God's Covenant: Promises Through the Ages

But I will establish my covenant with you. You shall come into the ship, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives with you.

The LORD smelled the pleasant aroma. The LORD said in his heart, “I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake because the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth. I will never again strike every living thing, as I have done.

While the earth remains, seed time and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night will not cease.”

“As for me, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your offspring after you,

and with every living creature that is with you: the birds, the livestock, and every animal of the earth with you, of all that go out of the ship, even every animal of the earth.

I will establish my covenant with you: All flesh will not be cut off any more by the waters of the flood. There will never again be a flood to destroy the earth.”

God said, “This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations:

I set my rainbow in the cloud, and it will be a sign of a covenant between me and the earth.

When I bring a cloud over the earth, that the rainbow will be seen in the cloud,

I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh, and the waters will no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.

The rainbow will be in the cloud. I will look at it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.”

God said to Noah, “This is the token of the covenant which I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.”

Now the LORD said to Abram, “Leave your country, and your relatives, and your father’s house, and go to the land that I will show you.

I will make of you a great nation. I will bless you and make your name great. You will be a blessing.

I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who treats you with contempt. All the families of the earth will be blessed through you.”

The LORD appeared to Abram and said, “I will give this land to your offspring.” He built an altar there to the LORD, who had appeared to him.

for I will give all the land which you see to you and to your offspring forever.

I will make your offspring as the dust of the earth, so that if a man can count the dust of the earth, then your offspring may also be counted.

Arise, walk through the land in its length and in its width; for I will give it to you.”

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

He brought him all these, and divided them in the middle, and laid each half opposite the other; but he didn’t divide the birds.

It came to pass that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold, a smoking furnace and a flaming torch passed between these pieces.

In that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, “I have given this land to your offspring, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates:

the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites,

the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim,

the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.”

I will make my covenant between me and you, and will multiply you exceedingly.”

“As for me, behold, my covenant is with you. You will be the father of a multitude of nations.

Your name will no more be called Abram, but your name will be Abraham; for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.

I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God to you and to your offspring after you.

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

God said to Abraham, “As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations.

This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you. Every male amongst you shall be circumcised.

You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskin. It will be a token of the covenant between me and you.

He who is eight days old shall be circumcised amongst you, every male throughout your generations, he who is born in the house, or bought with money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring.

He who is born in your house, and he who is bought with your money, must be circumcised. My covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant.

The uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin, that soul shall be cut off from his people. He has broken my covenant.”

God said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but her name shall be Sarah.

I will bless her, and moreover I will give you a son by her. Yes, I will bless her, and she will be a mother of nations. Kings of peoples will come from her.”

God said, “No, but Sarah, your wife, will bear you a son. You shall call his name Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant for his offspring after him.

But I will establish my covenant with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you at this set time next year.”

Abraham took Ishmael his son, all who were born in his house, and all who were bought with his money: every male amongst the men of Abraham’s house, and circumcised the flesh of their foreskin in the same day, as God had said to him.

Abraham was ninety-nine years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin.

Ishmael, his son, was thirteen years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin.

In the same day both Abraham and Ishmael, his son, were circumcised.

All the men of his house, those born in the house, and those bought with money from a foreigner, were circumcised with him.

He said, “I will certainly return to you at about this time next year; and behold, Sarah your wife will have a son.” Sarah heard in the tent door, which was behind him.

since Abraham will surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth will be blessed in him?

The LORD visited Sarah as he had said, and the LORD did to Sarah as he had spoken.

Abraham circumcised his son, Isaac, when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him.

I will also make a nation of the son of the servant, because he is your child.”

Now, therefore, swear to me here by God that you will not deal falsely with me, nor with my son, nor with my son’s son. But according to the kindness that I have done to you, you shall do to me, and to the land in which you have lived as a foreigner.”

Abraham said, “I will swear.”

Abraham took sheep and cattle, and gave them to Abimelech. Those two made a covenant.

Therefore he called that place Beersheba, because they both swore an oath there.

So they made a covenant at Beersheba. Abimelech rose up with Phicol, the captain of his army, and they returned into the land of the Philistines.

and said, “‘I have sworn by myself,’ says the LORD, ‘because you have done this thing, and have not withheld your son, your only son,

that I will bless you greatly, and I will multiply your offspring greatly like the stars of the heavens, and like the sand which is on the seashore. Your offspring will possess the gate of his enemies.

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

So the field of Ephron, which was in Machpelah, which was before Mamre, the field, the cave which was in it, and all the trees that were in the field, that were in all of its borders, were deeded

to Abraham for a possession in the presence of the children of Heth, before all who went in at the gate of his city.

I will make you swear by the LORD, the God of heaven and the God of the earth, that you shall not take a wife for my son of the daughters of the Canaanites, amongst whom I live.

The LORD, the God of heaven—who took me from my father’s house, and from the land of my birth, who spoke to me, and who swore to me, saying, ‘I will give this land to your offspring—he will send his angel before you, and you shall take a wife for my son from there.

The servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham his master, and swore to him concerning this matter.

My master made me swear, saying, ‘You shall not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I live,

Now this is the history of the generations of Ishmael, Abraham’s son, whom Hagar the Egyptian, Sarah’s servant, bore to Abraham.

This is the history of the generations of Isaac, Abraham’s son. Abraham became the father of Isaac.

The LORD said to her, “Two nations are in your womb. Two peoples will be separated from your body. The one people will be stronger than the other people. The elder will serve the younger.”

Jacob said, “First, sell me your birthright.”

Jacob said, “Swear to me first.” He swore to him. He sold his birthright to Jacob.

Live in this land, and I will be with you, and will bless you. For I will give to you, and to your offspring, all these lands, and I will establish the oath which I swore to Abraham your father.

I will multiply your offspring as the stars of the sky, and will give all these lands to your offspring. In your offspring all the nations of the earth will be blessed,

The LORD appeared to him the same night, and said, “I am the God of Abraham your father. Don’t be afraid, for I am with you, and will bless you, and multiply your offspring for my servant Abraham’s sake.”

They said, “We saw plainly that the LORD was with you. We said, ‘Let there now be an oath between us, even between us and you, and let’s make a covenant with you,

They rose up some time in the morning, and swore an oath to one another. Isaac sent them away, and they departed from him in peace.

May God Almighty bless you, and make you fruitful, and multiply you, that you may be a company of peoples,

and give you the blessing of Abraham, to you and to your offspring with you, that you may inherit the land where you travel, which God gave to Abraham.”

Behold, the LORD stood above it, and said, “I am the LORD, the God of Abraham your father, and the God of Isaac. I will give the land you lie on to you and to your offspring.

Your offspring will be as the dust of the earth, and you will spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south. In you and in your offspring, all the families of the earth will be blessed.

Behold, I am with you, and will keep you, wherever you go, and will bring you again into this land. For I will not leave you until I have done that which I have spoken of to you.”

Fulfil the week of this one, and we will give you the other also for the service which you will serve with me for seven more years.”

I will pass through all your flock today, removing from there every speckled and spotted one, and every black one amongst the sheep, and the spotted and speckled amongst the goats. This will be my hire.

So my righteousness will answer for me hereafter, when you come concerning my hire that is before you. Every one that is not speckled and spotted amongst the goats, and black amongst the sheep, that might be with me, will be considered stolen.”

Laban said, “Behold, let it be according to your word.”

That day, he removed the male goats that were streaked and spotted, and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had white in it, and all the black ones amongst the sheep, and gave them into the hand of his sons.

I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar, where you vowed a vow to me. Now arise, get out from this land, and return to the land of your birth.’”

Now come, let’s make a covenant, you and I. Let it be for a witness between me and you.”

Jacob took a stone, and set it up for a pillar.

Jacob said to his relatives, “Gather stones.” They took stones, and made a heap. They ate there by the heap.

Laban called it Jegar Sahadutha, but Jacob called it Galeed.

Laban said, “This heap is witness between me and you today.” Therefore it was named Galeed

and Mizpah, for he said, “The LORD watch between me and you, when we are absent one from another.

If you afflict my daughters, or if you take wives in addition to my daughters, no man is with us; behold, God is witness between me and you.”

Laban said to Jacob, “See this heap, and see the pillar, which I have set between me and you.

May this heap be a witness, and the pillar be a witness, that I will not pass over this heap to you, and that you will not pass over this heap and this pillar to me, for harm.

The God of Abraham, and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge between us.” Then Jacob swore by the fear of his father, Isaac.

Jacob said, “God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, the LORD, who said to me, ‘Return to your country, and to your relatives, and I will do you good,’

You said, ‘I will surely do you good, and make your offspring as the sand of the sea, which can’t be counted because there are so many.’”

He said, “Your name will no longer be called Jacob, but Israel; for you have fought with God and with men, and have prevailed.”

and said to them, “We can’t do this thing, to give our sister to one who is uncircumcised; for that is a reproach to us.

Only on this condition will we consent to you. If you will be as we are, that every male of you be circumcised,

then will we give our daughters to you; and we will take your daughters to us, and we will dwell with you, and we will become one people.

But if you will not listen to us and be circumcised, then we will take our sister, and we will be gone.”

Only on this condition will the men consent to us to live with us, to become one people, if every male amongst us is circumcised, as they are circumcised.

All who went out of the gate of his city listened to Hamor, and to Shechem his son; and every male was circumcised, all who went out of the gate of his city.

God said to him, “Your name is Jacob. Your name shall not be Jacob any more, but your name will be Israel.” He named him Israel.

God said to him, “I am God Almighty. Be fruitful and multiply. A nation and a company of nations will be from you, and kings will come out of your body.

The land which I gave to Abraham and Isaac, I will give it to you, and to your offspring after you I will give the land.”

The sons of Leah: Reuben (Jacob’s firstborn), Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun.

The sons of Rachel: Joseph and Benjamin.

The sons of Bilhah (Rachel’s servant): Dan and Naphtali.

The sons of Zilpah (Leah’s servant): Gad and Asher. These are the sons of Jacob, who were born to him in Paddan Aram.

These are the kings who reigned in the land of Edom, before any king reigned over the children of Israel.

These are the names of the chiefs who came from Esau, according to their families, after their places, and by their names: chief Timna, chief Alvah, chief Jetheth,

chief Oholibamah, chief Elah, chief Pinon,

chief Kenaz, chief Teman, chief Mibzar,

chief Magdiel, and chief Iram. These are the chiefs of Edom, according to their habitations in the land of their possession. This is Esau, the father of the Edomites.

and said to me, ‘Behold, I will make you fruitful, and multiply you, and I will make of you a company of peoples, and will give this land to your offspring after you for an everlasting possession.’

He blessed Joseph, and said, “The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who has fed me all my life long to this day,

the angel who has redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads, and let my name be named on them, and the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac. Let them grow into a multitude upon the earth.”

in the cave that is in the field of Machpelah, which is before Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought with the field from Ephron the Hittite as a burial place.

‘My father made me swear, saying, “Behold, I am dying. Bury me in my grave which I have dug for myself in the land of Canaan.” Now therefore, please let me go up and bury my father, and I will come again.’”

for his sons carried him into the land of Canaan, and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, which Abraham bought with the field, as a possession for a burial site, from Ephron the Hittite, near Mamre.

Joseph said to his brothers, “I am dying, but God will surely visit you, and bring you up out of this land to the land which he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.”

Joseph took an oath from the children of Israel, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here.”

God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.

Moreover he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Moses hid his face because he was afraid to look at God.

God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM,” and he said, “You shall tell the children of Israel this: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’”

God said moreover to Moses, “You shall tell the children of Israel this, ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, and this is my memorial to all generations.

Go and gather the elders of Israel together, and tell them, ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has appeared to me, saying, “I have surely visited you, and seen that which is done to you in Egypt.

“This is so that they may believe that the LORD, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has appeared to you.”

You shall tell Pharaoh, ‘The LORD says, Israel is my son, my firstborn,

and I have said to you, “Let my son go, that he may serve me;” and you have refused to let him go. Behold, I will kill your firstborn son.’”

Then Zipporah took a flint, and cut off the foreskin of her son, and cast it at his feet; and she said, “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me.”

So he let him alone. Then she said, “You are a bridegroom of blood,” because of the circumcision.

I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty; but by my name the LORD I was not known to them.

I have also established my covenant with them, to give them the land of Canaan, the land of their travels, in which they lived as aliens.

Moreover I have heard the groaning of the children of Israel, whom the Egyptians keep in bondage, and I have remembered my covenant.

I will take you to myself for a people. I will be your God; and you shall know that I am the LORD your God, who brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians.

I will bring you into the land which I swore to give to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob; and I will give it to you for a heritage: I am the LORD.’”

The LORD will make a distinction between the livestock of Israel and the livestock of Egypt; and nothing shall die of all that belongs to the children of Israel.”’”

But against any of the children of Israel a dog won’t even bark or move its tongue, against man or animal, that you may know that the LORD makes a distinction between the Egyptians and Israel.

The LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying,

“This month shall be to you the beginning of months. It shall be the first month of the year to you.

Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying, ‘On the tenth day of this month, they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to their fathers’ houses, a lamb for a household;

This day shall be a memorial for you. You shall keep it as a feast to the LORD. You shall keep it as a feast throughout your generations by an ordinance forever.

“‘Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread; even the first day you shall put away yeast out of your houses, for whoever eats leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day, that soul shall be cut off from Israel.

In the first day there shall be to you a holy convocation, and in the seventh day a holy convocation; no kind of work shall be done in them, except that which every man must eat, only that may be done by you.

You shall observe the feast of unleavened bread; for in this same day I have brought your armies out of the land of Egypt. Therefore you shall observe this day throughout your generations by an ordinance forever.

There shall be no yeast found in your houses for seven days, for whoever eats that which is leavened, that soul shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he is a foreigner, or one who is born in the land.

For the LORD will pass through to strike the Egyptians; and when he sees the blood on the lintel, and on the two door posts, the LORD will pass over the door, and will not allow the destroyer to come in to your houses to strike you.

You shall observe this thing for an ordinance to you and to your sons forever.

It shall happen when you have come to the land which the LORD will give you, as he has promised, that you shall keep this service.

Now the time that the children of Israel lived in Egypt was four hundred and thirty years.

It is a night to be much observed to the LORD for bringing them out from the land of Egypt. This is that night of the LORD, to be much observed by all the children of Israel throughout their generations.

The LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “This is the ordinance of the Passover. No foreigner shall eat of it,

but every man’s servant who is bought for money, when you have circumcised him, then shall he eat of it.

A foreigner and a hired servant shall not eat of it.

When a stranger lives as a foreigner with you, and would like to keep the Passover to the LORD, let all his males be circumcised, and then let him come near and keep it. He shall be as one who is born in the land; but no uncircumcised person shall eat of it.

One law shall be to him who is born at home, and to the stranger who lives as a foreigner amongst you.”

“Sanctify to me all the firstborn, whatever opens the womb amongst the children of Israel, both of man and of animal. It is mine.”

It shall be, when the LORD brings you into the land of the Canaanite, and the Hittite, and the Amorite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, which he swore to your fathers to give you, a land flowing with milk and honey, that you shall keep this service in this month.

“It shall be, when the LORD brings you into the land of the Canaanite, as he swore to you and to your fathers, and will give it to you,

Every firstborn of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb; and if you will not redeem it, then you shall break its neck; and you shall redeem all the firstborn of man amongst your sons.

Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for he had made the children of Israel swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones away from here with you.”

He said, “If you will diligently listen to the LORD your God’s voice, and will do that which is right in his eyes, and will pay attention to his commandments, and keep all his statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have put on the Egyptians; for I am the LORD who heals you.”

He said, “The LORD has sworn: ‘The LORD will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.’”

Moses went up to God, and the LORD called to him out of the mountain, saying, “This is what you shall tell the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel:

Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, then you shall be my own possession from amongst all peoples; for all the earth is mine;

and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel.”

The LORD said to Moses, “This is what you shall tell the children of Israel: ‘You yourselves have seen that I have talked with you from heaven.

then his master shall bring him to God, and shall bring him to the door or to the doorpost, and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall serve him forever.

Three times in the year all your males shall appear before the Lord GOD.

“Behold, I send an angel before you, to keep you by the way, and to bring you into the place which I have prepared.

Pay attention to him, and listen to his voice. Don’t provoke him, for he will not pardon your disobedience, for my name is in him.

But if you indeed listen to his voice, and do all that I speak, then I will be an enemy to your enemies, and an adversary to your adversaries.

For my angel shall go before you, and bring you in to the Amorite, the Hittite, the Perizzite, the Canaanite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite; and I will cut them off.

You shall not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor follow their practices, but you shall utterly overthrow them and demolish their pillars.

You shall make no covenant with them, nor with their gods.

Moses came and told the people all the LORD’s words, and all the ordinances; and all the people answered with one voice, and said, “All the words which the LORD has spoken will we do.”

Moses wrote all the LORD’s words, then rose up early in the morning and built an altar at the base of the mountain, with twelve pillars for the twelve tribes of Israel.

Moses took half of the blood and put it in basins, and half of the blood he sprinkled on the altar.

He took the book of the covenant and read it in the hearing of the people, and they said, “We will do all that the LORD has said, and be obedient.”

Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the people, and said, “Look, this is the blood of the covenant, which the LORD has made with you concerning all these words.”

Then Moses, Aaron, Nadab, Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel went up.

The LORD said to Moses, “Come up to me on the mountain, and stay here, and I will give you the stone tablets with the law and the commands that I have written, that you may teach them.”

Let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell amongst them.

You shall put the covenant which I shall give you into the ark.

You shall put the mercy seat on top of the ark, and in the ark you shall put the covenant that I will give you.

There I will meet with you, and I will tell you from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim which are on the ark of the covenant, all that I command you for the children of Israel.

You shall set bread of the presence on the table before me always.

You shall hang up the veil under the clasps, and shall bring the ark of the covenant in there within the veil. The veil shall separate the holy place from the most holy for you.

You shall put the mercy seat on the ark of the covenant in the most holy place.

In the Tent of Meeting, outside the veil which is before the covenant, Aaron and his sons shall keep it in order from evening to morning before the LORD: it shall be a statute forever throughout their generations on the behalf of the children of Israel.

You shall put them on Aaron your brother, and on his sons with him, and shall anoint them, and consecrate them, and sanctify them, that they may minister to me in the priest’s office.

They shall be on Aaron and on his sons, when they go in to the Tent of Meeting, or when they come near to the altar to minister in the holy place, that they don’t bear iniquity, and die. This shall be a statute forever to him and to his offspring after him.

You shall clothe them with belts, Aaron and his sons, and bind headbands on them. They shall have the priesthood by a perpetual statute. You shall consecrate Aaron and his sons.

“You shall also take the one ram, and Aaron and his sons shall lay their hands on the head of the ram.

You shall kill the ram, and you shall take its blood, and sprinkle it around on the altar.

“You shall take the other ram, and Aaron and his sons shall lay their hands on the head of the ram.

Then you shall kill the ram, and take some of its blood, and put it on the tip of the right ear of Aaron, and on the tip of the right ear of his sons, and on the thumb of their right hand, and on the big toe of their right foot; and sprinkle the blood around on the altar.

You shall take of the blood that is on the altar, and of the anointing oil, and sprinkle it on Aaron, and on his garments, and on his sons, and on the garments of his sons with him: and he shall be made holy, and his garments, and his sons, and his sons’ garments with him.

Also you shall take some of the ram’s fat, the fat tail, the fat that covers the innards, the cover of the liver, the two kidneys, the fat that is on them, and the right thigh (for it is a ram of consecration),

You shall put all of this in Aaron’s hands, and in his sons’ hands, and shall wave them for a wave offering before the LORD.

You shall sanctify the breast of the wave offering and the thigh of the wave offering, which is waved, and which is raised up, of the ram of consecration, even of that which is for Aaron, and of that which is for his sons.

It shall be for Aaron and his sons as their portion forever from the children of Israel; for it is a wave offering. It shall be a wave offering from the children of Israel of the sacrifices of their peace offerings, even their wave offering to the LORD.

“The holy garments of Aaron shall be for his sons after him, to be anointed in them, and to be consecrated in them.

Seven days shall the son who is priest in his place put them on, when he comes into the Tent of Meeting to minister in the holy place.

They shall eat those things with which atonement was made, to consecrate and sanctify them; but a stranger shall not eat of it, because they are holy.

“You shall do so to Aaron and to his sons, according to all that I have commanded you. You shall consecrate them seven days.

It shall be a continual burnt offering throughout your generations at the door of the Tent of Meeting before the LORD, where I will meet with you, to speak there to you.

There I will meet with the children of Israel; and the place shall be sanctified by my glory.

I will sanctify the Tent of Meeting and the altar. I will also sanctify Aaron and his sons to minister to me in the priest’s office.

I will dwell amongst the children of Israel, and will be their God.

They shall know that I am the LORD their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt, that I might dwell amongst them: I am the LORD their God.

You shall put it before the veil that is by the ark of the covenant, before the mercy seat that is over the covenant, where I will meet with you.

So they shall wash their hands and their feet, that they not die. This shall be a statute forever to them, even to him and to his descendants throughout their generations.”

You shall use it to anoint the Tent of Meeting, the ark of the covenant,

the altar of burnt offering with all its utensils, and the basin with its base.

You shall sanctify them, that they may be most holy. Whatever touches them shall be holy.

You shall anoint Aaron and his sons, and sanctify them, that they may minister to me in the priest’s office.

You shall speak to the children of Israel, saying, ‘This shall be a holy anointing oil to me throughout your generations.

