Exodus

1These are the names of the sons of Israel who went to Egypt with Jacob, each with his family:

²Reuben, Simeon, Levi and Judah; ³Issachar, Zebulun and Benjamin; ⁴Dan and Naphtali; Gad and Asher.

⁵The descendants of Jacob numbered seventy in all; Joseph was already in Egypt.

⁶Now Joseph and all his brothers and all that generation died,

⁷but the Israelites were fruitful and multiplied greatly and became exceedingly numerous, so that the land was filled with them.

⁸Then a new king, who did not know about Joseph, came to power in Egypt.

⁹“Look,” he said to his people, “the Israelites have become much too numerous for us.

¹⁰Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country.”

¹¹So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labor, and

they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh.

¹²But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread; so the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites

¹³and worked them ruthlessly.

¹⁴They made their lives bitter with hard labor in brick and mortar and with all kinds of work in the fields; in all their hard labor the Egyptians used them ruthlessly.

¹⁵The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, whose names were Shiphrah and Puah,

¹⁶“When you help the Hebrew women in childbirth and observe them on the delivery stool, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, let her live.”

¹⁷The midwives, however, feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them to do; they let the boys live.

¹⁸Then the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and asked them, “Why have you done this? Why have you let the boys live?”

¹⁹The midwives answered Pharaoh, “Hebrew women are not like Egyptian women; they are vigorous and give birth before the midwives arrive.”

²⁰So God was kind to the midwives and the people increased and became even more numerous.

²¹And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families of their own.

²²Then Pharaoh gave this order to all his people: “Every boy that is born you must throw into the Nile, but let every girl live.”

2Now a man of the house of Levi married a Levite woman,

²and she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him for three months.

³But when she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch. Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile.

⁴His sister stood at a distance to see what would happen to him.

⁵Then Pharaoh’s daughter went down to the Nile to bathe, and her attendants were walking along the river bank. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her slave girl to get it.

⁶She opened it and saw the baby. He was crying, and she felt sorry for him. “This is one of the Hebrew babies,” she said.

⁷Then his sister asked Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and get one of the

Hebrew women to nurse the baby for you?”

⁸“Yes, go,” she answered. And the girl went and got the baby’s mother.

⁹Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this baby and nurse him for me, and I will pay you.” So the woman took the baby and nursed him.

¹⁰When the child grew older, she took him to Pharaoh’s daughter and he became her son. She named him Moses, saying, “I drew him out of the water.”

¹¹One day, after Moses had grown up, he went out to where his own people were and watched them at their hard labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people.

¹²Glancing this way and that and seeing no one, he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.

¹³The next day he went out and saw two Hebrews fighting. He asked the one in the wrong, “Why are you hitting your fellow Hebrew?”

¹⁴The man said, “Who made you ruler and judge over us? Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid and thought, “What I did must have become known.”

¹⁵When Pharaoh heard of this, he tried to kill Moses, but Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in Midian, where he sat down by a well.

¹⁶Now a priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came to draw water and fill the troughs to water their father’s flock.

¹⁷Some shepherds came along and drove them away, but Moses got up and came to their rescue and watered their flock.

¹⁸When the girls returned to Reuel their father, he asked them, “Why have you returned so early today?”

¹⁹They answered, “An Egyptian rescued us from the shepherds. He even drew water for us and watered the flock.”

²⁰“And where is he?” he asked his daughters. “Why did you leave him? Invite him to have something to eat.”

²¹Moses agreed to stay with the man, who gave his daughter Zipporah to Moses in marriage.

²²Zipporah gave birth to a son, and Moses named him Gershom, saying, “I have become an alien in a foreign land.”

²³During that long period, the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned in their slavery and cried out, and their cry for help because of their slavery went up to God.

²⁴God heard their groaning and he remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac and with Jacob.

²⁵So God looked on the Israelites and was concerned about them.

3Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the desert and came to Horeb, the mountain of God.

²There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up.

³So Moses thought, “I will go over and see this strange sight-why the bush does not burn up.”

⁴When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!” And Moses said, “Here I am.”

⁵“Do not come any closer,” God said. “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.”

⁶Then he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.

⁷The Lord said, “I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering.

⁸So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey-the home of the

Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites.

⁹And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them.

¹⁰So now, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt.”

¹¹But Moses said to God, “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”

¹²And God said, “I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.”

¹³Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?”

¹⁴God said to Moses, “I am who I am . This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘IAM has sent me to you.’ “

¹⁵God also said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘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, the name by which I am to be remembered from generation to generation.

¹⁶“Go, assemble the elders of Israel and say to them, ‘The Lord , the God of your fathers-the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob-appeared to me and said: I have

watched over you and have seen what has been done to you in Egypt.

¹⁷And I have promised to bring you up out of your misery in Egypt into the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites-a land flowing with milk and honey.’

¹⁸“The elders of Israel will listen to you. Then you and the elders are to go to the king of Egypt and say to him, ‘The Lord , the God of the Hebrews, has met with us. Let us take a three-day journey into the desert to offer sacrifices to the Lord our God.’

¹⁹But I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go unless a mighty hand compels him.

²⁰So I will stretch out my hand and strike the Egyptians with all the wonders that I will perform among them. After that, he will let you go.

²¹“And I will make the Egyptians favorably disposed toward this people, so that when you leave you will not go empty-handed.

²²Every woman is to ask her neighbor and any woman living in her house for articles of silver and gold and for clothing, which you will put on your sons and daughters. And so you will plunder the Egyptians.”

4Moses answered, “What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you’?”

²Then the Lord said to him, “What is that in your hand?” “A staff,” he replied.

³The Lord said, “Throw it on the ground.” Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake, and he ran from it.

⁴Then the Lord said to him, “Reach out your hand and take it by the tail.” So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake and it turned back into a staff in his hand.

⁵“This,” said the Lord , “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.”

⁶Then the Lord said, “Put your hand inside your cloak.” So Moses put his hand into his cloak, and when he took it out, it was leprous, like snow.

⁷“Now put it back into your cloak,” he said. So Moses put his hand back into his cloak, and when he took it out, it was restored, like the rest of his flesh.

⁸Then the Lord said, “If they do not believe you or pay attention to the first miraculous sign, they may believe the second.

⁹But if they do not believe these two signs or listen to you, take some water from the Nile and pour it on the dry ground. The water you take from the river will become blood on the ground.”

¹⁰Moses said to the Lord , “O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the

past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.”

¹¹The Lord said to him, “Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the Lord ?

¹²Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”

¹³But Moses said, “O Lord, please send someone else to do it.”

¹⁴Then the Lord ‘s anger burned against Moses and he said, “What about your brother, Aaron the Levite? I know he can speak well. He is already on his way to meet you, and his heart will be glad when he sees you.

¹⁵You shall speak to him and put words in his mouth; I will help both of you speak and will teach you what to do.

¹⁶He will speak to the people for you, and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God to him.

¹⁷But take this staff in your hand so you can perform miraculous signs with it.”

¹⁸Then Moses went back to Jethro his father-in-law and said to him, “Let me go back to my own people in Egypt to see if any of them are still alive.” Jethro said, “Go, and I wish you well.”

¹⁹Now the Lord had said to Moses in Midian, “Go back to Egypt, for all the men who wanted to kill you are dead.”

²⁰So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey and started back to Egypt. And he took the staff of God in his hand.

²¹The Lord said to Moses, “When you return to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders I have given you the power to do. But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go.

²²Then say to Pharaoh, ‘This is what the Lord says: Israel is my firstborn son,

²³and I told you, “Let my son go, so he may worship me.” But you refused to let him go; so I will kill your firstborn son.’ “

²⁴At a lodging place on the way, the Lord met [Moses] and was about to kill him.

²⁵But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son’s foreskin and touched [Moses’] feet with it. “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me,” she said

²⁶So the Lord let him alone. (At that time she said “bridegroom of blood,” referring to circumcision.)

²⁷The Lord said to Aaron, “Go into the desert to meet Moses.” So he met Moses at the mountain of God and kissed him.

²⁸Then Moses told Aaron everything the Lord had sent him to say, and also about all the miraculous signs he had commanded him to perform.

²⁹Moses and Aaron brought together all the elders of the Israelites,

³⁰and Aaron told them everything the Lord had said to Moses. He also performed the signs before the people,

³¹and they believed. And when they heard that the Lord was concerned about them and had seen their misery, they bowed down and worshiped.

5Afterward Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and said, “This is what the Lord , the God of Israel, says: ‘Let my people go, so that they may hold a festival to me in the desert.’ “

²Pharaoh said, “Who is the Lord , that I should obey him and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord and I will not let Israel go.”

³Then they said, “The God of the Hebrews has met with us. Now let us take a three-day journey into the desert to offer sacrifices to the Lord our God, or he may strike us with plagues or with the sword.”

⁴But the king of Egypt said, “Moses and Aaron, why are you taking the people away from their labor? Get back to your work!”

⁵Then Pharaoh said, “Look, the people of the land are now numerous, and you are stopping them from working.”

⁶That same day Pharaoh gave this order to the slave drivers and foremen in charge of the people:

⁷“You are no longer to supply the people with straw for making bricks; let them go and gather their own straw.

⁸But require them to make the same number of bricks as before; don’t reduce the quota. They are lazy; that is why they are crying out, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to our God.’

⁹Make the work harder for the men so that they keep working and pay no attention to lies.”

¹⁰Then the slave drivers and the foremen went out and said to the people, “This is what Pharaoh says: ‘I will not give you any more straw.

¹¹Go and get your own straw wherever you can find it, but your work will not be reduced at all.’ “

¹²So the people scattered all over Egypt to gather stubble to use for straw.

¹³The slave drivers kept pressing them, saying, “Complete the work required of you for each day, just as when you had straw.”

¹⁴The Israelite foremen appointed by Pharaoh’s slave drivers were beaten and were asked, “Why didn’t you meet your quota of bricks yesterday or today, as before?”

¹⁵Then the Israelite foremen went and appealed to Pharaoh: “Why have you treated your servants this way?

¹⁶Your servants are given no straw, yet we are told, ‘Make bricks!’ Your servants

are being beaten, but the fault is with your own people.”

¹⁷Pharaoh said, “Lazy, that’s what you are-lazy! That is why you keep saying, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to the Lord .’

¹⁸Now get to work. You will not be given any straw, yet you must produce your full quota of bricks.”

¹⁹The Israelite foremen realized they were in trouble when they were told, “You are not to reduce the number of bricks required of you for each day.”

²⁰When they left Pharaoh, they found Moses and Aaron waiting to meet them,

²¹and they said, “May the Lord look upon you and judge you! You have made us a stench to Pharaoh and his officials and have put a sword in their hand to kill us.”

²²Moses returned to the Lord and said, “O Lord, why have you brought trouble upon this people? Is this why you sent me?

²³Ever since I went to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has brought trouble upon this people, and you have not rescued your people at all.”

6Then the Lord said to Moses, “Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh: Because of my mighty hand he will let them go; because of my mighty hand he will drive them out of his country.”

²God also said to Moses, “I am the Lord .

³I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty, but by my name the Lord I did not make myself known to them.

⁴I also established my covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan, where they lived as aliens.

⁵Moreover, I have heard the groaning of the Israelites, whom the Egyptians are enslaving, and I have remembered my covenant.

⁶“Therefore, say to the Israelites: ‘I am the Lord , and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment.

⁷I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians.

⁸And I will bring you to the land I swore with uplifted hand to give to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob. I will give it to you as a possession. I am the Lord .’ “

⁹Moses reported this to the Israelites, but they did not listen to him because of their discouragement and cruel bondage.

¹⁰Then the Lord said to Moses,

¹¹“Go, tell Pharaoh king of Egypt to let the Israelites go out of his country.”

¹²But Moses said to the Lord , “If the Israelites will not listen to me, why would

Pharaoh listen to me, since I speak with faltering lips ?”

¹³Now the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron about the Israelites and Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he commanded them to bring the Israelites out of Egypt.

¹⁴These were the heads of their families : The sons of Reuben the firstborn son of Israel were Hanoch and Pallu, Hezron and Carmi. These were the clans of Reuben.

¹⁵The sons of Simeon were Jemuel, Jamin, Ohad, Jakin, Zohar and Shaul the son of a Canaanite woman. These were the clans of Simeon.

¹⁶These were the names of the sons of Levi according to their records: Gershon, Kohath and Merari. Levi lived 137 years.

¹⁷The sons of Gershon, by clans, were Libni and Shimei.

¹⁸The sons of Kohath were Amram, Izhar, Hebron and Uzziel. Kohath lived 133 years.

¹⁹The sons of Merari were Mahli and Mushi. These were the clans of Levi according to their records.

²⁰Amram married his father’s sister Jochebed, who bore him Aaron and Moses. Amram lived 137 years.

²¹The sons of Izhar were Korah, Nepheg and Zicri.

²²The sons of Uzziel were Mishael, Elzaphan and Sithri.

²³Aaron married Elisheba, daughter of Amminadab and sister of Nahshon, and she bore him Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar.

²⁴The sons of Korah were Assir, Elkanah and Abiasaph. These were the Korahite clans.

²⁵Eleazar son of Aaron married one of the daughters of Putiel, and she bore him Phinehas. These were the heads of the Levite families, clan by clan.

²⁶It was this same Aaron and Moses to whom the Lord said, “Bring the Israelites out of Egypt by their divisions.”

²⁷They were the ones who spoke to Pharaoh king of Egypt about bringing the Israelites out of Egypt. It was the same Moses and Aaron.

²⁸Now when the Lord spoke to Moses in Egypt,

²⁹he said to him, “I am the Lord . Tell Pharaoh king of Egypt everything I tell you.”

³⁰But Moses said to the Lord , “Since I speak with faltering lips, why would Pharaoh listen to me?”

7Then the Lord said to Moses, “See, I have made you like God to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron will be your prophet.

²You are to say everything I command you, and your brother Aaron is to tell

Pharaoh to let the Israelites go out of his country.

³But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and though I multiply my miraculous signs and wonders in Egypt,

⁴he will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and with mighty acts of judgment I will bring out my divisions, my people the Israelites.

⁵And the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring the Israelites out of it.”

⁶Moses and Aaron did just as the Lord commanded them.

⁷Moses was eighty years old and Aaron eighty-three when they spoke to Pharaoh.

⁸The Lord said to Moses and Aaron,

⁹“When Pharaoh says to you, ‘Perform a miracle,’ then say to Aaron, ‘Take your staff and throw it down before Pharaoh,’ and it will become a snake.”

¹⁰So Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and did just as the Lord commanded. Aaron threw his staff down in front of Pharaoh and his officials, and it became a snake.

¹¹Pharaoh then summoned wise men and sorcerers, and the Egyptian magicians also did the same things by their secret arts:

¹²Each one threw down his staff and it became a snake. But Aaron’s staff swallowed up their staffs.

¹³Yet Pharaoh’s heart became hard and he would not listen to them, just as the Lord had said.

¹⁴Then the Lord said to Moses, “Pharaoh’s heart is unyielding; he refuses to let the people go.

¹⁵Go to Pharaoh in the morning as he goes out to the water. Wait on the bank of the Nile to meet him, and take in your hand the staff that was changed into a snake.

¹⁶Then say to him, ‘The Lord , the God of the Hebrews, has sent me to say to you: Let my people go, so that they may worship me in the desert. But until now you have not listened.

¹⁷This is what the Lord says: By this you will know that I am the Lord : With the staff that is in my hand I will strike the water of the Nile, and it will be changed into blood.

¹⁸The fish in the Nile will die, and the river will stink; the Egyptians will not be able to drink its water.’ “

¹⁹The Lord said to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Take your staff and stretch out your hand over the waters of Egypt-over the streams and canals, over the ponds and all the reservoirs’-and they will turn to blood. Blood will be everywhere in Egypt, even in the wooden buckets and stone jars.”

²⁰Moses and Aaron did just as the Lord had commanded. He raised his staff in the presence of Pharaoh and his officials and struck the water of the Nile, and all the water was changed into blood.

²¹The fish in the Nile died, and the river smelled so bad that the Egyptians could not drink its water. Blood was everywhere in Egypt.

²²But the Egyptian magicians did the same things by their secret arts, and Pharaoh’s heart became hard; he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said.

²³Instead, he turned and went into his palace, and did not take even this to heart.

²⁴And all the Egyptians dug along the Nile to get drinking water, because they could not drink the water of the river.

²⁵Seven days passed after the Lord struck the Nile.

8Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord says: Let my people go, so that they may worship me.

²If you refuse to let them go, I will plague your whole country with frogs.

³The Nile will teem with frogs. They will come up into your palace and your bedroom and onto your bed, into the houses of your officials and on your

people, and into your ovens and kneading troughs.

⁴The frogs will go up on you and your people and all your officials.’ “

⁵Then the Lord said to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Stretch out your hand with your staff over the streams and canals and ponds, and make frogs come up on the land of Egypt.’ “

⁶So Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt, and the frogs came up and covered the land.

⁷But the magicians did the same things by their secret arts; they also made frogs come up on the land of Egypt.

⁸Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Pray to the Lord to take the frogs away from me and my people, and I will let your people go to offer sacrifices to the Lord .”

⁹Moses said to Pharaoh, “I leave to you the honor of setting the time for me to pray for you and your officials and your people that you and your houses may be rid of the frogs, except for those that remain in the Nile.”

¹⁰“Tomorrow,” Pharaoh said. Moses replied, “It will be as you say, so that you may know there is no one like the Lord our God.

¹¹The frogs will leave you and your houses, your officials and your people; they will remain only in the Nile.”

¹²After Moses and Aaron left Pharaoh, Moses cried out to the Lord about the frogs he had brought on Pharaoh.

¹³And the Lord did what Moses asked. The frogs died in the houses, in the courtyards and in the fields.

¹⁴They were piled into heaps, and the land reeked of them.

¹⁵But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said.

¹⁶Then the Lord said to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Stretch out your staff and strike the dust of the ground,’ and throughout the land of Egypt the dust will become gnats.”

¹⁷They did this, and when Aaron stretched out his hand with the staff and struck the dust of the ground, gnats came upon men and animals. All the dust throughout the land of Egypt became gnats.

¹⁸But when the magicians tried to produce gnats by their secret arts, they could not. And the gnats were on men and animals.

¹⁹The magicians said to Pharaoh, “This is the finger of God.” But Pharaoh’s heart was hard and he would not listen, just as the Lord had said.

²⁰Then the Lord said to Moses, “Get up early in the morning and confront Pharaoh as he goes to the water and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord says:

Let my people go, so that they may worship me.

²¹If you do not let my people go, I will send swarms of flies on you and your officials, on your people and into your houses. The houses of the Egyptians will be full of flies, and even the ground where they are.

²²” ‘But on that day I will deal differently with the land of Goshen, where my people live; no swarms of flies will be there, so that you will know that I, the Lord , am in this land.

²³I will make a distinction between my people and your people. This miraculous sign will occur tomorrow.’ “

²⁴And the Lord did this. Dense swarms of flies poured into Pharaoh’s palace and into the houses of his officials, and throughout Egypt the land was ruined by the flies.

²⁵Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Go, sacrifice to your God here in the land.”

²⁶But Moses said, “That would not be right. The sacrifices we offer the Lord our God would be detestable to the Egyptians. And if we offer sacrifices that are detestable in their eyes, will they not stone us?

²⁷We must take a three-day journey into the desert to offer sacrifices to the Lord our God, as he commands us.”

²⁸Pharaoh said, “I will let you go to offer sacrifices to the Lord your God in the

desert, but you must not go very far. Now pray for me.”

²⁹Moses answered, “As soon as I leave you, I will pray to the Lord , and tomorrow the flies will leave Pharaoh and his officials and his people. Only be sure that Pharaoh does not act deceitfully again by not letting the people go to offer sacrifices to the Lord .”

³⁰Then Moses left Pharaoh and prayed to the Lord ,

³¹and the Lord did what Moses asked: The flies left Pharaoh and his officials and his people; not a fly remained.

³²But this time also Pharaoh hardened his heart and would not let the people go.

9Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord , the God of the Hebrews, says: “Let my people go, so that they may worship me.”

²If you refuse to let them go and continue to hold them back,

³the hand of the Lord will bring a terrible plague on your livestock in the field-on your horses and donkeys and camels and on your cattle and sheep and goats.

⁴But the Lord will make a distinction between the livestock of Israel and that of Egypt, so that no animal belonging to the Israelites will die.’ “

⁵The Lord set a time and said, “Tomorrow the Lord will do this in the land.”

⁶And the next day the Lord did it: All the livestock of the Egyptians died, but not one animal belonging to the Israelites died.

⁷Pharaoh sent men to investigate and found that not even one of the animals of the Israelites had died. Yet his heart was unyielding and he would not let the people go.

⁸Then the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Take handfuls of soot from a furnace and have Moses toss it into the air in the presence of Pharaoh.

⁹It will become fine dust over the whole land of Egypt, and festering boils will break out on men and animals throughout the land.”

¹⁰So they took soot from a furnace and stood before Pharaoh. Moses tossed it into the air, and festering boils broke out on men and animals.

¹¹The magicians could not stand before Moses because of the boils that were on them and on all the Egyptians.

¹²But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart and he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said to Moses.

¹³Then the Lord said to Moses, “Get up early in the morning, confront Pharaoh and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord ,

the God of the Hebrews, says: Let my people go, so that they may worship me,

¹⁴or this time I will send the full force of my plagues against you and against your officials and your people, so you may know that there is no one like me in all the earth.

¹⁵For by now I could have stretched out my hand and struck you and your people with a plague that would have wiped you off the earth.

¹⁶But I have raised you up for this very purpose, that I might show you my power and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.

¹⁷You still set yourself against my people and will not let them go.

¹⁸Therefore, at this time tomorrow I will send the worst hailstorm that has ever fallen on Egypt, from the day it was founded till now.

¹⁹Give an order now to bring your livestock and everything you have in the field to a place of shelter, because the hail will fall on every man and animal that has not been brought in and is still out in the field, and they will die.’ “

²⁰Those officials of Pharaoh who feared the word of the Lord hurried to bring their slaves and their livestock inside.

²¹But those who ignored the word of the Lord left their slaves and livestock in the field.

²²Then the Lord said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand toward the sky so that hail will fall all over Egypt-on men and animals and on everything growing in the fields of Egypt.”

²³When Moses stretched out his staff toward the sky, the Lord sent thunder and hail, and lightning flashed down to the ground. So the Lord rained hail on the land of Egypt;

²⁴hail fell and lightning flashed back and forth. It was the worst storm in all the land of Egypt since it had become a nation.

²⁵Throughout Egypt hail struck everything in the fields-both men and animals; it beat down everything growing in the fields and stripped every tree.

²⁶The only place it did not hail was the land of Goshen, where the Israelites were.

²⁷Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron. “This time I have sinned,” he said to them. “The Lord is in the right, and I and my people are in the wrong.

²⁸Pray to the Lord , for we have had enough thunder and hail. I will let you go; you don’t have to stay any longer.”

²⁹Moses replied, “When I have gone out of the city, I will spread out my hands in prayer to the Lord . The thunder will stop and there will be no more hail, so you may know that the earth is the Lord ‘s.

³⁰But I know that you and your officials still do not fear the Lord God.”

³¹(The flax and barley were destroyed, since the barley had headed and the flax was in bloom.

³²The wheat and spelt, however, were not destroyed, because they ripen later.)

³³Then Moses left Pharaoh and went out of the city. He spread out his hands toward the Lord ; the thunder and hail stopped, and the rain no longer poured down on the land.

³⁴When Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail and thunder had stopped, he sinned again: He and his officials hardened their hearts.

³⁵So Pharaoh’s heart was hard and he would not let the Israelites go, just as the Lord had said through Moses.

10Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these miraculous signs of mine among them

²that you may tell your children and grandchildren how I dealt harshly with the Egyptians and how I performed my signs among them, and that you may know that I am the Lord .”

³So Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and said to him, “This is what the Lord , the God of the Hebrews, says: ‘How long will you refuse to humble yourself

before me? Let my people go, so that they may worship me.

⁴If you refuse to let them go, I will bring locusts into your country tomorrow.

⁵They will cover the face of the ground so that it cannot be seen. They will devour what little you have left after the hail, including every tree that is growing in your fields.

⁶They will fill your houses and those of all your officials and all the Egyptians- something neither your fathers nor your forefathers have ever seen from the day they settled in this land till now.’ ” Then Moses turned and left Pharaoh.

⁷Pharaoh’s officials said to him, “How long will this man be a snare to us? Let the people go, so that they may worship the Lord their God. Do you not yet realize that Egypt is ruined?”

⁸Then Moses and Aaron were brought back to Pharaoh. “Go, worship the Lord your God,” he said. “But just who will be going?”

⁹Moses answered, “We will go with our young and old, with our sons and daughters, and with our flocks and herds, because we are to celebrate a festival to the Lord .”

¹⁰Pharaoh said, “The Lord be with you-if I let you go, along with your women and children! Clearly you are bent on evil.

¹¹No! Have only the men go; and worship the Lord , since that’s what you have been asking for.” Then Moses and

Aaron were driven out of Pharaoh’s presence.

¹²And the Lord said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand over Egypt so that locusts will swarm over the land and devour everything growing in the fields, everything left by the hail.”

¹³So Moses stretched out his staff over Egypt, and the Lord made an east wind blow across the land all that day and all that night. By morning the wind had brought the locusts;

¹⁴they invaded all Egypt and settled down in every area of the country in great numbers. Never before had there been such a plague of locusts, nor will there ever be again.

¹⁵They covered all the ground until it was black. They devoured all that was left after the hail-everything growing in the fields and the fruit on the trees. Nothing green remained on tree or plant in all the land of Egypt.

¹⁶Pharaoh quickly summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “I have sinned against the Lord your God and against you.

¹⁷Now forgive my sin once more and pray to the Lord your God to take this deadly plague away from me.”

¹⁸Moses then left Pharaoh and prayed to the Lord .

¹⁹And the Lord changed the wind to a very strong west wind, which caught up the locusts and carried them into the

Red Sea. Not a locust was left anywhere in Egypt.

²⁰But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he would not let the Israelites go.

²¹Then the Lord said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand toward the sky so that darkness will spread over Egypt- darkness that can be felt.”

²²So Moses stretched out his hand toward the sky, and total darkness covered all Egypt for three days.

²³No one could see anyone else or leave his place for three days. Yet all the Israelites had light in the places where they lived.

²⁴Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and said, “Go, worship the Lord . Even your women and children may go with you; only leave your flocks and herds behind.”

²⁵But Moses said, “You must allow us to have sacrifices and burnt offerings to present to the Lord our God.

²⁶Our livestock too must go with us; not a hoof is to be left behind. We have to use some of them in worshiping the Lord our God, and until we get there we will not know what we are to use to worship the Lord .”

²⁷But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he was not willing to let them go.

²⁸Pharaoh said to Moses, “Get out of my sight! Make sure you do not appear

before me again! The day you see my face you will die.”

²⁹“Just as you say,” Moses replied, “I will never appear before you again.”

11Now the Lord had said to Moses, “I will bring one more plague on Pharaoh and on Egypt. After that, he will let you go from here, and when he does, he will drive you out completely.

²Tell the people that men and women alike are to ask their neighbors for articles of silver and gold.”

³(The Lord made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and Moses himself was highly regarded in Egypt by Pharaoh’s officials and by the people.)

⁴So Moses said, “This is what the Lord says: ‘About midnight I will go throughout Egypt.

⁵Every firstborn son in Egypt will die, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn son of the slave girl, who is at her hand mill, and all the firstborn of the cattle as well.

⁶There will be loud wailing throughout Egypt-worse than there has ever been or ever will be again.

⁷But among the Israelites not a dog will bark at any man or animal.’ Then you will know that the Lord makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel.

⁸All these officials of yours will come to me, bowing down before me and saying, ‘Go, you and all the people who follow you!’ After that I will leave.” Then Moses, hot with anger, left Pharaoh.

⁹The Lord had said to Moses, “Pharaoh will refuse to listen to you-so that my wonders may be multiplied in Egypt.”

¹⁰Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharaoh, but the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he would not let the Israelites go out of his country.

12The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt,

²“This month is to be for you the first month, the first month of your year.

³Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month each man is to take a lamb for his family, one for each household.

⁴If any household is too small for a whole lamb, they must share one with their nearest neighbor, having taken into account the number of people there are. You are to determine the amount of lamb needed in accordance with what each person will eat.

⁵The animals you choose must be year- old males without defect, and you may take them from the sheep or the goats.

⁶Take care of them until the fourteenth day of the month, when all the people of

the community of Israel must slaughter them at twilight.

⁷Then they are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and tops of the doorframes of the houses where they eat the lambs.

⁸That same night they are to eat the meat roasted over the fire, along with bitter herbs, and bread made without yeast.

⁹Do not eat the meat raw or cooked in water, but roast it over the fire-head, legs and inner parts.

¹⁰Do not leave any of it till morning; if some is left till morning, you must burn it.

¹¹This is how you are to eat it: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the Lord ‘s Passover.

¹²“On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn- both men and animals-and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. I am the Lord .

¹³The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are; and when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt.

¹⁴“This is a day you are to commemorate; for the generations to come you shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord -a lasting ordinance.

¹⁵For seven days you are to eat bread made without yeast. On the first day remove the yeast from your houses, for whoever eats anything with yeast in it from the first day through the seventh must be cut off from Israel.

¹⁶On the first day hold a sacred assembly, and another one on the seventh day. Do no work at all on these days, except to prepare food for everyone to eat-that is all you may do.

¹⁷“Celebrate the Feast of Unleavened Bread, because it was on this very day that I brought your divisions out of Egypt. Celebrate this day as a lasting ordinance for the generations to come.

¹⁸In the first month you are to eat bread made without yeast, from the evening of the fourteenth day until the evening of the twenty-first day.

¹⁹For seven days no yeast is to be found in your houses. And whoever eats anything with yeast in it must be cut off from the community of Israel, whether he is an alien or native-born.

²⁰Eat nothing made with yeast. Wherever you live, you must eat unleavened bread.”

²¹Then Moses summoned all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Go at once and select the animals for your families and slaughter the Passover lamb.

²²Take a bunch of hyssop, dip it into the blood in the basin and put some of the blood on the top and on both sides of

the doorframe. Not one of you shall go out the door of his house until morning.

²³When the Lord goes through the land to strike down the Egyptians, he will see the blood on the top and sides of the doorframe and will pass over that doorway, and he will not permit the destroyer to enter your houses and strike you down.

