, “Ha! The one who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself by coming down from the cross!” In the same way, the chief priests with the scribes were mocking him among themselves and saying, “He saved others, but he cannot save himself! Let the Messiah, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross, so that we may see and believe.” Even those who were crucified with him taunted him.
Therefore I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven; that’s why she loved much. But the one who is forgiven little, loves little.”
But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your assets with prostitutes, you slaughtered the fattened calf for him.’
But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ ”
“But when the tenant farmers saw him, they discussed it among themselves and said, ‘This is the heir. Let’s kill him, so that the inheritance will be ours.’ So they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.
“What then will the owner of the vineyard do to them?
“Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother has a wife, and dies childless, his brother should take the wife and produce offspring for his brother.
but not a hair of your head will be lost.
He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.
This was John’s testimony when the Jews from Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him, “Who are you?”
If I have told you about earthly things and you don’t believe, how will you believe if I tell you about heavenly things?
so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
Don’t work for the food that perishes but for the food that lasts for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set his seal of approval on him.”
Jesus responded, “Truly I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin.
So from that day on they plotted to kill him.
But the chief priests had decided to kill Lazarus also, because he was the reason many of the Jews were deserting them and believing in Jesus.
Jesus answered him, “What I’m doing you don’t realize now, but afterward you will understand.”
Pilate told them, “You take him and judge him according to your law.”
“It’s not legal for us to put anyone to death,” the Jews declared. They said this so that Jesus’s words might be fulfilled indicating what kind of death he was going to die.
When the soldiers crucified Jesus, they took his clothes and divided them into four parts, a part for each soldier. They also took the tunic, which was seamless, woven in one piece from the top. So they said to one another, “Let’s not tear it, but cast lots for it, to see who gets it.” This happened that the Scripture might be fulfilled that says: They divided my clothes among themselves, and they cast lots for my clothing. This is what the soldiers did.
because you will not abandon me in Hades
or allow your holy one to see decay.
saying, “What should we do with these men? For an obvious sign has been done through them, clear to everyone living in Jerusalem, and we cannot deny it. But so that this does not spread any further among the people, let’s threaten them against speaking to anyone in this name again.” So they called for them and ordered them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus.
“The patriarchs became jealous of Joseph and sold him into Egypt, but God was with him and rescued him out of all his troubles. He gave him favor and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, who appointed him ruler over Egypt and over his whole household. Now a famine and great suffering came over all of Egypt and Canaan, and our ancestors could find no food. When Jacob heard there was grain in Egypt, he sent our ancestors there the first time. The second time, Joseph revealed himself to his brothers, and Joseph’s family became known to Pharaoh. Joseph invited his father Jacob and all his relatives, seventy-five people in all, and Jacob went down to Egypt. He and our ancestors died there, were carried back to Shechem, and were placed in the tomb that Abraham had bought for a sum of silver from the sons of Hamor in Shechem.
About that time King Herod violently attacked some who belonged to the church,
The apostles Barnabas and Paul tore their robes when they heard this and rushed into the crowd, shouting,
When it was morning, the Jews formed a conspiracy and bound themselves under a curse not to eat or drink until they had killed Paul.
For all who sin without the law will also perish without the law, and all who sin under the law will be judged by the law.
So what fruit was produced then from the things you are now ashamed of? The outcome of those things is death.
For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold as a slave under sin.
For if your brother or sister is hurt by what you eat, you are no longer walking according to love. Do not destroy, by what you eat, someone for whom Christ died.
for you were bought at a price. So glorify God with your body.
So the weak person, the brother or sister for whom Christ died, is ruined by your knowledge.
Those, then, who have fallen asleep in Christ have also perished.
who, existing in the form of God,
did not consider equality with God
as something to be exploited.
Instead he emptied himself
by assuming the form of a servant,
taking on the likeness of humanity.
And when he had come as a man,
for the sexually immoral and males who have sex with males, for slave traders, liars, perjurers, and for whatever else is contrary to the sound teaching
who wants everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
For we too were once foolish, disobedient, deceived, enslaved by various passions and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, detesting one another.
so that the proven character of your faith—more valuable than gold which, though perishable, is refined by fire—may result in praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
For you know that you were redeemed from your empty way of life inherited from your ancestors, not with perishable things like silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of an unblemished and spotless lamb.
Through these the world of that time perished when it was flooded.
The Lord does not delay his promise, as some understand delay, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish but all to come to repentance.
and the Living One. I was dead, but look—I am alive forever and ever, and I hold the keys of death and Hades.
I will grant my two witnesses authority to prophesy for 1,260 days, dressed in sackcloth.”
cinnamon, spice, incense, myrrh, and frankincense; wine, olive oil, fine flour, and grain; cattle and sheep; horses and carriages; and slaves—human lives.
He wore a robe dipped in blood, and his name is called the Word of God.
Then the sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them; each one was judged according to their works.
She made herself a tent upon the roof of her house, and put on sackcloth upon her loins. The garments of her widowhood were upon her.
When a righteous man was sold, wisdom didn’t forsake him,
but she delivered him from sin.
She went down with him into a dungeon,
and in bonds she didn’t depart from him,
until she brought him the sceptre of a kingdom,
and authority over those that dealt like a tyrant with him.
She also showed those who had mockingly accused him to be false,
and gave him eternal glory.
For the Son of Man came to save that which was lost.