It shall not be poured on man’s flesh, and do not make any like it, according to its composition. It is holy. It shall be holy to you.

Whoever compounds any like it, or whoever puts any of it on a stranger, he shall be cut off from his people.’”

The LORD said to Moses, “Take to yourself sweet spices, gum resin, onycha, and galbanum: sweet spices with pure frankincense. There shall be an equal weight of each.

You shall make incense of it, a perfume after the art of the perfumer, seasoned with salt, pure and holy.

You shall beat some of it very small, and put some of it before the covenant in the Tent of Meeting, where I will meet with you. It shall be to you most holy.

You shall not make this incense, according to its composition, for yourselves: it shall be to you holy for the LORD.

the Tent of Meeting, the ark of the covenant, the mercy seat that is on it, all the furniture of the Tent,

“Speak also to the children of Israel, saying, ‘Most certainly you shall keep my Sabbaths; for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the LORD who sanctifies you.

Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.

It is a sign between me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.’”

When he finished speaking with him on Mount Sinai, he gave Moses the two tablets of the covenant, stone tablets, written with God’s finger.

Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self, and said to them, ‘I will multiply your offspring as the stars of the sky, and all this land that I have spoken of I will give to your offspring, and they shall inherit it forever.’”

Moses turned, and went down from the mountain, with the two tablets of the covenant in his hand; tablets that were written on both their sides. They were written on one side and on the other.

The tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets.

As soon as he came near to the camp, he saw the calf and the dancing. Then Moses’ anger grew hot, and he threw the tablets out of his hands, and broke them beneath the mountain.

The LORD spoke to Moses, “Depart, go up from here, you and the people that you have brought up out of the land of Egypt, to the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your offspring.’

For how would people know that I have found favour in your sight, I and your people? Isn’t it that you go with us, so that we are separated, I and your people, from all the people who are on the surface of the earth?”

The LORD said to Moses, “Chisel two stone tablets like the first. I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke.

He said, “Behold, I make a covenant: before all your people I will do marvels, such as have not been worked in all the earth, nor in any nation; and all the people amongst whom you are shall see the work of the LORD; for it is an awesome thing that I do with you.

“Don’t make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, lest they play the prostitute after their gods, and sacrifice to their gods, and one call you and you eat of his sacrifice;

The LORD said to Moses, “Write these words; for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.”

He was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights; he neither ate bread, nor drank water. He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten commandments.

When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the covenant in Moses’ hand, when he came down from the mountain, Moses didn’t know that the skin of his face shone by reason of his speaking with him.

Afterward all the children of Israel came near, and he gave them all the commandments that the LORD had spoken with him on Mount Sinai.

the ark of the covenant with its poles, the mercy seat,

You shall put the ark of the covenant in it, and you shall screen the ark with the veil.

You shall set the golden altar for incense before the ark of the covenant, and put the screen of the door to the tabernacle.

“You shall set the altar of burnt offering before the door of the tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting.

You shall set the basin between the Tent of Meeting and the altar, and shall put water therein.

“You shall take the anointing oil, and anoint the tabernacle and all that is in it, and shall make it holy, and all its furniture, and it will be holy.

You shall anoint the altar of burnt offering, with all its vessels, and sanctify the altar, and the altar will be most holy.

“You shall bring Aaron and his sons to the door of the Tent of Meeting, and shall wash them with water.

You shall put on Aaron the holy garments; and you shall anoint him, and sanctify him, that he may minister to me in the priest’s office.

You shall anoint them, as you anointed their father, that they may minister to me in the priest’s office. Their anointing shall be to them for an everlasting priesthood throughout their generations.”

He took and put the covenant into the ark, and set the poles on the ark, and put the mercy seat above on the ark.

He brought the ark into the tabernacle, and set up the veil of the screen, and screened the ark of the covenant, as the LORD commanded Moses.

Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the LORD’s glory filled the tabernacle.

The LORD called to Moses, and spoke to him from the Tent of Meeting, saying,

“Speak to the children of Israel, and tell them, ‘When anyone of you offers an offering to the LORD, you shall offer your offering of the livestock, from the herd and from the flock.

Every offering of your meal offering you shall season with salt. You shall not allow the salt of the covenant of your God to be lacking from your meal offering. With all your offerings you shall offer salt.

“‘It shall be a perpetual statute throughout your generations in all your dwellings, that you shall eat neither fat nor blood.’”

Every male amongst the children of Aaron shall eat of it, as their portion forever throughout your generations, from the offerings of the LORD made by fire. Whoever touches them shall be holy.’”

The anointed priest that will be in his place from amongst his sons shall offer it. By a statute forever, it shall be wholly burnt to the LORD.

For the waved breast and the heaved thigh I have taken from the children of Israel out of the sacrifices of their peace offerings, and have given them to Aaron the priest and to his sons as their portion forever from the children of Israel.’”

which the LORD commanded to be given them of the children of Israel, in the day that he anointed them. It is their portion forever throughout their generations.

Moses brought Aaron’s sons, and clothed them with tunics, and tied sashes on them, and put headbands on them, as the LORD commanded Moses.

He brought the bull of the sin offering, and Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the bull of the sin offering.

He killed it; and Moses took the blood, and put it around on the horns of the altar with his finger, and purified the altar, and poured out the blood at the base of the altar, and sanctified it, to make atonement for it.

He took all the fat that was on the innards, and the cover of the liver, and the two kidneys, and their fat; and Moses burnt it on the altar.

But the bull, and its skin, and its meat, and its dung, he burnt with fire outside the camp, as the LORD commanded Moses.

He presented the ram of the burnt offering. Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the ram.

He killed it; and Moses sprinkled the blood around on the altar.

He cut the ram into its pieces; and Moses burnt the head, and the pieces, and the fat.

He washed the innards and the legs with water; and Moses burnt the whole ram on the altar. It was a burnt offering for a pleasant aroma. It was an offering made by fire to the LORD, as the LORD commanded Moses.

He presented the other ram, the ram of consecration. Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the ram.

He killed it; and Moses took some of its blood, and put it on the tip of Aaron’s right ear, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the great toe of his right foot.

He brought Aaron’s sons; and Moses put some of the blood on the tip of their right ear, and on the thumb of their right hand, and on the great toe of their right foot; and Moses sprinkled the blood around on the altar.

Moses took some of the anointing oil, and some of the blood which was on the altar, and sprinkled it on Aaron, on his garments, and on his sons, and on his sons’ garments with him, and sanctified Aaron, his garments, and his sons, and his sons’ garments with him.

In the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised.

“On the eighth day he shall bring them for his cleansing to the priest, to the door of the Tent of Meeting, before the LORD.

The priest shall take the lamb of the trespass offering, and the log of oil, and the priest shall wave them for a wave offering before the LORD.

He shall kill the lamb of the trespass offering. The priest shall take some of the blood of the trespass offering and put it on the tip of the right ear of him who is to be cleansed, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the big toe of his right foot.

The priest shall pour some of the oil into the palm of his own left hand;

and the priest shall sprinkle with his right finger some of the oil that is in his left hand seven times before the LORD.

Then the priest shall put some of the oil that is in his hand on the tip of the right ear of him who is to be cleansed, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the big toe of his right foot, on the place of the blood of the trespass offering.

“When you have come into the land of Canaan, which I give to you for a possession, and I put a spreading mildew in a house in the land of your possession,

He shall put the incense on the fire before the LORD, that the cloud of the incense may cover the mercy seat that is on the covenant, so that he will not die.

He shall take some of the blood of the bull, and sprinkle it with his finger on the mercy seat on the east; and before the mercy seat he shall sprinkle some of the blood with his finger seven times.

The LORD said to Moses,

“Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them, ‘I am the LORD your God.

You shall do my ordinances. You shall keep my statutes and walk in them. I am the LORD your God.

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

Therefore you shall keep my requirements, that you do not practise any of these abominable customs which were practised before you, and that you do not defile yourselves with them. I am the LORD your God.’”

“Speak to all the congregation of the children of Israel, and tell them, ‘You shall be holy; for I, the LORD your God, am holy.

“Moreover, you shall tell the children of Israel, ‘Anyone of the children of Israel, or of the strangers who live as foreigners in Israel, who gives any of his offspring to Molech shall surely be put to death. The people of the land shall stone that person with stones.

then I will set my face against that man and against his family, and will cut him off, and all who play the prostitute after him to play the prostitute with Molech, from amongst their people.

You shall keep my statutes, and do them. I am the LORD who sanctifies you.

But I have said to you, “You shall inherit their land, and I will give it to you to possess it, a land flowing with milk and honey.” I am the LORD your God, who has separated you from the peoples.

You shall be holy to me, for I, the LORD, am holy, and have set you apart from the peoples, that you should be mine.

You shall not profane my holy name, but I will be made holy amongst the children of Israel. I am the LORD who makes you holy,

who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to be your God. I am the LORD.”

The LORD spoke to Moses, saying,

“Speak to the children of Israel, and tell them, ‘The set feasts of the LORD, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, even these are my set feasts.

“‘Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation; you shall do no kind of work. It is a Sabbath to the LORD in all your dwellings.

“‘These are the set feasts of the LORD, even holy convocations, which you shall proclaim in their appointed season.

In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month in the evening, is the LORD’s Passover.

On the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread to the LORD. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread.

In the first day you shall have a holy convocation. You shall do no regular work.

You shall make proclamation on the same day that there shall be a holy convocation to you. You shall do no regular work. This is a statute forever in all your dwellings throughout your generations.

You shall do no kind of work: it is a statute forever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.

You shall keep it as a feast to the LORD seven days in the year. It is a statute forever throughout your generations. You shall keep it in the seventh month.

You shall dwell in temporary shelters for seven days. All who are native-born in Israel shall dwell in temporary shelters,

that your generations may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in temporary shelters when I brought them out of the land of Egypt. I am the LORD your God.’”

Outside of the veil of the Testimony, in the Tent of Meeting, Aaron shall keep it in order from evening to morning before the LORD continually. It shall be a statute forever throughout your generations.

Every Sabbath day he shall set it in order before the LORD continually. It is an everlasting covenant on the behalf of the children of Israel.

“‘The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine; for you are strangers and live as foreigners with me.

I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan, and to be your God.

For they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. They shall not be sold as slaves.

For to me the children of Israel are servants; they are my servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

“‘I will have respect for you, make you fruitful, multiply you, and will establish my covenant with you.

I will set my tent amongst you, and my soul won’t abhor you.

I will walk amongst you, and will be your God, and you will be my people.

and if you shall reject my statutes, and if your soul abhors my ordinances, so that you will not do all my commandments, but break my covenant,

I will bring a sword upon you that will execute the vengeance of the covenant. You will be gathered together within your cities, and I will send the pestilence amongst you. You will be delivered into the hand of the enemy.

then I will remember my covenant with Jacob, my covenant with Isaac, and also my covenant with Abraham; and I will remember the land.

Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject them, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly and to break my covenant with them; for I am the LORD their God.

But I will for their sake remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God. I am the LORD.’”

These are the statutes, ordinances, and laws, which the LORD made between him and the children of Israel in Mount Sinai by Moses.

If he will not redeem the field, or if he has sold the field to another man, it shall not be redeemed any more;

but the field, when it goes out in the Jubilee, shall be holy to the LORD, as a devoted field. It shall be owned by the priests.

“‘If he dedicates a field to the LORD which he has bought, which is not of the field of his possession,

then the priest shall reckon to him the worth of your valuation up to the Year of Jubilee; and he shall give your valuation on that day, as a holy thing to the LORD.

In the Year of Jubilee the field shall return to him from whom it was bought, even to him to whom the possession of the land belongs.

All your valuations shall be according to the shekel of the sanctuary: twenty gerahs to the shekel.

“‘However the firstborn amongst animals, which belongs to the LORD as a firstborn, no man may dedicate, whether an ox or a sheep. It is the LORD’s.

If it is an unclean animal, then he shall buy it back according to your valuation, and shall add to it the fifth part of it; or if it isn’t redeemed, then it shall be sold according to your valuation.

“‘Notwithstanding, no devoted thing that a man devotes to the LORD of all that he has, whether of man or animal, or of the field of his possession, shall be sold or redeemed. Everything that is permanently devoted is most holy to the LORD.

“‘No one devoted to destruction, who shall be devoted from amongst men, shall be ransomed. He shall surely be put to death.

These are the commandments which the LORD commanded Moses for the children of Israel on Mount Sinai.

The LORD spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the Tent of Meeting, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after they had come out of the land of Egypt, saying,

Now this is the history of the generations of Aaron and Moses in the day that the LORD spoke with Moses in Mount Sinai.

“Behold, I have taken the Levites from amongst the children of Israel instead of all the firstborn who open the womb amongst the children of Israel; and the Levites shall be mine,

for all the firstborn are mine. On the day that I struck down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt I made holy to me all the firstborn in Israel, both man and animal. They shall be mine. I am the LORD.”

You shall take the Levites for me—I am the LORD—instead of all the firstborn amongst the children of Israel; and the livestock of the Levites instead of all the firstborn amongst the livestock of the children of Israel.”

“Take the Levites instead of all the firstborn amongst the children of Israel, and the livestock of the Levites instead of their livestock; and the Levites shall be mine. I am the LORD.

“‘This is the law of the Nazirite who vows and of his offering to the LORD for his separation, in addition to that which he is able to afford. According to his vow which he vows, so he must do after the law of his separation.’”

“So they shall put my name on the children of Israel; and I will bless them.”

When Moses went into the Tent of Meeting to speak with the LORD, he heard his voice speaking to him from above the mercy seat that was on the ark of the Testimony, from between the two cherubim; and he spoke to him.

and Aaron shall offer the Levites before the LORD for a wave offering on the behalf of the children of Israel, that it may be theirs to do the service of the LORD.

Thus you shall separate the Levites from amongst the children of Israel, and the Levites shall be mine.

For they are wholly given to me from amongst the children of Israel; instead of all who open the womb, even the firstborn of all the children of Israel, I have taken them to me.

For all the firstborn amongst the children of Israel are mine, both man and animal. On the day that I struck all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, I sanctified them for myself.

I have taken the Levites instead of all the firstborn amongst the children of Israel.

I have given the Levites as a gift to Aaron and to his sons from amongst the children of Israel, to do the service of the children of Israel in the Tent of Meeting, and to make atonement for the children of Israel, so that there will be no plague amongst the children of Israel when the children of Israel come near to the sanctuary.”

“The sons of Aaron, the priests, shall blow the trumpets. This shall be to you for a statute forever throughout your generations.

In the second year, in the second month, on the twentieth day of the month, the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle of the covenant.

They set forward from the Mount of the LORD three days’ journey. The ark of the LORD’s covenant went before them three days’ journey, to seek out a resting place for them.

Have I conceived all this people? Have I brought them out, that you should tell me, ‘Carry them in your bosom, as a nurse carries a nursing infant, to the land which you swore to their fathers’?

‘Because the LORD was not able to bring this people into the land which he swore to them, therefore he has slain them in the wilderness.’

surely they shall not see the land which I swore to their fathers, neither shall any of those who despised me see it.

But my servant Caleb, because he had another spirit with him, and has followed me fully, him I will bring into the land into which he went. His offspring shall possess it.

surely you shall not come into the land concerning which I swore that I would make you dwell therein, except Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun.

I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to be your God: I am the LORD your God.”

You shall lay them up in the Tent of Meeting before the covenant, where I meet with you.

The LORD said to Moses, “Put back the rod of Aaron before the covenant, to be kept for a token against the children of rebellion; that you may make an end of their complaining against me, that they not die.”

The LORD said to Aaron, “You and your sons and your fathers’ house with you shall bear the iniquity of the sanctuary; and you and your sons with you shall bear the iniquity of your priesthood.

All the wave offerings of the holy things which the children of Israel offer to the LORD, I have given you and your sons and your daughters with you, as a portion forever. It is a covenant of salt forever before the LORD to you and to your offspring with you.”

But the Levites shall do the service of the Tent of Meeting, and they shall bear their iniquity. It shall be a statute forever throughout your generations. Amongst the children of Israel, they shall have no inheritance.

For the tithe of the children of Israel, which they offer as a wave offering to the LORD, I have given to the Levites for an inheritance. Therefore I have said to them, ‘Amongst the children of Israel they shall have no inheritance.’”

“He who touches the dead body of any man shall be unclean seven days.

He shall purify himself with water on the third day, and on the seventh day he shall be clean; but if he doesn’t purify himself the third day, then the seventh day he shall not be clean.

Whoever touches a dead person, the body of a man who has died, and doesn’t purify himself, defiles the LORD’s tabernacle; and that soul shall be cut off from Israel; because the water for impurity was not sprinkled on him, he shall be unclean. His uncleanness is yet on him.

“This is the law when a man dies in a tent: everyone who comes into the tent, and everyone who is in the tent, shall be unclean seven days.

Every open vessel, which has no covering bound on it, is unclean.

“Whoever in the open field touches one who is slain with a sword, or a dead body, or a bone of a man, or a grave, shall be unclean seven days.

“For the unclean, they shall take of the ashes of the burning of the sin offering; and running water shall be poured on them in a vessel.

A clean person shall take hyssop, dip it in the water, and sprinkle it on the tent, on all the vessels, on the persons who were there, and on him who touched the bone, or the slain, or the dead, or the grave.

The clean person shall sprinkle on the unclean on the third day, and on the seventh day. On the seventh day, he shall purify him. He shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water, and shall be clean at evening.

But the man who shall be unclean, and shall not purify himself, that soul shall be cut off from amongst the assembly, because he has defiled the sanctuary of the LORD. The water for impurity has not been sprinkled on him. He is unclean.

“Aaron shall be gathered to his people; for he shall not enter into the land which I have given to the children of Israel, because you rebelled against my word at the waters of Meribah.

Israel vowed a vow to the LORD, and said, “If you will indeed deliver this people into my hand, then I will utterly destroy their cities.”

For from the top of the rocks I see him. From the hills I see him. Behold, it is a people that dwells alone, and shall not be listed amongst the nations.

Who can count the dust of Jacob, or count the fourth part of Israel? Let me die the death of the righteous! Let my last end be like his!”

Now, behold, I go to my people. Come, I will inform you what this people shall do to your people in the latter days.”

Therefore say, ‘Behold, I give to him my covenant of peace.

It shall be to him, and to his offspring after him, the covenant of an everlasting priesthood, because he was jealous for his God, and made atonement for the children of Israel.’”

The sons of Simeon after their families: of Nemuel, the family of the Nemuelites; of Jamin, the family of the Jaminites; of Jachin, the family of the Jachinites;

of Zerah, the family of the Zerahites; of Shaul, the family of the Shaulites.

These are the families of the Simeonites, twenty-two thousand and two hundred.

The sons of Gad after their families: of Zephon, the family of the Zephonites; of Haggi, the family of the Haggites; of Shuni, the family of the Shunites;

of Ozni, the family of the Oznites; of Eri, the family of the Erites;

of Arod, the family of the Arodites; of Areli, the family of the Arelites.

These are the families of the sons of Gad according to those who were counted of them, forty thousand and five hundred.

The sons of Judah after their families were: of Shelah, the family of the Shelanites; of Perez, the family of the Perezites; of Zerah, the family of the Zerahites.

“To these the land shall be divided for an inheritance according to the number of names.

Those who were counted of them were twenty-three thousand, every male from a month old and upward; for they were not counted amongst the children of Israel, because there was no inheritance given them amongst the children of Israel.

“‘In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month, is the LORD’s Passover.

When a man vows a vow to the LORD, or swears an oath to bind his soul with a bond, he shall not break his word. He shall do according to all that proceeds out of his mouth.

“Also, when a woman vows a vow to the LORD and binds herself by a pledge, being in her father’s house, in her youth,

and her father hears her vow and her pledge with which she has bound her soul, and her father says nothing to her, then all her vows shall stand, and every pledge with which she has bound her soul shall stand.

“If she has a husband, while her vows are on her, or the rash utterance of her lips with which she has bound her soul,

and her husband hears it, and says nothing to her in the day that he hears it; then her vows shall stand, and her pledges with which she has bound her soul shall stand.

“But the vow of a widow, or of her who is divorced, everything with which she has bound her soul shall stand against her.

“If she vowed in her husband’s house or bound her soul by a bond with an oath,

and her husband heard it, and held his peace at her and didn’t disallow her, then all her vows shall stand, and every pledge with which she bound her soul shall stand.

The LORD’s anger burnt in that day, and he swore, saying,

‘Surely none of the men who came up out of Egypt, from twenty years old and upward, shall see the land which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob; because they have not wholly followed me,

Moses said to them: “If you will do this thing, if you will arm yourselves to go before the LORD to the war,

and the land is subdued before the LORD; then afterward you shall return, and be clear of obligation to the LORD and to Israel. Then this land shall be your possession before the LORD.

The children of Gad and the children of Reuben spoke to Moses, saying, “Your servants will do as my lord commands.

but your servants will pass over, every man who is armed for war, before the LORD to battle, as my lord says.”

So Moses commanded concerning them to Eleazar the priest, and to Joshua the son of Nun, and to the heads of the fathers’ households of the tribes of the children of Israel.

Moses said to them, “If the children of Gad and the children of Reuben will pass with you over the Jordan, every man who is armed to battle before the LORD, and the land is subdued before you, then you shall give them the land of Gilead for a possession;

but if they will not pass over with you armed, they shall have possessions amongst you in the land of Canaan.”

The children of Gad and the children of Reuben answered, saying, “As the LORD has said to your servants, so will we do.

We will pass over armed before the LORD into the land of Canaan, and the possession of our inheritance shall remain with us beyond the Jordan.”