²⁴“Obey these instructions as a lasting ordinance for you and your descendants.

²⁵When you enter the land that the Lord will give you as he promised, observe this ceremony.

²⁶And when your children ask you, ‘What does this ceremony mean to you?’

²⁷then tell them, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice to the Lord , who passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt and spared our homes when he struck down the Egyptians.’ ” Then the people bowed down and worshiped.

²⁸The Israelites did just what the Lord commanded Moses and Aaron.

²⁹At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstborn in Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well.

³⁰Pharaoh and all his officials and all the Egyptians got up during the night, and there was loud wailing in Egypt, for there was not a house without someone dead.

³¹During the night Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Up! Leave my people, you and the Israelites! Go, worship the Lord as you have requested.

³²Take your flocks and herds, as you have said, and go. And also bless me.”

³³The Egyptians urged the people to hurry and leave the country. “For otherwise,” they said, “we will all die!”

³⁴So the people took their dough before the yeast was added, and carried it on their shoulders in kneading troughs wrapped in clothing.

³⁵The Israelites did as Moses instructed and asked the Egyptians for articles of silver and gold and for clothing.

³⁶The Lord had made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and they gave them what they asked for; so they plundered the Egyptians.

³⁷The Israelites journeyed from Rameses to Succoth. There were about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children.

³⁸Many other people went up with them, as well as large droves of livestock, both flocks and herds.

³⁹With the dough they had brought from Egypt, they baked cakes of unleavened bread. The dough was without yeast because they had been driven out of Egypt and did not have time to prepare food for themselves.

⁴⁰Now the length of time the Israelite people lived in Egypt was 430 years.

⁴¹At the end of the 430 years, to the very day, all the Lord ‘s divisions left Egypt.

⁴²Because the Lord kept vigil that night to bring them out of Egypt, on this night all the Israelites are to keep vigil to honor the Lord for the generations to come.

⁴³The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “These are the regulations for the Passover: “No foreigner is to eat of it.

⁴⁴Any slave you have bought may eat of it after you have circumcised him,

⁴⁵but a temporary resident and a hired worker may not eat of it.

⁴⁶“It must be eaten inside one house; take none of the meat outside the house. Do not break any of the bones.

⁴⁷The whole community of Israel must celebrate it.

⁴⁸“An alien living among you who wants to celebrate the Lord ‘s Passover must have all the males in his household circumcised; then he may take part like one born in the land. No uncircumcised male may eat of it.

⁴⁹The same law applies to the native- born and to the alien living among you.”

⁵⁰All the Israelites did just what the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron.

⁵¹And on that very day the Lord brought the Israelites out of Egypt by their divisions.

13The Lord said to Moses,

²“Consecrate to me every firstborn male. The first offspring of every womb among the Israelites belongs to me, whether man or animal.”

³Then Moses said to the people, “Commemorate this day, the day you came out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery, because the Lord brought you out of it with a mighty hand. Eat nothing containing yeast.

⁴Today, in the month of Abib, you are leaving.

⁵When the Lord brings you into the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Hivites and Jebusites-the land he swore to your forefathers to give you, a land flowing with milk and honey-you are to observe this ceremony in this month:

⁶For seven days eat bread made without yeast and on the seventh day hold a festival to the Lord .

⁷Eat unleavened bread during those seven days; nothing with yeast in it is to be seen among you, nor shall any yeast be seen anywhere within your borders.

⁸On that day tell your son, ‘I do this because of what the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt.’

⁹This observance will be for you like a sign on your hand and a reminder on your forehead that the law of the Lord is to be on your lips. For the Lord brought you out of Egypt with his mighty hand.

¹⁰You must keep this ordinance at the appointed time year after year.

¹¹“After the Lord brings you into the land of the Canaanites and gives it to you, as he promised on oath to you and your forefathers,

¹²you are to give over to the Lord the first offspring of every womb. All the firstborn males of your livestock belong to the Lord .

¹³Redeem with a lamb every firstborn donkey, but if you do not redeem it, break its neck. Redeem every firstborn among your sons.

¹⁴“In days to come, when your son asks you, ‘What does this mean?’ say to him, ‘With a mighty hand the Lord brought us out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

¹⁵When Pharaoh stubbornly refused to let us go, the Lord killed every firstborn in Egypt, both man and animal. This is why I sacrifice to the Lord the first male offspring of every womb and redeem each of my firstborn sons.’

¹⁶And it will be like a sign on your hand and a symbol on your forehead that the Lord brought us out of Egypt with his mighty hand.”

¹⁷When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them on the road through

the Philistine country, though that was shorter. For God said, “If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.”

¹⁸So God led the people around by the desert road toward the Red Sea. The Israelites went up out of Egypt armed for battle.

¹⁹Moses took the bones of Joseph with him because Joseph had made the sons of Israel swear an oath. He had said, “God will surely come to your aid, and then you must carry my bones up with you from this place.”

²⁰After leaving Succoth they camped at Etham on the edge of the desert.

²¹By day the Lord went ahead of them in a pillar of cloud to guide them on their way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, so that they could travel by day or night.

²²Neither the pillar of cloud by day nor the pillar of fire by night left its place in front of the people.

14Then the Lord said to Moses,

²“Tell the Israelites to turn back and encamp near Pi Hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea. They are to encamp by the sea, directly opposite Baal Zephon.

³Pharaoh will think, ‘The Israelites are wandering around the land in confusion, hemmed in by the desert.’

⁴And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he will pursue them. But I will gain glory for myself through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord .” So the Israelites did this.

⁵When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, Pharaoh and his officials changed their minds about them and said, “What have we done? We have let the Israelites go and have lost their services!”

⁶So he had his chariot made ready and took his army with him.

⁷He took six hundred of the best chariots, along with all the other chariots of Egypt, with officers over all of them.

⁸The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, so that he pursued the Israelites, who were marching out boldly.

⁹The Egyptians-all Pharaoh’s horses and chariots, horsemen and troops- pursued the Israelites and overtook them as they camped by the sea near Pi Hahiroth, opposite Baal Zephon.

¹⁰As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians, marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the Lord .

¹¹They said to Moses, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt?

¹²Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!”

¹³Moses answered the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again.

¹⁴The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.”

¹⁵Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on.

¹⁶Raise your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea to divide the water so that the Israelites can go through the sea on dry ground.

¹⁷I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them. And I will gain glory through Pharaoh and all his army, through his chariots and his horsemen.

¹⁸The Egyptians will know that I am the Lord when I gain glory through Pharaoh, his chariots and his horsemen.”

¹⁹Then the angel of God, who had been traveling in front of Israel’s army, withdrew and went behind them. The pillar of cloud also moved from in front and stood behind them,

²⁰coming between the armies of Egypt and Israel. Throughout the night the cloud brought darkness to the one side

and light to the other side; so neither went near the other all night long.

²¹Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land. The waters were divided,

²²and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left.

²³The Egyptians pursued them, and all Pharaoh’s horses and chariots and horsemen followed them into the sea.

²⁴During the last watch of the night the Lord looked down from the pillar of fire and cloud at the Egyptian army and threw it into confusion.

²⁵He made the wheels of their chariots come off so that they had difficulty driving. And the Egyptians said, “Let’s get away from the Israelites! The Lord is fighting for them against Egypt.”

²⁶Then the Lord said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand over the sea so that the waters may flow back over the Egyptians and their chariots and horsemen.”

²⁷Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and at daybreak the sea went back to its place. The Egyptians were fleeing toward it, and the Lord swept them into the sea.

²⁸The water flowed back and covered the chariots and horsemen-the entire army of Pharaoh that had followed the

Israelites into the sea. Not one of them survived.

²⁹But the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left.

³⁰That day the Lord saved Israel from the hands of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians lying dead on the shore.

³¹And when the Israelites saw the great power the Lord displayed against the Egyptians, the people feared the Lord and put their trust in him and in Moses his servant.

15Then Moses and the Israelites sang this song to the Lord : “I will sing to the Lord , for he is highly exalted. The horse and its rider he has hurled into the sea.

²The Lord is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise him, my father’s God, and I will exalt him.

³The Lord is a warrior; the Lord is his name.

⁴Pharaoh’s chariots and his army he has hurled into the sea. The best of Pharaoh’s officers are drowned in the Red Sea.

⁵The deep waters have covered them; they sank to the depths like a stone.

⁶“Your right hand, O Lord , was majestic in power. Your right hand, O Lord , shattered the enemy.

⁷In the greatness of your majesty you threw down those who opposed you. You unleashed your burning anger; it consumed them like stubble.

⁸By the blast of your nostrils the waters piled up. The surging waters stood firm like a wall; the deep waters congealed in the heart of the sea.

⁹“The enemy boasted, ‘I will pursue, I will overtake them. I will divide the spoils; I will gorge myself on them. I will draw my sword and my hand will destroy them.’

¹⁰But you blew with your breath, and the sea covered them. They sank like lead in the mighty waters.

¹¹“Who among the gods is like you, O Lord ? Who is like you- majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonders?

¹²You stretched out your right hand and the earth swallowed them.

¹³“In your unfailing love you will lead the people you have redeemed. In your strength you will guide them to your holy dwelling.

¹⁴The nations will hear and tremble; anguish will grip the people of Philistia.

¹⁵The chiefs of Edom will be terrified, the leaders of Moab will be seized with

trembling, the people of Canaan will melt away;

¹⁶terror and dread will fall upon them. By the power of your arm they will be as still as a stone- until your people pass by, O Lord , until the people you bought pass by.

¹⁷You will bring them in and plant them on the mountain of your inheritance- the place, O Lord , you made for your dwelling, the sanctuary, O Lord, your hands established.

¹⁸The Lord will reign for ever and ever.”

¹⁹When Pharaoh’s horses, chariots and horsemen went into the sea, the Lord brought the waters of the sea back over them, but the Israelites walked through the sea on dry ground.

²⁰Then Miriam the prophetess, Aaron’s sister, took a tambourine in her hand, and all the women followed her, with tambourines and dancing.

²¹Miriam sang to them: “Sing to the Lord , for he is highly exalted. The horse and its rider he has hurled into the sea.”

²²Then Moses led Israel from the Red Sea and they went into the Desert of Shur. For three days they traveled in the desert without finding water.

²³When they came to Marah, they could not drink its water because it was bitter. (That is why the place is called Marah. )

²⁴So the people grumbled against Moses, saying, “What are we to drink?”

²⁵Then Moses cried out to the Lord , and the Lord showed him a piece of wood. He threw it into the water, and the water became sweet. There the Lord made a decree and a law for them, and there he tested them.

²⁶He said, “If you listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep all his decrees, I will not bring on you any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, for I am the Lord , who heals you.”

²⁷Then they came to Elim, where there were twelve springs and seventy palm trees, and they camped there near the water.

16The whole Israelite community set out from Elim and came to the Desert of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after they had come out of Egypt.

²In the desert the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron.

³The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the Lord ‘s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.”

⁴Then the Lord said to Moses, “I will rain down bread from heaven for you. The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day. In this way I will test them and see whether they will follow my instructions.

⁵On the sixth day they are to prepare what they bring in, and that is to be twice as much as they gather on the other days.”

⁶So Moses and Aaron said to all the Israelites, “In the evening you will know that it was the Lord who brought you out of Egypt,

⁷and in the morning you will see the glory of the Lord , because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we, that you should grumble against us?”

⁸Moses also said, “You will know that it was the Lord when he gives you meat to eat in the evening and all the bread you want in the morning, because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we? You are not grumbling against us, but against the Lord .”

⁹Then Moses told Aaron, “Say to the entire Israelite community, ‘Come before the Lord , for he has heard your grumbling.’ “

¹⁰While Aaron was speaking to the whole Israelite community, they looked toward the desert, and there was the glory of the Lord appearing in the cloud.

¹¹The Lord said to Moses,

¹²“I have heard the grumbling of the Israelites. Tell them, ‘At twilight you will eat meat, and in the morning you will be filled with bread. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God.’ “

¹³That evening quail came and covered the camp, and in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp.

¹⁴When the dew was gone, thin flakes like frost on the ground appeared on the desert floor.

¹⁵When the Israelites saw it, they said to each other, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was. Moses said to them, “It is the bread the Lord has given you to eat.

¹⁶This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘Each one is to gather as much as he needs. Take an omer for each person you have in your tent.’ “

¹⁷The Israelites did as they were told; some gathered much, some little.

¹⁸And when they measured it by the omer, he who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did not have too little. Each one gathered as much as he needed.

¹⁹Then Moses said to them, “No one is to keep any of it until morning.”

²⁰However, some of them paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it until morning, but it was full of maggots and began to smell. So Moses was angry with them.

²¹Each morning everyone gathered as much as he needed, and when the sun grew hot, it melted away.

²²On the sixth day, they gathered twice as much-two omers for each person-and

the leaders of the community came and reported this to Moses.

²³He said to them, “This is what the Lord commanded: ‘Tomorrow is to be a day of rest, a holy Sabbath to the Lord . So bake what you want to bake and boil what you want to boil. Save whatever is left and keep it until morning.’ “

²⁴So they saved it until morning, as Moses commanded, and it did not stink or get maggots in it.

²⁵“Eat it today,” Moses said, “because today is a Sabbath to the Lord . You will not find any of it on the ground today.

²⁶Six days you are to gather it, but on the seventh day, the Sabbath, there will not be any.”

²⁷Nevertheless, some of the people went out on the seventh day to gather it, but they found none.

²⁸Then the Lord said to Moses, “How long will you refuse to keep my commands and my instructions?

²⁹Bear in mind that the Lord has given you the Sabbath; that is why on the sixth day he gives you bread for two days. Everyone is to stay where he is on the seventh day; no one is to go out.”

³⁰So the people rested on the seventh day.

³¹The people of Israel called the bread manna. It was white like coriander seed and tasted like wafers made with honey.

³²Moses said, “This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘Take an omer of manna and keep it for the generations to come, so they can see the bread I gave you to eat in the desert when I brought you out of Egypt.’ “

³³So Moses said to Aaron, “Take a jar and put an omer of manna in it. Then place it before the Lord to be kept for the generations to come.”

³⁴As the Lord commanded Moses, Aaron put the manna in front of the Testimony, that it might be kept.

³⁵The Israelites ate manna forty years, until they came to a land that was settled; they ate manna until they reached the border of Canaan.

³⁶(An omer is one tenth of an ephah.)

17The whole Israelite community set out from the Desert of Sin, traveling from place to place as the Lord commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink.

²So they quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” Moses replied, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you put the Lord to the test?”

³But the people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?”

⁴Then Moses cried out to the Lord , “What am I to do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me.”

⁵The Lord answered Moses, “Walk on ahead of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go.

⁶I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.” So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel.

⁷And he called the place Massah and Meribah because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the Lord saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?”

⁸The Amalekites came and attacked the Israelites at Rephidim.

⁹Moses said to Joshua, “Choose some of our men and go out to fight the Amalekites. Tomorrow I will stand on top of the hill with the staff of God in my hands.”

¹⁰So Joshua fought the Amalekites as Moses had ordered, and Moses, Aaron and Hur went to the top of the hill.

¹¹As long as Moses held up his hands, the Israelites were winning, but whenever he lowered his hands, the Amalekites were winning.

¹²When Moses’ hands grew tired, they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it. Aaron and Hur held his hands

up-one on one side, one on the other-so that his hands remained steady till sunset.

¹³So Joshua overcame the Amalekite army with the sword.

¹⁴Then the Lord said to Moses, “Write this on a scroll as something to be remembered and make sure that Joshua hears it, because I will completely blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.”

¹⁵Moses built an altar and called it The Lord is my Banner.

¹⁶He said, “For hands were lifted up to the throne of the Lord . The Lord will be at war against the Amalekites from generation to generation.”

18Now Jethro, the priest of Midian and father-in-law of Moses, heard of everything God had done for Moses and for his people Israel, and how the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt.

²After Moses had sent away his wife Zipporah, his father-in-law Jethro received her

³and her two sons. One son was named Gershom, for Moses said, “I have become an alien in a foreign land”;

⁴and the other was named Eliezer, for he said, “My father’s God was my helper; he saved me from the sword of Pharaoh.”

⁵Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, together with Moses’ sons and wife, came to him in the desert, where he was camped near the mountain of God.

⁶Jethro had sent word to him, “I, your father-in-law Jethro, am coming to you with your wife and her two sons.”

⁷So Moses went out to meet his father- in-law and bowed down and kissed him. They greeted each other and then went into the tent.

⁸Moses told his father-in-law about everything the Lord had done to Pharaoh and the Egyptians for Israel’s sake and about all the hardships they had met along the way and how the Lord had saved them.

⁹Jethro was delighted to hear about all the good things the Lord had done for Israel in rescuing them from the hand of the Egyptians.

¹⁰He said, “Praise be to the Lord , who rescued you from the hand of the Egyptians and of Pharaoh, and who rescued the people from the hand of the Egyptians.

¹¹Now I know that the Lord is greater than all other gods, for he did this to those who had treated Israel arrogantly.”

¹²Then Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, brought a burnt offering and other sacrifices to God, and Aaron came with all the elders of Israel to eat bread with Moses’ father-in-law in the presence of God.

¹³The next day Moses took his seat to serve as judge for the people, and they stood around him from morning till evening.

¹⁴When his father-in-law saw all that Moses was doing for the people, he said, “What is this you are doing for the people? Why do you alone sit as judge, while all these people stand around you from morning till evening?”

¹⁵Moses answered him, “Because the people come to me to seek God’s will.

¹⁶Whenever they have a dispute, it is brought to me, and I decide between the parties and inform them of God’s decrees and laws.”

¹⁷Moses’ father-in-law replied, “What you are doing is not good.

¹⁸You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out. The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone.

¹⁹Listen now to me and I will give you some advice, and may God be with you. You must be the people’s representative before God and bring their disputes to him.

²⁰Teach them the decrees and laws, and show them the way to live and the duties they are to perform.

²¹But select capable men from all the people-men who fear God, trustworthy men who hate dishonest gain-and appoint them as officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens.

²²Have them serve as judges for the people at all times, but have them bring every difficult case to you; the simple cases they can decide themselves. That will make your load lighter, because they will share it with you.

²³If you do this and God so commands, you will be able to stand the strain, and all these people will go home satisfied.”

²⁴Moses listened to his father-in-law and did everything he said.

²⁵He chose capable men from all Israel and made them leaders of the people, officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens.

²⁶They served as judges for the people at all times. The difficult cases they brought to Moses, but the simple ones they decided themselves.

²⁷Then Moses sent his father-in-law on his way, and Jethro returned to his own country.

19In the third month after the Israelites left Egypt-on the very day-they came to the Desert of Sinai.

²After they set out from Rephidim, they entered the Desert of Sinai, and Israel camped there in the desert in front of the mountain.

³Then Moses went up to God, and the Lord called to him from the mountain and said, “This is what you are to say to the house of Jacob and what you are to tell the people of Israel:

⁴‘You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself.

⁵Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine,

⁶you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites.”

⁷So Moses went back and summoned the elders of the people and set before them all the words the Lord had commanded him to speak.

⁸The people all responded together, “We will do everything the Lord has said.” So Moses brought their answer back to the Lord .

⁹The Lord said to Moses, “I am going to come to you in a dense cloud, so that the people will hear me speaking with you and will always put their trust in you.” Then Moses told the Lord what the people had said.

¹⁰And the Lord said to Moses, “Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. Have them wash their clothes

¹¹and be ready by the third day, because on that day the Lord will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people.

¹²Put limits for the people around the mountain and tell them, ‘Be careful that you do not go up the mountain or touch

the foot of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall surely be put to death.

¹³He shall surely be stoned or shot with arrows; not a hand is to be laid on him. Whether man or animal, he shall not be permitted to live.’ Only when the ram’s horn sounds a long blast may they go up to the mountain.”

¹⁴After Moses had gone down the mountain to the people, he consecrated them, and they washed their clothes.

¹⁵Then he said to the people, “Prepare yourselves for the third day. Abstain from sexual relations.”

¹⁶On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast. Everyone in the camp trembled.

¹⁷Then Moses led the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain.

¹⁸Mount Sinai was covered with smoke, because the Lord descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, the whole mountain trembled violently,

¹⁹and the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder. Then Moses spoke and the voice of God answered him.

²⁰The Lord descended to the top of Mount Sinai and called Moses to the top of the mountain. So Moses went up

²¹and the Lord said to him, “Go down and warn the people so they do not force their way through to see the Lord and many of them perish.

²²Even the priests, who approach the Lord , must consecrate themselves, or the Lord will break out against them.”

²³Moses said to the Lord , “The people cannot come up Mount Sinai, because you yourself warned us, ‘Put limits around the mountain and set it apart as holy.’ “

²⁴The Lord replied, “Go down and bring Aaron up with you. But the priests and the people must not force their way through to come up to the Lord , or he will break out against them.”

²⁵So Moses went down to the people and told them.

20And God spoke all these words:

²“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

³“You shall have no other gods before me.

⁴“You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.

⁵You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the

third and fourth generation of those who hate me,

⁶but showing love to a thousand [generations] of those who love me and keep my commandments.

⁷“You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.

⁸“Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.

⁹Six days you shall labor and do all your work,

¹⁰but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates.

¹¹For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

¹²“Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.

¹³“You shall not murder.

¹⁴“You shall not commit adultery.

¹⁵“You shall not steal.

¹⁶“You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.

¹⁷“You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”

¹⁸When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance

¹⁹and said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die.”

²⁰Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. God has come to test you, so that the fear of God will be with you to keep you from sinning.”

²¹The people remained at a distance, while Moses approached the thick darkness where God was.

²²Then the Lord said to Moses, “Tell the Israelites this: ‘You have seen for yourselves that I have spoken to you from heaven:

²³Do not make any gods to be alongside me; do not make for yourselves gods of silver or gods of gold.

²⁴” ‘Make an altar of earth for me and sacrifice on it your burnt offerings and fellowship offerings, your sheep and goats and your cattle. Wherever I cause my name to be honored, I will come to you and bless you.

²⁵If you make an altar of stones for me, do not build it with dressed stones, for you will defile it if you use a tool on it.

²⁶And do not go up to my altar on steps, lest your nakedness be exposed on it.’

21“These are the laws you are to set before them:

²“If you buy a Hebrew servant, he is to serve you for six years. But in the seventh year, he shall go free, without paying anything.

³If he comes alone, he is to go free alone; but if he has a wife when he comes, she is to go with him.

⁴If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children shall belong to her master, and only the man shall go free.

⁵“But if the servant declares, ‘I love my master and my wife and children and do not want to go free,’

⁶then his master must take him before the judges. He shall take him to the door or the doorpost and pierce his ear with an awl. Then he will be his servant for life.

⁷“If a man sells his daughter as a servant, she is not to go free as menservants do.

⁸If she does not please the master who has selected her for himself, he must let her be redeemed. He has no right to sell her to foreigners, because he has broken faith with her.

⁹If he selects her for his son, he must grant her the rights of a daughter.

¹⁰If he marries another woman, he must not deprive the first one of her food, clothing and marital rights.

¹¹If he does not provide her with these three things, she is to go free, without any payment of money.

¹²“Anyone who strikes a man and kills him shall surely be put to death.

¹³However, if he does not do it intentionally, but God lets it happen, he is to flee to a place I will designate.

¹⁴But if a man schemes and kills another man deliberately, take him away from my altar and put him to death.

¹⁵“Anyone who attacks his father or his mother must be put to death.

¹⁶“Anyone who kidnaps another and either sells him or still has him when he is caught must be put to death.

¹⁷“Anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death.

¹⁸“If men quarrel and one hits the other with a stone or with his fist and he does not die but is confined to bed,

¹⁹the one who struck the blow will not be held responsible if the other gets up and walks around outside with his staff; however, he must pay the injured man for the loss of his time and see that he is completely healed.

²⁰“If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished,

²¹but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property.

²²“If men who are fighting hit a pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely but there is no serious injury, the offender must be fined whatever the woman’s husband demands and the court allows.

²³But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life,

²⁴eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,

²⁵burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.

²⁶“If a man hits a manservant or maidservant in the eye and destroys it, he must let the servant go free to compensate for the eye.

²⁷And if he knocks out the tooth of a manservant or maidservant, he must let the servant go free to compensate for the tooth.

²⁸“If a bull gores a man or a woman to death, the bull must be stoned to death, and its meat must not be eaten. But the owner of the bull will not be held responsible.

²⁹If, however, the bull has had the habit of goring and the owner has been warned but has not kept it penned up

and it kills a man or woman, the bull must be stoned and the owner also must be put to death.

³⁰However, if payment is demanded of him, he may redeem his life by paying whatever is demanded.

³¹This law also applies if the bull gores a son or daughter.

³²If the bull gores a male or female slave, the owner must pay thirty shekels of silver to the master of the slave, and the bull must be stoned.

³³“If a man uncovers a pit or digs one and fails to cover it and an ox or a donkey falls into it,

³⁴the owner of the pit must pay for the loss; he must pay its owner, and the dead animal will be his.

³⁵“If a man’s bull injures the bull of another and it dies, they are to sell the live one and divide both the money and the dead animal equally.

³⁶However, if it was known that the bull had the habit of goring, yet the owner did not keep it penned up, the owner must pay, animal for animal, and the dead animal will be his.

22“If a man steals an ox or a sheep and slaughters it or sells it, he must pay back five head of cattle for the ox and four sheep for the sheep.

²“If a thief is caught breaking in and is struck so that he dies, the defender is not guilty of bloodshed;

³but if it happens after sunrise, he is guilty of bloodshed. “A thief must certainly make restitution, but if he has nothing, he must be sold to pay for his theft.

⁴“If the stolen animal is found alive in his possession-whether ox or donkey or sheep-he must pay back double.

⁵“If a man grazes his livestock in a field or vineyard and lets them stray and they graze in another man’s field, he must make restitution from the best of his own field or vineyard.

⁶“If a fire breaks out and spreads into thornbushes so that it burns shocks of grain or standing grain or the whole field, the one who started the fire must make restitution.

⁷“If a man gives his neighbor silver or goods for safekeeping and they are stolen from the neighbor’s house, the thief, if he is caught, must pay back double.

⁸But if the thief is not found, the owner of the house must appear before the judges to determine whether he has laid his hands on the other man’s property.

⁹In all cases of illegal possession of an ox, a donkey, a sheep, a garment, or any other lost property about which somebody says, ‘This is mine,’ both parties are to bring their cases before the judges. The one whom the judges

declare guilty must pay back double to his neighbor.

¹⁰“If a man gives a donkey, an ox, a sheep or any other animal to his neighbor for safekeeping and it dies or is injured or is taken away while no one is looking,

¹¹the issue between them will be settled by the taking of an oath before the Lord that the neighbor did not lay hands on the other person’s property. The owner is to accept this, and no restitution is required.

¹²But if the animal was stolen from the neighbor, he must make restitution to the owner.

¹³If it was torn to pieces by a wild animal, he shall bring in the remains as evidence and he will not be required to pay for the torn animal.

¹⁴“If a man borrows an animal from his neighbor and it is injured or dies while the owner is not present, he must make restitution.

¹⁵But if the owner is with the animal, the borrower will not have to pay. If the animal was hired, the money paid for the hire covers the loss.

¹⁶“If a man seduces a virgin who is not pledged to be married and sleeps with her, he must pay the bride-price, and she shall be his wife.

¹⁷If her father absolutely refuses to give her to him, he must still pay the bride- price for virgins.

¹⁸“Do not allow a sorceress to live.

¹⁹“Anyone who has sexual relations with an animal must be put to death.

²⁰“Whoever sacrifices to any god other than the Lord must be destroyed.

²¹“Do not mistreat an alien or oppress him, for you were aliens in Egypt.

²²“Do not take advantage of a widow or an orphan.

²³If you do and they cry out to me, I will certainly hear their cry.

²⁴My anger will be aroused, and I will kill you with the sword; your wives will become widows and your children fatherless.

²⁵“If you lend money to one of my people among you who is needy, do not be like a moneylender; charge him no interest.

²⁶If you take your neighbor’s cloak as a pledge, return it to him by sunset,

²⁷because his cloak is the only covering he has for his body. What else will he sleep in? When he cries out to me, I will hear, for I am compassionate.

²⁸“Do not blaspheme God or curse the ruler of your people.

²⁹“Do not hold back offerings from your granaries or your vats. “You must give me the firstborn of your sons.

³⁰Do the same with your cattle and your sheep. Let them stay with their mothers for seven days, but give them to me on the eighth day.

³¹“You are to be my holy people. So do not eat the meat of an animal torn by wild beasts; throw it to the dogs.

23“Do not spread false reports. Do not help a wicked man by being a malicious witness.

²“Do not follow the crowd in doing wrong. When you give testimony in a lawsuit, do not pervert justice by siding with the crowd,

³and do not show favoritism to a poor man in his lawsuit.

⁴“If you come across your enemy’s ox or donkey wandering off, be sure to take it back to him.

⁵If you see the donkey of someone who hates you fallen down under its load, do not leave it there; be sure you help him with it.

⁶“Do not deny justice to your poor people in their lawsuits.

⁷Have nothing to do with a false charge and do not put an innocent or honest person to death, for I will not acquit the guilty.

⁸“Do not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds those who see and twists the words of the righteous.

⁹“Do not oppress an alien; you yourselves know how it feels to be aliens, because you were aliens in Egypt.

¹⁰“For six years you are to sow your fields and harvest the crops,

¹¹but during the seventh year let the land lie unplowed and unused. Then the poor among your people may get food from it, and the wild animals may eat what they leave. Do the same with your vineyard and your olive grove.

¹²“Six days do your work, but on the seventh day do not work, so that your ox and your donkey may rest and the slave born in your household, and the alien as well, may be refreshed.

¹³“Be careful to do everything I have said to you. Do not invoke the names of other gods; do not let them be heard on your lips.

¹⁴“Three times a year you are to celebrate a festival to me.

¹⁵“Celebrate the Feast of Unleavened Bread; for seven days eat bread made without yeast, as I commanded you. Do this at the appointed time in the month of Abib, for in that month you came out of Egypt. “No one is to appear before me empty-handed.

¹⁶“Celebrate the Feast of Harvest with the firstfruits of the crops you sow in your field. “Celebrate the Feast of Ingathering at the end of the year, when you gather in your crops from the field.

¹⁷“Three times a year all the men are to appear before the Sovereign Lord .