They travelled from Rephidim, and encamped in the wilderness of Sinai.

Moses commanded the children of Israel, saying, “This is the land which you shall inherit by lot, which the LORD has commanded to give to the nine tribes, and to the half-tribe;

for the tribe of the children of Reuben according to their fathers’ houses, the tribe of the children of Gad according to their fathers’ houses, and the half-tribe of Manasseh have received their inheritance.

The two tribes and the half-tribe have received their inheritance beyond the Jordan at Jericho eastward, towards the sunrise.”

You shall not defile the land which you inhabit, where I dwell; for I, the LORD, dwell amongst the children of Israel.’”

These are the commandments and the ordinances which the LORD commanded by Moses to the children of Israel in the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho.

Behold, I have set the land before you. Go in and possess the land which the LORD swore to your fathers—to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob—to give to them and to their offspring after them.’”

I said to you, “You have come to the hill country of the Amorites, which the LORD our God gives to us.

“Surely not one of these men of this evil generation shall see the good land which I swore to give to your fathers,

The days in which we came from Kadesh Barnea until we had come over the brook Zered were thirty-eight years, until all the generation of the men of war were consumed from the middle of the camp, as the LORD swore to them.

So, when all the men of war were consumed and dead from amongst the people,

When you come near the border of the children of Ammon, don’t bother them, nor contend with them; for I will not give you any of the land of the children of Ammon for a possession, because I have given it to the children of Lot for a possession.”

He declared to you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, even the ten commandments. He wrote them on two stone tablets.

But the LORD has taken you, and brought you out of the iron furnace, out of Egypt, to be to him a people of inheritance, as it is today.

Furthermore the LORD was angry with me for your sakes, and swore that I should not go over the Jordan, and that I should not go in to that good land which the LORD your God gives you for an inheritance;

but I must die in this land. I must not go over the Jordan, but you shall go over and possess that good land.

Be careful, lest you forget the covenant of the LORD your God, which he made with you, and make yourselves a carved image in the form of anything which the LORD your God has forbidden you.

For the LORD your God is a merciful God. He will not fail you nor destroy you, nor forget the covenant of your fathers which he swore to them.

The LORD our God made a covenant with us in Horeb.

The LORD didn’t make this covenant with our fathers, but with us, even us, who are all of us here alive today.

The LORD spoke with you face to face on the mountain out of the middle of the fire,

The LORD spoke these words to all your assembly on the mountain out of the middle of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness, with a great voice. He added no more. He wrote them on two stone tablets, and gave them to me.

It shall be, when the LORD your God brings you into the land which he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you, great and goodly cities which you didn’t build,

and he brought us out from there, that he might bring us in, to give us the land which he swore to our fathers.

For you are a holy people to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for his own possession, above all peoples who are on the face of the earth.

The LORD didn’t set his love on you nor choose you, because you were more in number than any people; for you were the fewest of all peoples;

but because the LORD loves you, and because he desires to keep the oath which he swore to your fathers, the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.

Know therefore that the LORD your God himself is God, the faithful God, who keeps covenant and loving kindness to a thousand generations with those who love him and keep his commandments,

It shall happen, because you listen to these ordinances and keep and do them, that the LORD your God will keep with you the covenant and the loving kindness which he swore to your fathers.

He will love you, bless you, and multiply you. He will also bless the fruit of your body and the fruit of your ground, your grain and your new wine and your oil, the increase of your livestock and the young of your flock, in the land which he swore to your fathers to give you.

You shall observe to do all the commandments which I command you today, that you may live, and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the LORD swore to your fathers.

But you shall remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he swore to your fathers, as it is today.

Not for your righteousness or for the uprightness of your heart do you go in to possess their land; but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD your God does drive them out from before you, and that he may establish the word which the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.

When I had gone up onto the mountain to receive the stone tablets, even the tablets of the covenant which the LORD made with you, then I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water.

The LORD delivered to me the two stone tablets written with God’s finger. On them were all the words which the LORD spoke with you on the mountain out of the middle of the fire in the day of the assembly.

It came to pass at the end of forty days and forty nights that the LORD gave me the two stone tablets, even the tablets of the covenant.

So I turned and came down from the mountain, and the mountain was burning with fire. The two tablets of the covenant were in my two hands.

I looked, and behold, you had sinned against the LORD your God. You had made yourselves a moulded calf. You had quickly turned away from the way which the LORD had commanded you.

I took hold of the two tablets, and threw them out of my two hands, and broke them before your eyes.

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

At that time the LORD said to me, “Cut two stone tablets like the first, and come up to me onto the mountain, and make an ark of wood.

I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets which you broke, and you shall put them in the ark.”

He wrote on the tablets, according to the first writing, the ten commandments, which the LORD spoke to you on the mountain out of the middle of the fire in the day of the assembly; and the LORD gave them to me.

I turned and came down from the mountain, and put the tablets in the ark which I had made; and there they are as the LORD commanded me.

At that time the LORD set apart the tribe of Levi to bear the ark of the LORD’s covenant, to stand before the LORD to minister to him, and to bless in his name, to this day.

Therefore Levi has no portion nor inheritance with his brothers; the LORD is his inheritance, according as the LORD your God spoke to him.)

The LORD said to me, “Arise, take your journey before the people; and they shall go in and possess the land which I swore to their fathers to give to them.”

Only the LORD had a delight in your fathers to love them, and he chose their offspring after them, even you above all peoples, as it is today.

and that you may prolong your days in the land which the LORD swore to your fathers to give to them and to their offspring, a land flowing with milk and honey.

that your days and your children’s days may be multiplied in the land which the LORD swore to your fathers to give them, as the days of the heavens above the earth.

These are the statutes and the ordinances which you shall observe to do in the land which the LORD, the God of your fathers, has given you to possess all the days that you live on the earth.

for you haven’t yet come to the rest and to the inheritance which the LORD your God gives you.

You are the children of the LORD your God. You shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.

For you are a holy people to the LORD your God, and the LORD has chosen you to be a people for his own possession, above all peoples who are on the face of the earth.

If there is found amongst you, within any of your gates which the LORD your God gives you, a man or woman who does that which is evil in the LORD your God’s sight in transgressing his covenant,

and has gone and served other gods and worshipped them, or the sun, or the moon, or any of the stars of the sky, which I have not commanded,

They shall have no inheritance amongst their brothers. The LORD is their inheritance, as he has spoken to them.

For the LORD your God has chosen him out of all your tribes to stand to minister in the LORD’s name, him and his sons forever.

I will raise them up a prophet from amongst their brothers, like you. I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I shall command him.

When the LORD your God cuts off the nations whose land the LORD your God gives you, and you succeed them and dwell in their cities and in their houses,

you shall set apart three cities for yourselves in the middle of your land, which the LORD your God gives you to possess.

If the LORD your God enlarges your border, as he has sworn to your fathers, and gives you all the land which he promised to give to your fathers;

You shall not remove your neighbour’s landmark, which they of old time have set, in your inheritance which you shall inherit, in the land that the LORD your God gives you to possess.

But of the cities of these peoples that the LORD your God gives you for an inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that breathes;

but you shall utterly destroy them: the Hittite, the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite, as the LORD your God has commanded you;

If someone is found slain in the land which the LORD your God gives you to possess, lying in the field, and it isn’t known who has struck him,

It shall be that the firstborn whom she bears shall succeed in the name of his brother who is dead, that his name not be blotted out of Israel.

You shall come to the priest who shall be in those days, and tell him, “I profess today to the LORD your God, that I have come to the land which the LORD swore to our fathers to give us.”

Look down from your holy habitation, from heaven, and bless your people Israel, and the ground which you have given us, as you swore to our fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey.”

You have declared today that the LORD is your God, and that you would walk in his ways, keep his statutes, his commandments, and his ordinances, and listen to his voice.

The LORD has declared today that you are a people for his own possession, as he has promised you, and that you should keep all his commandments.

He will make you high above all nations that he has made, in praise, in name, and in honour, and that you may be a holy people to the LORD your God, as he has spoken.

It shall be on the day when you shall pass over the Jordan to the land which the LORD your God gives you, that you shall set yourself up great stones, and coat them with plaster.

You shall write on them all the words of this law, when you have passed over, that you may go in to the land which the LORD your God gives you, a land flowing with milk and honey, as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has promised you.

Moses and the Levitical priests spoke to all Israel, saying, “Be silent and listen, Israel! Today you have become the people of the LORD your God.

You shall therefore obey the LORD your God’s voice, and do his commandments and his statutes, which I command you today.”

‘Cursed is he who doesn’t uphold the words of this law by doing them.’ All the people shall say, ‘Amen.’”

It shall happen, if you shall listen diligently to the LORD your God’s voice, to observe to do all his commandments which I command you today, that the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth.

The LORD will establish you for a holy people to himself, as he has sworn to you, if you shall keep the commandments of the LORD your God, and walk in his ways.

The LORD will grant you abundant prosperity in the fruit of your body, in the fruit of your livestock, and in the fruit of your ground, in the land which the LORD swore to your fathers to give you.

But it shall come to pass, if you will not listen to the LORD your God’s voice, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command you today, that all these curses will come on you and overtake you.

These are the words of the covenant which the LORD commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, in addition to the covenant which he made with them in Horeb.

Therefore keep the words of this covenant and do them, that you may prosper in all that you do.

All of you stand today in the presence of the LORD your God: your heads, your tribes, your elders, and your officers, even all the men of Israel,

that you may enter into the covenant of the LORD your God, and into his oath, which the LORD your God makes with you today,

that he may establish you today as his people, and that he may be your God, as he spoke to you and as he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.

Neither do I make this covenant and this oath with you only,

but with those who stand here with us today before the LORD our God, and also with those who are not here with us today

The LORD will set him apart for evil out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant written in this book of the law.

Then men will say, “Because they abandoned the covenant of the LORD, the God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them out of the land of Egypt,

and went and served other gods and worshipped them, gods that they didn’t know and that he had not given to them.

Therefore the LORD’s anger burnt against this land, to bring on it all the curses that are written in this book.

It shall happen, when all these things have come on you, the blessing and the curse, which I have set before you, and you shall call them to mind amongst all the nations where the LORD your God has driven you,

The LORD your God will bring you into the land which your fathers possessed, and you will possess it. He will do you good, and increase your numbers more than your fathers.

I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Therefore choose life, that you may live, you and your descendants,

to love the LORD your God, to obey his voice, and to cling to him; for he is your life, and the length of your days, that you may dwell in the land which the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.

He said to them, “I am one hundred and twenty years old today. I can no more go out and come in. The LORD has said to me, ‘You shall not go over this Jordan.’

Moses called to Joshua, and said to him in the sight of all Israel, “Be strong and courageous, for you shall go with this people into the land which the LORD has sworn to their fathers to give them; and you shall cause them to inherit it.

Moses wrote this law and delivered it to the priests the sons of Levi, who bore the ark of the LORD’s covenant, and to all the elders of Israel.

Moses commanded them, saying, “At the end of every seven years, in the set time of the year of release, in the feast of booths,

when all Israel has come to appear before the LORD your God in the place which he will choose, you shall read this law before all Israel in their hearing.

The LORD said to Moses, “Behold, you shall sleep with your fathers. This people will rise up and play the prostitute after the strange gods of the land where they go to be amongst them, and will forsake me and break my covenant which I have made with them.

Then my anger shall be kindled against them in that day, and I will forsake them, and I will hide my face from them, and they shall be devoured, and many evils and troubles shall come on them; so that they will say in that day, ‘Haven’t these evils come on us because our God is not amongst us?’

For when I have brought them into the land which I swore to their fathers, flowing with milk and honey, and they have eaten and filled themselves, and grown fat, then they will turn to other gods, and serve them, and despise me, and break my covenant.

It will happen, when many evils and troubles have come on them, that this song will testify before them as a witness; for it will not be forgotten out of the mouths of their descendants; for I know their ways and what they are doing today, before I have brought them into the land which I promised them.”

He commissioned Joshua the son of Nun, and said, “Be strong and courageous; for you shall bring the children of Israel into the land which I swore to them. I will be with you.”

Moses commanded the Levites, who bore the ark of the LORD’s covenant, saying,

“Take this book of the law, and put it by the side of the ark of the LORD your God’s covenant, that it may be there for a witness against you.

When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the children of men, he set the bounds of the peoples according to the number of the children of Israel.

For the LORD’s portion is his people. Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.

For I lift up my hand to heaven and declare, as I live forever,

He said, “The LORD came from Sinai, and rose from Seir to them. He shone from Mount Paran. He came from the ten thousands of holy ones. At his right hand was a fiery law for them.

Moses commanded us a law, an inheritance for the assembly of Jacob.

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

The LORD said to him, “This is the land which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your offspring.’ I have caused you to see it with your eyes, but you shall not go over there.”

“Moses my servant is dead. Now therefore arise, go across this Jordan, you and all these people, to the land which I am giving to them, even to the children of Israel.

I have given you every place that the sole of your foot will tread on, as I told Moses.

From the wilderness and this Lebanon even to the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, and to the great sea towards the going down of the sun, shall be your border.

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

Now therefore, please swear to me by the LORD, since I have dealt kindly with you, that you also will deal kindly with my father’s house, and give me a true sign;

The men said to her, “Our life for yours, if you don’t talk about this business of ours; and it shall be, when the LORD gives us the land, that we will deal kindly and truly with you.”

The men said to her, “We will be guiltless of this your oath which you’ve made us to swear.

Behold, when we come into the land, tie this line of scarlet thread in the window which you used to let us down. Gather to yourself into the house your father, your mother, your brothers, and all your father’s household.

It shall be that whoever goes out of the doors of your house into the street, his blood will be on his head, and we will be guiltless. Whoever is with you in the house, his blood shall be on our head, if any hand is on him.

But if you talk about this business of ours, then we shall be guiltless of your oath which you’ve made us to swear.”

She said, “Let it be as you have said.” She sent them away, and they departed. Then she tied the scarlet line in the window.

and they commanded the people, saying, “When you see the ark of the LORD your God’s covenant, and the Levitical priests bearing it, then leave your place and follow it.

Joshua spoke to the priests, saying, “Take up the ark of the covenant, and cross over before the people.” They took up the ark of the covenant, and went before the people.

The LORD said to Joshua, “Today I will begin to magnify you in the sight of all Israel, that they may know that as I was with Moses, so I will be with you.

You shall command the priests who bear the ark of the covenant, saying, ‘When you come to the brink of the waters of the Jordan, you shall stand still in the Jordan.’”

Joshua said, “By this you shall know that the living God is amongst you, and that he will without fail drive the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Hivite, the Perizzite, the Girgashite, the Amorite, and the Jebusite out from before you.

Behold, the ark of the covenant of the Lord of all the earth passes over before you into the Jordan.

It shall be that when the soles of the feet of the priests who bear the ark of the LORD, the Lord of all the earth, rest in the waters of the Jordan, that the waters of the Jordan will be cut off. The waters that come down from above shall stand in one heap.”

When the people moved from their tents to pass over the Jordan, the priests who bore the ark of the covenant being before the people,

and when those who bore the ark had come to the Jordan, and the feet of the priests who bore the ark had dipped in the edge of the water (for the Jordan overflows all its banks all the time of harvest),

The priests who bore the ark of the LORD’s covenant stood firm on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan; and all Israel crossed over on dry ground, until all the nation had passed completely over the Jordan.

and command them, saying, ‘Take from out of the middle of the Jordan, out of the place where the priests’ feet stood firm, twelve stones, carry them over with you, and lay them down in the place where you’ll camp tonight.’”

Joshua said to them, “Cross before the ark of the LORD your God into the middle of the Jordan, and each of you pick up a stone and put it on your shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the children of Israel;

that this may be a sign amongst you, that when your children ask in the future, saying, ‘What do you mean by these stones?’

then you shall tell them, ‘Because the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the LORD’s covenant. When it crossed over the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. These stones shall be for a memorial to the children of Israel forever.’”

Joshua set up twelve stones in the middle of the Jordan, in the place where the feet of the priests who bore the ark of the covenant stood; and they are there to this day.

When the priests who bore the ark of the LORD’s covenant had come up out of the middle of the Jordan, and the soles of the priests’ feet had been lifted up to the dry ground, the waters of the Jordan returned to their place, and went over all its banks, as before.

At that time, the LORD said to Joshua, “Make flint knives, and circumcise again the sons of Israel the second time.”

Joshua made himself flint knives, and circumcised the sons of Israel at the hill of the foreskins.

This is the reason Joshua circumcised them: all the people who came out of Egypt, who were males, even all the men of war, died in the wilderness along the way, after they came out of Egypt.

For all the people who came out were circumcised; but all the people who were born in the wilderness along the way as they came out of Egypt had not been circumcised.

For the children of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness until all the nation, even the men of war who came out of Egypt, were consumed, because they didn’t listen to the LORD’s voice. The LORD swore to them that he wouldn’t let them see the land which the LORD swore to their fathers that he would give us, a land flowing with milk and honey.

Their children, whom he raised up in their place, were circumcised by Joshua, for they were uncircumcised, because they had not circumcised them on the way.

The children of Israel encamped in Gilgal. They kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the month at evening in the plains of Jericho.

Joshua the son of Nun called the priests, and said to them, “Take up the ark of the covenant, and let seven priests bear seven trumpets of rams’ horns before the LORD’s ark.”

It was so, that when Joshua had spoken to the people, the seven priests bearing the seven trumpets of rams’ horns before the LORD advanced and blew the trumpets, and the ark of the LORD’s covenant followed them.

Israel has sinned. Yes, they have even transgressed my covenant which I commanded them. Yes, they have even taken some of the devoted things, and have also stolen, and also deceived. They have even put it amongst their own stuff.

Therefore the children of Israel can’t stand before their enemies. They turn their backs before their enemies, because they have become devoted for destruction. I will not be with you any more, unless you destroy the devoted things from amongst you.

It shall be, that he who is taken with the devoted thing shall be burnt with fire, he and all that he has, because he has transgressed the LORD’s covenant, and because he has done a disgraceful thing in Israel.’”

He wrote there on the stones a copy of Moses’ law, which he wrote in the presence of the children of Israel.

All Israel, with their elders, officers, and judges, stood on both sides of the ark before the Levitical priests, who carried the ark of the LORD’s covenant, the foreigner as well as the native; half of them in front of Mount Gerizim, and half of them in front of Mount Ebal, as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded at the first, that they should bless the people of Israel.

Afterward he read all the words of the law, the blessing and the curse, according to all that is written in the book of the law.

There was not a word of all that Moses commanded which Joshua didn’t read before all the assembly of Israel, with the women, the little ones, and the foreigners who were amongst them.

They went to Joshua at the camp at Gilgal, and said to him and to the men of Israel, “We have come from a far country. Now therefore make a covenant with us.”

The men of Israel said to the Hivites, “What if you live amongst us? How could we make a covenant with you?”

Our elders and all the inhabitants of our country spoke to us, saying, ‘Take supplies in your hand for the journey, and go to meet them. Tell them, “We are your servants. Now make a covenant with us.”’

Joshua made peace with them, and made a covenant with them, to let them live. The princes of the congregation swore to them.

At the end of three days after they had made a covenant with them, they heard that they were their neighbours, and that they lived amongst them.

The children of Israel didn’t strike them, because the princes of the congregation had sworn to them by the LORD, the God of Israel. All the congregation murmured against the princes.

But all the princes said to all the congregation, “We have sworn to them by the LORD, the God of Israel. Now therefore we may not touch them.

We will do this to them, and let them live; lest wrath be on us, because of the oath which we swore to them.”

The princes said to them, “Let them live.” So they became wood cutters and drawers of water for all the congregation, as the princes had spoken to them.

Now therefore you are cursed, and some of you will never fail to be slaves, both wood cutters and drawers of water for the house of my God.”

They answered Joshua, and said, “Because your servants were certainly told how the LORD your God commanded his servant Moses to give you all the land, and to destroy all the inhabitants of the land from before you. Therefore we were very afraid for our lives because of you, and have done this thing.

That day Joshua made them wood cutters and drawers of water for the congregation and for the LORD’s altar to this day, in the place which he should choose.

all the inhabitants of the hill country from Lebanon to Misrephoth Maim, even all the Sidonians. I will drive them out from before the children of Israel. Just allocate it to Israel for an inheritance, as I have commanded you.

Now therefore divide this land for an inheritance to the nine tribes and the half-tribe of Manasseh.”

With him the Reubenites and the Gadites received their inheritance, which Moses gave them, beyond the Jordan eastward, even as Moses the servant of the LORD gave them:

Only he gave no inheritance to the tribe of Levi. The offerings of the LORD, the God of Israel, made by fire are his inheritance, as he spoke to him.

Moses gave to the tribe of the children of Reuben according to their families.

Their border was from Aroer, that is on the edge of the valley of the Arnon, and the city that is in the middle of the valley, and all the plain by Medeba;

Heshbon, and all its cities that are in the plain; Dibon, Bamoth Baal, Beth Baal Meon,

Jahaz, Kedemoth, Mephaath,

Kiriathaim, Sibmah, Zereth Shahar in the mount of the valley,

Beth Peor, the slopes of Pisgah, Beth Jeshimoth,

all the cities of the plain, and all the kingdom of Sihon king of the Amorites, who reigned in Heshbon, whom Moses struck with the chiefs of Midian, Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba, the princes of Sihon, who lived in the land.

The border of the children of Reuben was the bank of the Jordan. This was the inheritance of the children of Reuben according to their families, the cities and its villages.

Moses gave to the tribe of Gad, to the children of Gad, according to their families.