¹⁸“Do not offer the blood of a sacrifice to me along with anything containing yeast. “The fat of my festival offerings must not be kept until morning.

¹⁹“Bring the best of the firstfruits of your soil to the house of the Lord your God. “Do not cook a young goat in its mother’s milk.

²⁰“See, I am sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared.

²¹Pay attention to him and listen to what he says. Do not rebel against him; he will not forgive your rebellion, since my Name is in him.

²²If you listen carefully to what he says and do all that I say, I will be an enemy to your enemies and will oppose those who oppose you.

²³My angel will go ahead of you and bring you into the land of the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites and Jebusites, and I will wipe them out.

²⁴Do not bow down before their gods or worship them or follow their practices. You must demolish them and break their sacred stones to pieces.

²⁵Worship the Lord your God, and his blessing will be on your food and water. I will take away sickness from among you,

²⁶and none will miscarry or be barren in your land. I will give you a full life span.

²⁷“I will send my terror ahead of you and throw into confusion every nation you encounter. I will make all your enemies turn their backs and run.

²⁸I will send the hornet ahead of you to drive the Hivites, Canaanites and Hittites out of your way.

²⁹But I will not drive them out in a single year, because the land would become desolate and the wild animals too numerous for you.

³⁰Little by little I will drive them out before you, until you have increased enough to take possession of the land.

³¹“I will establish your borders from the Red Sea to the Sea of the Philistines, and from the desert to the River. I will hand over to you the people who live in the land and you will drive them out before you.

³²Do not make a covenant with them or with their gods.

³³Do not let them live in your land, or they will cause you to sin against me, because the worship of their gods will certainly be a snare to you.”

24Then he said to Moses, “Come up to the Lord , you and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel. You are to worship at a distance,

²but Moses alone is to approach the Lord ; the others must not come near. And the people may not come up with him.”

³When Moses went and told the people all the Lord ‘s words and laws, they responded with one voice, “Everything the Lord has said we will do.”

⁴Moses then wrote down everything the Lord had said. He got up early the next morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain and set up twelve stone pillars representing the twelve tribes of Israel.

⁵Then he sent young Israelite men, and they offered burnt offerings and sacrificed young bulls as fellowship offerings to the Lord .

⁶Moses took half of the blood and put it in bowls, and the other half he sprinkled on the altar.

⁷Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it to the people. They responded, “We will do everything the Lord has said; we will obey.”

⁸Moses then took the blood, sprinkled it on the people and said, “This is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.”

⁹Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and the seventy elders of Israel went up

¹⁰and saw the God of Israel. Under his feet was something like a pavement made of sapphire, clear as the sky itself.

¹¹But God did not raise his hand against these leaders of the Israelites; they saw God, and they ate and drank.

¹²The Lord said to Moses, “Come up to me on the mountain and stay here, and I will give you the tablets of stone, with the law and commands I have written for their instruction.”

¹³Then Moses set out with Joshua his aide, and Moses went up on the mountain of God.

¹⁴He said to the elders, “Wait here for us until we come back to you. Aaron and Hur are with you, and anyone involved in a dispute can go to them.”

¹⁵When Moses went up on the mountain, the cloud covered it,

¹⁶and the glory of the Lord settled on Mount Sinai. For six days the cloud covered the mountain, and on the seventh day the Lord called to Moses from within the cloud.

¹⁷To the Israelites the glory of the Lord looked like a consuming fire on top of the mountain.

¹⁸Then Moses entered the cloud as he went on up the mountain. And he stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights.

25The Lord said to Moses,

²“Tell the Israelites to bring me an offering. You are to receive the offering

for me from each man whose heart prompts him to give.

³These are the offerings you are to receive from them: gold, silver and bronze;

⁴blue, purple and scarlet yarn and fine linen; goat hair;

⁵ram skins dyed red and hides of sea cows ; acacia wood;

⁶olive oil for the light; spices for the anointing oil and for the fragrant incense;

⁷and onyx stones and other gems to be mounted on the ephod and breastpiece.

⁸“Then have them make a sanctuary for me, and I will dwell among them.

⁹Make this tabernacle and all its furnishings exactly like the pattern I will show you.

¹⁰“Have them make a chest of acacia wood-two and a half cubits long, a cubit and a half wide, and a cubit and a half high.

¹¹Overlay it with pure gold, both inside and out, and make a gold molding around it.

¹²Cast four gold rings for it and fasten them to its four feet, with two rings on one side and two rings on the other.

¹³Then make poles of acacia wood and overlay them with gold.

¹⁴Insert the poles into the rings on the sides of the chest to carry it.

¹⁵The poles are to remain in the rings of this ark; they are not to be removed.

¹⁶Then put in the ark the Testimony, which I will give you.

¹⁷“Make an atonement cover of pure gold-two and a half cubits long and a cubit and a half wide.

¹⁸And make two cherubim out of hammered gold at the ends of the cover.

¹⁹Make one cherub on one end and the second cherub on the other; make the cherubim of one piece with the cover, at the two ends.

²⁰The cherubim are to have their wings spread upward, overshadowing the cover with them. The cherubim are to face each other, looking toward the cover.

²¹Place the cover on top of the ark and put in the ark the Testimony, which I will give you.

²²There, above the cover between the two cherubim that are over the ark of the Testimony, I will meet with you and give you all my commands for the Israelites.

²³“Make a table of acacia wood-two cubits long, a cubit wide and a cubit and a half high.

²⁴Overlay it with pure gold and make a gold molding around it.

²⁵Also make around it a rim a handbreadth wide and put a gold molding on the rim.

²⁶Make four gold rings for the table and fasten them to the four corners, where the four legs are.

²⁷The rings are to be close to the rim to hold the poles used in carrying the table.

²⁸Make the poles of acacia wood, overlay them with gold and carry the table with them.

²⁹And make its plates and dishes of pure gold, as well as its pitchers and bowls for the pouring out of offerings.

³⁰Put the bread of the Presence on this table to be before me at all times.

³¹“Make a lampstand of pure gold and hammer it out, base and shaft; its flowerlike cups, buds and blossoms shall be of one piece with it.

³²Six branches are to extend from the sides of the lampstand-three on one side and three on the other.

³³Three cups shaped like almond flowers with buds and blossoms are to be on one branch, three on the next branch, and the same for all six branches extending from the lampstand.

³⁴And on the lampstand there are to be four cups shaped like almond flowers with buds and blossoms.

³⁵One bud shall be under the first pair of branches extending from the lampstand,

a second bud under the second pair, and a third bud under the third pair-six branches in all.

³⁶The buds and branches shall all be of one piece with the lampstand, hammered out of pure gold.

³⁷“Then make its seven lamps and set them up on it so that they light the space in front of it.

³⁸Its wick trimmers and trays are to be of pure gold.

³⁹A talent of pure gold is to be used for the lampstand and all these accessories.

⁴⁰See that you make them according to the pattern shown you on the mountain.

26“Make the tabernacle with ten curtains of finely twisted linen and blue, purple and scarlet yarn, with cherubim worked into them by a skilled craftsman.

²All the curtains are to be the same size- twenty-eight cubits long and four cubits wide.

³Join five of the curtains together, and do the same with the other five.

⁴Make loops of blue material along the edge of the end curtain in one set, and do the same with the end curtain in the other set.

⁵Make fifty loops on one curtain and fifty loops on the end curtain of the other set, with the loops opposite each other.

⁶Then make fifty gold clasps and use them to fasten the curtains together so that the tabernacle is a unit.

⁷“Make curtains of goat hair for the tent over the tabernacle-eleven altogether.

⁸All eleven curtains are to be the same size-thirty cubits long and four cubits wide.

⁹Join five of the curtains together into one set and the other six into another set. Fold the sixth curtain double at the front of the tent.

¹⁰Make fifty loops along the edge of the end curtain in one set and also along the edge of the end curtain in the other set.

¹¹Then make fifty bronze clasps and put them in the loops to fasten the tent together as a unit.

¹²As for the additional length of the tent curtains, the half curtain that is left over is to hang down at the rear of the tabernacle.

¹³The tent curtains will be a cubit longer on both sides; what is left will hang over the sides of the tabernacle so as to cover it.

¹⁴Make for the tent a covering of ram skins dyed red, and over that a covering of hides of sea cows.

¹⁵“Make upright frames of acacia wood for the tabernacle.

¹⁶Each frame is to be ten cubits long and a cubit and a half wide,

¹⁷with two projections set parallel to each other. Make all the frames of the tabernacle in this way.

¹⁸Make twenty frames for the south side of the tabernacle

¹⁹and make forty silver bases to go under them-two bases for each frame, one under each projection.

²⁰For the other side, the north side of the tabernacle, make twenty frames

²¹and forty silver bases-two under each frame.

²²Make six frames for the far end, that is, the west end of the tabernacle,

²³and make two frames for the corners at the far end.

²⁴At these two corners they must be double from the bottom all the way to the top, and fitted into a single ring; both shall be like that.

²⁵So there will be eight frames and sixteen silver bases-two under each frame.

²⁶“Also make crossbars of acacia wood: five for the frames on one side of the tabernacle,

²⁷five for those on the other side, and five for the frames on the west, at the far end of the tabernacle.

²⁸The center crossbar is to extend from end to end at the middle of the frames.

²⁹Overlay the frames with gold and make gold rings to hold the crossbars. Also overlay the crossbars with gold.

³⁰“Set up the tabernacle according to the plan shown you on the mountain.

³¹“Make a curtain of blue, purple and scarlet yarn and finely twisted linen, with cherubim worked into it by a skilled craftsman.

³²Hang it with gold hooks on four posts of acacia wood overlaid with gold and standing on four silver bases.

³³Hang the curtain from the clasps and place the ark of the Testimony behind the curtain. The curtain will separate the Holy Place from the Most Holy Place.

³⁴Put the atonement cover on the ark of the Testimony in the Most Holy Place.

³⁵Place the table outside the curtain on the north side of the tabernacle and put the lampstand opposite it on the south side.

³⁶“For the entrance to the tent make a curtain of blue, purple and scarlet yarn and finely twisted linen-the work of an embroiderer.

³⁷Make gold hooks for this curtain and five posts of acacia wood overlaid with gold. And cast five bronze bases for them.

27“Build an altar of acacia wood, three cubits high; it is to be square, five cubits long and five cubits wide.

²Make a horn at each of the four corners, so that the horns and the altar are of one piece, and overlay the altar with bronze.

³Make all its utensils of bronze-its pots to remove the ashes, and its shovels, sprinkling bowls, meat forks and firepans.

⁴Make a grating for it, a bronze network, and make a bronze ring at each of the four corners of the network.

⁵Put it under the ledge of the altar so that it is halfway up the altar.

⁶Make poles of acacia wood for the altar and overlay them with bronze.

⁷The poles are to be inserted into the rings so they will be on two sides of the altar when it is carried.

⁸Make the altar hollow, out of boards. It is to be made just as you were shown on the mountain.

⁹“Make a courtyard for the tabernacle. The south side shall be a hundred cubits long and is to have curtains of finely twisted linen,

¹⁰with twenty posts and twenty bronze bases and with silver hooks and bands on the posts.

¹¹The north side shall also be a hundred cubits long and is to have curtains, with twenty posts and twenty bronze bases and with silver hooks and bands on the posts.

¹²“The west end of the courtyard shall be fifty cubits wide and have curtains, with ten posts and ten bases.

¹³On the east end, toward the sunrise, the courtyard shall also be fifty cubits wide.

¹⁴Curtains fifteen cubits long are to be on one side of the entrance, with three posts and three bases,

¹⁵and curtains fifteen cubits long are to be on the other side, with three posts and three bases.

¹⁶“For the entrance to the courtyard, provide a curtain twenty cubits long, of blue, purple and scarlet yarn and finely twisted linen-the work of an embroiderer-with four posts and four bases.

¹⁷All the posts around the courtyard are to have silver bands and hooks, and bronze bases.

¹⁸The courtyard shall be a hundred cubits long and fifty cubits wide, with curtains of finely twisted linen five cubits high, and with bronze bases.

¹⁹All the other articles used in the service of the tabernacle, whatever their function, including all the tent pegs for it and those for the courtyard, are to be of bronze.

²⁰“Command the Israelites to bring you clear oil of pressed olives for the light so that the lamps may be kept burning.

²¹In the Tent of Meeting, outside the curtain that is in front of the Testimony, Aaron and his sons are to keep the lamps burning before the Lord from evening till morning. This is to be a lasting ordinance among the Israelites for the generations to come.

28“Have Aaron your brother brought to you from among the Israelites, along with his sons Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar, so they may serve me as priests.

²Make sacred garments for your brother Aaron, to give him dignity and honor.

³Tell all the skilled men to whom I have given wisdom in such matters that they are to make garments for Aaron, for his consecration, so he may serve me as priest.

⁴These are the garments they are to make: a breastpiece, an ephod, a robe, a woven tunic, a turban and a sash. They are to make these sacred garments for your brother Aaron and his sons, so they may serve me as priests.

⁵Have them use gold, and blue, purple and scarlet yarn, and fine linen.

⁶“Make the ephod of gold, and of blue, purple and scarlet yarn, and of finely twisted linen-the work of a skilled craftsman.

⁷It is to have two shoulder pieces attached to two of its corners, so it can be fastened.

⁸Its skillfully woven waistband is to be like it-of one piece with the ephod and made with gold, and with blue, purple and scarlet yarn, and with finely twisted linen.

⁹“Take two onyx stones and engrave on them the names of the sons of Israel

¹⁰in the order of their birth-six names on one stone and the remaining six on the other.

¹¹Engrave the names of the sons of Israel on the two stones the way a gem cutter engraves a seal. Then mount the stones in gold filigree settings

¹²and fasten them on the shoulder pieces of the ephod as memorial stones for the sons of Israel. Aaron is to bear the names on his shoulders as a memorial before the Lord .

¹³Make gold filigree settings

¹⁴and two braided chains of pure gold, like a rope, and attach the chains to the settings.

¹⁵“Fashion a breastpiece for making decisions-the work of a skilled craftsman. Make it like the ephod: of gold, and of blue, purple and scarlet yarn, and of finely twisted linen.

¹⁶It is to be square-a span long and a span wide-and folded double.

¹⁷Then mount four rows of precious stones on it. In the first row there shall be a ruby, a topaz and a beryl;

¹⁸in the second row a turquoise, a sapphire and an emerald;

¹⁹in the third row a jacinth, an agate and an amethyst;

²⁰in the fourth row a chrysolite, an onyx and a jasper. Mount them in gold filigree settings.

²¹There are to be twelve stones, one for each of the names of the sons of Israel, each engraved like a seal with the name of one of the twelve tribes.

²²“For the breastpiece make braided chains of pure gold, like a rope.

²³Make two gold rings for it and fasten them to two corners of the breastpiece.

²⁴Fasten the two gold chains to the rings at the corners of the breastpiece,

²⁵and the other ends of the chains to the two settings, attaching them to the shoulder pieces of the ephod at the front.

²⁶Make two gold rings and attach them to the other two corners of the breastpiece on the inside edge next to the ephod.

²⁷Make two more gold rings and attach them to the bottom of the shoulder pieces on the front of the ephod, close to the seam just above the waistband of the ephod.

²⁸The rings of the breastpiece are to be tied to the rings of the ephod with blue cord, connecting it to the waistband, so that the breastpiece will not swing out from the ephod.

²⁹“Whenever Aaron enters the Holy Place, he will bear the names of the sons of Israel over his heart on the breastpiece of decision as a continuing memorial before the Lord .

³⁰Also put the Urim and the Thummim in the breastpiece, so they may be over Aaron’s heart whenever he enters the presence of the Lord . Thus Aaron will always bear the means of making decisions for the Israelites over his heart before the Lord .

³¹“Make the robe of the ephod entirely of blue cloth,

³²with an opening for the head in its center. There shall be a woven edge like a collar around this opening, so that it will not tear.

³³Make pomegranates of blue, purple and scarlet yarn around the hem of the robe, with gold bells between them.

³⁴The gold bells and the pomegranates are to alternate around the hem of the robe.

³⁵Aaron must wear it when he ministers. The sound of the bells will be heard when he enters the Holy Place before the Lord and when he comes out, so that he will not die.

³⁶“Make a plate of pure gold and engrave on it as on a seal:HOLY TO THE Lord .

³⁷Fasten a blue cord to it to attach it to the turban; it is to be on the front of the turban.

³⁸It will be on Aaron’s forehead, and he will bear the guilt involved in the sacred gifts the Israelites consecrate, whatever their gifts may be. It will be on Aaron’s forehead continually so that they will be acceptable to the Lord .

³⁹“Weave the tunic of fine linen and make the turban of fine linen. The sash is to be the work of an embroiderer.

⁴⁰Make tunics, sashes and headbands for Aaron’s sons, to give them dignity and honor.

⁴¹After you put these clothes on your brother Aaron and his sons, anoint and ordain them. Consecrate them so they may serve me as priests.

⁴²“Make linen undergarments as a covering for the body, reaching from the waist to the thigh.

⁴³Aaron and his sons must wear them whenever they enter the Tent of Meeting or approach the altar to minister in the Holy Place, so that they will not incur guilt and die. “This is to be a lasting ordinance for Aaron and his descendants.

29“This is what you are to do to consecrate them, so they may serve me

as priests: Take a young bull and two rams without defect.

²And from fine wheat flour, without yeast, make bread, and cakes mixed with oil, and wafers spread with oil.

³Put them in a basket and present them in it-along with the bull and the two rams.

⁴Then bring Aaron and his sons to the entrance to the Tent of Meeting and wash them with water.

⁵Take the garments and dress Aaron with the tunic, the robe of the ephod, the ephod itself and the breastpiece. Fasten the ephod on him by its skillfully woven waistband.

⁶Put the turban on his head and attach the sacred diadem to the turban.

⁷Take the anointing oil and anoint him by pouring it on his head.

⁸Bring his sons and dress them in tunics

⁹and put headbands on them. Then tie sashes on Aaron and his sons. The priesthood is theirs by a lasting ordinance. In this way you shall ordain Aaron and his sons.

¹⁰“Bring the bull to the front of the Tent of Meeting, and Aaron and his sons shall lay their hands on its head.

¹¹Slaughter it in the Lord ‘s presence at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.

¹²Take some of the bull’s blood and put it on the horns of the altar with your

finger, and pour out the rest of it at the base of the altar.

¹³Then take all the fat around the inner parts, the covering of the liver, and both kidneys with the fat on them, and burn them on the altar.

¹⁴But burn the bull’s flesh and its hide and its offal outside the camp. It is a sin offering.

¹⁵“Take one of the rams, and Aaron and his sons shall lay their hands on its head.

¹⁶Slaughter it and take the blood and sprinkle it against the altar on all sides.

¹⁷Cut the ram into pieces and wash the inner parts and the legs, putting them with the head and the other pieces.

¹⁸Then burn the entire ram on the altar. It is a burnt offering to the Lord , a pleasing aroma, an offering made to the Lord by fire.

¹⁹“Take the other ram, and Aaron and his sons shall lay their hands on its head.

²⁰Slaughter it, take some of its blood and put it on the lobes of the right ears of Aaron and his sons, on the thumbs of their right hands, and on the big toes of their right feet. Then sprinkle blood against the altar on all sides.

²¹And take some of the blood on the altar and some of the anointing oil and sprinkle it on Aaron and his garments and on his sons and their garments. Then he and his sons and their garments will be consecrated.

²²“Take from this ram the fat, the fat tail, the fat around the inner parts, the covering of the liver, both kidneys with the fat on them, and the right thigh. (This is the ram for the ordination.)

²³From the basket of bread made without yeast, which is before the Lord , take a loaf, and a cake made with oil, and a wafer.

²⁴Put all these in the hands of Aaron and his sons and wave them before the Lord as a wave offering.

²⁵Then take them from their hands and burn them on the altar along with the burnt offering for a pleasing aroma to the Lord , an offering made to the Lord by fire.

²⁶After you take the breast of the ram for Aaron’s ordination, wave it before the Lord as a wave offering, and it will be your share.

²⁷“Consecrate those parts of the ordination ram that belong to Aaron and his sons: the breast that was waved and the thigh that was presented.

²⁸This is always to be the regular share from the Israelites for Aaron and his sons. It is the contribution the Israelites are to make to the Lord from their fellowship offerings.

²⁹“Aaron’s sacred garments will belong to his descendants so that they can be anointed and ordained in them.

³⁰The son who succeeds him as priest and comes to the Tent of Meeting to

minister in the Holy Place is to wear them seven days.

³¹“Take the ram for the ordination and cook the meat in a sacred place.

³²At the entrance to the Tent of Meeting, Aaron and his sons are to eat the meat of the ram and the bread that is in the basket.

³³They are to eat these offerings by which atonement was made for their ordination and consecration. But no one else may eat them, because they are sacred.

³⁴And if any of the meat of the ordination ram or any bread is left over till morning, burn it up. It must not be eaten, because it is sacred.

³⁵“Do for Aaron and his sons everything I have commanded you, taking seven days to ordain them.

³⁶Sacrifice a bull each day as a sin offering to make atonement. Purify the altar by making atonement for it, and anoint it to consecrate it.

³⁷For seven days make atonement for the altar and consecrate it. Then the altar will be most holy, and whatever touches it will be holy.

³⁸“This is what you are to offer on the altar regularly each day: two lambs a year old.

³⁹Offer one in the morning and the other at twilight.

⁴⁰With the first lamb offer a tenth of an ephah of fine flour mixed with a quarter of a hin of oil from pressed olives, and a quarter of a hin of wine as a drink offering.

⁴¹Sacrifice the other lamb at twilight with the same grain offering and its drink offering as in the morning-a pleasing aroma, an offering made to the Lord by fire.

⁴²“For the generations to come this burnt offering is to be made regularly at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting before the Lord . There I will meet you and speak to you;

⁴³there also I will meet with the Israelites, and the place will be consecrated by my glory.

⁴⁴“So I will consecrate the Tent of Meeting and the altar and will consecrate Aaron and his sons to serve me as priests.

⁴⁵Then I will dwell among the Israelites and be their God.

⁴⁶They will know that I am the Lord their God, who brought them out of Egypt so that I might dwell among them. I am the Lord their God.

30“Make an altar of acacia wood for burning incense.

²It is to be square, a cubit long and a cubit wide, and two cubits high -its horns of one piece with it.

³Overlay the top and all the sides and the horns with pure gold, and make a gold molding around it.

⁴Make two gold rings for the altar below the molding-two on opposite sides-to hold the poles used to carry it.

⁵Make the poles of acacia wood and overlay them with gold.

⁶Put the altar in front of the curtain that is before the ark of the Testimony- before the atonement cover that is over the Testimony-where I will meet with you.

⁷“Aaron must burn fragrant incense on the altar every morning when he tends the lamps.

⁸He must burn incense again when he lights the lamps at twilight so incense will burn regularly before the Lord for the generations to come.

⁹Do not offer on this altar any other incense or any burnt offering or grain offering, and do not pour a drink offering on it.

¹⁰Once a year Aaron shall make atonement on its horns. This annual atonement must be made with the blood of the atoning sin offering for the generations to come. It is most holy to the Lord .”

¹¹Then the Lord said to Moses,

¹²“When you take a census of the Israelites to count them, each one must pay the Lord a ransom for his life at the

time he is counted. Then no plague will come on them when you number them.

¹³Each one who crosses over to those already counted is to give a half shekel, according to the sanctuary shekel, which weighs twenty gerahs. This half shekel is an offering to the Lord .

¹⁴All who cross over, those twenty years old or more, are to give an offering to the Lord .

¹⁵The rich are not to give more than a half shekel and the poor are not to give less when you make the offering to the Lord to atone for your lives.

¹⁶Receive the atonement money from the Israelites and use it for the service of the Tent of Meeting. It will be a memorial for the Israelites before the Lord , making atonement for your lives.”

¹⁷Then the Lord said to Moses,

¹⁸“Make a bronze basin, with its bronze stand, for washing. Place it between the Tent of Meeting and the altar, and put water in it.

¹⁹Aaron and his sons are to wash their hands and feet with water from it.

²⁰Whenever they enter the Tent of Meeting, they shall wash with water so that they will not die. Also, when they approach the altar to minister by presenting an offering made to the Lord by fire,

²¹they shall wash their hands and feet so that they will not die. This is to be a

lasting ordinance for Aaron and his descendants for the generations to come.”

²²Then the Lord said to Moses,

²³“Take the following fine spices: 500 shekels of liquid myrrh, half as much (that is, 250 shekels) of fragrant cinnamon, 250 shekels of fragrant cane,

²⁴500 shekels of cassia-all according to the sanctuary shekel-and a hin of olive oil.

²⁵Make these into a sacred anointing oil, a fragrant blend, the work of a perfumer. It will be the sacred anointing oil.

²⁶Then use it to anoint the Tent of Meeting, the ark of the Testimony,

²⁷the table and all its articles, the lampstand and its accessories, the altar of incense,

²⁸the altar of burnt offering and all its utensils, and the basin with its stand.

²⁹You shall consecrate them so they will be most holy, and whatever touches them will be holy.

³⁰“Anoint Aaron and his sons and consecrate them so they may serve me as priests.

³¹Say to the Israelites, ‘This is to be my sacred anointing oil for the generations to come.

³²Do not pour it on men’s bodies and do not make any oil with the same formula.

It is sacred, and you are to consider it sacred.

³³Whoever makes perfume like it and whoever puts it on anyone other than a priest must be cut off from his people.’ “

³⁴Then the Lord said to Moses, “Take fragrant spices-gum resin, onycha and galbanum-and pure frankincense, all in equal amounts,

³⁵and make a fragrant blend of incense, the work of a perfumer. It is to be salted and pure and sacred.

³⁶Grind some of it to powder and place it in front of the Testimony in the Tent of Meeting, where I will meet with you. It shall be most holy to you.

³⁷Do not make any incense with this formula for yourselves; consider it holy to the Lord .

³⁸Whoever makes any like it to enjoy its fragrance must be cut off from his people.”

31Then the Lord said to Moses,

²“See, I have chosen Bezalel son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah,

³and I have filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, ability and knowledge in all kinds of crafts-

⁴to make artistic designs for work in gold, silver and bronze,

⁵to cut and set stones, to work in wood, and to engage in all kinds of craftsmanship.

⁶Moreover, I have appointed Oholiab son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan, to help him. Also I have given skill to all the craftsmen to make everything I have commanded you:

⁷the Tent of Meeting, the ark of the Testimony with the atonement cover on it, and all the other furnishings of the tent-

⁸the table and its articles, the pure gold lampstand and all its accessories, the altar of incense,

⁹the altar of burnt offering and all its utensils, the basin with its stand-

¹⁰and also the woven garments, both the sacred garments for Aaron the priest and the garments for his sons when they serve as priests,

¹¹and the anointing oil and fragrant incense for the Holy Place. They are to make them just as I commanded you.”

¹²Then the Lord said to Moses,

¹³“Say to the Israelites, ‘You must observe my Sabbaths. This will be a sign between me and you for the generations to come, so you may know that I am the Lord , who makes you holy.

¹⁴” ‘Observe the Sabbath, because it is holy to you. Anyone who desecrates it must be put to death; whoever does any

work on that day must be cut off from his people.

¹⁵For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of rest, holy to the Lord . Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day must be put to death.

¹⁶The Israelites are to observe the Sabbath, celebrating it for the generations to come as a lasting covenant.

¹⁷It will be a sign between me and the Israelites forever, for in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day he abstained from work and rested.’ “

¹⁸When the Lord finished speaking to Moses on Mount Sinai, he gave him the two tablets of the Testimony, the tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God.

32When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, “Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him.”

²Aaron answered them, “Take off the gold earrings that your wives, your sons and your daughters are wearing, and bring them to me.”

³So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron.

⁴He took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.”

⁵When Aaron saw this, he built an altar in front of the calf and announced, “Tomorrow there will be a festival to the Lord .”

⁶So the next day the people rose early and sacrificed burnt offerings and presented fellowship offerings. Afterward they sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry.

⁷Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt.

⁸They have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it and have said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.’

⁹“I have seen these people,” the Lord said to Moses, “and they are a stiff- necked people.

¹⁰Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation.”

¹¹But Moses sought the favor of the Lord his God. “O Lord ,” he said, “why should your anger burn against your people,

whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand?

¹²Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster on your people.

¹³Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Israel, to whom you swore by your own self: ‘I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will give your descendants all this land I promised them, and it will be their inheritance forever.’ “

¹⁴Then the Lord relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened.

¹⁵Moses turned and went down the mountain with the two tablets of the Testimony in his hands. They were inscribed on both sides, front and back.

¹⁶The tablets were the work of God; the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets.

¹⁷When Joshua heard the noise of the people shouting, he said to Moses, “There is the sound of war in the camp.”

¹⁸Moses replied: “It is not the sound of victory, it is not the sound of defeat; it is the sound of singing that I hear.”

¹⁹When Moses approached the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, his anger burned and he threw the tablets

out of his hands, breaking them to pieces at the foot of the mountain.

²⁰And he took the calf they had made and burned it in the fire; then he ground it to powder, scattered it on the water and made the Israelites drink it.

²¹He said to Aaron, “What did these people do to you, that you led them into such great sin?”

²²“Do not be angry, my lord,” Aaron answered. “You know how prone these people are to evil.

²³They said to me, ‘Make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him.’

²⁴So I told them, ‘Whoever has any gold jewelry, take it off.’ Then they gave me the gold, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!”

²⁵Moses saw that the people were running wild and that Aaron had let them get out of control and so become a laughingstock to their enemies.

²⁶So he stood at the entrance to the camp and said, “Whoever is for the Lord , come to me.” And all the Levites rallied to him.

²⁷Then he said to them, “This is what the Lord , the God of Israel, says: ‘Each man strap a sword to his side. Go back and forth through the camp from one end to the other, each killing his brother and friend and neighbor.’ “

²⁸The Levites did as Moses commanded, and that day about three thousand of the people died.

²⁹Then Moses said, “You have been set apart to the Lord today, for you were against your own sons and brothers, and he has blessed you this day.”

³⁰The next day Moses said to the people, “You have committed a great sin. But now I will go up to the Lord ; perhaps I can make atonement for your sin.”

³¹So Moses went back to the Lord and said, “Oh, what a great sin these people have committed! They have made themselves gods of gold.

³²But now, please forgive their sin-but if not, then blot me out of the book you have written.”