Their border was Jazer, and all the cities of Gilead, and half the land of the children of Ammon, to Aroer that is near Rabbah;

Then the children of Judah came near to Joshua in Gilgal. Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite said to him, “You know the thing that the LORD spoke to Moses the man of God concerning me and concerning you in Kadesh Barnea.

Moses swore on that day, saying, ‘Surely the land where you walked shall be an inheritance to you and to your children forever, because you have wholly followed the LORD my God.’

The lot for the tribe of the children of Judah according to their families was to the border of Edom, even to the wilderness of Zin southward, at the uttermost part of the south.

He gave to Caleb the son of Jephunneh a portion amongst the children of Judah, according to the commandment of the LORD to Joshua, even Kiriath Arba, named after the father of Anak (also called Hebron).

This is the inheritance of the tribe of the children of Judah according to their families.

The farthest cities of the tribe of the children of Judah towards the border of Edom in the South were Kabzeel, Eder, Jagur,

Kinah, Dimonah, Adadah,

Kedesh, Hazor, Ithnan,

Ziph, Telem, Bealoth,

Hazor Hadattah, Kerioth Hezron (also called Hazor),

Amam, Shema, Moladah,

Hazar Gaddah, Heshmon, Beth Pelet,

Zelah, Eleph, the Jebusite (also called Jerusalem), Gibeath, and Kiriath; fourteen cities with their villages. This is the inheritance of the children of Benjamin according to their families.

and all the villages that were around these cities to Baalath Beer, Ramah of the South. This is the inheritance of the tribe of the children of Simeon according to their families.

This is the inheritance of the tribe of the children of Issachar according to their families, the cities with their villages.

This is the inheritance of the tribe of the children of Asher according to their families, these cities with their villages.

All the cities of the children of Aaron, the priests, were thirteen cities with their pasture lands.

The families of the children of Kohath, the Levites, even the rest of the children of Kohath, had the cities of their lot out of the tribe of Ephraim.

Kibzaim with its pasture lands, and Beth Horon with its pasture lands: four cities.

Out of the tribe of Dan, Elteke with its pasture lands, Gibbethon with its pasture lands,

Aijalon with its pasture lands, Gath Rimmon with its pasture lands: four cities.

Out of the half-tribe of Manasseh, Taanach with its pasture lands, and Gath Rimmon with its pasture lands: two cities.

All the cities of the families of the rest of the children of Kohath were ten with their pasture lands.

Out of the tribe of Issachar, Kishion with its pasture lands, Daberath with its pasture lands,

So the LORD gave to Israel all the land which he swore to give to their fathers. They possessed it, and lived in it.

The LORD gave them rest all around, according to all that he swore to their fathers. Not a man of all their enemies stood before them. The LORD delivered all their enemies into their hand.

Nothing failed of any good thing which the LORD had spoken to the house of Israel. All came to pass.

The children of Reuben and the children of Gad named the altar “A Witness Between Us that the LORD is God.”

Behold, I have allotted to you these nations that remain, to be an inheritance for your tribes, from the Jordan, with all the nations that I have cut off, even to the great sea towards the going down of the sun.

The LORD your God will thrust them out from before you, and drive them from out of your sight. You shall possess their land, as the LORD your God spoke to you.

“Behold, today I am going the way of all the earth. You know in all your hearts and in all your souls that not one thing has failed of all the good things which the LORD your God spoke concerning you. All have happened to you. Not one thing has failed of it.

It shall happen that as all the good things have come on you of which the LORD your God spoke to you, so the LORD will bring on you all the evil things, until he has destroyed you from off this good land which the LORD your God has given you,

when you disobey the covenant of the LORD your God, which he commanded you, and go and serve other gods, and bow down yourselves to them. Then the LORD’s anger will be kindled against you, and you will perish quickly from off the good land which he has given to you.”

I took your father Abraham from beyond the River, and led him throughout all the land of Canaan, and multiplied his offspring, and gave him Isaac.

The people said to Joshua, “We will serve the LORD our God, and we will listen to his voice.”

So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day, and made for them a statute and an ordinance in Shechem.

Joshua wrote these words in the book of the law of God; and he took a great stone, and set it up there under the oak that was by the sanctuary of the LORD.

Joshua said to all the people, “Behold, this stone shall be a witness against us, for it has heard all the LORD’s words which he spoke to us. It shall be therefore a witness against you, lest you deny your God.”

They buried the bones of Joseph, which the children of Israel brought up out of Egypt, in Shechem, in the parcel of ground which Jacob bought from the sons of Hamor the father of Shechem for a hundred pieces of silver. They became the inheritance of the children of Joseph.

The LORD’s angel came up from Gilgal to Bochim. He said, “I brought you out of Egypt, and have brought you to the land which I swore to give your fathers. I said, ‘I will never break my covenant with you.

You shall make no covenant with the inhabitants of this land. You shall break down their altars.’ But you have not listened to my voice. Why have you done this?

Wherever they went out, the LORD’s hand was against them for evil, as the LORD had spoken, and as the LORD had sworn to them; and they were very distressed.

The LORD’s anger burnt against Israel; and he said, “Because this nation transgressed my covenant which I commanded their fathers, and has not listened to my voice,

I also will no longer drive out any of the nations that Joshua left when he died from before them;

that by them I may test Israel, to see if they will keep the LORD’s way to walk therein, as their fathers kept it, or not.”

Yet you have forsaken me and served other gods. Therefore I will save you no more.

The elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “The LORD will be witness between us. Surely we will do what you say.”

for, behold, you shall conceive and give birth to a son. No razor shall come on his head, for the child shall be a Nazirite to God from the womb. He shall begin to save Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.”

He told her all his heart and said to her, “No razor has ever come on my head; for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother’s womb. If I am shaved, then my strength will go from me and I will become weak, and be like any other man.”

The children of Israel asked the LORD (for the ark of the covenant of God was there in those days,

Now the men of Israel had sworn in Mizpah, saying, “None of us will give his daughter to Benjamin as a wife.”

The children of Israel said, “Who is there amongst all the tribes of Israel who didn’t come up in the assembly to the LORD?” For they had made a great oath concerning him who didn’t come up to the LORD to Mizpah, saying, “He shall surely be put to death.”

How shall we provide wives for those who remain, since we have sworn by the LORD that we will not give them of our daughters to wives?”

Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. May The LORD do so to me, and more also, if anything but death parts you and me.”

He said, “Who are you?” She answered, “I am Ruth your servant. Therefore spread the corner of your garment over your servant; for you are a near kinsman.”

Now it is true that I am a near kinsman. However, there is a kinsman nearer than I.

Stay this night, and in the morning, if he will perform for you the part of a kinsman, good. Let him do the kinsman’s duty. But if he will not do the duty of a kinsman for you, then I will do the duty of a kinsman for you, as the LORD lives. Lie down until the morning.”

Now this was the custom in former time in Israel concerning redeeming and concerning exchanging, to confirm all things: a man took off his sandal, and gave it to his neighbour; and this was the way of formalizing transactions in Israel.

So the near kinsman said to Boaz, “Buy it for yourself,” then he took off his sandal.

She vowed a vow, and said, “LORD of Armies, if you will indeed look at the affliction of your servant and remember me, and not forget your servant, but will give to your servant a boy, then I will give him to the LORD all the days of his life, and no razor shall come on his head.”

A man of God came to Eli and said to him, “The LORD says, ‘Did I reveal myself to the house of your father when they were in Egypt in bondage to Pharaoh’s house?

I will raise up a faithful priest for myself who will do according to that which is in my heart and in my mind. I will build him a sure house. He will walk before my anointed forever.

Therefore I have sworn to the house of Eli that the iniquity of Eli’s house shall not be removed with sacrifice or offering forever.”

When the people had come into the camp, the elders of Israel said, “Why has the LORD defeated us today before the Philistines? Let’s get the ark of the LORD’s covenant out of Shiloh and bring it to us, that it may come amongst us and save us out of the hand of our enemies.”

So the people sent to Shiloh, and they brought from there the ark of the covenant of the LORD of Armies, who sits above the cherubim; and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were there with the ark of the covenant of God.

When the ark of the LORD’s covenant came into the camp, all Israel shouted with a great shout, so that the earth resounded.

When the Philistines heard the noise of the shout, they said, “What does the noise of this great shout in the camp of the Hebrews mean?” They understood that the LORD’s ark had come into the camp.

The Philistines were afraid, for they said, “God has come into the camp.” They said, “Woe to us! For there has not been such a thing before.

God’s ark was taken; and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were slain.

Now the Philistines had taken God’s ark, and they brought it from Ebenezer to Ashdod.

“Tomorrow about this time I will send you a man out of the land of Benjamin, and you shall anoint him to be prince over my people Israel. He will save my people out of the hand of the Philistines; for I have looked upon my people, because their cry has come to me.”

Then Samuel took the vial of oil and poured it on his head, then kissed him and said, “Hasn’t the LORD anointed you to be prince over his inheritance?

Then Nahash the Ammonite came up and encamped against Jabesh Gilead; and all the men of Jabesh said to Nahash, “Make a covenant with us, and we will serve you.”

Then Samuel said to the people, “Come! Let’s go to Gilgal, and renew the kingdom there.”

For the LORD will not forsake his people for his great name’s sake, because it has pleased the LORD to make you a people for himself.

Samuel said to Saul, “The LORD sent me to anoint you to be king over his people, over Israel. Now therefore listen to the voice of the LORD’s words.

The LORD of Armies says, ‘I remember what Amalek did to Israel, how he set himself against him on the way when he came up out of Egypt.

Then Jonathan and David made a covenant, because he loved him as his own soul.

Therefore deal kindly with your servant, for you have brought your servant into a covenant of the LORD with you; but if there is iniquity in me, kill me yourself, for why should you bring me to your father?”

Jonathan said to David, “By the LORD, the God of Israel, when I have sounded out my father about this time tomorrow, or the third day, behold, if there is good towards David, won’t I then send to you and disclose it to you?

The LORD do so to Jonathan and more also, should it please my father to do you evil, if I don’t disclose it to you and send you away, that you may go in peace. May the LORD be with you as he has been with my father.

but you shall also not cut off your kindness from my house forever, no, not when the LORD has cut off every one of the enemies of David from the surface of the earth.”

So Jonathan made a covenant with David’s house, saying, “The LORD will require it at the hand of David’s enemies.”

Jonathan caused David to swear again, for the love that he had to him; for he loved him as he loved his own soul.

Concerning the matter which you and I have spoken of, behold, the LORD is between you and me forever.”

Jonathan said to David, “Go in peace, because we have both sworn in the LORD’s name, saying, ‘The LORD is between me and you, and between my offspring and your offspring, forever.’” He arose and departed; and Jonathan went into the city.

He said to him, “Don’t be afraid, for the hand of Saul my father won’t find you; and you will be king over Israel, and I will be next to you; and Saul my father knows that also.”

They both made a covenant before the LORD. Then David stayed in the woods and Jonathan went to his house.

Swear now therefore to me by the LORD that you will not cut off my offspring after me, and that you will not destroy my name out of my father’s house.”

David swore to Saul. Saul went home, but David and his men went up to the stronghold.

Saul swore to her by the LORD, saying, “As the LORD lives, no punishment will happen to you for this thing.”

The LORD has done to you as he spoke by me. The LORD has torn the kingdom out of your hand and given it to your neighbour, even to David.

God do so to Abner, and more also, if, as the LORD has sworn to David, I don’t do even so to him:

to transfer the kingdom from Saul’s house, and to set up David’s throne over Israel and over Judah, from Dan even to Beersheba.”

Abner sent messengers to David on his behalf, saying, “Whose is the land?” and saying, “Make your alliance with me, and behold, my hand will be with you to bring all Israel around to you.”

David said, “Good. I will make a treaty with you, but one thing I require of you. That is, you will not see my face unless you first bring Michal, Saul’s daughter, when you come to see my face.”

David sent messengers to Ishbosheth, Saul’s son, saying, “Deliver me my wife Michal, whom I was given to marry for one hundred foreskins of the Philistines.”

Now then do it! For the LORD has spoken of David, saying, ‘By the hand of my servant David, I will save my people Israel out of the hand of the Philistines, and out of the hand of all their enemies.’”

Abner also spoke in the ears of Benjamin; and Abner went also to speak in the ears of David in Hebron all that seemed good to Israel and to the whole house of Benjamin.

Abner said to David, “I will arise and go, and will gather all Israel to my lord the king, that they may make a covenant with you, and that you may reign over all that your soul desires.” David sent Abner away; and he went in peace.

In times past, when Saul was king over us, it was you who led Israel out and in. The LORD said to you, ‘You will be shepherd of my people Israel, and you will be prince over Israel.’”

So all the elders of Israel came to the king to Hebron, and King David made a covenant with them in Hebron before the LORD; and they anointed David king over Israel.

and as from the day that I commanded judges to be over my people Israel. I will cause you to rest from all your enemies. Moreover the LORD tells you that the LORD will make you a house.

When your days are fulfilled and you sleep with your fathers, I will set up your offspring after you, who will proceed out of your body, and I will establish his kingdom.

He will build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.

I will be his father, and he will be my son. If he commits iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men and with the stripes of the children of men;

but my loving kindness will not depart from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I put away before you.

Your house and your kingdom will be made sure forever before you. Your throne will be established forever.”’”

What one nation in the earth is like your people, even like Israel, whom God went to redeem to himself for a people, and to make himself a name, and to do great things for you, and awesome things for your land, before your people, whom you redeemed to yourself out of Egypt, from the nations and their gods?

You established for yourself your people Israel to be your people forever; and you, LORD, became their God.

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

Behold, Zadok also came, and all the Levites with him, bearing the ark of the covenant of God; and they set down God’s ark; and Abiathar went up until all the people finished passing out of the city.

Zadok therefore and Abiathar carried God’s ark to Jerusalem again; and they stayed there.

The king said to Shimei, “You will not die.” The king swore to him.

The king called the Gibeonites and said to them (now the Gibeonites were not of the children of Israel, but of the remnant of the Amorites, and the children of Israel had sworn to them; and Saul sought to kill them in his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah);

But the king spared Mephibosheth the son of Jonathan the son of Saul, because of the LORD’s oath that was between them, between David and Jonathan the son of Saul.

He gives great deliverance to his king, and shows loving kindness to his anointed, to David and to his offspring, forever more.”

Now these are the last words of David. David the son of Jesse says, the man who was raised on high says, the anointed of the God of Jacob, the sweet psalmist of Israel:

Isn’t my house so with God? Yet he has made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure, for it is all my salvation and all my desire. Won’t he make it grow?

Go in to King David, and tell him, ‘Didn’t you, my lord the king, swear to your servant, saying, “Assuredly Solomon your son shall reign after me, and he shall sit on my throne”? Why then does Adonijah reign?’

She said to him, “My lord, you swore by the LORD your God to your servant, ‘Assuredly Solomon your son shall reign after me, and he shall sit on my throne.’

The king vowed and said, “As the LORD lives, who has redeemed my soul out of all adversity,

most certainly as I swore to you by the LORD, the God of Israel, saying, ‘Assuredly Solomon your son shall reign after me, and he shall sit on my throne in my place;’ I will most certainly do this today.”

Then come up after him, and he shall come and sit on my throne; for he shall be king in my place. I have appointed him to be prince over Israel and over Judah.”

Then the LORD may establish his word which he spoke concerning me, saying, ‘If your children are careful of their way, to walk before me in truth with all their heart and with all their soul, there shall not fail you,’ he said, ‘a man on the throne of Israel.’

“Behold, there is with you Shimei the son of Gera, the Benjamite of Bahurim, who cursed me with a grievous curse in the day when I went to Mahanaim; but he came down to meet me at the Jordan, and I swore to him by the LORD, saying, ‘I will not put you to death with the sword.’

Then King Solomon swore by the LORD, saying, “God do so to me, and more also, if Adonijah has not spoken this word against his own life.

Now therefore as the LORD lives, who has established me and set me on my father David’s throne, and who has made me a house as he promised, surely Adonijah shall be put to death today.”

So Solomon thrust Abiathar out from being priest to the LORD, that he might fulfil the LORD’s word which he spoke concerning the house of Eli in Shiloh.

The king sent and called for Shimei, and said to him, “Didn’t I adjure you by the LORD and warn you, saying, ‘Know for certain that on the day you go out and walk anywhere else, you shall surely die’? You said to me, ‘The saying that I have heard is good.’

Why then have you not kept the oath of the LORD and the commandment that I have instructed you with?”

But King Solomon will be blessed, and David’s throne will be established before the LORD forever.”

Solomon said, “You have shown to your servant David my father great loving kindness, because he walked before you in truth, in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart with you. You have kept for him this great loving kindness, that you have given him a son to sit on his throne, as it is today.

Your servant is amongst your people which you have chosen, a great people, that can’t be numbered or counted for multitude.

If you will walk in my ways, to keep my statutes and my commandments, as your father David walked, then I will lengthen your days.”

Behold, I intend to build a house for the name of the LORD my God, as the LORD spoke to David my father, saying, ‘Your son, whom I will set on your throne in your place shall build the house for my name.’

The LORD gave Solomon wisdom, as he promised him. There was peace between Hiram and Solomon, and the two of them made a treaty together.

“Concerning this house which you are building, if you will walk in my statutes, and execute my ordinances, and keep all my commandments to walk in them, then I will establish my word with you, which I spoke to David your father.

I will dwell amongst the children of Israel, and will not forsake my people Israel.”

He prepared an inner sanctuary in the middle of the house within, to set the ark of the LORD’s covenant there.

Then Solomon assembled the elders of Israel with all the heads of the tribes, the princes of the fathers’ households of the children of Israel, to King Solomon in Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the LORD’s covenant out of David’s city, which is Zion.

All the elders of Israel came, and the priests picked up the ark.

They brought up the LORD’s ark, the Tent of Meeting, and all the holy vessels that were in the Tent. The priests and the Levites brought these up.

The priests brought in the ark of the LORD’s covenant to its place, into the inner sanctuary of the house, to the most holy place, even under the cherubim’s wings.

For the cherubim spread their wings out over the place of the ark, and the cherubim covered the ark and its poles above.

There was nothing in the ark except the two stone tablets which Moses put there at Horeb, when the LORD made a covenant with the children of Israel, when they came out of the land of Egypt.

‘Since the day that I brought my people Israel out of Egypt, I chose no city out of all the tribes of Israel to build a house, that my name might be there; but I chose David to be over my people Israel.’

Nevertheless, you shall not build the house; but your son who shall come out of your body, he shall build the house for my name.’

The LORD has established his word that he spoke; for I have risen up in the place of David my father, and I sit on the throne of Israel, as the LORD promised, and have built the house for the name of the LORD, the God of Israel.

There I have set a place for the ark, in which is the LORD’s covenant, which he made with our fathers when he brought them out of the land of Egypt.”

and he said, “LORD, the God of Israel, there is no God like you, in heaven above, or on earth beneath; who keeps covenant and loving kindness with your servants who walk before you with all their heart;

who has kept with your servant David my father that which you promised him. Yes, you spoke with your mouth, and have fulfilled it with your hand, as it is today.

Now therefore, may LORD, the God of Israel, keep with your servant David my father that which you have promised him, saying, ‘There shall not fail from you a man in my sight to sit on the throne of Israel, if only your children take heed to their way, to walk before me as you have walked before me.’

(for they are your people and your inheritance, which you brought out of Egypt, from the middle of the iron furnace);

For you separated them from amongst all the peoples of the earth to be your inheritance, as you spoke by Moses your servant, when you brought our fathers out of Egypt, Lord GOD.”

The LORD said to him, “I have heard your prayer and your supplication that you have made before me. I have made this house holy, which you have built, to put my name there forever; and my eyes and my heart shall be there perpetually.

then I will establish the throne of your kingdom over Israel forever, as I promised to David your father, saying, ‘There shall not fail from you a man on the throne of Israel.’

Therefore the LORD said to Solomon, “Because this is done by you, and you have not kept my covenant and my statutes, which I have commanded you, I will surely tear the kingdom from you, and will give it to your servant.

Nevertheless, I will not do it in your days, for David your father’s sake; but I will tear it out of your son’s hand.

However, I will not tear away all the kingdom; but I will give one tribe to your son, for David my servant’s sake, and for Jerusalem’s sake which I have chosen.”

Ahijah took the new garment that was on him, and tore it in twelve pieces.

He said to Jeroboam, “Take ten pieces; for the LORD, the God of Israel, says, ‘Behold, I will tear the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon and will give ten tribes to you

(but he shall have one tribe, for my servant David’s sake and for Jerusalem’s sake, the city which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel),

“‘However, I will not take the whole kingdom out of his hand, but I will make him prince all the days of his life for David my servant’s sake whom I chose, who kept my commandments and my statutes,

I will give one tribe to his son, that David my servant may have a lamp always before me in Jerusalem, the city which I have chosen for myself to put my name there.

It shall be, if you will listen to all that I command you, and will walk in my ways, and do that which is right in my eyes, to keep my statutes and my commandments, as David my servant did, that I will be with you, and will build you a sure house, as I built for David, and will give Israel to you.

I will afflict the offspring of David for this, but not forever.’”

Go, tell Jeroboam, ‘The LORD, the God of Israel, says: “Because I exalted you from amongst the people, and made you prince over my people Israel,

For the LORD will strike Israel, as a reed is shaken in the water; and he will root up Israel out of this good land which he gave to their fathers, and will scatter them beyond the River, because they have made their Asherah poles, provoking the LORD to anger.

Rehoboam the son of Solomon reigned in Judah. Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he began to reign, and he reigned seventeen years in Jerusalem, the city which the LORD had chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, to put his name there. His mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonitess.