³³The Lord replied to Moses, “Whoever has sinned against me I will blot out of my book.

³⁴Now go, lead the people to the place I spoke of, and my angel will go before you. However, when the time comes for me to punish, I will punish them for their sin.”

³⁵And the Lord struck the people with a plague because of what they did with the calf Aaron had made.

33Then the Lord said to Moses, “Leave this place, you and the people you brought up out of Egypt, and go up to the land I promised on oath to

Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your descendants.’

²I will send an angel before you and drive out the Canaanites, Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites.

³Go up to the land flowing with milk and honey. But I will not go with you, because you are a stiff-necked people and I might destroy you on the way.”

⁴When the people heard these distressing words, they began to mourn and no one put on any ornaments.

⁵For the Lord had said to Moses, “Tell the Israelites, ‘You are a stiff-necked people. If I were to go with you even for a moment, I might destroy you. Now take off your ornaments and I will decide what to do with you.’ “

⁶So the Israelites stripped off their ornaments at Mount Horeb.

⁷Now Moses used to take a tent and pitch it outside the camp some distance away, calling it the “tent of meeting.” Anyone inquiring of the Lord would go to the tent of meeting outside the camp.

⁸And whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people rose and stood at the entrances to their tents, watching Moses until he entered the tent.

⁹As Moses went into the tent, the pillar of cloud would come down and stay at the entrance, while the Lord spoke with Moses.

¹⁰Whenever the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance to the tent, they all stood and worshiped, each at the entrance to his tent.

¹¹The Lord would speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks with his friend. Then Moses would return to the camp, but his young aide Joshua son of Nun did not leave the tent.

¹²Moses said to the Lord , “You have been telling me, ‘Lead these people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. You have said, ‘I know you by name and you have found favor with me.’

¹³If you are pleased with me, teach me your ways so I may know you and continue to find favor with you. Remember that this nation is your people.”

¹⁴The Lord replied, “My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.”

¹⁵Then Moses said to him, “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here.

¹⁶How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?”

¹⁷And the Lord said to Moses, “I will do the very thing you have asked, because I am pleased with you and I know you by name.”

¹⁸Then Moses said, “Now show me your glory.”

¹⁹And the Lord said, “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord , in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.

²⁰But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.”

²¹Then the Lord said, “There is a place near me where you may stand on a rock.

²²When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by.

²³Then I will remove my hand and you will see my back; but my face must not be seen.”

34The Lord said to Moses, “Chisel out two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke.

²Be ready in the morning, and then come up on Mount Sinai. Present yourself to me there on top of the mountain.

³No one is to come with you or be seen anywhere on the mountain; not even the flocks and herds may graze in front of the mountain.”

⁴So Moses chiseled out two stone tablets like the first ones and went up Mount Sinai early in the morning, as the Lord had commanded him; and he carried the two stone tablets in his hands.

⁵Then the Lord came down in the cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name, the Lord .

⁶And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The Lord , the Lord , the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness,

⁷maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation.”

⁸Moses bowed to the ground at once and worshiped.

⁹“O Lord, if I have found favor in your eyes,” he said, “then let the Lord go with us. Although this is a stiff-necked people, forgive our wickedness and our sin, and take us as your inheritance.”

¹⁰Then the Lord said: “I am making a covenant with you. Before all your people I will do wonders never before done in any nation in all the world. The people you live among will see how awesome is the work that I, the Lord , will do for you.

¹¹Obey what I command you today. I will drive out before you the Amorites, Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites.

¹²Be careful not to make a treaty with those who live in the land where you are going, or they will be a snare among you.

¹³Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones and cut down their Asherah poles.

¹⁴Do not worship any other god, for the Lord , whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.

¹⁵“Be careful not to make a treaty with those who live in the land; for when they prostitute themselves to their gods and sacrifice to them, they will invite you and you will eat their sacrifices.

¹⁶And when you choose some of their daughters as wives for your sons and those daughters prostitute themselves to their gods, they will lead your sons to do the same.

¹⁷“Do not make cast idols.

¹⁸“Celebrate the Feast of Unleavened Bread. For seven days eat bread made without yeast, as I commanded you. Do this at the appointed time in the month of Abib, for in that month you came out of Egypt.

¹⁹“The first offspring of every womb belongs to me, including all the firstborn males of your livestock, whether from herd or flock.

²⁰Redeem the firstborn donkey with a lamb, but if you do not redeem it, break its neck. Redeem all your firstborn sons. “No one is to appear before me empty- handed.

²¹“Six days you shall labor, but on the seventh day you shall rest; even during the plowing season and harvest you must rest.

²²“Celebrate the Feast of Weeks with the firstfruits of the wheat harvest, and the Feast of Ingathering at the turn of the year.

²³Three times a year all your men are to appear before the Sovereign Lord , the God of Israel.

²⁴I will drive out nations before you and enlarge your territory, and no one will covet your land when you go up three times each year to appear before the Lord your God.

²⁵“Do not offer the blood of a sacrifice to me along with anything containing yeast, and do not let any of the sacrifice from the Passover Feast remain until morning.

²⁶“Bring the best of the firstfruits of your soil to the house of the Lord your God. “Do not cook a young goat in its mother’s milk.”

²⁷Then the Lord said to Moses, “Write down these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.”

²⁸Moses was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights without eating

bread or drinking water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant-the Ten Commandments.

²⁹When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the Testimony in his hands, he was not aware that his face was radiant because he had spoken with the Lord .

³⁰When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, his face was radiant, and they were afraid to come near him.

³¹But Moses called to them; so Aaron and all the leaders of the community came back to him, and he spoke to them.

³²Afterward all the Israelites came near him, and he gave them all the commands the Lord had given him on Mount Sinai.

³³When Moses finished speaking to them, he put a veil over his face.

³⁴But whenever he entered the Lord ‘s presence to speak with him, he removed the veil until he came out. And when he came out and told the Israelites what he had been commanded,

³⁵they saw that his face was radiant. Then Moses would put the veil back over his face until he went in to speak with the Lord .

35Moses assembled the whole Israelite community and said to them, “These are the things the Lord has commanded you to do:

²For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day shall be your holy day, a Sabbath of rest to the Lord . Whoever does any work on it must be put to death.

³Do not light a fire in any of your dwellings on the Sabbath day.”

⁴Moses said to the whole Israelite community, “This is what the Lord has commanded:

⁵From what you have, take an offering for the Lord . Everyone who is willing is to bring to the Lord an offering of gold, silver and bronze;

⁶blue, purple and scarlet yarn and fine linen; goat hair;

⁷ram skins dyed red and hides of sea cows ; acacia wood;

⁸olive oil for the light; spices for the anointing oil and for the fragrant incense;

⁹and onyx stones and other gems to be mounted on the ephod and breastpiece.

¹⁰“All who are skilled among you are to come and make everything the Lord has commanded:

¹¹the tabernacle with its tent and its covering, clasps, frames, crossbars, posts and bases;

¹²the ark with its poles and the atonement cover and the curtain that shields it;

¹³the table with its poles and all its articles and the bread of the Presence;

¹⁴the lampstand that is for light with its accessories, lamps and oil for the light;

¹⁵the altar of incense with its poles, the anointing oil and the fragrant incense; the curtain for the doorway at the entrance to the tabernacle;

¹⁶the altar of burnt offering with its bronze grating, its poles and all its utensils; the bronze basin with its stand;

¹⁷the curtains of the courtyard with its posts and bases, and the curtain for the entrance to the courtyard;

¹⁸the tent pegs for the tabernacle and for the courtyard, and their ropes;

¹⁹the woven garments worn for ministering in the sanctuary-both the sacred garments for Aaron the priest and the garments for his sons when they serve as priests.”

²⁰Then the whole Israelite community withdrew from Moses’ presence,

²¹and everyone who was willing and whose heart moved him came and brought an offering to the Lord for the work on the Tent of Meeting, for all its service, and for the sacred garments.

²²All who were willing, men and women alike, came and brought gold jewelry of all kinds: brooches, earrings, rings and ornaments. They all presented their gold as a wave offering to the Lord .

²³Everyone who had blue, purple or scarlet yarn or fine linen, or goat hair, ram skins dyed red or hides of sea cows brought them.

²⁴Those presenting an offering of silver or bronze brought it as an offering to the Lord , and everyone who had acacia wood for any part of the work brought it.

²⁵Every skilled woman spun with her hands and brought what she had spun- blue, purple or scarlet yarn or fine linen.

²⁶And all the women who were willing and had the skill spun the goat hair.

²⁷The leaders brought onyx stones and other gems to be mounted on the ephod and breastpiece.

²⁸They also brought spices and olive oil for the light and for the anointing oil and for the fragrant incense.

²⁹All the Israelite men and women who were willing brought to the Lord freewill offerings for all the work the Lord through Moses had commanded them to do.

³⁰Then Moses said to the Israelites, “See, the Lord has chosen Bezalel son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah,

³¹and he has filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, ability and knowledge in all kinds of crafts-

³²to make artistic designs for work in gold, silver and bronze,

³³to cut and set stones, to work in wood and to engage in all kinds of artistic craftsmanship.

³⁴And he has given both him and Oholiab son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan, the ability to teach others.

³⁵He has filled them with skill to do all kinds of work as craftsmen, designers, embroiderers in blue, purple and scarlet yarn and fine linen, and weavers-all of them master craftsmen and designers.

36So Bezalel, Oholiab and every skilled person to whom the Lord has given skill and ability to know how to carry out all the work of constructing the sanctuary are to do the work just as the Lord has commanded.”

²Then Moses summoned Bezalel and Oholiab and every skilled person to whom the Lord had given ability and who was willing to come and do the work.

³They received from Moses all the offerings the Israelites had brought to carry out the work of constructing the sanctuary. And the people continued to bring freewill offerings morning after morning.

⁴So all the skilled craftsmen who were doing all the work on the sanctuary left their work

⁵and said to Moses, “The people are bringing more than enough for doing the work the Lord commanded to be done.”

⁶Then Moses gave an order and they sent this word throughout the camp: “No man or woman is to make anything else as an offering for the sanctuary.” And so the people were restrained from bringing more,

⁷because what they already had was more than enough to do all the work.

⁸All the skilled men among the workmen made the tabernacle with ten curtains of finely twisted linen and blue, purple and scarlet yarn, with cherubim worked into them by a skilled craftsman.

⁹All the curtains were the same size- twenty-eight cubits long and four cubits wide.

¹⁰They joined five of the curtains together and did the same with the other five.

¹¹Then they made loops of blue material along the edge of the end curtain in one set, and the same was done with the end curtain in the other set.

¹²They also made fifty loops on one curtain and fifty loops on the end curtain of the other set, with the loops opposite each other.

¹³Then they made fifty gold clasps and used them to fasten the two sets of curtains together so that the tabernacle was a unit.

¹⁴They made curtains of goat hair for the tent over the tabernacle-eleven altogether.

¹⁵All eleven curtains were the same size-thirty cubits long and four cubits wide.

¹⁶They joined five of the curtains into one set and the other six into another set.

¹⁷Then they made fifty loops along the edge of the end curtain in one set and also along the edge of the end curtain in the other set.

¹⁸They made fifty bronze clasps to fasten the tent together as a unit.

¹⁹Then they made for the tent a covering of ram skins dyed red, and over that a covering of hides of sea cows.

²⁰They made upright frames of acacia wood for the tabernacle.

²¹Each frame was ten cubits long and a cubit and a half wide,

²²with two projections set parallel to each other. They made all the frames of the tabernacle in this way.

²³They made twenty frames for the south side of the tabernacle

²⁴and made forty silver bases to go under them-two bases for each frame, one under each projection.

²⁵For the other side, the north side of the tabernacle, they made twenty frames

²⁶and forty silver bases-two under each frame.

²⁷They made six frames for the far end, that is, the west end of the tabernacle,

²⁸and two frames were made for the corners of the tabernacle at the far end.

²⁹At these two corners the frames were double from the bottom all the way to the top and fitted into a single ring; both were made alike.

³⁰So there were eight frames and sixteen silver bases-two under each frame.

³¹They also made crossbars of acacia wood: five for the frames on one side of the tabernacle,

³²five for those on the other side, and five for the frames on the west, at the far end of the tabernacle.

³³They made the center crossbar so that it extended from end to end at the middle of the frames.

³⁴They overlaid the frames with gold and made gold rings to hold the crossbars. They also overlaid the crossbars with gold.

³⁵They made the curtain of blue, purple and scarlet yarn and finely twisted linen, with cherubim worked into it by a skilled craftsman.

³⁶They made four posts of acacia wood for it and overlaid them with gold. They made gold hooks for them and cast their four silver bases.

³⁷For the entrance to the tent they made a curtain of blue, purple and scarlet yarn and finely twisted linen-the work of an embroiderer;

³⁸and they made five posts with hooks for them. They overlaid the tops of the posts and their bands with gold and made their five bases of bronze.

37Bezalel made the ark of acacia wood-two and a half cubits long, a cubit and a half wide, and a cubit and a half high.

²He overlaid it with pure gold, both inside and out, and made a gold molding around it.

³He cast four gold rings for it and fastened them to its four feet, with two rings on one side and two rings on the other.

⁴Then he made poles of acacia wood and overlaid them with gold.

⁵And he inserted the poles into the rings on the sides of the ark to carry it.

⁶He made the atonement cover of pure gold-two and a half cubits long and a cubit and a half wide.

⁷Then he made two cherubim out of hammered gold at the ends of the cover.

⁸He made one cherub on one end and the second cherub on the other; at the two ends he made them of one piece with the cover.

⁹The cherubim had their wings spread upward, overshadowing the cover with them. The cherubim faced each other, looking toward the cover.

¹⁰They made the table of acacia wood- two cubits long, a cubit wide, and a cubit and a half high.

¹¹Then they overlaid it with pure gold and made a gold molding around it.

¹²They also made around it a rim a handbreadth wide and put a gold molding on the rim.

¹³They cast four gold rings for the table and fastened them to the four corners, where the four legs were.

¹⁴The rings were put close to the rim to hold the poles used in carrying the table.

¹⁵The poles for carrying the table were made of acacia wood and were overlaid with gold.

¹⁶And they made from pure gold the articles for the table-its plates and dishes and bowls and its pitchers for the pouring out of drink offerings.

¹⁷They made the lampstand of pure gold and hammered it out, base and shaft; its flowerlike cups, buds and blossoms were of one piece with it.

¹⁸Six branches extended from the sides of the lampstand-three on one side and three on the other.

¹⁹Three cups shaped like almond flowers with buds and blossoms were on

one branch, three on the next branch and the same for all six branches extending from the lampstand.

²⁰And on the lampstand were four cups shaped like almond flowers with buds and blossoms.

²¹One bud was under the first pair of branches extending from the lampstand, a second bud under the second pair, and a third bud under the third pair-six branches in all.

²²The buds and the branches were all of one piece with the lampstand, hammered out of pure gold.

²³They made its seven lamps, as well as its wick trimmers and trays, of pure gold.

²⁴They made the lampstand and all its accessories from one talent of pure gold.

²⁵They made the altar of incense out of acacia wood. It was square, a cubit long and a cubit wide, and two cubits high -its horns of one piece with it.

²⁶They overlaid the top and all the sides and the horns with pure gold, and made a gold molding around it.

²⁷They made two gold rings below the molding-two on opposite sides-to hold the poles used to carry it.

²⁸They made the poles of acacia wood and overlaid them with gold.

²⁹They also made the sacred anointing oil and the pure, fragrant incense-the work of a perfumer.

38They built the altar of burnt offering of acacia wood, three cubits high; it was square, five cubits long and five cubits wide.

²They made a horn at each of the four corners, so that the horns and the altar were of one piece, and they overlaid the altar with bronze.

³They made all its utensils of bronze-its pots, shovels, sprinkling bowls, meat forks and firepans.

⁴They made a grating for the altar, a bronze network, to be under its ledge, halfway up the altar.

⁵They cast bronze rings to hold the poles for the four corners of the bronze grating.

⁶They made the poles of acacia wood and overlaid them with bronze.

⁷They inserted the poles into the rings so they would be on the sides of the altar for carrying it. They made it hollow, out of boards.

⁸They made the bronze basin and its bronze stand from the mirrors of the women who served at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.

⁹Next they made the courtyard. The south side was a hundred cubits long and had curtains of finely twisted linen,

¹⁰with twenty posts and twenty bronze bases, and with silver hooks and bands on the posts.

¹¹The north side was also a hundred cubits long and had twenty posts and twenty bronze bases, with silver hooks and bands on the posts.

¹²The west end was fifty cubits wide and had curtains, with ten posts and ten bases, with silver hooks and bands on the posts.

¹³The east end, toward the sunrise, was also fifty cubits wide.

¹⁴Curtains fifteen cubits long were on one side of the entrance, with three posts and three bases,

¹⁵and curtains fifteen cubits long were on the other side of the entrance to the courtyard, with three posts and three bases.

¹⁶All the curtains around the courtyard were of finely twisted linen.

¹⁷The bases for the posts were bronze. The hooks and bands on the posts were silver, and their tops were overlaid with silver; so all the posts of the courtyard had silver bands.

¹⁸The curtain for the entrance to the courtyard was of blue, purple and scarlet yarn and finely twisted linen-the work of an embroiderer. It was twenty cubits long and, like the curtains of the courtyard, five cubits high,

¹⁹with four posts and four bronze bases. Their hooks and bands were silver, and their tops were overlaid with silver.

²⁰All the tent pegs of the tabernacle and of the surrounding courtyard were bronze.

²¹These are the amounts of the materials used for the tabernacle, the tabernacle of the Testimony, which were recorded at Moses’ command by the Levites under the direction of Ithamar son of Aaron, the priest.

²²(Bezalel son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah, made everything the Lord commanded Moses;

²³with him was Oholiab son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan-a craftsman and designer, and an embroiderer in blue, purple and scarlet yarn and fine linen.)

²⁴The total amount of the gold from the wave offering used for all the work on the sanctuary was 29 talents and 730 shekels, according to the sanctuary shekel.

²⁵The silver obtained from those of the community who were counted in the census was 100 talents and 1,775 shekels, according to the sanctuary shekel-

²⁶one beka per person, that is, half a shekel, according to the sanctuary shekel, from everyone who had crossed over to those counted, twenty years old or more, a total of 603,550 men.

²⁷The 100 talents of silver were used to cast the bases for the sanctuary and for the curtain-100 bases from the 100 talents, one talent for each base.

²⁸They used the 1,775 shekels to make the hooks for the posts, to overlay the tops of the posts, and to make their bands.

²⁹The bronze from the wave offering was 70 talents and 2,400 shekels.

³⁰They used it to make the bases for the entrance to the Tent of Meeting, the bronze altar with its bronze grating and all its utensils,

³¹the bases for the surrounding courtyard and those for its entrance and all the tent pegs for the tabernacle and those for the surrounding courtyard.

39From the blue, purple and scarlet yarn they made woven garments for ministering in the sanctuary. They also made sacred garments for Aaron, as the Lord commanded Moses.

²They made the ephod of gold, and of blue, purple and scarlet yarn, and of finely twisted linen.

³They hammered out thin sheets of gold and cut strands to be worked into the blue, purple and scarlet yarn and fine linen-the work of a skilled craftsman.

⁴They made shoulder pieces for the ephod, which were attached to two of its corners, so it could be fastened.

⁵Its skillfully woven waistband was like it-of one piece with the ephod and made with gold, and with blue, purple and scarlet yarn, and with finely twisted linen, as the Lord commanded Moses.

⁶They mounted the onyx stones in gold filigree settings and engraved them like a seal with the names of the sons of Israel.

⁷Then they fastened them on the shoulder pieces of the ephod as memorial stones for the sons of Israel, as the Lord commanded Moses.

⁸They fashioned the breastpiece-the work of a skilled craftsman. They made it like the ephod: of gold, and of blue, purple and scarlet yarn, and of finely twisted linen.

⁹It was square-a span long and a span wide-and folded double.

¹⁰Then they mounted four rows of precious stones on it. In the first row there was a ruby, a topaz and a beryl;

¹¹in the second row a turquoise, a sapphire and an emerald;

¹²in the third row a jacinth, an agate and an amethyst;

¹³in the fourth row a chrysolite, an onyx and a jasper. They were mounted in gold filigree settings.

¹⁴There were twelve stones, one for each of the names of the sons of Israel, each engraved like a seal with the name of one of the twelve tribes.

¹⁵For the breastpiece they made braided chains of pure gold, like a rope.

¹⁶They made two gold filigree settings and two gold rings, and fastened the

rings to two of the corners of the breastpiece.

¹⁷They fastened the two gold chains to the rings at the corners of the breastpiece,

¹⁸and the other ends of the chains to the two settings, attaching them to the shoulder pieces of the ephod at the front.

¹⁹They made two gold rings and attached them to the other two corners of the breastpiece on the inside edge next to the ephod.

²⁰Then they made two more gold rings and attached them to the bottom of the shoulder pieces on the front of the ephod, close to the seam just above the waistband of the ephod.

²¹They tied the rings of the breastpiece to the rings of the ephod with blue cord, connecting it to the waistband so that the breastpiece would not swing out from the ephod-as the Lord commanded Moses.

²²They made the robe of the ephod entirely of blue cloth-the work of a weaver-

²³with an opening in the center of the robe like the opening of a collar, and a band around this opening, so that it would not tear.

²⁴They made pomegranates of blue, purple and scarlet yarn and finely twisted linen around the hem of the robe.

²⁵And they made bells of pure gold and attached them around the hem between the pomegranates.

²⁶The bells and pomegranates alternated around the hem of the robe to be worn for ministering, as the Lord commanded Moses.

²⁷For Aaron and his sons, they made tunics of fine linen-the work of a weaver-

²⁸and the turban of fine linen, the linen headbands and the undergarments of finely twisted linen.

²⁹The sash was of finely twisted linen and blue, purple and scarlet yarn-the work of an embroiderer-as the Lord commanded Moses.

³⁰They made the plate, the sacred diadem, out of pure gold and engraved on it, like an inscription on a seal: HOLY TO THE Lord .

³¹Then they fastened a blue cord to it to attach it to the turban, as the Lord commanded Moses.

³²So all the work on the tabernacle, the Tent of Meeting, was completed. The Israelites did everything just as the Lord commanded Moses.

³³Then they brought the tabernacle to Moses: the tent and all its furnishings, its clasps, frames, crossbars, posts and bases;

³⁴the covering of ram skins dyed red, the covering of hides of sea cows and the shielding curtain;

³⁵the ark of the Testimony with its poles and the atonement cover;

³⁶the table with all its articles and the bread of the Presence;

³⁷the pure gold lampstand with its row of lamps and all its accessories, and the oil for the light;

³⁸the gold altar, the anointing oil, the fragrant incense, and the curtain for the entrance to the tent;

³⁹the bronze altar with its bronze grating, its poles and all its utensils; the basin with its stand;

⁴⁰the curtains of the courtyard with its posts and bases, and the curtain for the entrance to the courtyard; the ropes and tent pegs for the courtyard; all the furnishings for the tabernacle, the Tent of Meeting;

⁴¹and the woven garments worn for ministering in the sanctuary, both the sacred garments for Aaron the priest and the garments for his sons when serving as priests.

⁴²The Israelites had done all the work just as the Lord had commanded Moses.

⁴³Moses inspected the work and saw that they had done it just as the Lord had commanded. So Moses blessed them.

40Then the Lord said to Moses:

²“Set up the tabernacle, the Tent of Meeting, on the first day of the first month.

³Place the ark of the Testimony in it and shield the ark with the curtain.

⁴Bring in the table and set out what belongs on it. Then bring in the lampstand and set up its lamps.

⁵Place the gold altar of incense in front of the ark of the Testimony and put the curtain at the entrance to the tabernacle.

⁶“Place the altar of burnt offering in front of the entrance to the tabernacle, the Tent of Meeting;

⁷place the basin between the Tent of Meeting and the altar and put water in it.

⁸Set up the courtyard around it and put the curtain at the entrance to the courtyard.

⁹“Take the anointing oil and anoint the tabernacle and everything in it; consecrate it and all its furnishings, and it will be holy.

¹⁰Then anoint the altar of burnt offering and all its utensils; consecrate the altar, and it will be most holy.

¹¹Anoint the basin and its stand and consecrate them.

¹²“Bring Aaron and his sons to the entrance to the Tent of Meeting and wash them with water.

¹³Then dress Aaron in the sacred garments, anoint him and consecrate him so he may serve me as priest.

¹⁴Bring his sons and dress them in tunics.

¹⁵Anoint them just as you anointed their father, so they may serve me as priests. Their anointing will be to a priesthood that will continue for all generations to come.”

¹⁶Moses did everything just as the Lord commanded him.

¹⁷So the tabernacle was set up on the first day of the first month in the second year.

¹⁸When Moses set up the tabernacle, he put the bases in place, erected the frames, inserted the crossbars and set up the posts.

¹⁹Then he spread the tent over the tabernacle and put the covering over the tent, as the Lord commanded him.

²⁰He took the Testimony and placed it in the ark, attached the poles to the ark and put the atonement cover over it.

²¹Then he brought the ark into the tabernacle and hung the shielding curtain and shielded the ark of the Testimony, as the Lord commanded him.

²²Moses placed the table in the Tent of Meeting on the north side of the tabernacle outside the curtain

²³and set out the bread on it before the Lord , as the Lord commanded him.

²⁴He placed the lampstand in the Tent of Meeting opposite the table on the south side of the tabernacle

²⁵and set up the lamps before the Lord , as the Lord commanded him.

²⁶Moses placed the gold altar in the Tent of Meeting in front of the curtain

²⁷and burned fragrant incense on it, as the Lord commanded him.

²⁸Then he put up the curtain at the entrance to the tabernacle.

²⁹He set the altar of burnt offering near the entrance to the tabernacle, the Tent of Meeting, and offered on it burnt offerings and grain offerings, as the Lord commanded him.

³⁰He placed the basin between the Tent of Meeting and the altar and put water in it for washing,

³¹and Moses and Aaron and his sons used it to wash their hands and feet.

³²They washed whenever they entered the Tent of Meeting or approached the altar, as the Lord commanded Moses.

³³Then Moses set up the courtyard around the tabernacle and altar and put up the curtain at the entrance to the courtyard. And so Moses finished the work. The Glory of the Lord

³⁴Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.

³⁵Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting because the cloud had settled upon it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.

³⁶In all the travels of the Israelites, whenever the cloud lifted from above the tabernacle, they would set out;

³⁷but if the cloud did not lift, they did not set out-until the day it lifted.

³⁸So the cloud of the Lord was over the tabernacle by day, and fire was in the cloud by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel during all their travels.

Genesis

Posted on March 20, 2025March 20, 2025 by robertmacsbible_hpehg4

Genesis

¹⁰God called the dry ground “land,” and the gathered waters he called “seas.”

1In the beginning God created the

heavens and the earth.

²Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

³And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.

⁴God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness.

⁵God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning- the first day.

⁶And God said, “Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water.”

⁷So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so.

⁸God called the expanse “sky.” And there was evening, and there was morning-the second day.

⁹And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so.

And God saw that it was good.

¹¹Then God said, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.” And it was so.

¹²The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.

¹³And there was evening, and there was morning-the third day.

¹⁴And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years,

¹⁵and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth.” And it was so.

¹⁶God made two great lights-the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars.

¹⁷God set them in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth,

¹⁸to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good.

¹⁹And there was evening, and there was morning-the fourth day.

²⁰And God said, “Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky.”

²¹So God created the great creatures of the sea and every living and moving thing with which the water teems, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.

²²God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth.”

²³And there was evening, and there was morning-the fifth day.

²⁴And God said, “Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: livestock, creatures that move along the ground, and wild animals, each according to its kind.” And it was so.

²⁵God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.

²⁶Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

²⁷So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

²⁸God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

²⁹Then God said, “I give you every seed- bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food.

³⁰And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground- everything that has the breath of life in it-I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.

³¹God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning-the sixth day.

2Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array.

²By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work.

³And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.

⁴This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created.

When the Lord God made the earth and the heavens-

⁵and no shrub of the field had yet appeared on the earth and no plant of the field had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no man to work the ground,

⁶but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground-

⁷the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

⁸Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed.

⁹And the Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground-trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

¹⁰A river watering the garden flowed from Eden; from there it was separated into four headwaters.

¹¹The name of the first is the Pishon; it winds through the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold.

¹²(The gold of that land is good; aromatic resin and onyx are also there.)

¹³The name of the second river is the Gihon; it winds through the entire land of Cush.

¹⁴The name of the third river is the Tigris; it runs along the east side of Asshur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.

¹⁵The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.

¹⁶And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden;

¹⁷but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”

¹⁸The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”

¹⁹Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name.

²⁰So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. But for Adam no suitable helper was found.

²¹So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with flesh.

²²Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.

²³The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman, ‘ for she was taken out of man.”

²⁴For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.

²⁵The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.

3Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”

²The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden,

³but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’ “

⁴“You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman.

⁵“For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

⁶When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.

⁷Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.

⁸Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

⁹But the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”

¹⁰He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”

¹¹And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”

¹²The man said, “The woman you put here with me-she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”

¹³Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

¹⁴So the Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, “Cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life.

¹⁵And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring

and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”

¹⁶To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.”

¹⁷To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.

¹⁸It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field.

¹⁹By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.”

²⁰Adam named his wife Eve, because she would become the mother of all the living.

²¹The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them.

²²And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.”

²³So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken.

²⁴After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.

4Adam lay with his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. She said, “With the help of the Lord I have brought forth a man.”

²Later she gave birth to his brother Abel. Now Abel kept flocks, and Cain worked the soil.

³In the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the Lord .

⁴But Abel brought fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock. The Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering,

⁵but on Cain and his offering he did not look with favor. So Cain was very angry, and his face was downcast.

⁶Then the Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast?

⁷If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.”

⁸Now Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let’s go out to the field.” And while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.

⁹Then the Lord said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?” “I don’t know,” he replied. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

¹⁰The Lord said, “What have you done? Listen! Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground.

¹¹Now you are under a curse and driven from the ground, which opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.

¹²When you work the ground, it will no longer yield its crops for you. You will be a restless wanderer on the earth.”

¹³Cain said to the Lord , “My punishment is more than I can bear.

¹⁴Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me.”

¹⁵But the Lord said to him, “Not so ; if anyone kills Cain, he will suffer vengeance seven times over.” Then the Lord put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him.

¹⁶So Cain went out from the Lord ‘s presence and lived in the land of Nod, east of Eden.

¹⁷Cain lay with his wife, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch. Cain was then building a city, and he named it after his son Enoch.

¹⁸To Enoch was born Irad, and Irad was the father of Mehujael, and Mehujael

was the father of Methushael, and Methushael was the father of Lamech.

¹⁹Lamech married two women, one named Adah and the other Zillah.

²⁰Adah gave birth to Jabal; he was the father of those who live in tents and raise livestock.

²¹His brother’s name was Jubal; he was the father of all who play the harp and flute.

²²Zillah also had a son, Tubal-Cain, who forged all kinds of tools out of bronze and iron. Tubal-Cain’s sister was Naamah.

²³Lamech said to his wives, “Adah and Zillah, listen to me; wives of Lamech, hear my words. I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for injuring me.

²⁴If Cain is avenged seven times, then Lamech seventy-seven times.”

²⁵Adam lay with his wife again, and she gave birth to a son and named him Seth, saying, “God has granted me another child in place of Abel, since Cain killed him.”

²⁶Seth also had a son, and he named him Enosh. At that time men began to call on the name of the Lord .

5This is the written account of Adam’s line. When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God.

²He created them male and female and blessed them. And when they were created, he called them “man. “

³When Adam had lived 130 years, he had a son in his own likeness, in his own image; and he named him Seth.

⁴After Seth was born, Adam lived 800 years and had other sons and daughters.

⁵Altogether, Adam lived 930 years, and then he died.

⁶When Seth had lived 105 years, he became the father of Enosh.

⁷And after he became the father of Enosh, Seth lived 807 years and had other sons and daughters.

⁸Altogether, Seth lived 912 years, and then he died.

⁹When Enosh had lived 90 years, he became the father of Kenan.

¹⁰And after he became the father of Kenan, Enosh lived 815 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹¹Altogether, Enosh lived 905 years, and then he died.

¹²When Kenan had lived 70 years, he became the father of Mahalalel.

¹³And after he became the father of Mahalalel, Kenan lived 840 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹⁴Altogether, Kenan lived 910 years, and then he died.

¹⁵When Mahalalel had lived 65 years, he became the father of Jared.

¹⁶And after he became the father of Jared, Mahalalel lived 830 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹⁷Altogether, Mahalalel lived 895 years, and then he died.

¹⁸When Jared had lived 162 years, he became the father of Enoch.

¹⁹And after he became the father of Enoch, Jared lived 800 years and had other sons and daughters.

²⁰Altogether, Jared lived 962 years, and then he died.

²¹When Enoch had lived 65 years, he became the father of Methuselah.

²²And after he became the father of Methuselah, Enoch walked with God

300 years and had other sons and daughters.

²³Altogether, Enoch lived 365 years.

²⁴Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.

²⁵When Methuselah had lived 187 years, he became the father of Lamech.

²⁶And after he became the father of Lamech, Methuselah lived 782 years and had other sons and daughters.

²⁷Altogether, Methuselah lived 969 years, and then he died.

²⁸When Lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son.

²⁹He named him Noah and said, “He will comfort us in the labor and painful toil of our hands caused by the ground the Lord has cursed.”

³⁰After Noah was born, Lamech lived

595 years and had other sons and daughters.

³¹Altogether, Lamech lived 777 years, and then he died.

³²After Noah was 500 years old, he became the father of Shem, Ham and Japheth.

6When men began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them,

²the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose.

³Then the Lord said, “My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal ; his days will be a hundred and twenty years.”

⁴The Nephilim were on the earth in those days-and also afterward-when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.

⁵The Lord saw how great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time.

⁶The Lord was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain.

⁷So the Lord said, “I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth-men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds of the air-for I am grieved that I have made them.”

⁸But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord .

⁹This is the account of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked with God.

¹⁰Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth.

¹¹Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence.

¹²God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways.

¹³So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth.

¹⁴So make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out.

¹⁵This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high.

¹⁶Make a roof for it and finish the ark to within 18 inches of the top. Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks.

¹⁷I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish.

¹⁸But I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark-you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you.

¹⁹You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you.

²⁰Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive.

²¹You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them.”

²²Noah did everything just as God commanded him.

7The Lord then said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation.

²Take with you seven of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and two of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate,

³and also seven of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth.

⁴Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.”

⁵And Noah did all that the Lord commanded him.

⁶Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters came on the earth.

⁷And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood.

⁸Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground,

⁹male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah.

¹⁰And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth.

¹¹In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month-on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened.

¹²And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights.

¹³On that very day Noah and his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark.

¹⁴They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind and every bird according to its kind, everything with wings.

¹⁵Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life in them came to Noah and entered the ark.

¹⁶The animals going in were male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah. Then the Lord shut him in.

¹⁷For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth.

¹⁸The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water.

¹⁹They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered.

²⁰The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than twenty feet. ,

²¹Every living thing that moved on the earth perished-birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind.

²²Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died.

²³Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; men and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds of the air were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.

²⁴The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days.

8But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and he sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded.

²Now the springs of the deep and the floodgates of the heavens had been closed, and the rain had stopped falling from the sky.

³The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the water had gone down,

⁴and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat.

⁵The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.

⁶After forty days Noah opened the window he had made in the ark

⁷and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth.

⁸Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground.

⁹But the dove could find no place to set its feet because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark.

¹⁰He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark.

¹¹When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth.

¹²He waited seven more days and sent the dove out again, but this time it did not return to him.

¹³By the first day of the first month of Noah’s six hundred and first year, the water had dried up from the earth. Noah then removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry.

¹⁴By the twenty-seventh day of the second month the earth was completely dry.

¹⁵Then God said to Noah,

¹⁶“Come out of the ark, you and your wife and your sons and their wives.

¹⁷Bring out every kind of living creature that is with you-the birds, the animals, and all the creatures that move along the ground-so they can multiply on the earth and be fruitful and increase in number upon it.”

¹⁸So Noah came out, together with his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives.

¹⁹All the animals and all the creatures that move along the ground and all the birds-everything that moves on the earth-came out of the ark, one kind after another.

²⁰Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and, taking some of all the clean animals and clean birds, he sacrificed burnt offerings on it.

²¹The Lord smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: “Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done.

²²“As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.”

9Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.

²The fear and dread of you will fall upon all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all

the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands.

³Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.

⁴“But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it.

⁵And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each man, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of his fellow man.

⁶“Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man.

⁷As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it.”

⁸Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him:

⁹“I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you

¹⁰and with every living creature that was with you-the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you-every living creature on earth.

¹¹I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.”

¹²And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and

you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come:

¹³I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth.

¹⁴Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds,

¹⁵I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life.

¹⁶Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.”

¹⁷So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth.”

¹⁸The sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem, Ham and Japheth. (Ham was the father of Canaan.)

¹⁹These were the three sons of Noah, and from them came the people who were scattered over the earth.

²⁰Noah, a man of the soil, proceeded to plant a vineyard.

²¹When he drank some of its wine, he became drunk and lay uncovered inside his tent.

²²Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father’s nakedness and told his two brothers outside.

²³But Shem and Japheth took a garment and laid it across their shoulders; then they walked in backward and covered their father’s nakedness. Their faces were turned the other way so that they would not see their father’s nakedness.

²⁴When Noah awoke from his wine and found out what his youngest son had done to him,

²⁵he said, “Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves will he be to his brothers.”

²⁶He also said, “Blessed be the Lord , the God of Shem! May Canaan be the slave of Shem.

²⁷May God extend the territory of Japheth ; may Japheth live in the tents of Shem, and may Canaan be his slave.”

²⁸After the flood Noah lived 350 years.

²⁹Altogether, Noah lived 950 years, and then he died.

10This is the account of Shem, Ham and Japheth, Noah’s sons, who themselves had sons after the flood. The Japhethites

²The sons of Japheth: Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech and Tiras.

³The sons of Gomer: Ashkenaz, Riphath and Togarmah.

⁴The sons of Javan: Elishah, Tarshish, the Kittim and the Rodanim.

⁵(From these the maritime peoples spread out into their territories by their clans within their nations, each with its own language.) The Hamites

⁶The sons of Ham: Cush, Mizraim, Put and Canaan.

⁷The sons of Cush: Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah and Sabteca. The sons of Raamah: Sheba and Dedan.

⁸Cush was the father of Nimrod, who grew to be a mighty warrior on the earth.

⁹He was a mighty hunter before the Lord ; that is why it is said, “Like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the Lord .”

¹⁰The first centers of his kingdom were Babylon, Erech, Akkad and Calneh, in Shinar.

¹¹From that land he went to Assyria, where he built Nineveh, Rehoboth Ir, Calah

¹²and Resen, which is between Nineveh and Calah; that is the great city.

¹³Mizraim was the father of the Ludites, Anamites, Lehabites, Naphtuhites,

¹⁴Pathrusites, Casluhites (from whom the Philistines came) and Caphtorites.

¹⁵Canaan was the father of Sidon his firstborn, and of the Hittites,

¹⁶Jebusites, Amorites, Girgashites,

¹⁷Hivites, Arkites, Sinites,

¹⁸Arvadites, Zemarites and Hamathites. Later the Canaanite clans scattered

¹⁹and the borders of Canaan reached from Sidon toward Gerar as far as Gaza, and then toward Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, as far as Lasha.

²⁰These are the sons of Ham by their clans and languages, in their territories and nations. The Semites

²¹Sons were also born to Shem, whose older brother was Japheth; Shem was the ancestor of all the sons of Eber.

²²The sons of Shem: Elam, Asshur, Arphaxad, Lud and Aram.

²³The sons of Aram: Uz, Hul, Gether and Meshech.

²⁴Arphaxad was the father of Shelah, and Shelah the father of Eber.

²⁵Two sons were born to Eber: One was named Peleg, because in his time the earth was divided; his brother was named Joktan.

²⁶Joktan was the father of Almodad, Sheleph, Hazarmaveth, Jerah,

²⁷Hadoram, Uzal, Diklah,

²⁸Obal, Abimael, Sheba,

²⁹Ophir, Havilah and Jobab. All these were sons of Joktan.

³⁰The region where they lived stretched from Mesha toward Sephar, in the eastern hill country.

³¹These are the sons of Shem by their clans and languages, in their territories and nations.

³²These are the clans of Noah’s sons, according to their lines of descent, within their nations. From these the nations spread out over the earth after the flood.

11Now the whole world had one language and a common speech.

²As men moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.

³They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.

⁴Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”

⁵But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building.

⁶The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have

begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.

⁷Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”

⁸So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city.

⁹That is why it was called Babel – because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

¹⁰This is the account of Shem. Two years after the flood, when Shem was 100 years old, he became the father of Arphaxad.

¹¹And after he became the father of Arphaxad, Shem lived 500 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹²When Arphaxad had lived 35 years, he became the father of Shelah.

¹³And after he became the father of Shelah, Arphaxad lived 403 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹⁴When Shelah had lived 30 years, he became the father of Eber.

¹⁵And after he became the father of Eber, Shelah lived 403 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹⁶When Eber had lived 34 years, he became the father of Peleg.

¹⁷And after he became the father of Peleg, Eber lived 430 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹⁸When Peleg had lived 30 years, he became the father of Reu.

¹⁹And after he became the father of Reu, Peleg lived 209 years and had other sons and daughters.

²⁰When Reu had lived 32 years, he became the father of Serug.

²¹And after he became the father of Serug, Reu lived 207 years and had other sons and daughters.

²²When Serug had lived 30 years, he became the father of Nahor.

²³And after he became the father of Nahor, Serug lived 200 years and had other sons and daughters.

²⁴When Nahor had lived 29 years, he became the father of Terah.

²⁵And after he became the father of Terah, Nahor lived 119 years and had other sons and daughters.

²⁶After Terah had lived 70 years, he became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran.

²⁷This is the account of Terah. Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran. And Haran became the father of Lot.

²⁸While his father Terah was still alive, Haran died in Ur of the Chaldeans, in the land of his birth.

²⁹Abram and Nahor both married. The name of Abram’s wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor’s wife was Milcah; she was the daughter of Haran, the father of both Milcah and Iscah.

³⁰Now Sarai was barren; she had no children.

³¹Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and together they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Haran, they settled there.

³²Terah lived 205 years, and he died in Haran.

12The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.

²“I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.

³I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

⁴So Abram left, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Haran.

⁵He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.

⁶Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land.

⁷The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord , who had appeared to him.

⁸From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord .

⁹Then Abram set out and continued toward the Negev.

¹⁰Now there was a famine in the land, and Abram went down to Egypt to live there for a while because the famine was severe.

¹¹As he was about to enter Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, “I know what a beautiful woman you are.

¹²When the Egyptians see you, they will say, ‘This is his wife.’ Then they will kill me but will let you live.

¹³Say you are my sister, so that I will be treated well for your sake and my life will be spared because of you.”

¹⁴When Abram came to Egypt, the Egyptians saw that she was a very beautiful woman.

¹⁵And when Pharaoh’s officials saw her, they praised her to Pharaoh, and she was taken into his palace.

¹⁶He treated Abram well for her sake, and Abram acquired sheep and cattle, male and female donkeys, menservants and maidservants, and camels.

¹⁷But the Lord inflicted serious diseases on Pharaoh and his household because of Abram’s wife Sarai.

¹⁸So Pharaoh summoned Abram. “What have you done to me?” he said. “Why didn’t you tell me she was your wife?

¹⁹Why did you say, ‘She is my sister,’ so that I took her to be my wife? Now then, here is your wife. Take her and go!”

²⁰Then Pharaoh gave orders about Abram to his men, and they sent him on his way, with his wife and everything he had.

13So Abram went up from Egypt to the Negev, with his wife and everything he had, and Lot went with him.

²Abram had become very wealthy in livestock and in silver and gold.

³From the Negev he went from place to place until he came to Bethel, to the place between Bethel and Ai where his tent had been earlier

⁴and where he had first built an altar. There Abram called on the name of the Lord .

⁵Now Lot, who was moving about with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents.

⁶But the land could not support them while they stayed together, for their possessions were so great that they were not able to stay together.

⁷And quarreling arose between Abram’s herdsmen and the herdsmen of Lot. The Canaanites and Perizzites were also living in the land at that time.

⁸So Abram said to Lot, “Let’s not have any quarreling between you and me, or between your herdsmen and mine, for we are brothers.

⁹Is not the whole land before you? Let’s part company. If you go to the left, I’ll go to the right; if you go to the right, I’ll go to the left.”

¹⁰Lot looked up and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan was well watered, like the garden of the Lord , like the land of Egypt, toward Zoar. (This was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.)

¹¹So Lot chose for himself the whole plain of the Jordan and set out toward the east. The two men parted company:

¹²Abram lived in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived among the cities of the plain and pitched his tents near Sodom.

¹³Now the men of Sodom were wicked and were sinning greatly against the Lord .

¹⁴The Lord said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, “Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west.

¹⁵All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever.

¹⁶I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted.

¹⁷Go, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you.”

¹⁸So Abram moved his tents and went to live near the great trees of Mamre at Hebron, where he built an altar to the Lord .

14At this time Amraphel king of Shinar, Arioch king of Ellasar, Kedorlaomer king of Elam and Tidal king of Goiim

²went to war against Bera king of Sodom, Birsha king of Gomorrah, Shinab king of Admah, Shemeber king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (that is, Zoar).

³All these latter kings joined forces in the Valley of Siddim (the Salt Sea ).

⁴For twelve years they had been subject to Kedorlaomer, but in the thirteenth year they rebelled.

⁵In the fourteenth year, Kedorlaomer and the kings allied with him went out and defeated the Rephaites in Ashteroth Karnaim, the Zuzites in Ham, the Emites in Shaveh Kiriathaim

⁶and the Horites in the hill country of Seir, as far as El Paran near the desert.

⁷Then they turned back and went to En Mishpat (that is, Kadesh), and they conquered the whole territory of the Amalekites, as well as the Amorites who were living in Hazazon Tamar.

⁸Then the king of Sodom, the king of Gomorrah, the king of Admah, the king of Zeboiim and the king of Bela (that is, Zoar) marched out and drew up their battle lines in the Valley of Siddim

⁹against Kedorlaomer king of Elam, Tidal king of Goiim, Amraphel king of Shinar and Arioch king of Ellasar-four kings against five.

¹⁰Now the Valley of Siddim was full of tar pits, and when the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, some of the men fell into them and the rest fled to the hills.

¹¹The four kings seized all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah and all their food; then they went away.

¹²They also carried off Abram’s nephew Lot and his possessions, since he was living in Sodom.

¹³One who had escaped came and reported this to Abram the Hebrew. Now Abram was living near the great trees of Mamre the Amorite, a brother of Eshcol and Aner, all of whom were allied with Abram.

¹⁴When Abram heard that his relative had been taken captive, he called out the 318 trained men born in his household and went in pursuit as far as Dan.

¹⁵During the night Abram divided his men to attack them and he routed them, pursuing them as far as Hobah, north of Damascus.

¹⁶He recovered all the goods and brought back his relative Lot and his possessions, together with the women and the other people.

¹⁷After Abram returned from defeating Kedorlaomer and the kings allied with him, the king of Sodom came out to meet him in the Valley of Shaveh (that is, the King’s Valley).

¹⁸Then Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine. He was priest of God Most High,

¹⁹and he blessed Abram, saying, “Blessed be Abram by God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth.

²⁰And blessed be God Most High, who delivered your enemies into your hand.” Then Abram gave him a tenth of everything.

²¹The king of Sodom said to Abram, “Give me the people and keep the goods for yourself.”

²²But Abram said to the king of Sodom, “I have raised my hand to the Lord , God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth, and have taken an oath

²³that I will accept nothing belonging to you, not even a thread or the thong of a sandal, so that you will never be able to say, ‘I made Abram rich.’

²⁴I will accept nothing but what my men have eaten and the share that belongs to the men who went with me-to Aner, Eshcol and Mamre. Let them have their share.”

15After this, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision: “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward. “

²But Abram said, “O Sovereign Lord , what can you give me since I remain childless and the one who will inherit my estate is Eliezer of Damascus?”

³And Abram said, “You have given me no children; so a servant in my household will be my heir.”

⁴Then the word of the Lord came to him: “This man will not be your heir, but a son coming from your own body will be your heir.”

⁵He took him outside and said, “Look up at the heavens and count the stars-if

indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.”

⁶Abram believed the Lord , and he credited it to him as righteousness.

⁷He also said to him, “I am the Lord , who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to take possession of it.”

⁸But Abram said, “O Sovereign Lord , how can I know that I will gain possession of it?”

⁹So the Lord said to him, “Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon.”

¹⁰Abram brought all these to him, cut them in two and arranged the halves opposite each other; the birds, however, he did not cut in half.

¹¹Then birds of prey came down on the carcasses, but Abram drove them away.

¹²As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him.

¹³Then the Lord said to him, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years.

¹⁴But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out with great possessions.

¹⁵You, however, will go to your fathers in peace and be buried at a good old age.

¹⁶In the fourth generation your descendants will come back here, for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure.”

¹⁷When the sun had set and darkness had fallen, a smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces.

¹⁸On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram and said, “To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates-

¹⁹the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites,

²⁰Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites,

²¹Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites and Jebusites.”

16Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar;

²so she said to Abram, “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my maidservant; perhaps I can build a family through her.” Abram agreed to what Sarai said.

³So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian maidservant Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife.

⁴He slept with Hagar, and she conceived. When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress.

⁵Then Sarai said to Abram, “You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my servant in your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me. May the Lord judge between you and me.”

⁶“Your servant is in your hands,” Abram said. “Do with her whatever you think best.” Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her.

⁷The angel of the Lord found Hagar near a spring in the desert; it was the spring that is beside the road to Shur.

⁸And he said, “Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from, and where are you going?” “I’m running away from my mistress Sarai,” she answered.

⁹Then the angel of the Lord told her, “Go back to your mistress and submit to her.”

¹⁰The angel added, “I will so increase your descendants that they will be too numerous to count.”

¹¹The angel of the Lord also said to her: “You are now with child and you will have a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard of your misery.

¹²He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.”

¹³She gave this name to the Lord who spoke to her: “You are the God who sees me,” for she said, “I have now seen the One who sees me.”

¹⁴That is why the well was called Beer Lahai Roi ; it is still there, between Kadesh and Bered.

¹⁵So Hagar bore Abram a son, and Abram gave the name Ishmael to the son she had borne.

¹⁶Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore him Ishmael.

17When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am God Almighty ; walk before me and be blameless.

²I will confirm my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers.”

³Abram fell facedown, and God said to him,

⁴“As for me, this is my covenant with you: You will be the father of many nations.

⁵No longer will you be called Abram ; your name will be Abraham, for I have made you a father of many nations.

⁶I will make you very fruitful; I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you.

⁷I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.

⁸The whole land of Canaan, where you are now an alien, I will give as an everlasting possession to you and your descendants after you; and I will be their God.”

⁹Then God said to Abraham, “As for you, you must keep my covenant, you and your descendants after you for the generations to come.

¹⁰This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you, the covenant you are to keep: Every male among you shall be circumcised.

¹¹You are to undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and you.

¹²For the generations to come every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised, including those born in your household or bought with money from a foreigner-those who are not your offspring.

¹³Whether born in your household or bought with your money, they must be circumcised. My covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant.

¹⁴Any uncircumcised male, who has not been circumcised in the flesh, will be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant.”

¹⁵God also said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you are no longer to call her Sarai; her name will be Sarah.

¹⁶I will bless her and will surely give you a son by her. I will bless her so that she will be the mother of nations; kings of peoples will come from her.”

¹⁷Abraham fell facedown; he laughed and said to himself, “Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?”

¹⁸And Abraham said to God, “If only Ishmael might live under your blessing!”

¹⁹Then God said, “Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.

²⁰And as for Ishmael, I have heard you: I will surely bless him; I will make him fruitful and will greatly increase his numbers. He will be the father of twelve rulers, and I will make him into a great nation.

²¹But my covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you by this time next year.”

²²When he had finished speaking with Abraham, God went up from him.

²³On that very day Abraham took his son Ishmael and all those born in his household or bought with his money, every male in his household, and circumcised them, as God told him.

²⁴Abraham was ninety-nine years old when he was circumcised,

²⁵and his son Ishmael was thirteen;

²⁶Abraham and his son Ishmael were both circumcised on that same day.

²⁷And every male in Abraham’s household, including those born in his household or bought from a foreigner, was circumcised with him.

18The Lord appeared to Abraham near the great trees of Mamre while he was sitting at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day.

²Abraham looked up and saw three men standing nearby. When he saw them, he hurried from the entrance of his tent to meet them and bowed low to the ground.

³He said, “If I have found favor in your eyes, my lord, do not pass your servant by.

⁴Let a little water be brought, and then you may all wash your feet and rest under this tree.

⁵Let me get you something to eat, so you can be refreshed and then go on your way-now that you have come to your servant.” “Very well,” they answered, “do as you say.”

⁶So Abraham hurried into the tent to Sarah. “Quick,” he said, “get three seahs of fine flour and knead it and bake some bread.”

⁷Then he ran to the herd and selected a choice, tender calf and gave it to a servant, who hurried to prepare it.

⁸He then brought some curds and milk and the calf that had been prepared, and set these before them. While they ate, he stood near them under a tree.

⁹“Where is your wife Sarah?” they asked him. “There, in the tent,” he said.

¹⁰Then the Lord said, “I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah your wife will have a son.” Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, which was behind him.

¹¹Abraham and Sarah were already old and well advanced in years, and Sarah was past the age of childbearing.

¹²So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, “After I am worn out and my master is old, will I now have this pleasure?”

¹³Then the Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Will I really have a child, now that I am old?’

¹⁴Is anything too hard for the Lord ? I will return to you at the appointed time next year and Sarah will have a son.”

¹⁵Sarah was afraid, so she lied and said, “I did not laugh.” But he said, “Yes, you did laugh.”

¹⁶When the men got up to leave, they looked down toward Sodom, and Abraham walked along with them to see them on their way.

¹⁷Then the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?

¹⁸Abraham will surely become a great and powerful nation, and all nations on earth will be blessed through him.

¹⁹For I have chosen him, so that he will direct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing what is right and just, so that the Lord will bring about for Abraham what he has promised him.”

²⁰Then the Lord said, “The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin so grievous

²¹that I will go down and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has reached me. If not, I will know.”

²²The men turned away and went toward Sodom, but Abraham remained standing before the Lord .

²³Then Abraham approached him and said: “Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked?

²⁴What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it?

²⁵Far be it from you to do such a thing-to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from you! Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?”

²⁶The Lord said, “If I find fifty righteous people in the city of Sodom, I will spare the whole place for their sake.”

²⁷Then Abraham spoke up again: “Now that I have been so bold as to speak to the Lord, though I am nothing but dust and ashes,

²⁸what if the number of the righteous is five less than fifty? Will you destroy the whole city because of five people?” “If I find forty-five there,” he said, “I will not destroy it.”

²⁹Once again he spoke to him, “What if only forty are found there?” He said, “For the sake of forty, I will not do it.”

³⁰Then he said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak. What if only thirty can be found there?” He answered, “I will not do it if I find thirty there.”

³¹Abraham said, “Now that I have been so bold as to speak to the Lord, what if only twenty can be found there?” He said, “For the sake of twenty, I will not destroy it.”

³²Then he said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak just once more. What if only ten can be found there?” He answered, “For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it.”

³³When the Lord had finished speaking with Abraham, he left, and Abraham returned home.

19The two angels arrived at Sodom in the evening, and Lot was sitting in the

gateway of the city. When he saw them, he got up to meet them and bowed down with his face to the ground.

²“My lords,” he said, “please turn aside to your servant’s house. You can wash your feet and spend the night and then go on your way early in the morning.” “No,” they answered, “we will spend the night in the square.”

³But he insisted so strongly that they did go with him and entered his house. He prepared a meal for them, baking bread without yeast, and they ate.

⁴Before they had gone to bed, all the men from every part of the city of Sodom-both young and old-surrounded the house.

⁵They called to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so that we can have sex with them.”

⁶Lot went outside to meet them and shut the door behind him

⁷and said, “No, my friends. Don’t do this wicked thing.

⁸Look, I have two daughters who have never slept with a man. Let me bring them out to you, and you can do what you like with them. But don’t do anything to these men, for they have come under the protection of my roof.”

⁹“Get out of our way,” they replied. And they said, “This fellow came here as an alien, and now he wants to play the judge! We’ll treat you worse than them.”

They kept bringing pressure on Lot and moved forward to break down the door.

¹⁰But the men inside reached out and pulled Lot back into the house and shut the door.

¹¹Then they struck the men who were at the door of the house, young and old, with blindness so that they could not find the door.

¹²The two men said to Lot, “Do you have anyone else here-sons-in-law, sons or daughters, or anyone else in the city who belongs to you? Get them out of here,

¹³because we are going to destroy this place. The outcry to the Lord against its people is so great that he has sent us to destroy it.”

¹⁴So Lot went out and spoke to his sons- in-law, who were pledged to marry his daughters. He said, “Hurry and get out of this place, because the Lord is about to destroy the city!” But his sons-in-law thought he was joking.

¹⁵With the coming of dawn, the angels urged Lot, saying, “Hurry! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or you will be swept away when the city is punished.”

¹⁶When he hesitated, the men grasped his hand and the hands of his wife and of his two daughters and led them safely out of the city, for the Lord was merciful to them.

¹⁷As soon as they had brought them out, one of them said, “Flee for your lives! Don’t look back, and don’t stop anywhere in the plain! Flee to the mountains or you will be swept away!”

¹⁸But Lot said to them, “No, my lords, please!

¹⁹Your servant has found favor in your eyes, and you have shown great kindness to me in sparing my life. But I can’t flee to the mountains; this disaster will overtake me, and I’ll die.

²⁰Look, here is a town near enough to run to, and it is small. Let me flee to it-it is very small, isn’t it? Then my life will be spared.”

²¹He said to him, “Very well, I will grant this request too; I will not overthrow the town you speak of.

²²But flee there quickly, because I cannot do anything until you reach it.” (That is why the town was called Zoar. )

²³By the time Lot reached Zoar, the sun had risen over the land.

²⁴Then the Lord rained down burning sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrah-from the Lord out of the heavens.

²⁵Thus he overthrew those cities and the entire plain, including all those living in the cities-and also the vegetation in the land.

²⁶But Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.

²⁷Early the next morning Abraham got up and returned to the place where he had stood before the Lord .

²⁸He looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah, toward all the land of the plain, and he saw dense smoke rising from the land, like smoke from a furnace.

²⁹So when God destroyed the cities of the plain, he remembered Abraham, and he brought Lot out of the catastrophe that overthrew the cities where Lot had lived.

³⁰Lot and his two daughters left Zoar and settled in the mountains, for he was afraid to stay in Zoar. He and his two daughters lived in a cave.

³¹One day the older daughter said to the younger, “Our father is old, and there is no man around here to lie with us, as is the custom all over the earth.

³²Let’s get our father to drink wine and then lie with him and preserve our family line through our father.”

³³That night they got their father to drink wine, and the older daughter went in and lay with him. He was not aware of it when she lay down or when she got up.

³⁴The next day the older daughter said to the younger, “Last night I lay with my father. Let’s get him to drink wine again tonight, and you go in and lie with him so we can preserve our family line through our father.”

³⁵So they got their father to drink wine that night also, and the younger

daughter went and lay with him. Again he was not aware of it when she lay down or when she got up.

³⁶So both of Lot’s daughters became pregnant by their father.

³⁷The older daughter had a son, and she named him Moab ; he is the father of the Moabites of today.

³⁸The younger daughter also had a son, and she named him Ben-Ammi ; he is the father of the Ammonites of today.

20Now Abraham moved on from there into the region of the Negev and lived between Kadesh and Shur. For a while he stayed in Gerar,

²and there Abraham said of his wife Sarah, “She is my sister.” Then Abimelech king of Gerar sent for Sarah and took her.

³But God came to Abimelech in a dream one night and said to him, “You are as good as dead because of the woman you have taken; she is a married woman.”

⁴Now Abimelech had not gone near her, so he said, “Lord, will you destroy an innocent nation?

⁵Did he not say to me, ‘She is my sister,’ and didn’t she also say, ‘He is my brother’? I have done this with a clear conscience and clean hands.”

⁶Then God said to him in the dream, “Yes, I know you did this with a clear

conscience, and so I have kept you from sinning against me. That is why I did not let you touch her.