Nevertheless for David’s sake, the LORD his God gave him a lamp in Jerusalem, to set up his son after him and to establish Jerusalem;

“Let there be a treaty between me and you, like that between my father and your father. Behold, I have sent to you a present of silver and gold. Go, break your treaty with Baasha king of Israel, that he may depart from me.”

Elijah took twelve stones, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, to whom the LORD’s word came, saying, “Israel shall be your name.”

At the time of the evening offering, Elijah the prophet came near and said, “LORD, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your word.

He said, “I have been very jealous for the LORD, the God of Armies; for the children of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.”

He said, “I have been very jealous for the LORD, the God of Armies; for the children of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.”

Ben Hadad said to him, “The cities which my father took from your father I will restore. You shall make streets for yourself in Damascus, as my father made in Samaria.” “I”, said Ahab, “will let you go with this covenant.” So he made a covenant with him and let him go.

However, the LORD would not destroy Judah, for David his servant’s sake, as he promised him to give to him a lamp for his children always.

He arose, and went into the house. Then he poured the oil on his head, and said to him, “The LORD, the God of Israel, says, ‘I have anointed you king over the people of the LORD, even over Israel.

They said, “That is a lie. Tell us now.” He said, “He said to me, ‘The LORD says, I have anointed you king over Israel.’”

Know now that nothing will fall to the earth of the LORD’s word, which the LORD spoke concerning Ahab’s house. For the LORD has done that which he spoke by his servant Elijah.”

The LORD said to Jehu, “Because you have done well in executing that which is right in my eyes, and have done to Ahab’s house according to all that was in my heart, your descendants shall sit on the throne of Israel to the fourth generation.”

In the seventh year Jehoiada sent and fetched the captains over hundreds of the Carites and of the guard, and brought them to him into the LORD’s house; and he made a covenant with them, and made a covenant with them in the LORD’s house, and showed them the king’s son.

Then he brought out the king’s son, and put the crown on him, and gave him the covenant; and they made him king and anointed him; and they clapped their hands, and said, “Long live the king!”

Jehoiada made a covenant between the LORD and the king and the people, that they should be the LORD’s people; also between the king and the people.

But the LORD was gracious to them, and had compassion on them, and favoured them because of his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and would not destroy them and he didn’t cast them from his presence as yet.

This was the LORD’s word which he spoke to Jehu, saying, “Your sons to the fourth generation shall sit on the throne of Israel.” So it came to pass.

They rejected his statutes and his covenant that he made with their fathers, and his testimonies which he testified to them; and they followed vanity, and became vain, and followed the nations that were around them, concerning whom the LORD had commanded them that they should not do like them.

To this day they do what they did before. They don’t fear the LORD, and they do not follow the statutes, or the ordinances, or the law, or the commandment which the LORD commanded the children of Jacob, whom he named Israel;

with whom the LORD had made a covenant and commanded them, saying, “You shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice to them;

You shall not forget the covenant that I have made with you. You shall not fear other gods.

because they didn’t obey the LORD their God’s voice, but transgressed his covenant, even all that Moses the servant of the LORD commanded, and would not hear it or do it.

‘For I will defend this city to save it, for my own sake and for my servant David’s sake.’”

I will add to your days fifteen years. I will deliver you and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city for my own sake, and for my servant David’s sake.”’”

He set the engraved image of Asherah that he had made in the house of which the LORD said to David and to Solomon his son, “In this house, and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my name forever;

I will not cause the feet of Israel to wander any more out of the land which I gave their fathers, if only they will observe to do according to all that I have commanded them, and according to all the law that my servant Moses commanded them.”

The king went up to the LORD’s house, and all the men of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem with him—with the priests, the prophets, and all the people, both small and great; and he read in their hearing all the words of the book of the covenant which was found in the LORD’s house.

The king stood by the pillar and made a covenant before the LORD to walk after the LORD and to keep his commandments, his testimonies, and his statutes with all his heart and all his soul, to confirm the words of this covenant that were written in this book; and all the people agreed to the covenant.

The king commanded all the people, saying, “Keep the Passover to the LORD your God, as it is written in this book of the covenant.”

Surely there was not kept such a Passover from the days of the judges who judged Israel, nor in all the days of the kings of Israel, nor of the kings of Judah;

but in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, this Passover was kept to the LORD in Jerusalem.

Abram (also called Abraham).

The sons of Abraham: Isaac and Ishmael.

The sons of Keturah, Abraham’s concubine: she bore Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shuah. The sons of Jokshan: Sheba and Dedan.

Abraham became the father of Isaac. The sons of Isaac: Esau and Israel.

These are the sons of Israel: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun,

Tamar his daughter-in-law bore him Perez and Zerah. All the sons of Judah were five.

Ram became the father of Amminadab, and Amminadab became the father of Nahshon, prince of the children of Judah;

For Judah prevailed above his brothers, and from him came the prince; but the birthright was Joseph’s)—

the sons of Reuben the firstborn of Israel: Hanoch, Pallu, Hezron, and Carmi.

The sons of Levi: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari.

The sons of Kohath: Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel.

The children of Amram: Aaron, Moses, and Miriam. The sons of Aaron: Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar.

Eleazar became the father of Phinehas, Phinehas became the father of Abishua,

Abishua became the father of Bukki. Bukki became the father of Uzzi.

The sons of Levi: Gershom, Kohath, and Merari.

The sons of Merari: Mahli and Mushi. These are the families of the Levites according to their fathers’ households.

and by the borders of the children of Manasseh, Beth Shean and its towns, Taanach and its towns, Megiddo and its towns, and Dor and its towns. The children of Joseph the son of Israel lived in these.

In times past, even when Saul was king, it was you who led out and brought in Israel. The LORD your God said to you, ‘You shall be shepherd of my people Israel, and you shall be prince over my people Israel.’”

So all the elders of Israel came to the king to Hebron; and David made a covenant with them in Hebron before the LORD. They anointed David king over Israel, according to the LORD’s word by Samuel.

These are the numbers of the heads of those who were armed for war, who came to David to Hebron to turn the kingdom of Saul to him, according to the LORD’s word.

So David, the elders of Israel, and the captains over thousands went to bring the ark of the LORD’s covenant up out of the house of Obed-Edom with joy.

When God helped the Levites who bore the ark of the LORD’s covenant, they sacrificed seven bulls and seven rams.

Thus all Israel brought the ark of the LORD’s covenant up with shouting, with sound of the cornet, with trumpets, and with cymbals, sounding aloud with stringed instruments and harps.

As the ark of the LORD’s covenant came to David’s city, Michal the daughter of Saul looked out at the window, and saw king David dancing and playing; and she despised him in her heart.

They brought in God’s ark, and set it in the middle of the tent that David had pitched for it; and they offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before God.

with Benaiah and Jahaziel the priests with trumpets continually, before the ark of the covenant of God.

you offspring of Israel his servant, you children of Jacob, his chosen ones.

Remember his covenant forever, the word which he commanded to a thousand generations,

the covenant which he made with Abraham, his oath to Isaac.

He confirmed it to Jacob for a statute, and to Israel for an everlasting covenant,

saying, “I will give you the land of Canaan, The lot of your inheritance,”

“Don’t touch my anointed ones! Do my prophets no harm!”

So he left Asaph and his brothers there before the ark of the LORD’s covenant, to minister before the ark continually, as every day’s work required;

When David was living in his house, David said to Nathan the prophet, “Behold, I live in a cedar house, but the ark of the LORD’s covenant is in a tent.”

“Now therefore, you shall tell my servant David, ‘The LORD of Armies says, “I took you from the sheep pen, from following the sheep, to be prince over my people Israel.

and from the day that I commanded judges to be over my people Israel. I will subdue all your enemies. Moreover I tell you that the LORD will build you a house.

It will happen, when your days are fulfilled that you must go to be with your fathers, that I will set up your offspring after you, who will be of your sons; and I will establish his kingdom.

He will build me a house, and I will establish his throne forever.

I will be his father, and he will be my son. I will not take my loving kindness away from him, as I took it from him who was before you;

but I will settle him in my house and in my kingdom forever. His throne will be established forever.”’”

What one nation in the earth is like your people Israel, whom God went to redeem to himself for a people, to make you a name by great and awesome things, in driving out nations from before your people whom you redeemed out of Egypt?

For you made your people Israel your own people forever; and you, LORD, became their God.

Now it has pleased you to bless the house of your servant, that it may continue forever before you; for you, LORD, have blessed, and it is blessed forever.”

Behold, a son shall be born to you, who shall be a man of peace. I will give him rest from all his enemies all around; for his name shall be Solomon, and I will give peace and quietness to Israel in his days.

He shall build a house for my name; and he will be my son, and I will be his father; and I will establish the throne of his kingdom over Israel forever.’

Now set your heart and your soul to follow the LORD your God. Arise therefore, and build the sanctuary of the LORD God, to bring the ark of the LORD’s covenant and the holy vessels of God into the house that is to be built for the LORD’s name.”

Then David the king stood up on his feet and said, “Hear me, my brothers and my people! As for me, it was in my heart to build a house of rest for the ark of the LORD’s covenant, and for the footstool of our God; and I had prepared for the building.

However the LORD, the God of Israel, chose me out of all the house of my father to be king over Israel forever. For he has chosen Judah to be prince; and in the house of Judah, the house of my father; and amongst the sons of my father he took pleasure in me to make me king over all Israel.

He said to me, ‘Solomon, your son, shall build my house and my courts; for I have chosen him to be my son, and I will be his father.

I will establish his kingdom forever if he continues to do my commandments and my ordinances, as it is today.’

and for the altar of incense, refined gold by weight; and gold for the plans for the chariot, and the cherubim that spread out and cover the ark of the LORD’s covenant.

LORD, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Israel, our fathers, keep this desire forever in the thoughts of the heart of your people, and prepare their heart for you;

Now, LORD God, let your promise to David my father be established; for you have made me king over a people like the dust of the earth in multitude.

Behold, I am about to build a house for the name of the LORD my God, to dedicate it to him, to burn before him incense of sweet spices, for the continual show bread, and for the burnt offerings morning and evening, on the Sabbaths, on the new moons, and on the set feasts of the LORD our God. This is an ordinance forever to Israel.

Then Solomon began to build the LORD’s house at Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where the LORD appeared to David his father, which he prepared in the place that David had appointed, on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

Then Solomon assembled the elders of Israel and all the heads of the tribes, the princes of the fathers’ households of the children of Israel, to Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the LORD’s covenant out of David’s city, which is Zion.

The priests brought in the ark of the LORD’s covenant to its place, into the inner sanctuary of the house, to the most holy place, even under the wings of the cherubim.

For the cherubim spread out their wings over the place of the ark, and the cherubim covered the ark and its poles above.

There was nothing in the ark except the two tablets which Moses put there at Horeb, when the LORD made a covenant with the children of Israel, when they came out of Egypt.

He said, “Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, who spoke with his mouth to David my father, and has with his hands fulfilled it, saying,

‘Since the day that I brought my people out of the land of Egypt, I chose no city out of all the tribes of Israel to build a house in, that my name might be there, and I chose no man to be prince over my people Israel;

but now I have chosen Jerusalem, that my name might be there; and I have chosen David to be over my people Israel.’

nevertheless you shall not build the house, but your son who will come out of your body, he shall build the house for my name.’

“The LORD has performed his word that he spoke; for I have risen up in the place of David my father, and sit on the throne of Israel, as the LORD promised, and have built the house for the name of the LORD, the God of Israel.

There I have set the ark, in which is the LORD’s covenant, which he made with the children of Israel.”

Then he said, “LORD, the God of Israel, there is no God like you in heaven or on earth—you who keep covenant and loving kindness with your servants who walk before you with all their heart;

who have kept with your servant David my father that which you promised him. Yes, you spoke with your mouth, and have fulfilled it with your hand, as it is today.

“Now therefore, LORD, the God of Israel, keep with your servant David my father that which you have promised him, saying, ‘There shall not fail you a man in my sight to sit on the throne of Israel, if only your children take heed to their way, to walk in my law as you have walked before me.’

Now therefore, LORD, the God of Israel, let your word be verified, which you spoke to your servant David.

“LORD God, don’t turn away the face of your anointed. Remember your loving kindnesses to David your servant.”

then I will establish the throne of your kingdom, according as I covenanted with David your father, saying, ‘There shall not fail you a man to be ruler in Israel.’

So the king didn’t listen to the people; for it was brought about by God, that the LORD might establish his word, which he spoke by Ahijah the Shilonite to Jeroboam the son of Nebat.

Ought you not to know that the LORD, the God of Israel, gave the kingdom over Israel to David forever, even to him and to his sons by a covenant of salt?

“Now you intend to withstand the kingdom of the LORD in the hand of the sons of David. You are a great multitude, and the golden calves which Jeroboam made you for gods are with you.

He went out to meet Asa, and said to him, “Hear me, Asa, and all Judah and Benjamin! The LORD is with you while you are with him; and if you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will forsake you.

They entered into the covenant to seek the LORD, the God of their fathers, with all their heart and with all their soul;

and that whoever would not seek the LORD, the God of Israel, should be put to death, whether small or great, whether man or woman.

They swore to the LORD with a loud voice, with shouting, with trumpets, and with cornets.

All Judah rejoiced at the oath, for they had sworn with all their heart and sought him with their whole desire; and he was found by them. Then the LORD gave them rest all around.

Didn’t you, our God, drive out the inhabitants of this land before your people Israel, and give it to the offspring of Abraham your friend forever?

They lived in it, and have built you a sanctuary in it for your name, saying,

‘If evil comes on us—the sword, judgement, pestilence, or famine—we will stand before this house, and before you (for your name is in this house), and cry to you in our affliction, and you will hear and save.’

behold, how they reward us, to come to cast us out of your possession, which you have given us to inherit.

However the LORD would not destroy David’s house, because of the covenant that he had made with David, and as he promised to give a lamp to him and to his children always.

In the seventh year, Jehoiada strengthened himself, and took the captains of hundreds—Azariah the son of Jeroham, Ishmael the son of Jehohanan, Azariah the son of Obed, Maaseiah the son of Adaiah, and Elishaphat the son of Zichri—into a covenant with him.

All the assembly made a covenant with the king in God’s house. Jehoiada said to them, “Behold, the king’s son must reign, as the LORD has spoken concerning the sons of David.

Then they brought out the king’s son, put the crown on him, gave him the covenant, and made him king. Jehoiada and his sons anointed him, and they said, “Long live the king!”

Jehoiada made a covenant between himself, all the people, and the king, that they should be the LORD’s people.

Now it is in my heart to make a covenant with the LORD, the God of Israel, that his fierce anger may turn away from us.

So they established a decree to make proclamation throughout all Israel, from Beersheba even to Dan, that they should come to keep the Passover to the LORD, the God of Israel, at Jerusalem, for they had not kept it in great numbers in the way it is written.

So the couriers went with the letters from the king and his princes throughout all Israel and Judah, according to the commandment of the king, saying, “You children of Israel, turn again to the LORD, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, that he may return to the remnant of you that have escaped out of the hand of the kings of Assyria.

He built altars in the LORD’s house, of which the LORD said, “My name shall be in Jerusalem forever.”

He set the engraved image of the idol, which he had made, in God’s house, of which God said to David and to Solomon his son, “In this house, and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my name forever.

I will not any more remove the foot of Israel from off the land which I have appointed for your fathers, if only they will observe to do all that I have commanded them, even all the law, the statutes, and the ordinances given by Moses.”

The king went up to the LORD’s house with all the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem—the priests, the Levites, and all the people, both great and small—and he read in their hearing all the words of the book of the covenant that was found in the LORD’s house.

The king stood in his place and made a covenant before the LORD, to walk after the LORD, and to keep his commandments, his testimonies, and his statutes with all his heart and with all his soul, to perform the words of the covenant that were written in this book.

He caused all who were found in Jerusalem and Benjamin to stand. The inhabitants of Jerusalem did according to the covenant of God, the God of their fathers.

Josiah kept a Passover to the LORD in Jerusalem. They killed the Passover on the fourteenth day of the first month.

The children of Israel who were present kept the Passover at that time, and the feast of unleavened bread seven days.

There was no Passover like that kept in Israel from the days of Samuel the prophet, nor did any of the kings of Israel keep such a Passover as Josiah kept—with the priests, the Levites, and all Judah and Israel who were present, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

This Passover was kept in the eighteenth year of the reign of Josiah.

to fulfil the LORD’s word by Jeremiah’s mouth, until the land had enjoyed its Sabbaths. As long as it lay desolate, it kept Sabbath, to fulfil seventy years.

The children of Parosh, two thousand and one hundred and seventy-two.

The children of Shephatiah, three hundred and seventy-two.

The children of Arah, seven hundred and seventy-five.

The children of Pahathmoab, of the children of Jeshua and Joab, two thousand and eight hundred and twelve.

The children of Elam, one thousand and two hundred and fifty-four.

The children of Zattu, nine hundred and forty-five.

The children of Zaccai, seven hundred and sixty.

The children of Bani, six hundred and forty-two.

The children of Bebai, six hundred and twenty-three.

The children of Azgad, one thousand and two hundred and twenty-two.

The men of Anathoth, one hundred and twenty-eight.

The children of Azmaveth, forty-two.

The children of Kiriath Arim, Chephirah, and Beeroth, seven hundred and forty-three.

The children of Ramah and Geba, six hundred and twenty-one.

The men of Michmas, one hundred and twenty-two.

The men of Bethel and Ai, two hundred and twenty-three.

The children of Nebo, fifty-two.

The children of Magbish, one hundred and fifty-six.

The children of the other Elam, one thousand and two hundred and fifty-four.

The children of Harim, three hundred and twenty.

The children of Lod, Hadid, and Ono, seven hundred and twenty-five.

The children of Jericho, three hundred and forty-five.

The children of Senaah, three thousand and six hundred and thirty.

The children of the captivity kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the first month.

which you have commanded by your servants the prophets, saying, ‘The land to which you go to possess is an unclean land through the uncleanness of the peoples of the lands, through their abominations, which have filled it from one end to another with their filthiness.

Now therefore don’t give your daughters to their sons. Don’t take their daughters to your sons, nor seek their peace or their prosperity forever, that you may be strong and eat the good of the land, and leave it for an inheritance to your children forever.’

Now therefore let’s make a covenant with our God to put away all the wives and those who are born of them, according to the counsel of my lord and of those who tremble at the commandment of our God. Let it be done according to the law.

Then Ezra arose, and made the chiefs of the priests, the Levites, and all Israel to swear that they would do according to this word. So they swore.

They gave their hand that they would put away their wives; and being guilty, they offered a ram of the flock for their guilt.

and said, “I beg you, LORD, the God of heaven, the great and awesome God who keeps covenant and loving kindness with those who love him and keep his commandments,

“Remember, I beg you, the word that you commanded your servant Moses, saying, ‘If you trespass, I will scatter you amongst the peoples;

but if you return to me, and keep my commandments and do them, though your outcasts were in the uttermost part of the heavens, yet I will gather them from there, and will bring them to the place that I have chosen, to cause my name to dwell there.’

Then they said, “We will restore them, and will require nothing of them. We will do so, even as you say.” Then I called the priests, and took an oath of them, that they would do according to this promise.

Also I shook out my lap, and said, “So may God shake out every man from his house, and from his labour, that doesn’t perform this promise; even may he be shaken out and emptied like this.” All the assembly said, “Amen,” and praised the LORD. The people did according to this promise.

These are the children of the province who went up out of the captivity of those who had been carried away, whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried away, and who returned to Jerusalem and to Judah, everyone to his city,

who came with Zerubbabel, Jeshua, Nehemiah, Azariah, Raamiah, Nahamani, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mispereth, Bigvai, Nehum, and Baanah. The number of the men of the people of Israel:

The children of Parosh: two thousand and one hundred and seventy-two.

The children of Shephatiah: three hundred and seventy-two.

The children of Arah: six hundred and fifty-two.

The children of Pahathmoab, of the children of Jeshua and Joab: two thousand and eight hundred and eighteen.

The children of Elam: one thousand and two hundred and fifty-four.

The children of Zattu: eight hundred and forty-five.

The children of Zaccai: seven hundred and sixty.

The children of Binnui: six hundred and forty-eight.

The children of Bebai: six hundred and twenty-eight.

The children of Azgad: two thousand and three hundred and twenty-two.

The children of Adonikam: six hundred and sixty-seven.

The children of Bigvai: two thousand and sixty-seven.

All the temple servants and the children of Solomon’s servants were three hundred and ninety-two.

These were those who went up from Tel Melah, Tel Harsha, Cherub, Addon, and Immer; but they could not show their fathers’ houses, nor their offspring, whether they were of Israel:

The children of Delaiah, the children of Tobiah, the children of Nekoda: six hundred and forty-two.

Of the priests: the children of Hobaiah, the children of Hakkoz, the children of Barzillai, who took a wife of the daughters of Barzillai the Gileadite, and was called after their name.

These searched for their genealogical records, but couldn’t find them. Therefore they were deemed disqualified and removed from the priesthood.

The whole assembly together was forty-two thousand and three hundred and sixty,

in addition to their male servants and their female servants, of whom there were seven thousand and three hundred and thirty-seven. They had two hundred and forty-five singing men and singing women.

They found written in the law how the LORD had commanded by Moses that the children of Israel should dwell in booths in the feast of the seventh month;

and that they should publish and proclaim in all their cities and in Jerusalem, saying, “Go out to the mountain, and get olive branches, branches of wild olive, myrtle branches, palm branches, and branches of thick trees, to make temporary shelters, as it is written.”