⁷Now return the man’s wife, for he is a prophet, and he will pray for you and you will live. But if you do not return her, you may be sure that you and all yours will die.”

⁸Early the next morning Abimelech summoned all his officials, and when he told them all that had happened, they were very much afraid.

⁹Then Abimelech called Abraham in and said, “What have you done to us? How have I wronged you that you have brought such great guilt upon me and my kingdom? You have done things to me that should not be done.”

¹⁰And Abimelech asked Abraham, “What was your reason for doing this?”

¹¹Abraham replied, “I said to myself, ‘There is surely no fear of God in this place, and they will kill me because of my wife.’

¹²Besides, she really is my sister, the daughter of my father though not of my mother; and she became my wife.

¹³And when God had me wander from my father’s household, I said to her, ‘This is how you can show your love to me: Everywhere we go, say of me, “He is my brother.” ‘ “

¹⁴Then Abimelech brought sheep and cattle and male and female slaves and

gave them to Abraham, and he returned Sarah his wife to him.

¹⁵And Abimelech said, “My land is before you; live wherever you like.”

¹⁶To Sarah he said, “I am giving your brother a thousand shekels of silver. This is to cover the offense against you before all who are with you; you are completely vindicated.”

¹⁷Then Abraham prayed to God, and God healed Abimelech, his wife and his slave girls so they could have children again,

¹⁸for the Lord had closed up every womb in Abimelech’s household because of Abraham’s wife Sarah.

21Now the Lord was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised.

²Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had promised him.

³Abraham gave the name Isaac to the son Sarah bore him.

⁴When his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham circumcised him, as God commanded him.

⁵Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.

⁶Sarah said, “God has brought me laughter, and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me.”

⁷And she added, “Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”

⁸The child grew and was weaned, and on the day Isaac was weaned Abraham held a great feast.

⁹But Sarah saw that the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham was mocking,

¹⁰and she said to Abraham, “Get rid of that slave woman and her son, for that slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac.”

¹¹The matter distressed Abraham greatly because it concerned his son.

¹²But God said to him, “Do not be so distressed about the boy and your maidservant. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.

¹³I will make the son of the maidservant into a nation also, because he is your offspring.”

¹⁴Early the next morning Abraham took some food and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. He set them on her shoulders and then sent her off with the boy. She went on her way and wandered in the desert of Beersheba.

¹⁵When the water in the skin was gone, she put the boy under one of the bushes.

¹⁶Then she went off and sat down nearby, about a bowshot away, for she thought, “I cannot watch the boy die.” And as she sat there nearby, she began to sob.

¹⁷God heard the boy crying, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven and said to her, “What is the matter, Hagar? Do not be afraid; God has heard the boy crying as he lies there.

¹⁸Lift the boy up and take him by the hand, for I will make him into a great nation.”

¹⁹Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. So she went and filled the skin with water and gave the boy a drink.

²⁰God was with the boy as he grew up. He lived in the desert and became an archer.

²¹While he was living in the Desert of Paran, his mother got a wife for him from Egypt.

²²At that time Abimelech and Phicol the commander of his forces said to Abraham, “God is with you in everything you do.

²³Now swear to me here before God that you will not deal falsely with me or my children or my descendants. Show to me and the country where you are living

as an alien the same kindness I have shown to you.”

²⁴Abraham said, “I swear it.”

²⁵Then Abraham complained to Abimelech about a well of water that Abimelech’s servants had seized.

²⁶But Abimelech said, “I don’t know who has done this. You did not tell me, and I heard about it only today.”

²⁷So Abraham brought sheep and cattle and gave them to Abimelech, and the two men made a treaty.

²⁸Abraham set apart seven ewe lambs from the flock,

²⁹and Abimelech asked Abraham, “What is the meaning of these seven ewe lambs you have set apart by themselves?”

³⁰He replied, “Accept these seven lambs from my hand as a witness that I dug this well.”

³¹So that place was called Beersheba, because the two men swore an oath there.

³²After the treaty had been made at Beersheba, Abimelech and Phicol the commander of his forces returned to the land of the Philistines.

³³Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba, and there he called upon the name of the Lord , the Eternal God.

³⁴And Abraham stayed in the land of the Philistines for a long time.

22Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!” “Here I am,” he replied.

²Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.”

³Early the next morning Abraham got up and saddled his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about.

⁴On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance.

⁵He said to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.”

⁶Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together,

⁷Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, “Father?” “Yes, my son?” Abraham replied. “The fire and wood are here,” Isaac said, “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”

⁸Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering,

my son.” And the two of them went on together.

⁹When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood.

¹⁰Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.

¹¹But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!” “Here I am,” he replied.

¹²“Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.”

¹³Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son.

¹⁴So Abraham called that place The Lord Will Provide. And to this day it is said, “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.”

¹⁵The angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time

¹⁶and said, “I swear by myself, declares the Lord , that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son,

¹⁷I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars

in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies,

¹⁸and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”

¹⁹Then Abraham returned to his servants, and they set off together for Beersheba. And Abraham stayed in Beersheba.

²⁰Some time later Abraham was told, “Milcah is also a mother; she has borne sons to your brother Nahor:

²¹Uz the firstborn, Buz his brother, Kemuel (the father of Aram),

²²Kesed, Hazo, Pildash, Jidlaph and Bethuel.”

²³Bethuel became the father of Rebekah. Milcah bore these eight sons to Abraham’s brother Nahor.

²⁴His concubine, whose name was Reumah, also had sons: Tebah, Gaham, Tahash and Maacah.

23Sarah lived to be a hundred and twenty-seven years old.

²She died at Kiriath Arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan, and Abraham went to mourn for Sarah and to weep over her.

³Then Abraham rose from beside his dead wife and spoke to the Hittites. He said,

⁴“I am an alien and a stranger among you. Sell me some property for a burial site here so I can bury my dead.”

⁵The Hittites replied to Abraham,

⁶“Sir, listen to us. You are a mighty prince among us. Bury your dead in the choicest of our tombs. None of us will refuse you his tomb for burying your dead.”

⁷Then Abraham rose and bowed down before the people of the land, the Hittites.

⁸He said to them, “If you are willing to let me bury my dead, then listen to me and intercede with Ephron son of Zohar on my behalf

⁹so he will sell me the cave of Machpelah, which belongs to him and is at the end of his field. Ask him to sell it to me for the full price as a burial site among you.”

¹⁰Ephron the Hittite was sitting among his people and he replied to Abraham in the hearing of all the Hittites who had come to the gate of his city.

¹¹“No, my lord,” he said. “Listen to me; I give you the field, and I give you the cave that is in it. I give it to you in the presence of my people. Bury your dead.”

¹²Again Abraham bowed down before the people of the land

¹³and he said to Ephron in their hearing, “Listen to me, if you will. I will pay the price of the field. Accept it from me so I can bury my dead there.”

¹⁴Ephron answered Abraham,

¹⁵“Listen to me, my lord; the land is worth four hundred shekels of silver, but what is that between me and you? Bury your dead.”

¹⁶Abraham agreed to Ephron’s terms and weighed out for him the price he had named in the hearing of the Hittites: four hundred shekels of silver, according to the weight current among the merchants.

¹⁷So Ephron’s field in Machpelah near Mamre-both the field and the cave in it, and all the trees within the borders of the field-was deeded

¹⁸to Abraham as his property in the presence of all the Hittites who had come to the gate of the city.

¹⁹Afterward Abraham buried his wife Sarah in the cave in the field of Machpelah near Mamre (which is at Hebron) in the land of Canaan.

²⁰So the field and the cave in it were deeded to Abraham by the Hittites as a burial site.

24Abraham was now old and well advanced in years, and the Lord had blessed him in every way.

²He said to the chief servant in his household, the one in charge of all that he had, “Put your hand under my thigh.

³I want you to swear by the Lord , the God of heaven and the God of earth, that you will not get a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I am living,

⁴but will go to my country and my own relatives and get a wife for my son Isaac.”

⁵The servant asked him, “What if the woman is unwilling to come back with me to this land? Shall I then take your son back to the country you came from?”

⁶“Make sure that you do not take my son back there,” Abraham said.

⁷“The Lord , the God of heaven, who brought me out of my father’s household and my native land and who spoke to me and promised me on oath, saying, ‘To your offspring I will give this land’-he will send his angel before you so that you can get a wife for my son from there.

⁸If the woman is unwilling to come back with you, then you will be released from this oath of mine. Only do not take my son back there.”

⁹So the servant put his hand under the thigh of his master Abraham and swore an oath to him concerning this matter.

¹⁰Then the servant took ten of his master’s camels and left, taking with him all kinds of good things from his master. He set out for Aram Naharaim and made his way to the town of Nahor.

¹¹He had the camels kneel down near the well outside the town; it was toward evening, the time the women go out to draw water.

¹²Then he prayed, “O Lord , God of my master Abraham, give me success today, and show kindness to my master Abraham.

¹³See, I am standing beside this spring, and the daughters of the townspeople are coming out to draw water.

¹⁴May it be that when I say to a girl, ‘Please let down your jar that I may have a drink,’ and she says, ‘Drink, and I’ll water your camels too’-let her be the one you have chosen for your servant Isaac. By this I will know that you have shown kindness to my master.”

¹⁵Before he had finished praying, Rebekah came out with her jar on her shoulder. She was the daughter of Bethuel son of Milcah, who was the wife of Abraham’s brother Nahor.

¹⁶The girl was very beautiful, a virgin; no man had ever lain with her. She went down to the spring, filled her jar and came up again.

¹⁷The servant hurried to meet her and said, “Please give me a little water from your jar.”

¹⁸“Drink, my lord,” she said, and quickly lowered the jar to her hands and gave him a drink.

¹⁹After she had given him a drink, she said, “I’ll draw water for your camels too, until they have finished drinking.”

²⁰So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough, ran back to the well to draw more water, and drew enough for all his camels.

²¹Without saying a word, the man watched her closely to learn whether or not the Lord had made his journey successful.

²²When the camels had finished drinking, the man took out a gold nose ring weighing a beka and two gold bracelets weighing ten shekels.

²³Then he asked, “Whose daughter are you? Please tell me, is there room in your father’s house for us to spend the night?”

²⁴She answered him, “I am the daughter of Bethuel, the son that Milcah bore to Nahor.”

²⁵And she added, “We have plenty of straw and fodder, as well as room for you to spend the night.”

²⁶Then the man bowed down and worshiped the Lord ,

²⁷saying, “Praise be to the Lord , the God of my master Abraham, who has not abandoned his kindness and faithfulness to my master. As for me, the Lord has led me on the journey to the house of my master’s relatives.”

²⁸The girl ran and told her mother’s household about these things.

²⁹Now Rebekah had a brother named Laban, and he hurried out to the man at the spring.

³⁰As soon as he had seen the nose ring, and the bracelets on his sister’s arms, and had heard Rebekah tell what the man said to her, he went out to the man and found him standing by the camels near the spring.

³¹“Come, you who are blessed by the Lord ,” he said. “Why are you standing out here? I have prepared the house and a place for the camels.”

³²So the man went to the house, and the camels were unloaded. Straw and fodder were brought for the camels, and water for him and his men to wash their feet.

³³Then food was set before him, but he said, “I will not eat until I have told you what I have to say.” “Then tell us,” Laban said.

³⁴So he said, “I am Abraham’s servant.

³⁵The Lord has blessed my master abundantly, and he has become wealthy. He has given him sheep and cattle,

silver and gold, menservants and maidservants, and camels and donkeys.

³⁶My master’s wife Sarah has borne him a son in her old age, and he has given him everything he owns.

³⁷And my master made me swear an oath, and said, ‘You must not get a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I live,

³⁸but go to my father’s family and to my own clan, and get a wife for my son.’

³⁹“Then I asked my master, ‘What if the woman will not come back with me?’

⁴⁰“He replied, ‘The Lord , before whom I have walked, will send his angel with you and make your journey a success, so that you can get a wife for my son from my own clan and from my father’s family.

⁴¹Then, when you go to my clan, you will be released from my oath even if they refuse to give her to you-you will be released from my oath.’

⁴²“When I came to the spring today, I said, ‘O Lord , God of my master Abraham, if you will, please grant success to the journey on which I have come.

⁴³See, I am standing beside this spring; if a maiden comes out to draw water and I say to her, “Please let me drink a little water from your jar,”

⁴⁴and if she says to me, “Drink, and I’ll draw water for your camels too,” let her

be the one the Lord has chosen for my master’s son.’

⁴⁵“Before I finished praying in my heart, Rebekah came out, with her jar on her shoulder. She went down to the spring and drew water, and I said to her, ‘Please give me a drink.’

⁴⁶“She quickly lowered her jar from her shoulder and said, ‘Drink, and I’ll water your camels too.’ So I drank, and she watered the camels also.

⁴⁷“I asked her, ‘Whose daughter are you?’ “She said, ‘The daughter of Bethuel son of Nahor, whom Milcah bore to him.’ “Then I put the ring in her nose and the bracelets on her arms,

⁴⁸and I bowed down and worshiped the Lord . I praised the Lord , the God of my master Abraham, who had led me on the right road to get the granddaughter of my master’s brother for his son.

⁴⁹Now if you will show kindness and faithfulness to my master, tell me; and if not, tell me, so I may know which way to turn.”

⁵⁰Laban and Bethuel answered, “This is from the Lord ; we can say nothing to you one way or the other.

⁵¹Here is Rebekah; take her and go, and let her become the wife of your master’s son, as the Lord has directed.”

⁵²When Abraham’s servant heard what they said, he bowed down to the ground before the Lord .

⁵³Then the servant brought out gold and silver jewelry and articles of clothing and gave them to Rebekah; he also gave costly gifts to her brother and to her mother.

⁵⁴Then he and the men who were with him ate and drank and spent the night there. When they got up the next morning, he said, “Send me on my way to my master.”

⁵⁵But her brother and her mother replied, “Let the girl remain with us ten days or so; then you may go.”

⁵⁶But he said to them, “Do not detain me, now that the Lord has granted success to my journey. Send me on my way so I may go to my master.”

⁵⁷Then they said, “Let’s call the girl and ask her about it.”

⁵⁸So they called Rebekah and asked her, “Will you go with this man?” “I will go,” she said.

⁵⁹So they sent their sister Rebekah on her way, along with her nurse and Abraham’s servant and his men.

⁶⁰And they blessed Rebekah and said to her, “Our sister, may you increase to thousands upon thousands; may your offspring possess the gates of their enemies.”

⁶¹Then Rebekah and her maids got ready and mounted their camels and went back with the man. So the servant took Rebekah and left.

⁶²Now Isaac had come from Beer Lahai Roi, for he was living in the Negev.

⁶³He went out to the field one evening to meditate, and as he looked up, he saw camels approaching.

⁶⁴Rebekah also looked up and saw Isaac. She got down from her camel

⁶⁵and asked the servant, “Who is that man in the field coming to meet us?” “He is my master,” the servant answered. So she took her veil and covered herself.

⁶⁶Then the servant told Isaac all he had done.

⁶⁷Isaac brought her into the tent of his mother Sarah, and he married Rebekah. So she became his wife, and he loved her; and Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death.

25Abraham took another wife, whose name was Keturah.

²She bore him Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak and Shuah.

³Jokshan was the father of Sheba and Dedan; the descendants of Dedan were the Asshurites, the Letushites and the Leummites.

⁴The sons of Midian were Ephah, Epher, Hanoch, Abida and Eldaah. All these were descendants of Keturah.

⁵Abraham left everything he owned to Isaac.

⁶But while he was still living, he gave gifts to the sons of his concubines and sent them away from his son Isaac to the land of the east.

⁷Altogether, Abraham lived a hundred and seventy-five years.

⁸Then Abraham breathed his last and died at a good old age, an old man and full of years; and he was gathered to his people.

⁹His sons Isaac and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Machpelah near Mamre, in the field of Ephron son of Zohar the Hittite,

¹⁰the field Abraham had bought from the Hittites. There Abraham was buried with his wife Sarah.

¹¹After Abraham’s death, God blessed his son Isaac, who then lived near Beer Lahai Roi.

¹²This is the account of Abraham’s son Ishmael, whom Sarah’s maidservant, Hagar the Egyptian, bore to Abraham.

¹³These are the names of the sons of Ishmael, listed in the order of their birth: Nebaioth the firstborn of Ishmael, Kedar, Adbeel, Mibsam,

¹⁴Mishma, Dumah, Massa,

¹⁵Hadad, Tema, Jetur, Naphish and Kedemah.

¹⁶These were the sons of Ishmael, and these are the names of the twelve tribal rulers according to their settlements and camps.

¹⁷Altogether, Ishmael lived a hundred and thirty-seven years. He breathed his last and died, and he was gathered to his people.

¹⁸His descendants settled in the area from Havilah to Shur, near the border of Egypt, as you go toward Asshur. And they lived in hostility toward all their brothers.

¹⁹This is the account of Abraham’s son Isaac. Abraham became the father of Isaac,

²⁰and Isaac was forty years old when he married Rebekah daughter of Bethuel the Aramean from Paddan Aram and sister of Laban the Aramean.

²¹Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife, because she was barren. The Lord answered his prayer, and his wife Rebekah became pregnant.

²²The babies jostled each other within her, and she said, “Why is this happening to me?” So she went to inquire of the Lord .

²³The Lord said to her, “Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you will be separated; one people will be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger.”

²⁴When the time came for her to give birth, there were twin boys in her womb.

²⁵The first to come out was red, and his whole body was like a hairy garment; so they named him Esau.

²⁶After this, his brother came out, with his hand grasping Esau’s heel; so he was named Jacob. Isaac was sixty years old when Rebekah gave birth to them.

²⁷The boys grew up, and Esau became a skillful hunter, a man of the open country, while Jacob was a quiet man, staying among the tents.

²⁸Isaac, who had a taste for wild game, loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob.

²⁹Once when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the open country, famished.

³⁰He said to Jacob, “Quick, let me have some of that red stew! I’m famished!” (That is why he was also called Edom. )

³¹Jacob replied, “First sell me your birthright.”

³²“Look, I am about to die,” Esau said. “What good is the birthright to me?”

³³But Jacob said, “Swear to me first.” So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob.

³⁴Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and some lentil stew. He ate and drank, and then got up and left. So Esau despised his birthright.

26Now there was a famine in the land-besides the earlier famine of Abraham’s time-and Isaac went to Abimelech king of the Philistines in Gerar.

²The Lord appeared to Isaac and said, “Do not go down to Egypt; live in the land where I tell you to live.

³Stay in this land for a while, and I will be with you and will bless you. For to you and your descendants I will give all these lands and will confirm the oath I swore to your father Abraham.

⁴I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and will give them all these lands, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed,

⁵because Abraham obeyed me and kept my requirements, my commands, my decrees and my laws.”

⁶So Isaac stayed in Gerar.

⁷When the men of that place asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” because he was afraid to say, “She is my wife.” He thought, “The men of this place might kill me on account of Rebekah, because she is beautiful.”

⁸When Isaac had been there a long time, Abimelech king of the Philistines looked down from a window and saw Isaac caressing his wife Rebekah.

⁹So Abimelech summoned Isaac and said, “She is really your wife! Why did

you say, ‘She is my sister’?” Isaac answered him, “Because I thought I might lose my life on account of her.”

¹⁰Then Abimelech said, “What is this you have done to us? One of the men might well have slept with your wife, and you would have brought guilt upon us.”

¹¹So Abimelech gave orders to all the people: “Anyone who molests this man or his wife shall surely be put to death.”

¹²Isaac planted crops in that land and the same year reaped a hundredfold, because the Lord blessed him.

¹³The man became rich, and his wealth continued to grow until he became very wealthy.

¹⁴He had so many flocks and herds and servants that the Philistines envied him.

¹⁵So all the wells that his father’s servants had dug in the time of his father Abraham, the Philistines stopped up, filling them with earth.

¹⁶Then Abimelech said to Isaac, “Move away from us; you have become too powerful for us.”

¹⁷So Isaac moved away from there and encamped in the Valley of Gerar and settled there.

¹⁸Isaac reopened the wells that had been dug in the time of his father Abraham, which the Philistines had stopped up after Abraham died, and he gave them the same names his father had given them.

¹⁹Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and discovered a well of fresh water there.

²⁰But the herdsmen of Gerar quarreled with Isaac’s herdsmen and said, “The water is ours!” So he named the well Esek, because they disputed with him.

²¹Then they dug another well, but they quarreled over that one also; so he named it Sitnah.

²²He moved on from there and dug another well, and no one quarreled over it. He named it Rehoboth, saying, “Now the Lord has given us room and we will flourish in the land.”

²³From there he went up to Beersheba.

²⁴That night the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am the God of your father Abraham. Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bless you and will increase the number of your descendants for the sake of my servant Abraham.”

²⁵Isaac built an altar there and called on the name of the Lord . There he pitched his tent, and there his servants dug a well.

²⁶Meanwhile, Abimelech had come to him from Gerar, with Ahuzzath his personal adviser and Phicol the commander of his forces.

²⁷Isaac asked them, “Why have you come to me, since you were hostile to me and sent me away?”

²⁸They answered, “We saw clearly that the Lord was with you; so we said,

‘There ought to be a sworn agreement between us’-between us and you. Let us make a treaty with you

²⁹that you will do us no harm, just as we did not molest you but always treated you well and sent you away in peace. And now you are blessed by the Lord .”

³⁰Isaac then made a feast for them, and they ate and drank.

³¹Early the next morning the men swore an oath to each other. Then Isaac sent them on their way, and they left him in peace.

³²That day Isaac’s servants came and told him about the well they had dug. They said, “We’ve found water!”

³³He called it Shibah, and to this day the name of the town has been Beersheba.

³⁴When Esau was forty years old, he married Judith daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and also Basemath daughter of Elon the Hittite.

³⁵They were a source of grief to Isaac and Rebekah.

27When Isaac was old and his eyes were so weak that he could no longer see, he called for Esau his older son and said to him, “My son.” “Here I am,” he answered.

²Isaac said, “I am now an old man and don’t know the day of my death.

³Now then, get your weapons-your quiver and bow-and go out to the open country to hunt some wild game for me.

⁴Prepare me the kind of tasty food I like and bring it to me to eat, so that I may give you my blessing before I die.”

⁵Now Rebekah was listening as Isaac spoke to his son Esau. When Esau left for the open country to hunt game and bring it back,

⁶Rebekah said to her son Jacob, “Look, I overheard your father say to your brother Esau,

⁷‘Bring me some game and prepare me some tasty food to eat, so that I may give you my blessing in the presence of the Lord before I die.’

⁸Now, my son, listen carefully and do what I tell you:

⁹Go out to the flock and bring me two choice young goats, so I can prepare some tasty food for your father, just the way he likes it.

¹⁰Then take it to your father to eat, so that he may give you his blessing before he dies.”

¹¹Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, “But my brother Esau is a hairy man, and I’m a man with smooth skin.

¹²What if my father touches me? I would appear to be tricking him and would bring down a curse on myself rather than a blessing.”

¹³His mother said to him, “My son, let the curse fall on me. Just do what I say; go and get them for me.”

¹⁴So he went and got them and brought them to his mother, and she prepared some tasty food, just the way his father liked it.

¹⁵Then Rebekah took the best clothes of Esau her older son, which she had in the house, and put them on her younger son Jacob.

¹⁶She also covered his hands and the smooth part of his neck with the goatskins.

¹⁷Then she handed to her son Jacob the tasty food and the bread she had made.

¹⁸He went to his father and said, “My father.” “Yes, my son,” he answered. “Who is it?”

¹⁹Jacob said to his father, “I am Esau your firstborn. I have done as you told me. Please sit up and eat some of my game so that you may give me your blessing.”

²⁰Isaac asked his son, “How did you find it so quickly, my son?” “The Lord your God gave me success,” he replied.

²¹Then Isaac said to Jacob, “Come near so I can touch you, my son, to know whether you really are my son Esau or not.”

²²Jacob went close to his father Isaac, who touched him and said, “The voice is

the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.”

²³He did not recognize him, for his hands were hairy like those of his brother Esau; so he blessed him.

²⁴“Are you really my son Esau?” he asked. “I am,” he replied.

²⁵Then he said, “My son, bring me some of your game to eat, so that I may give you my blessing.” Jacob brought it to him and he ate; and he brought some wine and he drank.

²⁶Then his father Isaac said to him, “Come here, my son, and kiss me.”

²⁷So he went to him and kissed him. When Isaac caught the smell of his clothes, he blessed him and said, “Ah, the smell of my son is like the smell of a field that the Lord has blessed.

²⁸May God give you of heaven’s dew and of earth’s richness- an abundance of grain and new wine.

²⁹May nations serve you and peoples bow down to you. Be lord over your brothers, and may the sons of your mother bow down to you. May those who curse you be cursed and those who bless you be blessed.”

³⁰After Isaac finished blessing him and Jacob had scarcely left his father’s presence, his brother Esau came in from hunting.

³¹He too prepared some tasty food and brought it to his father. Then he said to

him, “My father, sit up and eat some of my game, so that you may give me your blessing.”

³²His father Isaac asked him, “Who are you?” “I am your son,” he answered, “your firstborn, Esau.”

³³Isaac trembled violently and said, “Who was it, then, that hunted game and brought it to me? I ate it just before you came and I blessed him-and indeed he will be blessed!”

³⁴When Esau heard his father’s words, he burst out with a loud and bitter cry and said to his father, “Bless me-me too, my father!”

³⁵But he said, “Your brother came deceitfully and took your blessing.”

³⁶Esau said, “Isn’t he rightly named Jacob ? He has deceived me these two times: He took my birthright, and now he’s taken my blessing!” Then he asked, “Haven’t you reserved any blessing for me?”

³⁷Isaac answered Esau, “I have made him lord over you and have made all his relatives his servants, and I have sustained him with grain and new wine. So what can I possibly do for you, my son?”

³⁸Esau said to his father, “Do you have only one blessing, my father? Bless me too, my father!” Then Esau wept aloud.

³⁹His father Isaac answered him, “Your dwelling will be away from the earth’s

richness, away from the dew of heaven above.

⁴⁰You will live by the sword and you will serve your brother. But when you grow restless, you will throw his yoke from off your neck.”

⁴¹Esau held a grudge against Jacob because of the blessing his father had given him. He said to himself, “The days of mourning for my father are near; then I will kill my brother Jacob.”

⁴²When Rebekah was told what her older son Esau had said, she sent for her younger son Jacob and said to him, “Your brother Esau is consoling himself with the thought of killing you.

⁴³Now then, my son, do what I say: Flee at once to my brother Laban in Haran.

⁴⁴Stay with him for a while until your brother’s fury subsides.

⁴⁵When your brother is no longer angry with you and forgets what you did to him, I’ll send word for you to come back from there. Why should I lose both of you in one day?”

⁴⁶Then Rebekah said to Isaac, “I’m disgusted with living because of these Hittite women. If Jacob takes a wife from among the women of this land, from Hittite women like these, my life will not be worth living.”

28So Isaac called for Jacob and blessed him and commanded him: “Do not marry a Canaanite woman.

²Go at once to Paddan Aram, to the house of your mother’s father Bethuel. Take a wife for yourself there, from among the daughters of Laban, your mother’s brother.

³May God Almighty bless you and make you fruitful and increase your numbers until you become a community of peoples.

⁴May he give you and your descendants the blessing given to Abraham, so that you may take possession of the land where you now live as an alien, the land God gave to Abraham.”

⁵Then Isaac sent Jacob on his way, and he went to Paddan Aram, to Laban son of Bethuel the Aramean, the brother of Rebekah, who was the mother of Jacob and Esau.

⁶Now Esau learned that Isaac had blessed Jacob and had sent him to Paddan Aram to take a wife from there, and that when he blessed him he commanded him, “Do not marry a Canaanite woman,”

⁷and that Jacob had obeyed his father and mother and had gone to Paddan Aram.

⁸Esau then realized how displeasing the Canaanite women were to his father Isaac;

⁹so he went to Ishmael and married Mahalath, the sister of Nebaioth and daughter of Ishmael son of Abraham, in addition to the wives he already had.

¹⁰Jacob left Beersheba and set out for Haran.

¹¹When he reached a certain place, he stopped for the night because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones there, he put it under his head and lay down to sleep.

¹²He had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.

¹³There above it stood the Lord , and he said: “I am the Lord , the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying.

¹⁴Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring.

¹⁵I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.”

¹⁶When Jacob awoke from his sleep, he thought, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it.”

¹⁷He was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven.”

¹⁸Early the next morning Jacob took the stone he had placed under his head and set it up as a pillar and poured oil on top of it.

¹⁹He called that place Bethel, though the city used to be called Luz.

²⁰Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me and will watch over me on this journey I am taking and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear

²¹so that I return safely to my father’s house, then the Lord will be my God

²²and this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be God’s house, and of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.”

29Then Jacob continued on his journey and came to the land of the eastern peoples.

²There he saw a well in the field, with three flocks of sheep lying near it because the flocks were watered from that well. The stone over the mouth of the well was large.

³When all the flocks were gathered there, the shepherds would roll the stone away from the well’s mouth and water the sheep. Then they would return the stone to its place over the mouth of the well.

⁴Jacob asked the shepherds, “My brothers, where are you from?” “We’re from Haran,” they replied.

⁵He said to them, “Do you know Laban, Nahor’s grandson?” “Yes, we know him,” they answered.

⁶Then Jacob asked them, “Is he well?” “Yes, he is,” they said, “and here comes his daughter Rachel with the sheep.”

⁷“Look,” he said, “the sun is still high; it is not time for the flocks to be gathered. Water the sheep and take them back to pasture.”

⁸“We can’t,” they replied, “until all the flocks are gathered and the stone has been rolled away from the mouth of the well. Then we will water the sheep.”

⁹While he was still talking with them, Rachel came with her father’s sheep, for she was a shepherdess.

¹⁰When Jacob saw Rachel daughter of Laban, his mother’s brother, and Laban’s sheep, he went over and rolled the stone away from the mouth of the well and watered his uncle’s sheep.

¹¹Then Jacob kissed Rachel and began to weep aloud.

¹²He had told Rachel that he was a relative of her father and a son of Rebekah. So she ran and told her father.

¹³As soon as Laban heard the news about Jacob, his sister’s son, he hurried to meet him. He embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his home, and there Jacob told him all these things.

¹⁴Then Laban said to him, “You are my own flesh and blood.” After Jacob had stayed with him for a whole month,

¹⁵Laban said to him, “Just because you are a relative of mine, should you work for me for nothing? Tell me what your wages should be.”

¹⁶Now Laban had two daughters; the name of the older was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel.

¹⁷Leah had weak eyes, but Rachel was lovely in form, and beautiful.

¹⁸Jacob was in love with Rachel and said, “I’ll work for you seven years in return for your younger daughter Rachel.”

¹⁹Laban said, “It’s better that I give her to you than to some other man. Stay here with me.”

²⁰So Jacob served seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her.

²¹Then Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife. My time is completed, and I want to lie with her.”

²²So Laban brought together all the people of the place and gave a feast.

²³But when evening came, he took his daughter Leah and gave her to Jacob, and Jacob lay with her.

²⁴And Laban gave his servant girl Zilpah to his daughter as her maidservant.

²⁵When morning came, there was Leah! So Jacob said to Laban, “What is this you have done to me? I served you for Rachel, didn’t I? Why have you deceived me?”

²⁶Laban replied, “It is not our custom here to give the younger daughter in marriage before the older one.

²⁷Finish this daughter’s bridal week; then we will give you the younger one also, in return for another seven years of work.”

²⁸And Jacob did so. He finished the week with Leah, and then Laban gave him his daughter Rachel to be his wife.

²⁹Laban gave his servant girl Bilhah to his daughter Rachel as her maidservant.

³⁰Jacob lay with Rachel also, and he loved Rachel more than Leah. And he worked for Laban another seven years.

³¹When the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, he opened her womb, but Rachel was barren.

³²Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Reuben, for she said, “It is because the Lord has seen my misery. Surely my husband will love me now.”

³³She conceived again, and when she gave birth to a son she said, “Because the Lord heard that I am not loved, he gave me this one too.” So she named him Simeon.

³⁴Again she conceived, and when she gave birth to a son she said, “Now at

last my husband will become attached to me, because I have borne him three sons.” So he was named Levi.

³⁵She conceived again, and when she gave birth to a son she said, “This time I will praise the Lord .” So she named him Judah. Then she stopped having children.

30When Rachel saw that she was not bearing Jacob any children, she became jealous of her sister. So she said to Jacob, “Give me children, or I’ll die!”

²Jacob became angry with her and said, “Am I in the place of God, who has kept you from having children?”

³Then she said, “Here is Bilhah, my maidservant. Sleep with her so that she can bear children for me and that through her I too can build a family.”

⁴So she gave him her servant Bilhah as a wife. Jacob slept with her,

⁵and she became pregnant and bore him a son.

⁶Then Rachel said, “God has vindicated me; he has listened to my plea and given me a son.” Because of this she named him Dan.

⁷Rachel’s servant Bilhah conceived again and bore Jacob a second son.

⁸Then Rachel said, “I have had a great struggle with my sister, and I have won.” So she named him Naphtali.

⁹When Leah saw that she had stopped having children, she took her maidservant Zilpah and gave her to Jacob as a wife.

¹⁰Leah’s servant Zilpah bore Jacob a son.

¹¹Then Leah said, “What good fortune!” So she named him Gad.

¹²Leah’s servant Zilpah bore Jacob a second son.

¹³Then Leah said, “How happy I am! The women will call me happy.” So she named him Asher.

¹⁴During wheat harvest, Reuben went out into the fields and found some mandrake plants, which he brought to his mother Leah. Rachel said to Leah, “Please give me some of your son’s mandrakes.”

¹⁵But she said to her, “Wasn’t it enough that you took away my husband? Will you take my son’s mandrakes too?” “Very well,” Rachel said, “he can sleep with you tonight in return for your son’s mandrakes.”

¹⁶So when Jacob came in from the fields that evening, Leah went out to meet him. “You must sleep with me,” she said. “I have hired you with my son’s mandrakes.” So he slept with her that night.

¹⁷God listened to Leah, and she became pregnant and bore Jacob a fifth son.

¹⁸Then Leah said, “God has rewarded me for giving my maidservant to my husband.” So she named him Issachar.

¹⁹Leah conceived again and bore Jacob a sixth son.

²⁰Then Leah said, “God has presented me with a precious gift. This time my husband will treat me with honor, because I have borne him six sons.” So she named him Zebulun.

²¹Some time later she gave birth to a daughter and named her Dinah.

²²Then God remembered Rachel; he listened to her and opened her womb.

²³She became pregnant and gave birth to a son and said, “God has taken away my disgrace.”

²⁴She named him Joseph, and said, “May the Lord add to me another son.”

²⁵After Rachel gave birth to Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, “Send me on my way so I can go back to my own homeland.

²⁶Give me my wives and children, for whom I have served you, and I will be on my way. You know how much work I’ve done for you.”

²⁷But Laban said to him, “If I have found favor in your eyes, please stay. I have learned by divination that the Lord has blessed me because of you.”

²⁸He added, “Name your wages, and I will pay them.”

²⁹Jacob said to him, “You know how I have worked for you and how your livestock has fared under my care.

³⁰The little you had before I came has increased greatly, and the Lord has blessed you wherever I have been. But now, when may I do something for my own household?”

³¹“What shall I give you?” he asked. “Don’t give me anything,” Jacob replied. “But if you will do this one thing for me, I will go on tending your flocks and watching over them:

³²Let me go through all your flocks today and remove from them every speckled or spotted sheep, every dark-colored lamb and every spotted or speckled goat. They will be my wages.

³³And my honesty will testify for me in the future, whenever you check on the wages you have paid me. Any goat in my possession that is not speckled or spotted, or any lamb that is not dark- colored, will be considered stolen.”

³⁴“Agreed,” said Laban. “Let it be as you have said.”

³⁵That same day he removed all the male goats that were streaked or spotted, and all the speckled or spotted female goats (all that had white on them) and all the dark-colored lambs, and he placed them in the care of his sons.

³⁶Then he put a three-day journey between himself and Jacob, while Jacob

continued to tend the rest of Laban’s flocks.

³⁷Jacob, however, took fresh-cut branches from poplar, almond and plane trees and made white stripes on them by peeling the bark and exposing the white inner wood of the branches.

³⁸Then he placed the peeled branches in all the watering troughs, so that they would be directly in front of the flocks when they came to drink. When the flocks were in heat and came to drink,

³⁹they mated in front of the branches. And they bore young that were streaked or speckled or spotted.

⁴⁰Jacob set apart the young of the flock by themselves, but made the rest face the streaked and dark-colored animals that belonged to Laban. Thus he made separate flocks for himself and did not put them with Laban’s animals.

⁴¹Whenever the stronger females were in heat, Jacob would place the branches in the troughs in front of the animals so they would mate near the branches,

⁴²but if the animals were weak, he would not place them there. So the weak animals went to Laban and the strong ones to Jacob.

⁴³In this way the man grew exceedingly prosperous and came to own large flocks, and maidservants and menservants, and camels and donkeys.

31Jacob heard that Laban’s sons were saying, “Jacob has taken everything our father owned and has gained all this wealth from what belonged to our father.”

²And Jacob noticed that Laban’s attitude toward him was not what it had been.

³Then the Lord said to Jacob, “Go back to the land of your fathers and to your relatives, and I will be with you.”

⁴So Jacob sent word to Rachel and Leah to come out to the fields where his flocks were.

⁵He said to them, “I see that your father’s attitude toward me is not what it was before, but the God of my father has been with me.

⁶You know that I’ve worked for your father with all my strength,

⁷yet your father has cheated me by changing my wages ten times. However, God has not allowed him to harm me.

⁸If he said, ‘The speckled ones will be your wages,’ then all the flocks gave birth to speckled young; and if he said, ‘The streaked ones will be your wages,’ then all the flocks bore streaked young.

⁹So God has taken away your father’s livestock and has given them to me.

¹⁰“In breeding season I once had a dream in which I looked up and saw that the male goats mating with the flock were streaked, speckled or spotted.

¹¹The angel of God said to me in the dream, ‘Jacob.’ I answered, ‘Here I am.’

¹²And he said, ‘Look up and see that all the male goats mating with the flock are streaked, speckled or spotted, for I have seen all that Laban has been doing to you.

¹³I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar and where you made a vow to me. Now leave this land at once and go back to your native land.’ “

¹⁴Then Rachel and Leah replied, “Do we still have any share in the inheritance of our father’s estate?

¹⁵Does he not regard us as foreigners? Not only has he sold us, but he has used up what was paid for us.

¹⁶Surely all the wealth that God took away from our father belongs to us and our children. So do whatever God has told you.”

¹⁷Then Jacob put his children and his wives on camels,

¹⁸and he drove all his livestock ahead of him, along with all the goods he had accumulated in Paddan Aram, to go to his father Isaac in the land of Canaan.

¹⁹When Laban had gone to shear his sheep, Rachel stole her father’s household gods.

²⁰Moreover, Jacob deceived Laban the Aramean by not telling him he was running away.

²¹So he fled with all he had, and crossing the River, he headed for the hill country of Gilead.

²²On the third day Laban was told that Jacob had fled.

²³Taking his relatives with him, he pursued Jacob for seven days and caught up with him in the hill country of Gilead.

²⁴Then God came to Laban the Aramean in a dream at night and said to him, “Be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.”

²⁵Jacob had pitched his tent in the hill country of Gilead when Laban overtook him, and Laban and his relatives camped there too.

²⁶Then Laban said to Jacob, “What have you done? You’ve deceived me, and you’ve carried off my daughters like captives in war.

²⁷Why did you run off secretly and deceive me? Why didn’t you tell me, so I could send you away with joy and singing to the music of tambourines and harps?

²⁸You didn’t even let me kiss my grandchildren and my daughters good- by. You have done a foolish thing.

²⁹I have the power to harm you; but last night the God of your father said to me, ‘Be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.’

³⁰Now you have gone off because you longed to return to your father’s house. But why did you steal my gods?”

³¹Jacob answered Laban, “I was afraid, because I thought you would take your daughters away from me by force.

³²But if you find anyone who has your gods, he shall not live. In the presence of our relatives, see for yourself whether there is anything of yours here with me; and if so, take it.” Now Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen the gods.

³³So Laban went into Jacob’s tent and into Leah’s tent and into the tent of the two maidservants, but he found nothing. After he came out of Leah’s tent, he entered Rachel’s tent.

³⁴Now Rachel had taken the household gods and put them inside her camel’s saddle and was sitting on them. Laban searched through everything in the tent but found nothing.

³⁵Rachel said to her father, “Don’t be angry, my lord, that I cannot stand up in your presence; I’m having my period.” So he searched but could not find the household gods.

³⁶Jacob was angry and took Laban to task. “What is my crime?” he asked Laban. “What sin have I committed that you hunt me down?

³⁷Now that you have searched through all my goods, what have you found that belongs to your household? Put it here in front of your relatives and mine, and let them judge between the two of us.

³⁸“I have been with you for twenty years now. Your sheep and goats have not miscarried, nor have I eaten rams from your flocks.

³⁹I did not bring you animals torn by wild beasts; I bore the loss myself. And you demanded payment from me for whatever was stolen by day or night.

⁴⁰This was my situation: The heat consumed me in the daytime and the cold at night, and sleep fled from my eyes.

⁴¹It was like this for the twenty years I was in your household. I worked for you fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks, and you changed my wages ten times.

⁴²If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had not been with me, you would surely have sent me away empty-handed. But God has seen my hardship and the toil of my hands, and last night he rebuked you.”

⁴³Laban answered Jacob, “The women are my daughters, the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks. All you see is mine. Yet what can I do today about these daughters of mine, or about the children they have borne?

⁴⁴Come now, let’s make a covenant, you and I, and let it serve as a witness between us.”

⁴⁵So Jacob took a stone and set it up as a pillar.

⁴⁶He said to his relatives, “Gather some stones.” So they took stones and piled them in a heap, and they ate there by the heap.

⁴⁷Laban called it Jegar Sahadutha, and Jacob called it Galeed.

⁴⁸Laban said, “This heap is a witness between you and me today.” That is why it was called Galeed.

⁴⁹It was also called Mizpah, because he said, “May the Lord keep watch between you and me when we are away from each other.

⁵⁰If you mistreat my daughters or if you take any wives besides my daughters, even though no one is with us, remember that God is a witness between you and me.”

⁵¹Laban also said to Jacob, “Here is this heap, and here is this pillar I have set up between you and me.

⁵²This heap is a witness, and this pillar is a witness, that I will not go past this heap to your side to harm you and that you will not go past this heap and pillar to my side to harm me.

⁵³May the God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge between us.” So Jacob took an oath in the name of the Fear of his father Isaac.

⁵⁴He offered a sacrifice there in the hill country and invited his relatives to a meal. After they had eaten, they spent the night there.

⁵⁵Early the next morning Laban kissed his grandchildren and his daughters and blessed them. Then he left and returned home.

32Jacob also went on his way, and the angels of God met him.

²When Jacob saw them, he said, “This is the camp of God!” So he named that place Mahanaim.

³Jacob sent messengers ahead of him to his brother Esau in the land of Seir, the country of Edom.

⁴He instructed them: “This is what you are to say to my master Esau: ‘Your servant Jacob says, I have been staying with Laban and have remained there till now.

⁵I have cattle and donkeys, sheep and goats, menservants and maidservants. Now I am sending this message to my lord, that I may find favor in your eyes.’ “

⁶When the messengers returned to Jacob, they said, “We went to your brother Esau, and now he is coming to meet you, and four hundred men are with him.”

⁷In great fear and distress Jacob divided the people who were with him into two groups, and the flocks and herds and camels as well.

⁸He thought, “If Esau comes and attacks one group, the group that is left may escape.”

⁹Then Jacob prayed, “O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, O Lord , who said to me, ‘Go back to your country and your relatives, and I will make you prosper,’

¹⁰I am unworthy of all the kindness and faithfulness you have shown your servant. I had only my staff when I crossed this Jordan, but now I have become two groups.

¹¹Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children.

¹²But you have said, ‘I will surely make you prosper and will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted.’ “

¹³He spent the night there, and from what he had with him he selected a gift for his brother Esau:

¹⁴two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams,

¹⁵thirty female camels with their young, forty cows and ten bulls, and twenty female donkeys and ten male donkeys.

¹⁶He put them in the care of his servants, each herd by itself, and said to his servants, “Go ahead of me, and keep some space between the herds.”

¹⁷He instructed the one in the lead: “When my brother Esau meets you and asks, ‘To whom do you belong, and

where are you going, and who owns all these animals in front of you?’

¹⁸then you are to say, ‘They belong to your servant Jacob. They are a gift sent to my lord Esau, and he is coming behind us.’ “

¹⁹He also instructed the second, the third and all the others who followed the herds: “You are to say the same thing to Esau when you meet him.

²⁰And be sure to say, ‘Your servant Jacob is coming behind us.’ ” For he thought, “I will pacify him with these gifts I am sending on ahead; later, when I see him, perhaps he will receive me.”

²¹So Jacob’s gifts went on ahead of him, but he himself spent the night in the camp.

²²That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two maidservants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok.

²³After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions.

²⁴So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak.

²⁵When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man.

²⁶Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.” But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”

²⁷The man asked him, “What is your name?” “Jacob,” he answered.

²⁸Then the man said, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome.”

²⁹Jacob said, “Please tell me your name.” But he replied, “Why do you ask my name?” Then he blessed him there.

³⁰So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, “It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.”

³¹The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel, and he was limping because of his hip.

³²Therefore to this day the Israelites do not eat the tendon attached to the socket of the hip, because the socket of Jacob’s hip was touched near the tendon.

33Jacob looked up and there was Esau, coming with his four hundred men; so he divided the children among Leah, Rachel and the two maidservants.

²He put the maidservants and their children in front, Leah and her children next, and Rachel and Joseph in the rear.

³He himself went on ahead and bowed down to the ground seven times as he approached his brother.

⁴But Esau ran to meet Jacob and embraced him; he threw his arms

around his neck and kissed him. And they wept.

⁵Then Esau looked up and saw the women and children. “Who are these with you?” he asked. Jacob answered, “They are the children God has graciously given your servant.”

⁶Then the maidservants and their children approached and bowed down.

⁷Next, Leah and her children came and bowed down. Last of all came Joseph and Rachel, and they too bowed down.

⁸Esau asked, “What do you mean by all these droves I met?” “To find favor in your eyes, my lord,” he said.

⁹But Esau said, “I already have plenty, my brother. Keep what you have for yourself.”

¹⁰“No, please!” said Jacob. “If I have found favor in your eyes, accept this gift from me. For to see your face is like seeing the face of God, now that you have received me favorably.

¹¹Please accept the present that was brought to you, for God has been gracious to me and I have all I need.” And because Jacob insisted, Esau accepted it.

¹²Then Esau said, “Let us be on our way; I’ll accompany you.”

¹³But Jacob said to him, “My lord knows that the children are tender and that I must care for the ewes and cows that are nursing their young. If they are

driven hard just one day, all the animals will die.

¹⁴So let my lord go on ahead of his servant, while I move along slowly at the pace of the droves before me and that of the children, until I come to my lord in Seir.”

¹⁵Esau said, “Then let me leave some of my men with you.” “But why do that?” Jacob asked. “Just let me find favor in the eyes of my lord.”

¹⁶So that day Esau started on his way back to Seir.

¹⁷Jacob, however, went to Succoth, where he built a place for himself and made shelters for his livestock. That is why the place is called Succoth.

¹⁸After Jacob came from Paddan Aram, he arrived safely at the city of Shechem in Canaan and camped within sight of the city.

¹⁹For a hundred pieces of silver, he bought from the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem, the plot of ground where he pitched his tent.

²⁰There he set up an altar and called it El Elohe Israel.

34Now Dinah, the daughter Leah had borne to Jacob, went out to visit the women of the land.

²When Shechem son of Hamor the Hivite, the ruler of that area, saw her, he took her and violated her.

³His heart was drawn to Dinah daughter of Jacob, and he loved the girl and spoke tenderly to her.

⁴And Shechem said to his father Hamor, “Get me this girl as my wife.”

⁵When Jacob heard that his daughter Dinah had been defiled, his sons were in the fields with his livestock; so he kept quiet about it until they came home.

⁶Then Shechem’s father Hamor went out to talk with Jacob.

⁷Now Jacob’s sons had come in from the fields as soon as they heard what had happened. They were filled with grief and fury, because Shechem had done a disgraceful thing in Israel by lying with Jacob’s daughter-a thing that should not be done.

⁸But Hamor said to them, “My son Shechem has his heart set on your daughter. Please give her to him as his wife.

⁹Intermarry with us; give us your daughters and take our daughters for yourselves.

¹⁰You can settle among us; the land is open to you. Live in it, trade in it, and acquire property in it.”

¹¹Then Shechem said to Dinah’s father and brothers, “Let me find favor in your eyes, and I will give you whatever you ask.

¹²Make the price for the bride and the gift I am to bring as great as you like,

and I’ll pay whatever you ask me. Only give me the girl as my wife.”

¹³Because their sister Dinah had been defiled, Jacob’s sons replied deceitfully as they spoke to Shechem and his father Hamor.

¹⁴They said to them, “We can’t do such a thing; we can’t give our sister to a man who is not circumcised. That would be a disgrace to us.

¹⁵We will give our consent to you on one condition only: that you become like us by circumcising all your males.

¹⁶Then we will give you our daughters and take your daughters for ourselves. We’ll settle among you and become one people with you.

¹⁷But if you will not agree to be circumcised, we’ll take our sister and go.”

¹⁸Their proposal seemed good to Hamor and his son Shechem.

¹⁹The young man, who was the most honored of all his father’s household, lost no time in doing what they said, because he was delighted with Jacob’s daughter.

²⁰So Hamor and his son Shechem went to the gate of their city to speak to their fellow townsmen.

²¹“These men are friendly toward us,” they said. “Let them live in our land and trade in it; the land has plenty of room

for them. We can marry their daughters and they can marry ours.

²²But the men will consent to live with us as one people only on the condition that our males be circumcised, as they themselves are.

²³Won’t their livestock, their property and all their other animals become ours? So let us give our consent to them, and they will settle among us.”

²⁴All the men who went out of the city gate agreed with Hamor and his son Shechem, and every male in the city was circumcised.

²⁵Three days later, while all of them were still in pain, two of Jacob’s sons, Simeon and Levi, Dinah’s brothers, took their swords and attacked the unsuspecting city, killing every male.

²⁶They put Hamor and his son Shechem to the sword and took Dinah from Shechem’s house and left.

²⁷The sons of Jacob came upon the dead bodies and looted the city where their sister had been defiled.

²⁸They seized their flocks and herds and donkeys and everything else of theirs in the city and out in the fields.

²⁹They carried off all their wealth and all their women and children, taking as plunder everything in the houses.

³⁰Then Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, “You have brought trouble on me by making me a stench to the Canaanites

and Perizzites, the people living in this land. We are few in number, and if they join forces against me and attack me, I and my household will be destroyed.”

³¹But they replied, “Should he have treated our sister like a prostitute?”

35Then God said to Jacob, “Go up to Bethel and settle there, and build an altar there to God, who appeared to you when you were fleeing from your brother Esau.”

²So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, “Get rid of the foreign gods you have with you, and purify yourselves and change your clothes.

³Then come, let us go up to Bethel, where I will build an altar to God, who answered me in the day of my distress and who has been with me wherever I have gone.”

⁴So they gave Jacob all the foreign gods they had and the rings in their ears, and Jacob buried them under the oak at Shechem.

⁵Then they set out, and the terror of God fell upon the towns all around them so that no one pursued them.

⁶Jacob and all the people with him came to Luz (that is, Bethel) in the land of Canaan.

⁷There he built an altar, and he called the place El Bethel, because it was

there that God revealed himself to him when he was fleeing from his brother.

⁸Now Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, died and was buried under the oak below Bethel. So it was named Allon Bacuth.

⁹After Jacob returned from Paddan Aram, God appeared to him again and blessed him.

¹⁰God said to him, “Your name is Jacob, but you will no longer be called Jacob; your name will be Israel. ” So he named him Israel.

¹¹And God said to him, “I am God Almighty ; be fruitful and increase in number. A nation and a community of nations will come from you, and kings will come from your body.

¹²The land I gave to Abraham and Isaac I also give to you, and I will give this land to your descendants after you.”

¹³Then God went up from him at the place where he had talked with him.

¹⁴Jacob set up a stone pillar at the place where God had talked with him, and he poured out a drink offering on it; he also poured oil on it.

¹⁵Jacob called the place where God had talked with him Bethel.

¹⁶Then they moved on from Bethel. While they were still some distance from Ephrath, Rachel began to give birth and had great difficulty.

¹⁷And as she was having great difficulty in childbirth, the midwife said to her, “Don’t be afraid, for you have another son.”

¹⁸As she breathed her last-for she was dying-she named her son Ben-Oni. But his father named him Benjamin.

¹⁹So Rachel died and was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem).

²⁰Over her tomb Jacob set up a pillar, and to this day that pillar marks Rachel’s tomb.

²¹Israel moved on again and pitched his tent beyond Migdal Eder.

²²While Israel was living in that region, Reuben went in and slept with his father’s concubine Bilhah, and Israel heard of it. Jacob had twelve sons:

²³The sons of Leah: Reuben the firstborn of Jacob, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar and Zebulun.

²⁴The sons of Rachel: Joseph and Benjamin.

²⁵The sons of Rachel’s maidservant Bilhah: Dan and Naphtali.

²⁶The sons of Leah’s maidservant Zilpah: Gad and Asher. These were the sons of Jacob, who were born to him in Paddan Aram.

²⁷Jacob came home to his father Isaac in Mamre, near Kiriath Arba (that is, Hebron), where Abraham and Isaac had stayed.

²⁸Isaac lived a hundred and eighty years.

²⁹Then he breathed his last and died and was gathered to his people, old and full of years. And his sons Esau and Jacob buried him.

36This is the account of Esau (that is, Edom).

²Esau took his wives from the women of Canaan: Adah daughter of Elon the Hittite, and Oholibamah daughter of Anah and granddaughter of Zibeon the Hivite-

³also Basemath daughter of Ishmael and sister of Nebaioth.

⁴Adah bore Eliphaz to Esau, Basemath bore Reuel,

⁵and Oholibamah bore Jeush, Jalam and Korah. These were the sons of Esau, who were born to him in Canaan.

⁶Esau took his wives and sons and daughters and all the members of his household, as well as his livestock and all his other animals and all the goods he had acquired in Canaan, and moved to a land some distance from his brother Jacob.

⁷Their possessions were too great for them to remain together; the land where they were staying could not support them both because of their livestock.

⁸So Esau (that is, Edom) settled in the hill country of Seir.

⁹This is the account of Esau the father of the Edomites in the hill country of Seir.

¹⁰These are the names of Esau’s sons: Eliphaz, the son of Esau’s wife Adah, and Reuel, the son of Esau’s wife Basemath.

¹¹The sons of Eliphaz: Teman, Omar, Zepho, Gatam and Kenaz.

¹²Esau’s son Eliphaz also had a concubine named Timna, who bore him Amalek. These were grandsons of Esau’s wife Adah.

¹³The sons of Reuel: Nahath, Zerah, Shammah and Mizzah. These were grandsons of Esau’s wife Basemath.

¹⁴The sons of Esau’s wife Oholibamah daughter of Anah and granddaughter of Zibeon, whom she bore to Esau: Jeush, Jalam and Korah.

¹⁵These were the chiefs among Esau’s descendants: The sons of Eliphaz the firstborn of Esau: Chiefs Teman, Omar, Zepho, Kenaz,

¹⁶Korah, Gatam and Amalek. These were the chiefs descended from Eliphaz in Edom; they were grandsons of Adah.

¹⁷The sons of Esau’s son Reuel: Chiefs Nahath, Zerah, Shammah and Mizzah. These were the chiefs descended from Reuel in Edom; they were grandsons of Esau’s wife Basemath.

¹⁸The sons of Esau’s wife Oholibamah: Chiefs Jeush, Jalam and Korah. These

were the chiefs descended from Esau’s wife Oholibamah daughter of Anah.

¹⁹These were the sons of Esau (that is, Edom), and these were their chiefs.

²⁰These were the sons of Seir the Horite, who were living in the region: Lotan, Shobal, Zibeon, Anah,

²¹Dishon, Ezer and Dishan. These sons of Seir in Edom were Horite chiefs.

²²The sons of Lotan: Hori and Homam. Timna was Lotan’s sister.

²³The sons of Shobal: Alvan, Manahath, Ebal, Shepho and Onam.

²⁴The sons of Zibeon: Aiah and Anah. This is the Anah who discovered the hot springs in the desert while he was grazing the donkeys of his father Zibeon.

²⁵The children of Anah: Dishon and Oholibamah daughter of Anah.

²⁶The sons of Dishon : Hemdan, Eshban, Ithran and Keran.

²⁷The sons of Ezer: Bilhan, Zaavan and Akan.

²⁸The sons of Dishan: Uz and Aran.

²⁹These were the Horite chiefs: Lotan, Shobal, Zibeon, Anah,

³⁰Dishon, Ezer and Dishan. These were the Horite chiefs, according to their divisions, in the land of Seir.

³¹These were the kings who reigned in Edom before any Israelite king reigned :

³²Bela son of Beor became king of Edom. His city was named Dinhabah.

³³When Bela died, Jobab son of Zerah from Bozrah succeeded him as king.

³⁴When Jobab died, Husham from the land of the Temanites succeeded him as king.

³⁵When Husham died, Hadad son of Bedad, who defeated Midian in the country of Moab, succeeded him as king. His city was named Avith.

³⁶When Hadad died, Samlah from Masrekah succeeded him as king.

³⁷When Samlah died, Shaul from Rehoboth on the river succeeded him as king.

³⁸When Shaul died, Baal-Hanan son of Acbor succeeded him as king.

³⁹When Baal-Hanan son of Acbor died, Hadad succeeded him as king. His city was named Pau, and his wife’s name was Mehetabel daughter of Matred, the daughter of Me-Zahab.

⁴⁰These were the chiefs descended from Esau, by name, according to their clans and regions: Timna, Alvah, Jetheth,

⁴¹Oholibamah, Elah, Pinon,

⁴²Kenaz, Teman, Mibzar,

⁴³Magdiel and Iram. These were the chiefs of Edom, according to their settlements in the land they occupied. This was Esau the father of the Edomites.

37Jacob lived in the land where his father had stayed, the land of Canaan.

²This is the account of Jacob. Joseph, a young man of seventeen, was tending the flocks with his brothers, the sons of Bilhah and the sons of Zilpah, his father’s wives, and he brought their father a bad report about them.

³Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons, because he had been born to him in his old age; and he made a richly ornamented robe for him.

⁴When his brothers saw that their father loved him more than any of them, they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him.

⁵Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him all the more.

⁶He said to them, “Listen to this dream I had:

⁷We were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright, while your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it.”

⁸His brothers said to him, “Do you intend to reign over us? Will you actually rule us?” And they hated him all the more

because of his dream and what he had said.

⁹Then he had another dream, and he told it to his brothers. “Listen,” he said, “I had another dream, and this time the sun and moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me.”

¹⁰When he told his father as well as his brothers, his father rebuked him and said, “What is this dream you had? Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow down to the ground before you?”

¹¹His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the matter in mind.

¹²Now his brothers had gone to graze their father’s flocks near Shechem,

¹³and Israel said to Joseph, “As you know, your brothers are grazing the flocks near Shechem. Come, I am going to send you to them.” “Very well,” he replied.

¹⁴So he said to him, “Go and see if all is well with your brothers and with the flocks, and bring word back to me.” Then he sent him off from the Valley of Hebron. When Joseph arrived at Shechem,

¹⁵a man found him wandering around in the fields and asked him, “What are you looking for?”

¹⁶He replied, “I’m looking for my brothers. Can you tell me where they are grazing their flocks?”

¹⁷“They have moved on from here,” the man answered. “I heard them say, ‘Let’s go to Dothan.’ ” So Joseph went after his brothers and found them near Dothan.

¹⁸But they saw him in the distance, and before he reached them, they plotted to kill him.

¹⁹“Here comes that dreamer!” they said to each other.

²⁰“Come now, let’s kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. Then we’ll see what comes of his dreams.”

²¹When Reuben heard this, he tried to rescue him from their hands. “Let’s not take his life,” he said.

²²“Don’t shed any blood. Throw him into this cistern here in the desert, but don’t lay a hand on him.” Reuben said this to rescue him from them and take him back to his father.