You are the LORD, the God who chose Abram, brought him out of Ur of the Chaldees, gave him the name of Abraham,

found his heart faithful before you, and made a covenant with him to give the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizzite, the Jebusite, and the Girgashite, to give it to his offspring, and have performed your words, for you are righteous.

and made known to them your holy Sabbath, and commanded them commandments, statutes, and a law, by Moses your servant,

and gave them bread from the sky for their hunger, and brought water out of the rock for them for their thirst, and commanded them that they should go in to possess the land which you had sworn to give them.

You also multiplied their children as the stars of the sky, and brought them into the land concerning which you said to their fathers that they should go in to possess it.

Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who keeps covenant and loving kindness, don’t let all the travail seem little before you that has come on us, on our kings, on our princes, on our priests, on our prophets, on our fathers, and on all your people, since the time of the kings of Assyria to this day.

Yet for all this, we make a sure covenant, and write it; and our princes, our Levites, and our priests, seal it.”

Now those who sealed were: Nehemiah the governor, the son of Hacaliah, and Zedekiah,

Seraiah, Azariah, Jeremiah,

Pashhur, Amariah, Malchijah,

Hattush, Shebaniah, Malluch,

Harim, Meremoth, Obadiah,

Daniel, Ginnethon, Baruch,

Meshullam, Abijah, Mijamin,

Maaziah, Bilgai, and Shemaiah. These were the priests.

The Levites: Jeshua the son of Azaniah, Binnui of the sons of Henadad, Kadmiel;

and their brothers, Shebaniah, Hodiah, Kelita, Pelaiah, Hanan,

Mica, Rehob, Hashabiah,

Zaccur, Sherebiah, Shebaniah,

Hodiah, Bani, and Beninu.

The chiefs of the people: Parosh, Pahathmoab, Elam, Zattu, Bani,

Bunni, Azgad, Bebai,

Adonijah, Bigvai, Adin,

Ater, Hezekiah, Azzur,

Hodiah, Hashum, Bezai,

Hariph, Anathoth, Nobai,

Magpiash, Meshullam, Hezir,

joined with their brothers, their nobles, and entered into a curse and into an oath, to walk in God’s law, which was given by Moses the servant of God, and to observe and do all the commandments of the LORD our Lord, and his ordinances and his statutes;

and if the peoples of the land bring wares or any grain on the Sabbath day to sell, that we would not buy from them on the Sabbath, or on a holy day; and that we would forego the seventh year crops and the exaction of every debt.

Also we made ordinances for ourselves, to charge ourselves yearly with the third part of a shekel for the service of the house of our God:

for the show bread, for the continual meal offering, for the continual burnt offering, for the Sabbaths, for the new moons, for the set feasts, for the holy things, for the sin offerings to make atonement for Israel, and for all the work of the house of our God.

We, the priests, the Levites, and the people, cast lots for the wood offering, to bring it into the house of our God, according to our fathers’ houses, at times appointed year by year, to burn on the LORD our God’s altar, as it is written in the law;

also the firstborn of our sons and of our livestock, as it is written in the law, and the firstborn of our herds and of our flocks, to bring to the house of our God, to the priests who minister in the house of our God;

The priest, the descendent of Aaron, shall be with the Levites when the Levites take tithes. The Levites shall bring up the tithe of the tithes to the house of our God, to the rooms, into the treasure house.

I contended with them, cursed them, struck certain of them, plucked off their hair, and made them swear by God, “You shall not give your daughters to their sons, nor take their daughters for your sons, or for yourselves.

Remember them, my God, because they have defiled the priesthood and the covenant of the priesthood and of the Levites.

There was a certain Jew in the citadel of Susa whose name was Mordecai, the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish, a Benjamite,

the Jews established and imposed on themselves, on their descendants, and on all those who joined themselves to them, so that it should not fail that they would keep these two days according to what was written and according to its appointed time every year;

Then Esther the queen, the daughter of Abihail, and Mordecai the Jew wrote with all authority to confirm this second letter of Purim.

to confirm these days of Purim in their appointed times, as Mordecai the Jew and Esther the queen had decreed, and as they had imposed upon themselves and their descendants in the matter of the fastings and their mourning.

The commandment of Esther confirmed these matters of Purim; and it was written in the book.

“I made a covenant with my eyes; how then should I look lustfully at a young woman?

Will he make a covenant with you, that you should take him for a servant forever?

“Yet I have set my King on my holy hill of Zion.”

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

He gives great deliverance to his king, and shows loving kindness to his anointed, to David and to his offspring, forever more.

The LORD’s law is perfect, restoring the soul. The LORD’s covenant is sure, making wise the simple.

I was thrown on you from my mother’s womb. You are my God since my mother bore me.

All the paths of the LORD are loving kindness and truth to such as keep his covenant and his testimonies.

The friendship of the LORD is with those who fear him. He will show them his covenant.

Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, the people whom he has chosen for his own inheritance.

Then I said, “Behold, I have come. It is written about me in the book in the scroll.

All this has come on us, yet we haven’t forgotten you. We haven’t been false to your covenant.

“Gather my saints together to me, those who have made a covenant with me by sacrifice.”

“Hear, my people, and I will speak. Israel, I will testify against you. I am God, your God.

But to the wicked God says, “What right do you have to declare my statutes, that you have taken my covenant on your lips,

He raises his hands against his friends. He has violated his covenant.

God has spoken from his sanctuary: “I will triumph. I will divide Shechem, and measure out the valley of Succoth.

For you, God, have heard my vows. You have given me the heritage of those who fear your name.

So I will sing praise to your name forever, that I may fulfil my vows daily.

Remember your congregation, which you purchased of old, which you have redeemed to be the tribe of your inheritance: Mount Zion, in which you have lived.

Honour your covenant, for haunts of violence fill the dark places of the earth.

For he established a covenant in Jacob, and appointed a teaching in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children;

They didn’t keep God’s covenant, and refused to walk in his law.

For their heart was not right with him, neither were they faithful in his covenant.

Yet they tempted and rebelled against the Most High God, and didn’t keep his testimonies,

Moreover he rejected the tent of Joseph, and didn’t choose the tribe of Ephraim,

But chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion which he loved.

He also chose David his servant, and took him from the sheepfolds;

from following the ewes that have their young, he brought him to be the shepherd of Jacob, his people, and Israel, his inheritance.

For it is a statute for Israel, an ordinance of the God of Jacob.

He appointed it in Joseph for a covenant, when he went out over the land of Egypt, I heard a language that I didn’t know.

“Hear, my people, and I will testify to you, Israel, if you would listen to me!

But my people didn’t listen to my voice. Israel desired none of me.

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

I said, “You are gods, all of you are sons of the Most High.

“I have made a covenant with my chosen one, I have sworn to David, my servant,

‘I will establish your offspring forever, and build up your throne to all generations.’” Selah.

Then you spoke in vision to your saints, and said, “I have given strength to the warrior. I have exalted a young man from the people.

I have found David, my servant. I have anointed him with my holy oil,

I will also appoint him my firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth.

I will keep my loving kindness for him forever more. My covenant will stand firm with him.

I will also make his offspring endure forever, and his throne as the days of heaven.

If his children forsake my law, and don’t walk in my ordinances;

if they break my statutes, and don’t keep my commandments;

But I will not completely take my loving kindness from him, nor allow my faithfulness to fail.

I will not break my covenant, nor alter what my lips have uttered.

Once I have sworn by my holiness, I will not lie to David.

His offspring will endure forever, his throne like the sun before me.

It will be established forever like the moon, the faithful witness in the sky.” Selah.

You have renounced the covenant of your servant. You have defiled his crown in the dust.

Lord, where are your former loving kindnesses, which you swore to David in your faithfulness?

For the LORD won’t reject his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance.

to those who keep his covenant, to those who remember to obey his precepts.

you offspring of Abraham, his servant, you children of Jacob, his chosen ones.

He has remembered his covenant forever, the word which he commanded to a thousand generations,

the covenant which he made with Abraham, his oath to Isaac,

and confirmed it to Jacob for a statute; to Israel for an everlasting covenant,

saying, “To you I will give the land of Canaan, the lot of your inheritance,”

“Don’t touch my anointed ones! Do my prophets no harm!”

For he remembered his holy word, and Abraham, his servant.

He remembered for them his covenant, and repented according to the multitude of his loving kindnesses.

The LORD has sworn, and will not change his mind: “You are a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek.”

He has given food to those who fear him. He always remembers his covenant.

He has sent redemption to his people. He has ordained his covenant forever. His name is holy and awesome!

Judah became his sanctuary, Israel his dominion.

I have sworn, and have confirmed it, that I will obey your righteous ordinances.

how he swore to the LORD, and vowed to the Mighty One of Jacob:

The LORD has sworn to David in truth. He will not turn from it: “I will set the fruit of your body on your throne.

If your children will keep my covenant, my testimony that I will teach them, their children also will sit on your throne forever more.”

For the LORD has chosen Jacob for himself, Israel for his own possession.

and gave their land for a heritage, a heritage to Israel, his people.

even a heritage to Israel his servant, for his loving kindness endures forever;

He shows his word to Jacob, his statutes and his ordinances to Israel.

He has not done this for just any nation. They don’t know his ordinances. Praise the LORD!

who forsakes the friend of her youth, and forgets the covenant of her God;

I say, “Keep the king’s command!” because of the oath to God.

Wrap up the covenant. Seal the law amongst my disciples.

Turn to the law and to the covenant! If they don’t speak according to this word, surely there is no morning for them.

The LORD of Armies has sworn, saying, “Surely, as I have thought, so shall it happen; and as I have purposed, so shall it stand:

In that day, there will be five cities in the land of Egypt that speak the language of Canaan, and swear to the LORD of Armies. One will be called “The city of destruction.”

In that day, there will be an altar to the LORD in the middle of the land of Egypt, and a pillar to the LORD at its border.

The LORD will be known to Egypt, and the Egyptians will know the LORD in that day. Yes, they will worship with sacrifice and offering, and will vow a vow to the LORD, and will perform it.

because the LORD of Armies has blessed them, saying, “Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel my inheritance.”

The earth also is polluted under its inhabitants, because they have transgressed the laws, violated the statutes, and broken the everlasting covenant.

It will happen in that day that the LORD will thresh from the flowing stream of the Euphrates to the brook of Egypt; and you will be gathered one by one, children of Israel.

“Because you have said, ‘We have made a covenant with death, and we are in agreement with Sheol. When the overflowing scourge passes through, it won’t come to us; for we have made lies our refuge, and we have hidden ourselves under falsehood.’”

Your covenant with death shall be annulled, and your agreement with Sheol shall not stand. When the overflowing scourge passes through, then you will be trampled down by it.

Therefore the LORD, who redeemed Abraham, says concerning the house of Jacob: “Jacob shall no longer be ashamed, neither shall his face grow pale.

The highways are desolate. The travelling man ceases. The covenant is broken. He has despised the cities. He doesn’t respect man.

“But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the offspring of Abraham my friend,

you whom I have taken hold of from the ends of the earth, and called from its corners, and said to you, ‘You are my servant. I have chosen you and have not cast you away.’

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

everyone who is called by my name, and whom I have created for my glory, whom I have formed, yes, whom I have made.’”

I am the LORD, your Holy One, the Creator of Israel, your King.”

The animals of the field, the jackals and the ostriches, shall honour me, because I give water in the wilderness and rivers in the desert, to give drink to my people, my chosen,

the people which I formed for myself, that they might declare my praise.

Yet listen now, Jacob my servant, and Israel, whom I have chosen.

This is what the LORD who made you, and formed you from the womb, who will help you says: “Don’t be afraid, Jacob my servant; and you, Jeshurun, whom I have chosen.

One will say, ‘I am the LORD’s.’ Another will be called by the name of Jacob; and another will write with his hand ‘to the LORD,’ and honour the name of Israel.”

Remember these things, Jacob and Israel, for you are my servant. I have formed you. You are my servant. Israel, you will not be forgotten by me.

who confirms the word of his servant, and performs the counsel of his messengers; who says of Jerusalem, ‘She will be inhabited;’ and of the cities of Judah, ‘They will be built,’ and ‘I will raise up its waste places;’

For Jacob my servant’s sake, and Israel my chosen, I have called you by your name. I have given you a title, though you have not known me.

“Hear this, house of Jacob, you who are called by the name of Israel, and have come out of the waters of Judah. You swear by the LORD’s name, and make mention of the God of Israel, but not in truth, nor in righteousness—

“Listen to me, O Jacob, and Israel my called: I am he. I am the first. I am also the last.

Your offspring also would have been as the sand and the descendants of your body like its grains. His name would not be cut off nor destroyed from before me.”

Listen, islands, to me. Listen, you peoples, from afar: the LORD has called me from the womb; from the inside of my mother, he has mentioned my name.

He said to me, “You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified.”

The LORD says, “I have answered you in an acceptable time. I have helped you in a day of salvation. I will preserve you and give you for a covenant of the people, to raise up the land, to make them inherit the desolate heritage,

The LORD says, “Where is the bill of your mother’s divorce, with which I have put her away? Or to which of my creditors have I sold you? Behold, you were sold for your iniquities, and your mother was put away for your transgressions.

I have put my words in your mouth and have covered you in the shadow of my hand, that I may plant the heavens, and lay the foundations of the earth, and tell Zion, ‘You are my people.’”

For your Maker is your husband; the LORD of Armies is his name. The Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer. He will be called the God of the whole earth.

For the LORD has called you as a wife forsaken and grieved in spirit, even a wife of youth, when she is cast off,” says your God.

“For this is like the waters of Noah to me; for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah will no more go over the earth, so I have sworn that I will not be angry with you, nor rebuke you.

For the mountains may depart, and the hills be removed, but my loving kindness will not depart from you, and my covenant of peace will not be removed,” says the LORD who has mercy on you.

Turn your ear, and come to me. Hear, and your soul will live. I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David.

Behold, I have given him for a witness to the peoples, a leader and commander to the peoples.

Let no foreigner who has joined himself to the LORD speak, saying, “The LORD will surely separate me from his people.” Do not let the eunuch say, “Behold, I am a dry tree.”

For the LORD says, “To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, choose the things that please me, and hold fast to my covenant,

I will give them in my house and within my walls a memorial and a name better than of sons and of daughters. I will give them an everlasting name that will not be cut off.

Also the foreigners who join themselves to the LORD to serve him, and to love the LORD’s name, to be his servants, everyone who keeps the Sabbath from profaning it, and holds fast my covenant,

The Lord GOD, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, says, “I will yet gather others to him, in addition to his own who are gathered.”

You have set up your memorial behind the doors and the posts, for you have exposed yourself to someone besides me, and have gone up. You have enlarged your bed and made you a covenant with them. You loved what you saw on their bed.

“As for me, this is my covenant with them,” says the LORD. “My Spirit who is on you, and my words which I have put in your mouth shall not depart out of your mouth, nor out of the mouth of your offspring, nor out of the mouth of your offspring’s offspring,” says the LORD, “from now on and forever.”

“For I, the LORD, love justice. I hate robbery and iniquity. I will give them their reward in truth and I will make an everlasting covenant with them.

Their offspring will be known amongst the nations, and their offspring amongst the peoples. All who see them will acknowledge them, that they are the offspring which the LORD has blessed.”

The nations will see your righteousness, and all kings your glory. You will be called by a new name, which the LORD’s mouth will name.

You will also be a crown of beauty in the LORD’s hand, and a royal diadem in your God’s hand.

The LORD has sworn by his right hand, and by the arm of his strength, “Surely I will no more give your grain to be food for your enemies, and foreigners will not drink your new wine, for which you have laboured,

For he said, “Surely, they are my people, children who will not deal falsely;” so he became their Saviour.

For you are our Father, though Abraham doesn’t know us, and Israel does not acknowledge us. You, LORD, are our Father. Our Redeemer from everlasting is your name.

We have become like those over whom you never ruled, like those who were not called by your name.

But now, LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay and you our potter. We all are the work of your hand.

Don’t be furious, LORD. Don’t remember iniquity forever. Look and see, we beg you, we are all your people.

I will bring offspring out of Jacob, and out of Judah an inheritor of my mountains. My chosen will inherit it, and my servants will dwell there.

“Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. Before you were born, I sanctified you. I have appointed you a prophet to the nations.”

“Go and proclaim in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, ‘The LORD says, “I remember for you the kindness of your youth, your love as a bride, how you went after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown.

“They say, ‘If a man puts away his wife, and she goes from him, and becomes another man’s, should he return to her again?’ Wouldn’t that land be greatly polluted? But you have played the prostitute with many lovers; yet return again to me,” says the LORD.

Moreover, the LORD said to me in the days of Josiah the king, “Have you seen that which backsliding Israel has done? She has gone up on every high mountain and under every green tree, and has played the prostitute there.

I said after she had done all these things, ‘She will return to me;’ but she didn’t return, and her treacherous sister Judah saw it.

I saw when, for this very cause, that backsliding Israel had committed adultery, I had put her away and given her a certificate of divorce, yet treacherous Judah, her sister, had no fear, but she also went and played the prostitute.

Because she took her prostitution lightly, the land was polluted, and she committed adultery with stones and with wood.

Only acknowledge your iniquity, that you have transgressed against the LORD your God, and have scattered your ways to the strangers under every green tree, and you have not obeyed my voice,’” says the LORD.

“Return, backsliding children,” says the LORD, “for I am a husband to you. I will take one of you from a city, and two from a family, and I will bring you to Zion.

It will come to pass, when you are multiplied and increased in the land in those days,” says the LORD, “they will no longer say, ‘the ark of the LORD’s covenant!’ It will not come to mind. They won’t remember it. They won’t miss it, nor will another be made.

In those days the house of Judah will walk with the house of Israel, and they will come together out of the land of the north to the land that I gave for an inheritance to your fathers.

“Surely as a wife treacherously departs from her husband, so you have dealt treacherously with me, house of Israel,” says the LORD.

“If you will return, Israel,” says the LORD, “if you will return to me, and if you will put away your abominations out of my sight; then you will not be removed;

For the house of Israel and the house of Judah have dealt very treacherously against me,” says the LORD.

then I will cause you to dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers, from of old even forever more.

For I didn’t speak to your fathers or command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices;

but this thing I commanded them, saying, ‘Listen to my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people. Walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.’

“Behold, the days come,” says the LORD, “that I will punish all those who are circumcised only in their flesh:

Hear the word which the LORD speaks to you, house of Israel!

The portion of Jacob is not like these; for he is the maker of all things; and Israel is the tribe of his inheritance. The LORD of Armies is his name.

“Hear the words of this covenant, and speak to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem;

and say to them, the LORD, the God of Israel says: ‘Cursed is the man who doesn’t hear the words of this covenant,

which I commanded your fathers in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, out of the iron furnace,’ saying, ‘Obey my voice and do them, according to all which I command you; so you shall be my people, and I will be your God;

that I may establish the oath which I swore to your fathers, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey,’ as it is today.” Then I answered, and said, “Amen, LORD.”

The LORD said to me, “Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem, saying, ‘Hear the words of this covenant, and do them.

Yet they didn’t obey, nor turn their ear, but everyone walked in the stubbornness of their evil heart. Therefore I brought on them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do, but they didn’t do them.’”

They have turned back to the iniquities of their forefathers, who refused to hear my words. They have gone after other gods to serve them. The house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken my covenant which I made with their fathers.

“I have forsaken my house. I have cast off my heritage. I have given the dearly beloved of my soul into the hand of her enemies.

My heritage has become to me as a lion in the forest. She has uttered her voice against me. Therefore I have hated her.

Many shepherds have destroyed my vineyard. They have trodden my portion under foot. They have made my pleasant portion a desolate wilderness.

The LORD says, “Concerning all my evil neighbours, who touch the inheritance which I have caused my people Israel to inherit: Behold, I will pluck them up from off their land, and will pluck up the house of Judah from amongst them.

It will happen that after I have plucked them up, I will return and have compassion on them. I will bring them again, every man to his heritage, and every man to his land.

It will happen, if they will diligently learn the ways of my people, to swear by my name, ‘As the LORD lives;’ even as they taught my people to swear by Baal, then they will be built up in the middle of my people.

But if they will not hear, then I will pluck up that nation, plucking up and destroying it,” says the LORD.

For as the belt clings to the waist of a man, so I have caused the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah to cling to me,’ says the LORD; ‘that they may be to me for a people, for a name, for praise, and for glory; but they would not hear.’

Do not abhor us, for your name’s sake. Do not disgrace the throne of your glory. Remember, and don’t break your covenant with us.

then you shall tell them, ‘Because your fathers have forsaken me,’ says the LORD, ‘and have walked after other gods, have served them, have worshipped them, have forsaken me, and have not kept my law.

“Therefore behold, the days come,” says the LORD, “that it will no more be said, ‘As the LORD lives, who brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt;’

but, ‘As the LORD lives, who brought up the children of Israel from the land of the north, and from all the countries where he had driven them.’ I will bring them again into their land that I gave to their fathers.

But if you will not hear these words, I swear by myself,” says the LORD, “that this house will become a desolation.”’”

Then they will answer, ‘Because they abandoned the covenant of the LORD their God, worshipped other gods, and served them.’”

The LORD says, “Record this man as childless, a man who will not prosper in his days; for no more will a man of his offspring prosper, sitting on David’s throne and ruling in Judah.”

“Behold, the days come,” says the LORD, “that I will raise to David a righteous Branch; and he will reign as king and deal wisely, and will execute justice and righteousness in the land.

“Therefore, behold, the days come,” says the LORD, “that they will no more say, ‘As the LORD lives, who brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt;’

I will give them a heart to know me, that I am the LORD. They will be my people, and I will be their God; for they will return to me with their whole heart.

All the nations will serve him, his son, and his son’s son, until the time of his own land comes. Then many nations and great kings will make him their bondservant.

For the LORD of Armies says concerning the pillars, concerning the sea, concerning the bases, and concerning the rest of the vessels that are left in this city,

yes, the LORD of Armies, the God of Israel, says concerning the vessels that are left in the LORD’s house, and in the house of the king of Judah, and at Jerusalem:

That same year, in the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the fourth year, in the fifth month, Hananiah the son of Azzur, the prophet, who was of Gibeon, spoke to me in the LORD’s house, in the presence of the priests and of all the people, saying,

For the LORD says, “After seventy years are accomplished for Babylon, I will visit you and perform my good word towards you, in causing you to return to this place.

I will be found by you,” says the LORD, “and I will turn again your captivity, and I will gather you from all the nations, and from all the places where I have driven you, says the LORD. I will bring you again to the place from where I caused you to be carried away captive.”

the LORD says concerning the king who sits on David’s throne, and concerning all the people who dwell in this city, your brothers who haven’t gone with you into captivity,

For, behold, the days come,’ says the LORD, ‘that I will reverse the captivity of my people Israel and Judah,’ says the LORD. ‘I will cause them to return to the land that I gave to their fathers, and they will possess it.’”

These are the words that the LORD spoke concerning Israel and concerning Judah.

“You shall be my people, and I will be your God.

“At that time,” says the LORD, “I will be the God of all the families of Israel, and they will be my people.”

“Behold, the days come,” says the LORD, “that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah,

not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, which covenant of mine they broke, although I was a husband to them,” says the LORD.

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

“If these ordinances depart from before me,” says the LORD, “then the offspring of Israel also will cease from being a nation before me forever.”

The measuring line will go out further straight onward to the hill Gareb, and will turn towards Goah.

The whole valley of the dead bodies and of the ashes, and all the fields to the brook Kidron, to the corner of the horse gate towards the east, will be holy to the LORD. It will not be plucked up or thrown down any more forever.”

and gave them this land, which you swore to their fathers to give them, a land flowing with milk and honey.

Then they will be my people, and I will be their God.

I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from following them, to do them good. I will put my fear in their hearts, that they may not depart from me.

“Behold, the days come,” says the LORD, “that I will perform that good word which I have spoken concerning the house of Israel and concerning the house of Judah.

“In those days and at that time, I will cause a Branch of righteousness to grow up to David. He will execute justice and righteousness in the land.

For the LORD says: “David will never lack a man to sit on the throne of the house of Israel.

The Levitical priests won’t lack a man before me to offer burnt offerings, to burn meal offerings, and to do sacrifice continually.”

“The LORD says: ‘If you can break my covenant of the day and my covenant of the night, so that there will not be day and night in their time,

then my covenant could also be broken with David my servant, that he won’t have a son to reign on his throne; and with the Levitical priests, my ministers.

As the army of the sky can’t be counted, and the sand of the sea can’t be measured, so I will multiply the offspring of David my servant and the Levites who minister to me.’”

“Don’t consider what this people has spoken, saying, ‘Has the LORD cast off the two families which he chose?’ Thus they despise my people, that they should be no more a nation before them.”

The LORD says: “If my covenant of day and night fails, if I have not appointed the ordinances of heaven and earth,

then I will also cast away the offspring of Jacob, and of David my servant, so that I will not take of his offspring to be rulers over the offspring of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; for I will cause their captivity to be reversed and will have mercy on them.”

The word came to Jeremiah from the LORD, after King Zedekiah had made a covenant with all the people who were at Jerusalem, to proclaim liberty to them,

that every man should let his male servant, and every man his female servant, who is a Hebrew or a Hebrewess, go free, that no one should make bondservants of them, of a Jew his brother.

All the princes and all the people obeyed who had entered into the covenant, that everyone should let his male servant and everyone his female servant go free, that no one should make bondservants of them any more. They obeyed and let them go,

but afterwards they turned, and caused the servants and the handmaids whom they had let go free to return, and brought them into subjection for servants and for handmaids.

“The LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘I made a covenant with your fathers in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage, saying:

At the end of seven years, every man of you shall release his brother who is a Hebrew, who has been sold to you, and has served you six years. You shall let him go free from you. But your fathers didn’t listen to me, and didn’t incline their ear.

You had now turned, and had done that which is right in my eyes, in every man proclaiming liberty to his neighbour. You had made a covenant before me in the house which is called by my name;

but you turned and profaned my name, and every man caused his servant and every man his handmaid, whom you had let go free at their pleasure, to return. You brought them into subjection, to be to you for servants and for handmaids.’”

Therefore the LORD says: “You have not listened to me, to proclaim liberty, every man to his brother, and every man to his neighbour. Behold, I proclaim to you a liberty,” says the LORD, “to the sword, to the pestilence, and to the famine. I will make you be tossed back and forth amongst all the kingdoms of the earth.

I will give the men who have transgressed my covenant, who have not performed the words of the covenant which they made before me when they cut the calf in two and passed between its parts:

the princes of Judah, the princes of Jerusalem, the eunuchs, the priests, and all the people of the land, who passed between the parts of the calf.

therefore the LORD of Armies, the God of Israel, says: ‘Jonadab the son of Rechab will not lack a man to stand before me forever.’”

Therefore the LORD says concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah: “He will have no one to sit on David’s throne. His dead body will be cast out in the day to the heat, and in the night to the frost.

So Zedekiah the king swore secretly to Jeremiah, saying, “As the LORD lives, who made our souls, I will not put you to death, neither will I give you into the hand of these men who seek your life.”

“Therefore hear the LORD’s word, all Judah who dwell in the land of Egypt: ‘Behold, I have sworn by my great name,’ says the LORD, ‘that my name will no more be named in the mouth of any man of Judah in all the land of Egypt, saying, “As the Lord GOD lives.”

For I have sworn by myself,” says the LORD, “that Bozrah will become an astonishment, a reproach, a waste, and a curse. All its cities will be perpetual wastes.”

They will enquire concerning Zion with their faces turned towards it, saying, ‘Come, and join yourselves to the LORD in an everlasting covenant that will not be forgotten.’

The portion of Jacob is not like these, for he formed all things, including the tribe of his inheritance. The LORD of Armies is his name.

“The Lord GOD says: ‘This is Jerusalem. I have set her in the middle of the nations, and countries are around her.

She has rebelled against my ordinances in doing wickedness more than the nations, and against my statutes more than the countries that are around her; for they have rejected my ordinances, and as for my statutes, they have not walked in them.’

“Therefore the Lord GOD says: ‘Because you are more turbulent than the nations that are around you, and have not walked in my statutes, neither have kept my ordinances, neither have followed the ordinances of the nations that are around you;

therefore the Lord GOD says: ‘Behold, I, even I, am against you; and I will execute judgements amongst you in the sight of the nations.

Therefore as I live,’ says the Lord GOD, ‘surely, because you have defiled my sanctuary with all your detestable things, and with all your abominations, therefore I will also diminish you. My eye won’t spare, and I will have no pity.

“‘Thus my anger will be accomplished, and I will cause my wrath towards them to rest, and I will be comforted. They will know that I, the LORD, have spoken in my zeal, when I have accomplished my wrath on them.

“Son of man, your brothers, even your brothers, the men of your relatives, and all the house of Israel, all of them, are the ones to whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, ‘Go far away from the LORD. This land has been given to us for a possession.’

“Therefore say, ‘The Lord GOD says: “I will gather you from the peoples, and assemble you out of the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.”

that they may walk in my statutes, and keep my ordinances, and do them. They will be my people, and I will be their God.

that the house of Israel may no more go astray from me, neither defile themselves any more with all their transgressions; but that they may be my people, and I may be their God,” says the Lord GOD.’”

“‘“Now when I passed by you, and looked at you, behold, your time was the time of love; and I spread my garment over you and covered your nakedness. Yes, I pledged myself to you and entered into a covenant with you,” says the Lord GOD, “and you became mine.

“‘“Adulterous wife, who takes strangers instead of her husband!

“‘For the Lord GOD says: “I will also deal with you as you have done, who have despised the oath in breaking the covenant.

Nevertheless I will remember my covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I will establish an everlasting covenant with you.

Then you will remember your ways and be ashamed when you receive your sisters, your elder sisters and your younger; and I will give them to you for daughters, but not by your covenant.

I will establish my covenant with you. Then you will know that I am the LORD;

He took one of the royal offspring, and made a covenant with him. He also brought him under an oath, and took away the mighty of the land,

that the kingdom might be brought low, that it might not lift itself up, but that by keeping his covenant it might stand.

But he rebelled against him in sending his ambassadors into Egypt, that they might give him horses and many people. Will he prosper? Will he who does such things escape? Will he break the covenant, and still escape?

“‘As I live,’ says the Lord GOD, ‘surely in the place where the king dwells who made him king, whose oath he despised, and whose covenant he broke, even with him in the middle of Babylon he will die.

For he has despised the oath by breaking the covenant; and behold, he had given his hand, and yet has done all these things. He won’t escape.

“Therefore the Lord GOD says: ‘As I live, I will surely bring on his own head my oath that he has despised and my covenant that he has broken.

Tell them, ‘The Lord GOD says: “In the day when I chose Israel, and swore to the offspring of the house of Jacob, and made myself known to them in the land of Egypt, when I swore to them, saying, ‘I am the LORD your God;’

in that day I swore to them to bring them out of the land of Egypt into a land that I had searched out for them, flowing with milk and honey, which is the glory of all lands.

Moreover also I gave them my Sabbaths, to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the LORD who sanctifies them.

Moreover also I swore to them in the wilderness that I would not bring them into the land which I had given them, flowing with milk and honey, which is the glory of all lands,

Make my Sabbaths holy. They shall be a sign between me and you, that you may know that I am the LORD your God.’

Moreover I swore to them in the wilderness, that I would scatter them amongst the nations and disperse them through the countries,

“Therefore, son of man, speak to the house of Israel, and tell them, ‘The Lord GOD says: “Moreover, in this your fathers have blasphemed me, in that they have committed a trespass against me.

For when I had brought them into the land which I swore to give to them, then they saw every high hill and every thick tree, and they offered there their sacrifices, and there they presented the provocation of their offering. There they also made their pleasant aroma, and there they poured out their drink offerings.

“I will cause you to pass under the rod, and I will bring you into the bond of the covenant.

You will know that I am the LORD when I bring you into the land of Israel, into the country which I swore to give to your fathers.

They played the prostitute in Egypt. They played the prostitute in their youth. Their breasts were fondled there, and their youthful nipples were caressed there.

Their names were Oholah the elder, and Oholibah her sister. They became mine, and they bore sons and daughters. As for their names, Samaria is Oholah, and Jerusalem Oholibah.

“Oholah played the prostitute when she was mine. She doted on her lovers, on the Assyrians her neighbours,

She gave herself as a prostitute to them, all of them the choicest men of Assyria. She defiled herself with the idols of whoever she lusted after.

She hasn’t left her prostitution since leaving Egypt; for in her youth they lay with her. They caressed her youthful nipples and they poured out their prostitution on her.

“Therefore I delivered her into the hand of her lovers, into the hand of the Assyrians on whom she doted.

“Her sister Oholibah saw this, yet she was more corrupt in her lusting than she, and in her prostitution which was more depraved than the prostitution of her sister.

“‘The Lord GOD says: “When I have gathered the house of Israel from the peoples amongst whom they are scattered, and am shown as holy amongst them in the sight of the nations, then they will dwell in their own land which I gave to my servant Jacob.

“Son of man, those who inhabit the waste places in the land of Israel speak, saying, ‘Abraham was one, and he inherited the land; but we are many. The land is given us for inheritance.’

I, the LORD, will be their God, and my servant David prince amongst them. I, the LORD, have spoken it.

“‘I will make with them a covenant of peace, and will cause evil animals to cease out of the land. They will dwell securely in the wilderness and sleep in the woods.

They will know that I, the LORD, their God am with them, and that they, the house of Israel, are my people, says the Lord GOD.

You my sheep, the sheep of my pasture, are men, and I am your God,’ says the Lord GOD.”

“‘“Because you have said, ‘These two nations and these two countries will be mine, and we will possess it,’ although the LORD was there,

therefore the Lord GOD says: “Surely in the fire of my jealousy I have spoken against the residue of the nations, and against all Edom, that have appointed my land to themselves for a possession with the joy of all their heart, with despite of soul, to cast it out for a prey.”’

Therefore the Lord GOD says: “I have sworn, ‘Surely the nations that are around you will bear their shame.’

Yes, I will cause men to walk on you, even my people Israel. They will possess you, and you will be their inheritance, and you will never again bereave them of their children.”

“‘“For I will take you from amongst the nations and gather you out of all the countries, and will bring you into your own land.

You will dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers. You will be my people, and I will be your God.

Then the nations that are left around you will know that I, the LORD, have built the ruined places and planted that which was desolate. I, the LORD, have spoken it, and I will do it.”

They won’t defile themselves any more with their idols, nor with their detestable things, nor with any of their transgressions; but I will save them out of all their dwelling places in which they have sinned, and will cleanse them. So they will be my people, and I will be their God.

They will dwell in the land that I have given to Jacob my servant, in which your fathers lived. They will dwell therein, they, and their children, and their children’s children, forever. David my servant will be their prince forever.

Moreover I will make a covenant of peace with them. It will be an everlasting covenant with them. I will place them, multiply them, and will set my sanctuary amongst them forever more.

My tent also will be with them. I will be their God, and they will be my people.

The nations will know that I am the LORD who sanctifies Israel, when my sanctuary is amongst them forever more.”’”

“‘“I will make my holy name known amongst my people Israel. I won’t allow my holy name to be profaned any more. Then the nations will know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.

So the house of Israel will know that I am the LORD their God, from that day and forward.

“Therefore the Lord GOD says: ‘Now I will reverse the captivity of Jacob and have mercy on the whole house of Israel. I will be jealous for my holy name.

He said to me, “Son of man, this is the place of my throne and the place of the soles of my feet, where I will dwell amongst the children of Israel forever. The house of Israel will no more defile my holy name, neither they nor their kings, by their prostitution and by the dead bodies of their kings in their high places;

Now let them put away their prostitution, and the dead bodies of their kings far from me. Then I will dwell amongst them forever.

in that you have brought in foreigners, uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh, to be in my sanctuary, to profane it, even my house, when you offer my bread, the fat and the blood; and they have broken my covenant, to add to all your abominations.

“‘They shall have an inheritance: I am their inheritance; and you shall give them no possession in Israel. I am their possession.

“‘“In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month, you shall have the Passover, a feast of seven days; unleavened bread shall be eaten.

The Lord GOD says: “This shall be the border by which you shall divide the land for inheritance according to the twelve tribes of Israel. Joseph shall have two portions.

You shall inherit it, one as well as another; for I swore to give it to your fathers. This land will fall to you for inheritance.

“This shall be the border of the land: “On the north side, from the great sea, by the way of Hethlon, to the entrance of Zedad;

Hamath, Berothah, Sibraim (which is between the border of Damascus and the border of Hamath), to Hazer Hatticon, which is by the border of Hauran.

The border from the sea shall be Hazar Enon at the border of Damascus; and on the north northward is the border of Hamath. This is the north side.

“The east side, between Hauran, Damascus, Gilead, and the land of Israel, shall be the Jordan; from the north border to the east sea you shall measure. This is the east side.

“The south side southward shall be from Tamar as far as the waters of Meriboth Kadesh, to the brook, to the great sea. This is the south side southward.

“The west side shall be the great sea, from the south border as far as opposite the entrance of Hamath. This is the west side.

“So you shall divide this land to yourselves according to the tribes of Israel.

“Now these are the names of the tribes: From the north end, beside the way of Hethlon to the entrance of Hamath, Hazar Enan at the border of Damascus, northward beside Hamath (and they shall have their sides east and west), Dan, one portion.

“By the border of Dan, from the east side to the west side, Asher, one portion.

“By the border of Asher, from the east side even to the west side, Naphtali, one portion.

“By the border of Naphtali, from the east side to the west side, Manasseh, one portion.

“By the border of Manasseh, from the east side to the west side, Ephraim, one portion.

“By the border of Ephraim, from the east side even to the west side, Reuben, one portion.

“By the border of Reuben, from the east side to the west side, Judah, one portion.

“By the border of Judah, from the east side to the west side, shall be the offering which you shall offer, twenty-five thousand reeds in width, and in length as one of the portions, from the east side to the west side; and the sanctuary shall be in the middle of it.

“The remainder shall be for the prince, on the one side and on the other of the holy offering and of the possession of the city; in front of the twenty-five thousand of the offering towards the east border, and westward in front of the twenty-five thousand towards the west border, alongside the portions, it shall be for the prince. The holy offering and the sanctuary of the house shall be in the middle of it.

Moreover, from the possession of the Levites, and from the possession of the city, being in the middle of that which is the prince’s, between the border of Judah and the border of Benjamin, shall be for the prince.

“As for the rest of the tribes: from the east side to the west side, Benjamin, one portion.

“By the border of Benjamin, from the east side to the west side, Simeon, one portion.

“By the border of Simeon, from the east side to the west side, Issachar, one portion.

“By the border of Issachar, from the east side to the west side, Zebulun, one portion.

“By the border of Zebulun, from the east side to the west side, Gad, one portion.

“By the border of Gad, at the south side southward, the border shall be even from Tamar to the waters of Meribath Kadesh, to the brook, to the great sea.

“This is the land which you shall divide by lot to the tribes of Israel for inheritance, and these are their several portions, says the Lord GOD.

and the gates of the city shall be named after the tribes of Israel, three gates northward: the gate of Reuben, one; the gate of Judah, one; the gate of Levi, one.

“At the east side four thousand and five hundred reeds, and three gates: even the gate of Joseph, one; the gate of Benjamin, one; the gate of Dan, one.

“At the south side four thousand and five hundred reeds by measure, and three gates: the gate of Simeon, one; the gate of Issachar, one; the gate of Zebulun, one.

“At the west side four thousand and five hundred reeds, with their three gates: the gate of Gad, one; the gate of Asher, one; the gate of Naphtali, one.

“It shall be eighteen thousand reeds in circumference; and the name of the city from that day shall be, ‘The LORD is there.’

I prayed to the LORD my God, and made confession, and said, “Oh, Lord, the great and dreadful God, who keeps covenant and loving kindness with those who love him and keep his commandments,

He will make a firm covenant with many for one week. In the middle of the week he will cause the sacrifice and the offering to cease. On the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate; and even to the decreed full end, wrath will be poured out on the desolate.”

The overwhelming forces will be overwhelmed from before him, and will be broken. Yes, also the prince of the covenant.

After the treaty made with him he will work deceitfully; for he will come up and will become strong with few people.

Then he will return into his land with great wealth. His heart will be against the holy covenant. He will take action, and return to his own land.

For ships of Kittim will come against him. Therefore he will be grieved, and will return, and have indignation against the holy covenant, and will take action. He will even return, and have regard to those who forsake the holy covenant.

He will corrupt those who do wickedly against the covenant by flatteries; but the people who know their God will be strong and take action.

She conceived again, and bore a daughter. Then he said to him, “Call her name Lo-Ruhamah, for I will no longer have mercy on the house of Israel, that I should in any way pardon them.

He said, “Call his name Lo-Ammi, for you are not my people, and I will not be yours.

Yet the number of the children of Israel will be as the sand of the sea, which can’t be measured or counted; and it will come to pass that, in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’

“Say to your brothers, ‘My people!’ and to your sisters, ‘My loved one!’

Contend with your mother! Contend, for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband; and let her put away her prostitution from her face, and her adulteries from between her breasts;

It will be in that day,” says the LORD, “that you will call me ‘my husband,’ and no longer call me ‘my master.’

For I will take away the names of the Baals out of her mouth, and they will no longer be mentioned by name.

In that day I will make a covenant for them with the animals of the field, and with the birds of the sky, and with the creeping things of the ground. I will break the bow, the sword, and the battle out of the land, and will make them lie down safely.

I will betroth you to me forever. Yes, I will betroth you to me in righteousness, in justice, in loving kindness, and in compassion.

I will even betroth you to me in faithfulness; and you shall know the LORD.

It will happen in that day, that I will respond,” says the LORD. “I will respond to the heavens, and they will respond to the earth;

I will sow her to me in the earth; and I will have mercy on her who had not obtained mercy; and I will tell those who were not my people, ‘You are my people;’ and they will say, ‘You are My God!’”

So I bought her for myself for fifteen pieces of silver and a homer and a half of barley.

I said to her, “You shall stay with me many days. You shall not play the prostitute, and you shall not be with any other man. I will also be so towards you.”

They are unfaithful to the LORD; for they have borne illegitimate children. Now the new moon will devour them with their fields.

But they, like Adam, have broken the covenant. They were unfaithful to me there.

“Put the trumpet to your lips! Something like an eagle is over the LORD’s house, because they have broken my covenant and rebelled against my law.

They won’t dwell in the LORD’s land; but Ephraim will return to Egypt, and they will eat unclean food in Assyria.

They make promises, swearing falsely in making covenants. Therefore judgement springs up like poisonous weeds in the furrows of the field.

“When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt.

Ephraim feeds on wind, and chases the east wind. He continually multiplies lies and desolation. They make a covenant with Assyria, and oil is carried into Egypt.

“But I am the LORD your God from the land of Egypt. I will yet again make you dwell in tents, as in the days of the solemn feast.

“Yet I am the LORD your God from the land of Egypt; and you shall acknowledge no god but me, and besides me there is no saviour.

You will know that I am amongst Israel, and that I am the LORD, your God, and there is no one else; and my people will never again be disappointed.

The LORD says: “For three transgressions of Tyre, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they delivered up the whole community to Edom, and didn’t remember the brotherly covenant;

Hear this word that the LORD has spoken against you, children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up out of the land of Egypt, saying:

“I have only chosen you of all the families of the earth. Therefore I will punish you for all of your sins.”

that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations who are called by my name,” says the LORD who does this.

I will plant them on their land, and they will no more be plucked up out of their land which I have given them,” says the LORD your God.

Indeed all the nations may walk in the name of their gods, but we will walk in the name of the LORD our God forever and ever.

But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, being small amongst the clans of Judah, out of you one will come out to me who is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings out are from of old, from ancient times.

Hear, you mountains, the LORD’s indictment, and you enduring foundations of the earth; for the LORD has a case against his people, and he will contend with Israel.

My people, what have I done to you? How have I burdened you? Answer me!

My people, remember now what Balak king of Moab devised, and what Balaam the son of Beor answered him from Shittim to Gilgal, that you may know the righteous acts of the LORD.”

You will give truth to Jacob, and mercy to Abraham, as you have sworn to our fathers from the days of old.

You uncovered your bow. You called for your sworn arrows. Selah. You split the earth with rivers.

This is the word that I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt, and my Spirit lived amongst you. ‘Don’t be afraid.’

In that day, says the LORD of Armies, I will take you, Zerubbabel my servant, the son of Shealtiel,’ says the LORD, ‘and will make you like a signet ring, for I have chosen you,’ says the LORD of Armies.”

Therefore tell them, the LORD of Armies says: ‘Return to me,’ says the LORD of Armies, ‘and I will return to you,’ says the LORD of Armies.

For I,’ says the LORD, ‘will be to her a wall of fire around it, and I will be the glory in the middle of her.

Many nations shall join themselves to the LORD in that day, and shall be my people; and I will dwell amongst you, and you shall know that the LORD of Armies has sent me to you.

The LORD will inherit Judah as his portion in the holy land, and will again choose Jerusalem.

“The LORD of Armies says: ‘If you will walk in my ways, and if you will follow my instructions, then you also shall judge my house, and shall also keep my courts, and I will give you a place of access amongst these who stand by.

Hear now, Joshua the high priest, you and your fellows who sit before you, for they are men who are a sign; for, behold, I will bring out my servant, the Branch.

I will bring them, and they will dwell within Jerusalem. They will be my people, and I will be their God, in truth and in righteousness.”

I will take away his blood out of his mouth, and his abominations from between his teeth; and he also will be a remnant for our God; and he will be as a chieftain in Judah, and Ekron as a Jebusite.

As for you also, because of the blood of your covenant, I have set free your prisoners from the pit in which is no water.

I took my staff Favour and cut it apart, that I might break my covenant that I had made with all the peoples.

It was broken in that day; and thus the poor of the flock that listened to me knew that it was the LORD’s word.

Then I cut apart my other staff, Union, that I might break the brotherhood between Judah and Israel.

I will bring the third part into the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will test them like gold is tested. They will call on my name, and I will hear them. I will say, ‘It is my people;’ and they will say, ‘The LORD is my God.’”

A revelation, the LORD’s word to Israel by Malachi.

“I have loved you,” says the LORD. Yet you say, “How have you loved us?” “Wasn’t Esau Jacob’s brother?” says the LORD, “Yet I loved Jacob;

You will know that I have sent this commandment to you, that my covenant may be with Levi,” says the LORD of Armies.

“My covenant was with him of life and peace; and I gave them to him that he might be reverent towards me; and he was reverent towards me, and stood in awe of my name.

But you have turned away from the path. You have caused many to stumble in the law. You have corrupted the covenant of Levi,” says the LORD of Armies.

Don’t we all have one father? Hasn’t one God created us? Why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother, profaning the covenant of our fathers?

Judah has dealt treacherously, and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Judah has profaned the holiness of the LORD which he loves, and has married the daughter of a foreign god.

Yet you say, ‘Why?’ Because the LORD has been witness between you and the wife of your youth, against whom you have dealt treacherously, though she is your companion and the wife of your covenant.

Did he not make you one, although he had the residue of the Spirit? Why one? He sought godly offspring. Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let no one deal treacherously against the wife of his youth.

“Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me! The Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly come to his temple. Behold, the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, is coming!” says the LORD of Armies.

“Remember the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded to him in Horeb for all Israel, even statutes and ordinances.

The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.

Abraham became the father of Isaac. Isaac became the father of Jacob. Jacob became the father of Judah and his brothers.

Jesse became the father of King David. David the king became the father of Solomon by her who had been Uriah’s wife.

Solomon became the father of Rehoboam. Rehoboam became the father of Abijah. Abijah became the father of Asa.

Asa became the father of Jehoshaphat. Jehoshaphat became the father of Joram. Joram became the father of Uzziah.

Uzziah became the father of Jotham. Jotham became the father of Ahaz. Ahaz became the father of Hezekiah.

Hezekiah became the father of Manasseh. Manasseh became the father of Amon. Amon became the father of Josiah.

Josiah became the father of Jechoniah and his brothers at the time of the exile to Babylon.

After the exile to Babylon, Jechoniah became the father of Shealtiel. Shealtiel became the father of Zerubbabel.

Zerubbabel became the father of Abiud. Abiud became the father of Eliakim. Eliakim became the father of Azor.

Azor became the father of Zadok. Zadok became the father of Achim. Achim became the father of Eliud.

Eliud became the father of Eleazar. Eleazar became the father of Matthan. Matthan became the father of Jacob.

So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; from David to the exile to Babylon fourteen generations; and from the carrying away to Babylon to the Christ, fourteen generations.

Now all this has happened that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying,

and was there until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying, “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

Then that which was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled, saying,

and came and lived in a city called Nazareth; that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophets that he will be called a Nazarene.

For this is he who was spoken of by Isaiah the prophet, saying, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, make the way of the Lord ready! Make his paths straight!”

that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through Isaiah the prophet, saying,

“The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, towards the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles,

For this is he, of whom it is written, ‘Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you.’

When he had agreed with the labourers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard.

‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.”

As they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks for it, and broke it. He gave to the disciples and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.”

He took the cup, gave thanks, and gave to them, saying, “All of you drink it,

for this is my blood of the new covenant, which is poured out for many for the remission of sins.

But I tell you that I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on, until that day when I drink it anew with you in my Father’s Kingdom.”

As it is written in the prophets, “Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you:

Elijah and Moses appeared to them, and they were talking with Jesus.

They asked him, saying, “Why do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?”

But about the dead, that they are raised, haven’t you read in the book of Moses about the Bush, how God spoke to him, saying, ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’?

He said to them, “This is my blood of the new covenant, which is poured out for many.

Most certainly I tell you, I will no more drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it anew in God’s Kingdom.”

to a virgin pledged to be married to a man whose name was Joseph, of David’s house. The virgin’s name was Mary.

He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David,

and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever. There will be no end to his Kingdom.”

He has given help to Israel, his servant, that he might remember mercy,

as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and his offspring forever.”

On the eighth day, they came to circumcise the child; and they would have called him Zacharias, after the name of his father.

(as he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets who have been from of old),

to show mercy towards our fathers, to remember his holy covenant,

the oath which he swore to Abraham our father,

When eight days were fulfilled for the circumcision of the child, his name was called Jesus, which was given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.

(as it is written in the law of the Lord, “Every male who opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord”),

the son of Jacob, the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham, the son of Terah, the son of Nahor,

the son of Serug, the son of Reu, the son of Peleg, the son of Eber, the son of Shelah,

the son of Cainan, the son of Arphaxad, the son of Shem, the son of Noah, the son of Lamech,

the son of Methuselah, the son of Enoch, the son of Jared, the son of Mahalaleel, the son of Cainan,

the son of Enos, the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son of God.

This is he of whom it is written, ‘Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you.’

Jesus said to him, “Today, salvation has come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham.

But that the dead are raised, even Moses showed at the bush, when he called the Lord ‘The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’

Now the feast of unleavened bread, which is called the Passover, was approaching.

The day of unleavened bread came, on which the Passover must be sacrificed.

for I tell you, I will no longer by any means eat of it until it is fulfilled in God’s Kingdom.”

for I tell you, I will not drink at all again from the fruit of the vine, until God’s Kingdom comes.”

He took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body which is given for you. Do this in memory of me.”

Likewise, he took the cup after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.

I confer on you a kingdom, even as my Father conferred on me,

He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you, that all things which are written in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms concerning me must be fulfilled.”

Moses has given you circumcision (not that it is of Moses, but of the fathers), and on the Sabbath you circumcise a boy.

Hasn’t the Scripture said that the Christ comes of the offspring of David, and from Bethlehem, the village where David was?”

I am one who testifies about myself, and the Father who sent me testifies about me.”

Now before the feast of the Passover, Jesus, knowing that his time had come that he would depart from this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

Peter said to him, “You will never wash my feet!” Jesus answered him, “If I don’t wash you, you have no part with me.”

Therefore, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his body, according to the flesh, he would raise up the Christ to sit on his throne,

For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are far off, even as many as the Lord our God will call to himself.”

But the things which God announced by the mouth of all his prophets, that Christ should suffer, he thus fulfilled.

and that he may send Christ Jesus, who was ordained for you before,

whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God spoke long ago by the mouth of his holy prophets.

For Moses indeed said to the fathers, ‘The Lord God will raise up a prophet for you from amongst your brothers, like me. You shall listen to him in all things whatever he says to you.

It will be that every soul that will not listen to that prophet will be utterly destroyed from amongst the people.’

Yes, and all the prophets from Samuel and those who followed after, as many as have spoken, also told of these days.

You are the children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying to Abraham, ‘All the families of the earth will be blessed through your offspring.’

He said, “Brothers and fathers, listen. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran,

and said to him, ‘Get out of your land and away from your relatives, and come into a land which I will show you.’

He gave him no inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on. He promised that he would give it to him for a possession, and to his offspring after him, when he still had no child.

‘I will judge the nation to which they will be in bondage,’ said God, ‘and after that they will come out and serve me in this place.’

He gave him the covenant of circumcision. So Abraham became the father of Isaac, and circumcised him the eighth day. Isaac became the father of Jacob, and Jacob became the father of the twelve patriarchs.

“But as the time of the promise came close which God had sworn to Abraham, the people grew and multiplied in Egypt,

‘I am the God of your fathers: the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ Moses trembled and dared not look.

This is that Moses who said to the children of Israel, ‘The Lord our God will raise up a prophet for you from amongst your brothers, like me.’

This is he who was in the assembly in the wilderness with the angel that spoke to him on Mount Sinai, and with our fathers, who received living revelations to give to us,

“Our fathers had the tabernacle of the testimony in the wilderness, even as he who spoke to Moses commanded him to make it according to the pattern that he had seen;

From this man’s offspring, God has brought salvation to Israel according to his promise,

“Brothers, children of the stock of Abraham, and those amongst you who fear God, the word of this salvation is sent out to you.

that God has fulfilled this to us, their children, in that he raised up Jesus. As it is also written in the second psalm, ‘You are my Son. Today I have become your father.’

“Concerning that he raised him up from the dead, now no more to return to corruption, he has spoken thus: ‘I will give you the holy and sure blessings of David.’

Simeon has reported how God first visited the nations to take out of them a people for his name.

This agrees with the words of the prophets. As it is written,

‘After these things I will return. I will again build the tabernacle of David, which has fallen. I will again build its ruins. I will set it up

that the rest of men may seek after the Lord: all the Gentiles who are called by my name, says the Lord, who does all these things.’

Paul, having stayed after this many more days, took his leave of the brothers, and sailed from there for Syria, together with Priscilla and Aquila. He shaved his head in Cenchreae, for he had a vow.

Now I stand here to be judged for the hope of the promise made by God to our fathers,

which he promised before through his prophets in the holy Scriptures,

concerning his Son, who was born of the offspring of David according to the flesh,

without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, unforgiving, unmerciful;

For circumcision indeed profits, if you are a doer of the law, but if you are a transgressor of the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision.

If therefore the uncircumcised keep the ordinances of the law, won’t his uncircumcision be accounted as circumcision?

For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh;

but he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, not in the letter; whose praise is not from men, but from God.

Then what advantage does the Jew have? Or what is the profit of circumcision?

Much in every way! Because first of all, they were entrusted with the revelations of God.

How then was it counted? When he was in circumcision, or in uncircumcision? Not in circumcision, but in uncircumcision.

He received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had while he was in uncircumcision, that he might be the father of all those who believe, though they might be in uncircumcision, that righteousness might also be accounted to them.

For the promise to Abraham and to his offspring that he would be heir of the world wasn’t through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.

For this cause it is of faith, that it may be according to grace, to the end that the promise may be sure to all the offspring, not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all.

As it is written, “I have made you a father of many nations.” This is in the presence of him whom he believed: God, who gives life to the dead, and calls the things that are not, as though they were.

Against hope, Abraham in hope believed, to the end that he might become a father of many nations, according to that which had been spoken, “So will your offspring be.”

For whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn amongst many brothers.

Whom he predestined, those he also called. Whom he called, those he also justified. Whom he justified, those he also glorified.

who are Israelites; whose is the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service, and the promises;

Neither, because they are Abraham’s offspring, are they all children. But, “your offspring will be accounted as from Isaac.”

That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as heirs.

As he says also in Hosea, “I will call them ‘my people,’ which were not my people; and her ‘beloved,’ who was not beloved.”

“It will be that in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be called ‘children of the living God.’”

I ask then, did God reject his people? May it never be! For I also am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.

God didn’t reject his people, whom he foreknew. Or don’t you know what the Scripture says about Elijah? How he pleads with God against Israel:

and so all Israel will be saved. Even as it is written, “There will come out of Zion the Deliverer, and he will turn away ungodliness from Jacob.

This is my covenant with them, when I will take away their sins.”

For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.

Now I say that Christ has been made a servant of the circumcision for the truth of God, that he might confirm the promises given to the fathers,

and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.

When he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “Take, eat. This is my body, which is broken for you. Do this in memory of me.”

In the same way he also took the cup after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink, in memory of me.”

who also sealed us and gave us the down payment of the Spirit in our hearts.

being revealed that you are a letter of Christ, served by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tablets of stone, but in tablets that are hearts of flesh.

who also made us sufficient as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

But if the service of death, written engraved on stones, came with glory, so that the children of Israel could not look steadfastly on the face of Moses for the glory of his face, which was passing away,

and not as Moses, who put a veil on his face so that the children of Israel wouldn’t look steadfastly on the end of that which was passing away.

But their minds were hardened, for until this very day at the reading of the old covenant the same veil remains, because in Christ it passes away.

But to this day, when Moses is read, a veil lies on their heart.

What agreement does a temple of God have with idols? For you are a temple of the living God. Even as God said, “I will dwell in them and walk in them. I will be their God and they will be my people.”

I will be to you a Father. You will be to me sons and daughters,’ says the Lord Almighty.”

Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they the offspring of Abraham? So am I.

Brothers, speaking of human terms, though it is only a man’s covenant, yet when it has been confirmed, no one makes it void or adds to it.

Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his offspring. He doesn’t say, “To descendants”, as of many, but as of one, “To your offspring”, which is Christ.

Now I say this: A covenant confirmed beforehand by God in Christ, the law, which came four hundred and thirty years after, does not annul, so as to make the promise of no effect.

If you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring and heirs according to promise.

For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the servant, and one by the free woman.

However, the son by the servant was born according to the flesh, but the son by the free woman was born through promise.

These things contain an allegory, for these are two covenants. One is from Mount Sinai, bearing children to bondage, which is Hagar.

For this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and answers to the Jerusalem that exists now, for she is in bondage with her children.

Now we, brothers, as Isaac was, are children of promise.

even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and without defect before him in love,

having predestined us for adoption as children through Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his desire,

Therefore remember that once you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called “uncircumcision” by that which is called “circumcision” (in the flesh, made by hands),

that you were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world.

which are a shadow of the things to come; but the body is Christ’s.

Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God, according to the promise of the life which is in Christ Jesus,

who saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given to us in Christ Jesus before times eternal,

For to which of the angels did he say at any time, “You are my Son. Today I have become your father?” and again, “I will be to him a Father, and he will be to me a Son?”

For most certainly, he doesn’t give help to angels, but he gives help to the offspring of Abraham.

As he says also in another place, “You are a priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek.”

For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he could swear by no one greater, he swore by himself,

saying, “Surely blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply you.”

For men indeed swear by a greater one, and in every dispute of theirs the oath is final for confirmation.

In this way God, being determined to show more abundantly to the heirs of the promise the immutability of his counsel, interposed with an oath,

but he whose genealogy is not counted from them has accepted tithes from Abraham, and has blessed him who has the promises.

for he was yet in the body of his father when Melchizedek met him.

Now if perfection was through the Levitical priesthood (for under it the people have received the law), what further need was there for another priest to arise after the order of Melchizedek, and not be called after the order of Aaron?

For the priesthood being changed, there is of necessity a change made also in the law.

For it is evident that our Lord has sprung out of Judah, about which tribe Moses spoke nothing concerning priesthood.

This is yet more abundantly evident, if after the likeness of Melchizedek there arises another priest,

for it is testified, “You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.”

For there is an annulling of a foregoing commandment because of its weakness and uselessness

(for the law made nothing perfect), and a bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God.

Inasmuch as he was not made priest without the taking of an oath

(for they indeed have been made priests without an oath), but he with an oath by him that says of him, “The Lord swore and will not change his mind, ‘You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.’”

By so much, Jesus has become the guarantee of a better covenant.

For the law appoints men as high priests who have weakness, but the word of the oath, which came after the law, appoints a Son forever who has been perfected.

But now he has obtained a more excellent ministry, by as much as he is also the mediator of a better covenant, which on better promises has been given as law.

For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second.

For finding fault with them, he said, “Behold, the days are coming”, says the Lord, “that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah;

not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; for they didn’t continue in my covenant, and I disregarded them,” says the Lord.

“For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” says the Lord: “I will put my laws into their mind; I will also write them on their heart. I will be their God, and they will be my people.

They will not teach every man his fellow citizen and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all will know me, from their least to their greatest.

In that he says, “A new covenant”, he has made the first obsolete. But that which is becoming obsolete and grows aged is near to vanishing away.

Now indeed even the first covenant had ordinances of divine service and an earthly sanctuary.

having a golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which was a golden pot holding the manna, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant;

being only (with foods and drinks and various washings) fleshly ordinances, imposed until a time of reformation.

But Christ having come as a high priest of the coming good things, through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this creation,

For this reason he is the mediator of a new covenant, since a death has occurred for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first covenant, that those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.

For where a last will and testament is, there must of necessity be the death of him who made it.

For a will is in force where there has been death, for it is never in force while he who made it lives.

Therefore even the first covenant has not been dedicated without blood.

For when every commandment had been spoken by Moses to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of the calves and the goats, with water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people,

saying, “This is the blood of the covenant which God has commanded you.”

then he has said, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He takes away the first, that he may establish the second,

“This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days,” says the Lord, “I will put my laws on their heart, I will also write them on their mind;” then he says,

and having a great priest over God’s house,

How much worse punishment do you think he will be judged worthy of who has trodden under foot the Son of God, and has counted the blood of the covenant with which he was sanctified an unholy thing, and has insulted the Spirit of grace?

to whom it was said, “Your offspring will be accounted as from Isaac,”

By faith Joseph, when his end was near, made mention of the departure of the children of Israel, and gave instructions concerning his bones.

For you have not come to a mountain that might be touched and that burnt with fire, and to blackness, darkness, storm,

to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better than that of Abel.

We have an altar from which those who serve the holy tabernacle have no right to eat.

For the bodies of those animals, whose blood is brought into the holy place by the high priest as an offering for sin, are burnt outside of the camp.

Now may the God of peace, who brought again from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep with the blood of an eternal covenant, our Lord Jesus,

who was foreknown indeed before the foundation of the world, but was revealed in this last age for your sake,

This is the promise which he promised us, the eternal life.

I heard the number of those who were sealed, one hundred and forty-four thousand, sealed out of every tribe of the children of Israel:

of the tribe of Judah twelve thousand were sealed, of the tribe of Reuben twelve thousand, of the tribe of Gad twelve thousand,

of the tribe of Asher twelve thousand, of the tribe of Naphtali twelve thousand, of the tribe of Manasseh twelve thousand,

of the tribe of Simeon twelve thousand, of the tribe of Levi twelve thousand, of the tribe of Issachar twelve thousand,

of the tribe of Zebulun twelve thousand, of the tribe of Joseph twelve thousand, and of the tribe of Benjamin twelve thousand were sealed.

but in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he is about to sound, then the mystery of God is finished, as he declared to his servants the prophets.

God’s temple that is in heaven was opened, and the ark of the Lord’s covenant was seen in his temple. Lightnings, sounds, thunders, an earthquake, and great hail followed.

I heard a loud voice out of heaven saying, “Behold, God’s dwelling is with people; and he will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.

He who overcomes, I will give him these things. I will be his God, and he will be my son.

having a great and high wall with twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and names written on them, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel.

The wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them twelve names of the twelve Apostles of the Lamb.

I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify these things to you for the assemblies. I am the root and the offspring of David, the Bright and Morning Star.”