²³So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe-the richly ornamented robe he was wearing-

²⁴and they took him and threw him into the cistern. Now the cistern was empty; there was no water in it.

²⁵As they sat down to eat their meal, they looked up and saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead. Their camels were loaded with spices, balm and myrrh, and they were on their way to take them down to Egypt.

²⁶Judah said to his brothers, “What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood?

²⁷Come, let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him; after all, he is our brother, our own flesh and blood.” His brothers agreed.

²⁸So when the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for twenty shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt.

²⁹When Reuben returned to the cistern and saw that Joseph was not there, he tore his clothes.

³⁰He went back to his brothers and said, “The boy isn’t there! Where can I turn now?”

³¹Then they got Joseph’s robe, slaughtered a goat and dipped the robe in the blood.

³²They took the ornamented robe back to their father and said, “We found this. Examine it to see whether it is your son’s robe.”

³³He recognized it and said, “It is my son’s robe! Some ferocious animal has devoured him. Joseph has surely been torn to pieces.”

³⁴Then Jacob tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and mourned for his son many days.

³⁵All his sons and daughters came to comfort him, but he refused to be

comforted. “No,” he said, “in mourning will I go down to the grave to my son.” So his father wept for him.

³⁶Meanwhile, the Midianites sold Joseph in Egypt to Potiphar, one of Pharaoh’s officials, the captain of the guard.

38At that time, Judah left his brothers and went down to stay with a man of Adullam named Hirah.

²There Judah met the daughter of a Canaanite man named Shua. He married her and lay with her;

³she became pregnant and gave birth to a son, who was named Er.

⁴She conceived again and gave birth to a son and named him Onan.

⁵She gave birth to still another son and named him Shelah. It was at Kezib that she gave birth to him.

⁶Judah got a wife for Er, his firstborn, and her name was Tamar.

⁷But Er, Judah’s firstborn, was wicked in the Lord ‘s sight; so the Lord put him to death.

⁸Then Judah said to Onan, “Lie with your brother’s wife and fulfill your duty to her as a brother-in-law to produce offspring for your brother.”

⁹But Onan knew that the offspring would not be his; so whenever he lay with his brother’s wife, he spilled his semen on

the ground to keep from producing offspring for his brother.

¹⁰What he did was wicked in the Lord ‘s sight; so he put him to death also.

¹¹Judah then said to his daughter-in-law Tamar, “Live as a widow in your father’s house until my son Shelah grows up.” For he thought, “He may die too, just like his brothers.” So Tamar went to live in her father’s house.

¹²After a long time Judah’s wife, the daughter of Shua, died. When Judah had recovered from his grief, he went up to Timnah, to the men who were shearing his sheep, and his friend Hirah the Adullamite went with him.

¹³When Tamar was told, “Your father-in- law is on his way to Timnah to shear his sheep,”

¹⁴she took off her widow’s clothes, covered herself with a veil to disguise herself, and then sat down at the entrance to Enaim, which is on the road to Timnah. For she saw that, though Shelah had now grown up, she had not been given to him as his wife.

¹⁵When Judah saw her, he thought she was a prostitute, for she had covered her face.

¹⁶Not realizing that she was his daughter-in-law, he went over to her by the roadside and said, “Come now, let me sleep with you.” “And what will you give me to sleep with you?” she asked.

¹⁷“I’ll send you a young goat from my flock,” he said. “Will you give me something as a pledge until you send it?” she asked.

¹⁸He said, “What pledge should I give you?” “Your seal and its cord, and the staff in your hand,” she answered. So he gave them to her and slept with her, and she became pregnant by him.

¹⁹After she left, she took off her veil and put on her widow’s clothes again.

²⁰Meanwhile Judah sent the young goat by his friend the Adullamite in order to get his pledge back from the woman, but he did not find her.

²¹He asked the men who lived there, “Where is the shrine prostitute who was beside the road at Enaim?” “There hasn’t been any shrine prostitute here,” they said.

²²So he went back to Judah and said, “I didn’t find her. Besides, the men who lived there said, ‘There hasn’t been any shrine prostitute here.’ “

²³Then Judah said, “Let her keep what she has, or we will become a laughingstock. After all, I did send her this young goat, but you didn’t find her.”

²⁴About three months later Judah was told, “Your daughter-in-law Tamar is guilty of prostitution, and as a result she is now pregnant.” Judah said, “Bring her out and have her burned to death!”

²⁵As she was being brought out, she sent a message to her father-in-law. “I

am pregnant by the man who owns these,” she said. And she added, “See if you recognize whose seal and cord and staff these are.”

²⁶Judah recognized them and said, “She is more righteous than I, since I wouldn’t give her to my son Shelah.” And he did not sleep with her again.

²⁷When the time came for her to give birth, there were twin boys in her womb.

²⁸As she was giving birth, one of them put out his hand; so the midwife took a scarlet thread and tied it on his wrist and said, “This one came out first.”

²⁹But when he drew back his hand, his brother came out, and she said, “So this is how you have broken out!” And he was named Perez.

³⁰Then his brother, who had the scarlet thread on his wrist, came out and he was given the name Zerah.

39Now Joseph had been taken down to Egypt. Potiphar, an Egyptian who was one of Pharaoh’s officials, the captain of the guard, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had taken him there.

²The Lord was with Joseph and he prospered, and he lived in the house of his Egyptian master.

³When his master saw that the Lord was with him and that the Lord gave him success in everything he did,

⁴Joseph found favor in his eyes and became his attendant. Potiphar put him in charge of his household, and he entrusted to his care everything he owned.

⁵From the time he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the Lord blessed the household of the Egyptian because of Joseph. The blessing of the Lord was on everything Potiphar had, both in the house and in the field.

⁶So he left in Joseph’s care everything he had; with Joseph in charge, he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate. Now Joseph was well-built and handsome,

⁷and after a while his master’s wife took notice of Joseph and said, “Come to bed with me!”

⁸But he refused. “With me in charge,” he told her, “my master does not concern himself with anything in the house; everything he owns he has entrusted to my care.

⁹No one is greater in this house than I am. My master has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?”

¹⁰And though she spoke to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to bed with her or even be with her.

¹¹One day he went into the house to attend to his duties, and none of the household servants was inside.

¹²She caught him by his cloak and said, “Come to bed with me!” But he left his cloak in her hand and ran out of the house.

¹³When she saw that he had left his cloak in her hand and had run out of the house,

¹⁴she called her household servants. “Look,” she said to them, “this Hebrew has been brought to us to make sport of us! He came in here to sleep with me, but I screamed.

¹⁵When he heard me scream for help, he left his cloak beside me and ran out of the house.”

¹⁶She kept his cloak beside her until his master came home.

¹⁷Then she told him this story: “That Hebrew slave you brought us came to me to make sport of me.

¹⁸But as soon as I screamed for help, he left his cloak beside me and ran out of the house.”

¹⁹When his master heard the story his wife told him, saying, “This is how your slave treated me,” he burned with anger.

²⁰Joseph’s master took him and put him in prison, the place where the king’s prisoners were confined. But while Joseph was there in the prison,

²¹the Lord was with him; he showed him kindness and granted him favor in the eyes of the prison warden.

²²So the warden put Joseph in charge of all those held in the prison, and he was made responsible for all that was done there.

²³The warden paid no attention to anything under Joseph’s care, because the Lord was with Joseph and gave him success in whatever he did.

40Some time later, the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt offended their master, the king of Egypt.

²Pharaoh was angry with his two officials, the chief cupbearer and the chief baker,

³and put them in custody in the house of the captain of the guard, in the same prison where Joseph was confined.

⁴The captain of the guard assigned them to Joseph, and he attended them. After they had been in custody for some time,

⁵each of the two men-the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt, who were being held in prison-had a dream the same night, and each dream had a meaning of its own.

⁶When Joseph came to them the next morning, he saw that they were dejected.

⁷So he asked Pharaoh’s officials who were in custody with him in his master’s house, “Why are your faces so sad today?”

⁸“We both had dreams,” they answered, “but there is no one to interpret them.”

Then Joseph said to them, “Do not interpretations belong to God? Tell me your dreams.”

⁹So the chief cupbearer told Joseph his dream. He said to him, “In my dream I saw a vine in front of me,

¹⁰and on the vine were three branches. As soon as it budded, it blossomed, and its clusters ripened into grapes.

¹¹Pharaoh’s cup was in my hand, and I took the grapes, squeezed them into Pharaoh’s cup and put the cup in his hand.”

¹²“This is what it means,” Joseph said to him. “The three branches are three days.

¹³Within three days Pharaoh will lift up your head and restore you to your position, and you will put Pharaoh’s cup in his hand, just as you used to do when you were his cupbearer.

¹⁴But when all goes well with you, remember me and show me kindness; mention me to Pharaoh and get me out of this prison.

¹⁵For I was forcibly carried off from the land of the Hebrews, and even here I have done nothing to deserve being put in a dungeon.”

¹⁶When the chief baker saw that Joseph had given a favorable interpretation, he said to Joseph, “I too had a dream: On my head were three baskets of bread.

¹⁷In the top basket were all kinds of baked goods for Pharaoh, but the birds

were eating them out of the basket on my head.”

¹⁸“This is what it means,” Joseph said. “The three baskets are three days.

¹⁹Within three days Pharaoh will lift off your head and hang you on a tree. And the birds will eat away your flesh.”

²⁰Now the third day was Pharaoh’s birthday, and he gave a feast for all his officials. He lifted up the heads of the chief cupbearer and the chief baker in the presence of his officials:

²¹He restored the chief cupbearer to his position, so that he once again put the cup into Pharaoh’s hand,

²²but he hanged the chief baker, just as Joseph had said to them in his interpretation.

²³The chief cupbearer, however, did not remember Joseph; he forgot him.

41When two full years had passed, Pharaoh had a dream: He was standing by the Nile,

²when out of the river there came up seven cows, sleek and fat, and they grazed among the reeds.

³After them, seven other cows, ugly and gaunt, came up out of the Nile and stood beside those on the riverbank.

⁴And the cows that were ugly and gaunt ate up the seven sleek, fat cows. Then Pharaoh woke up.

⁵He fell asleep again and had a second dream: Seven heads of grain, healthy and good, were growing on a single stalk.

⁶After them, seven other heads of grain sprouted-thin and scorched by the east wind.

⁷The thin heads of grain swallowed up the seven healthy, full heads. Then Pharaoh woke up; it had been a dream.

⁸In the morning his mind was troubled, so he sent for all the magicians and wise men of Egypt. Pharaoh told them his dreams, but no one could interpret them for him.

⁹Then the chief cupbearer said to Pharaoh, “Today I am reminded of my shortcomings.

¹⁰Pharaoh was once angry with his servants, and he imprisoned me and the chief baker in the house of the captain of the guard.

¹¹Each of us had a dream the same night, and each dream had a meaning of its own.

¹²Now a young Hebrew was there with us, a servant of the captain of the guard. We told him our dreams, and he interpreted them for us, giving each man the interpretation of his dream.

¹³And things turned out exactly as he interpreted them to us: I was restored to my position, and the other man was hanged. “

¹⁴So Pharaoh sent for Joseph, and he was quickly brought from the dungeon. When he had shaved and changed his clothes, he came before Pharaoh.

¹⁵Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I had a dream, and no one can interpret it. But I have heard it said of you that when you hear a dream you can interpret it.”

¹⁶“I cannot do it,” Joseph replied to Pharaoh, “but God will give Pharaoh the answer he desires.”

¹⁷Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “In my dream I was standing on the bank of the Nile,

¹⁸when out of the river there came up seven cows, fat and sleek, and they grazed among the reeds.

¹⁹After them, seven other cows came up-scrawny and very ugly and lean. I had never seen such ugly cows in all the land of Egypt.

²⁰The lean, ugly cows ate up the seven fat cows that came up first.

²¹But even after they ate them, no one could tell that they had done so; they looked just as ugly as before. Then I woke up.

²²“In my dreams I also saw seven heads of grain, full and good, growing on a single stalk.

²³After them, seven other heads sprouted-withered and thin and scorched by the east wind.

²⁴The thin heads of grain swallowed up the seven good heads. I told this to the magicians, but none could explain it to me.”

²⁵Then Joseph said to Pharaoh, “The dreams of Pharaoh are one and the same. God has revealed to Pharaoh what he is about to do.

²⁶The seven good cows are seven years, and the seven good heads of grain are seven years; it is one and the same dream.

²⁷The seven lean, ugly cows that came up afterward are seven years, and so are the seven worthless heads of grain scorched by the east wind: They are seven years of famine.

²⁸“It is just as I said to Pharaoh: God has shown Pharaoh what he is about to do.

²⁹Seven years of great abundance are coming throughout the land of Egypt,

³⁰but seven years of famine will follow them. Then all the abundance in Egypt will be forgotten, and the famine will ravage the land.

³¹The abundance in the land will not be remembered, because the famine that follows it will be so severe.

³²The reason the dream was given to Pharaoh in two forms is that the matter

has been firmly decided by God, and God will do it soon.

³³“And now let Pharaoh look for a discerning and wise man and put him in charge of the land of Egypt.

³⁴Let Pharaoh appoint commissioners over the land to take a fifth of the harvest of Egypt during the seven years of abundance.

³⁵They should collect all the food of these good years that are coming and store up the grain under the authority of Pharaoh, to be kept in the cities for food.

³⁶This food should be held in reserve for the country, to be used during the seven years of famine that will come upon Egypt, so that the country may not be ruined by the famine.”

³⁷The plan seemed good to Pharaoh and to all his officials.

³⁸So Pharaoh asked them, “Can we find anyone like this man, one in whom is the spirit of God ?”

³⁹Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Since God has made all this known to you, there is no one so discerning and wise as you.

⁴⁰You shall be in charge of my palace, and all my people are to submit to your orders. Only with respect to the throne will I be greater than you.”

⁴¹So Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I hereby put you in charge of the whole land of Egypt.”

⁴²Then Pharaoh took his signet ring from his finger and put it on Joseph’s finger. He dressed him in robes of fine linen and put a gold chain around his neck.

⁴³He had him ride in a chariot as his second-in-command, and men shouted before him, “Make way !” Thus he put him in charge of the whole land of Egypt.

⁴⁴Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I am Pharaoh, but without your word no one will lift hand or foot in all Egypt.”

⁴⁵Pharaoh gave Joseph the name Zaphenath-Paneah and gave him Asenath daughter of Potiphera, priest of On, to be his wife. And Joseph went throughout the land of Egypt.

⁴⁶Joseph was thirty years old when he entered the service of Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from Pharaoh’s presence and traveled throughout Egypt.

⁴⁷During the seven years of abundance the land produced plentifully.

⁴⁸Joseph collected all the food produced in those seven years of abundance in Egypt and stored it in the cities. In each city he put the food grown in the fields surrounding it.

⁴⁹Joseph stored up huge quantities of grain, like the sand of the sea; it was so much that he stopped keeping records because it was beyond measure.

⁵⁰Before the years of famine came, two sons were born to Joseph by Asenath daughter of Potiphera, priest of On.

⁵¹Joseph named his firstborn Manasseh and said, “It is because God has made me forget all my trouble and all my father’s household.”

⁵²The second son he named Ephraim and said, “It is because God has made me fruitful in the land of my suffering.”

⁵³The seven years of abundance in Egypt came to an end,

⁵⁴and the seven years of famine began, just as Joseph had said. There was famine in all the other lands, but in the whole land of Egypt there was food.

⁵⁵When all Egypt began to feel the famine, the people cried to Pharaoh for food. Then Pharaoh told all the Egyptians, “Go to Joseph and do what he tells you.”

⁵⁶When the famine had spread over the whole country, Joseph opened the storehouses and sold grain to the Egyptians, for the famine was severe throughout Egypt.

⁵⁷And all the countries came to Egypt to buy grain from Joseph, because the famine was severe in all the world.

42When Jacob learned that there was grain in Egypt, he said to his sons, “Why do you just keep looking at each other?”

²He continued, “I have heard that there is grain in Egypt. Go down there and buy some for us, so that we may live and not die.”

³Then ten of Joseph’s brothers went down to buy grain from Egypt.

⁴But Jacob did not send Benjamin, Joseph’s brother, with the others, because he was afraid that harm might come to him.

⁵So Israel’s sons were among those who went to buy grain, for the famine was in the land of Canaan also.

⁶Now Joseph was the governor of the land, the one who sold grain to all its people. So when Joseph’s brothers arrived, they bowed down to him with their faces to the ground.

⁷As soon as Joseph saw his brothers, he recognized them, but he pretended to be a stranger and spoke harshly to them. “Where do you come from?” he asked. “From the land of Canaan,” they replied, “to buy food.”

⁸Although Joseph recognized his brothers, they did not recognize him.

⁹Then he remembered his dreams about them and said to them, “You are spies! You have come to see where our land is unprotected.”

¹⁰“No, my lord,” they answered. “Your servants have come to buy food.

¹¹We are all the sons of one man. Your servants are honest men, not spies.”

¹²“No!” he said to them. “You have come to see where our land is unprotected.”

¹³But they replied, “Your servants were twelve brothers, the sons of one man, who lives in the land of Canaan. The youngest is now with our father, and one is no more.”

¹⁴Joseph said to them, “It is just as I told you: You are spies!

¹⁵And this is how you will be tested: As surely as Pharaoh lives, you will not leave this place unless your youngest brother comes here.

¹⁶Send one of your number to get your brother; the rest of you will be kept in prison, so that your words may be tested to see if you are telling the truth. If you are not, then as surely as Pharaoh lives, you are spies!”

¹⁷And he put them all in custody for three days.

¹⁸On the third day, Joseph said to them, “Do this and you will live, for I fear God:

¹⁹If you are honest men, let one of your brothers stay here in prison, while the rest of you go and take grain back for your starving households.

²⁰But you must bring your youngest brother to me, so that your words may be verified and that you may not die.” This they proceeded to do.

²¹They said to one another, “Surely we are being punished because of our brother. We saw how distressed he was when he pleaded with us for his life, but we would not listen; that’s why this distress has come upon us.”

²²Reuben replied, “Didn’t I tell you not to sin against the boy? But you wouldn’t listen! Now we must give an accounting for his blood.”

²³They did not realize that Joseph could understand them, since he was using an interpreter.

²⁴He turned away from them and began to weep, but then turned back and spoke to them again. He had Simeon taken from them and bound before their eyes.

²⁵Joseph gave orders to fill their bags with grain, to put each man’s silver back in his sack, and to give them provisions for their journey. After this was done for them,

²⁶they loaded their grain on their donkeys and left.

²⁷At the place where they stopped for the night one of them opened his sack to get feed for his donkey, and he saw his silver in the mouth of his sack.

²⁸“My silver has been returned,” he said to his brothers. “Here it is in my sack.” Their hearts sank and they turned to each other trembling and said, “What is this that God has done to us?”

²⁹When they came to their father Jacob in the land of Canaan, they told him all that had happened to them. They said,

³⁰“The man who is lord over the land spoke harshly to us and treated us as though we were spying on the land.

³¹But we said to him, ‘We are honest men; we are not spies.

³²We were twelve brothers, sons of one father. One is no more, and the youngest is now with our father in Canaan.’

³³“Then the man who is lord over the land said to us, ‘This is how I will know whether you are honest men: Leave one of your brothers here with me, and take food for your starving households and go.

³⁴But bring your youngest brother to me so I will know that you are not spies but honest men. Then I will give your brother back to you, and you can trade in the land.’ “

³⁵As they were emptying their sacks, there in each man’s sack was his pouch of silver! When they and their father saw the money pouches, they were frightened.

³⁶Their father Jacob said to them, “You have deprived me of my children. Joseph is no more and Simeon is no more, and now you want to take Benjamin. Everything is against me!”

³⁷Then Reuben said to his father, “You may put both of my sons to death if I do not bring him back to you. Entrust him to my care, and I will bring him back.”

³⁸But Jacob said, “My son will not go down there with you; his brother is dead and he is the only one left. If harm comes to him on the journey you are

taking, you will bring my gray head down to the grave in sorrow.”

43Now the famine was still severe in the land.

²So when they had eaten all the grain they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, “Go back and buy us a little more food.”

³But Judah said to him, “The man warned us solemnly, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’

⁴If you will send our brother along with us, we will go down and buy food for you.

⁵But if you will not send him, we will not go down, because the man said to us, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’ “

⁶Israel asked, “Why did you bring this trouble on me by telling the man you had another brother?”

⁷They replied, “The man questioned us closely about ourselves and our family. ‘Is your father still living?’ he asked us. ‘Do you have another brother?’ We simply answered his questions. How were we to know he would say, ‘Bring your brother down here’?”

⁸Then Judah said to Israel his father, “Send the boy along with me and we will go at once, so that we and you and our children may live and not die.

⁹I myself will guarantee his safety; you can hold me personally responsible for him. If I do not bring him back to you and set him here before you, I will bear the blame before you all my life.

¹⁰As it is, if we had not delayed, we could have gone and returned twice.”

¹¹Then their father Israel said to them, “If it must be, then do this: Put some of the best products of the land in your bags and take them down to the man as a gift-a little balm and a little honey, some spices and myrrh, some pistachio nuts and almonds.

¹²Take double the amount of silver with you, for you must return the silver that was put back into the mouths of your sacks. Perhaps it was a mistake.

¹³Take your brother also and go back to the man at once.

¹⁴And may God Almighty grant you mercy before the man so that he will let your other brother and Benjamin come back with you. As for me, if I am bereaved, I am bereaved.”

¹⁵So the men took the gifts and double the amount of silver, and Benjamin also. They hurried down to Egypt and presented themselves to Joseph.

¹⁶When Joseph saw Benjamin with them, he said to the steward of his house, “Take these men to my house, slaughter an animal and prepare dinner; they are to eat with me at noon.”

¹⁷The man did as Joseph told him and took the men to Joseph’s house.

¹⁸Now the men were frightened when they were taken to his house. They thought, “We were brought here because of the silver that was put back into our sacks the first time. He wants to attack us and overpower us and seize us as slaves and take our donkeys.”

¹⁹So they went up to Joseph’s steward and spoke to him at the entrance to the house.

²⁰“Please, sir,” they said, “we came down here the first time to buy food.

²¹But at the place where we stopped for the night we opened our sacks and each of us found his silver-the exact weight-in the mouth of his sack. So we have brought it back with us.

²²We have also brought additional silver with us to buy food. We don’t know who put our silver in our sacks.”

²³“It’s all right,” he said. “Don’t be afraid. Your God, the God of your father, has given you treasure in your sacks; I received your silver.” Then he brought Simeon out to them.

²⁴The steward took the men into Joseph’s house, gave them water to wash their feet and provided fodder for their donkeys.

²⁵They prepared their gifts for Joseph’s arrival at noon, because they had heard that they were to eat there.

²⁶When Joseph came home, they presented to him the gifts they had brought into the house, and they bowed down before him to the ground.

²⁷He asked them how they were, and then he said, “How is your aged father you told me about? Is he still living?”

²⁸They replied, “Your servant our father is still alive and well.” And they bowed low to pay him honor.

²⁹As he looked about and saw his brother Benjamin, his own mother’s son, he asked, “Is this your youngest brother, the one you told me about?” And he said, “God be gracious to you, my son.”

³⁰Deeply moved at the sight of his brother, Joseph hurried out and looked for a place to weep. He went into his private room and wept there.

³¹After he had washed his face, he came out and, controlling himself, said, “Serve the food.”

³²They served him by himself, the brothers by themselves, and the Egyptians who ate with him by themselves, because Egyptians could not eat with Hebrews, for that is detestable to Egyptians.

³³The men had been seated before him in the order of their ages, from the firstborn to the youngest; and they looked at each other in astonishment.

³⁴When portions were served to them from Joseph’s table, Benjamin’s portion was five times as much as anyone

else’s. So they feasted and drank freely with him.

44Now Joseph gave these instructions to the steward of his house: “Fill the men’s sacks with as much food as they can carry, and put each man’s silver in the mouth of his sack.

²Then put my cup, the silver one, in the mouth of the youngest one’s sack, along with the silver for his grain.” And he did as Joseph said.

³As morning dawned, the men were sent on their way with their donkeys.

⁴They had not gone far from the city when Joseph said to his steward, “Go after those men at once, and when you catch up with them, say to them, ‘Why have you repaid good with evil?

⁵Isn’t this the cup my master drinks from and also uses for divination? This is a wicked thing you have done.’ “

⁶When he caught up with them, he repeated these words to them.

⁷But they said to him, “Why does my lord say such things? Far be it from your servants to do anything like that!

⁸We even brought back to you from the land of Canaan the silver we found inside the mouths of our sacks. So why would we steal silver or gold from your master’s house?

⁹If any of your servants is found to have it, he will die; and the rest of us will become my lord’s slaves.”

¹⁰“Very well, then,” he said, “let it be as you say. Whoever is found to have it will become my slave; the rest of you will be free from blame.”

¹¹Each of them quickly lowered his sack to the ground and opened it.

¹²Then the steward proceeded to search, beginning with the oldest and ending with the youngest. And the cup was found in Benjamin’s sack.

¹³At this, they tore their clothes. Then they all loaded their donkeys and returned to the city.

¹⁴Joseph was still in the house when Judah and his brothers came in, and they threw themselves to the ground before him.

¹⁵Joseph said to them, “What is this you have done? Don’t you know that a man like me can find things out by divination?”

¹⁶“What can we say to my lord?” Judah replied. “What can we say? How can we prove our innocence? God has uncovered your servants’ guilt. We are now my lord’s slaves-we ourselves and the one who was found to have the cup.”

¹⁷But Joseph said, “Far be it from me to do such a thing! Only the man who was found to have the cup will become my

slave. The rest of you, go back to your father in peace.”

¹⁸Then Judah went up to him and said: “Please, my lord, let your servant speak a word to my lord. Do not be angry with your servant, though you are equal to Pharaoh himself.

¹⁹My lord asked his servants, ‘Do you have a father or a brother?’

²⁰And we answered, ‘We have an aged father, and there is a young son born to him in his old age. His brother is dead, and he is the only one of his mother’s sons left, and his father loves him.’

²¹“Then you said to your servants, ‘Bring him down to me so I can see him for myself.’

²²And we said to my lord, ‘The boy cannot leave his father; if he leaves him, his father will die.’

²³But you told your servants, ‘Unless your youngest brother comes down with you, you will not see my face again.’

²⁴When we went back to your servant my father, we told him what my lord had said.

²⁵“Then our father said, ‘Go back and buy a little more food.’

²⁶But we said, ‘We cannot go down. Only if our youngest brother is with us will we go. We cannot see the man’s face unless our youngest brother is with us.’

²⁷“Your servant my father said to us, ‘You know that my wife bore me two sons.

²⁸One of them went away from me, and I said, “He has surely been torn to pieces.” And I have not seen him since.

²⁹If you take this one from me too and harm comes to him, you will bring my gray head down to the grave in misery.’

³⁰“So now, if the boy is not with us when I go back to your servant my father and if my father, whose life is closely bound up with the boy’s life,

³¹sees that the boy isn’t there, he will die. Your servants will bring the gray head of our father down to the grave in sorrow.

³²Your servant guaranteed the boy’s safety to my father. I said, ‘If I do not bring him back to you, I will bear the blame before you, my father, all my life!’

³³“Now then, please let your servant remain here as my lord’s slave in place of the boy, and let the boy return with his brothers.

³⁴How can I go back to my father if the boy is not with me? No! Do not let me see the misery that would come upon my father.”

45Then Joseph could no longer control himself before all his attendants, and he cried out, “Have everyone leave my presence!” So there was no one with Joseph when he made himself known to his brothers.

²And he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard him, and Pharaoh’s household heard about it.

³Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still living?” But his brothers were not able to answer him, because they were terrified at his presence.

⁴Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Come close to me.” When they had done so, he said, “I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt!

⁵And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you.

⁶For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will not be plowing and reaping.

⁷But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance.

⁸“So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God. He made me father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household and ruler of all Egypt.

⁹Now hurry back to my father and say to him, ‘This is what your son Joseph says: God has made me lord of all Egypt. Come down to me; don’t delay.

¹⁰You shall live in the region of Goshen and be near me-you, your children and grandchildren, your flocks and herds, and all you have.

¹¹I will provide for you there, because five years of famine are still to come. Otherwise you and your household and all who belong to you will become destitute.’

¹²“You can see for yourselves, and so can my brother Benjamin, that it is really I who am speaking to you.

¹³Tell my father about all the honor accorded me in Egypt and about everything you have seen. And bring my father down here quickly.”

¹⁴Then he threw his arms around his brother Benjamin and wept, and Benjamin embraced him, weeping.

¹⁵And he kissed all his brothers and wept over them. Afterward his brothers talked with him.

¹⁶When the news reached Pharaoh’s palace that Joseph’s brothers had come, Pharaoh and all his officials were pleased.

¹⁷Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Tell your brothers, ‘Do this: Load your animals and return to the land of Canaan,

¹⁸and bring your father and your families back to me. I will give you the best of the land of Egypt and you can enjoy the fat of the land.’

¹⁹“You are also directed to tell them, ‘Do this: Take some carts from Egypt for your children and your wives, and get your father and come.

²⁰Never mind about your belongings, because the best of all Egypt will be yours.’ “

²¹So the sons of Israel did this. Joseph gave them carts, as Pharaoh had commanded, and he also gave them provisions for their journey.

²²To each of them he gave new clothing, but to Benjamin he gave three hundred shekels of silver and five sets of clothes.

²³And this is what he sent to his father: ten donkeys loaded with the best things of Egypt, and ten female donkeys loaded with grain and bread and other provisions for his journey.

²⁴Then he sent his brothers away, and as they were leaving he said to them, “Don’t quarrel on the way!”

²⁵So they went up out of Egypt and came to their father Jacob in the land of Canaan.

²⁶They told him, “Joseph is still alive! In fact, he is ruler of all Egypt.” Jacob was stunned; he did not believe them.

²⁷But when they told him everything Joseph had said to them, and when he saw the carts Joseph had sent to carry him back, the spirit of their father Jacob revived.

²⁸And Israel said, “I’m convinced! My son Joseph is still alive. I will go and see him before I die.”

46So Israel set out with all that was his, and when he reached Beersheba, he offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac.

²And God spoke to Israel in a vision at night and said, “Jacob! Jacob!” “Here I am,” he replied.

³“I am God, the God of your father,” he said. “Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for I will make you into a great nation there.

⁴I will go down to Egypt with you, and I will surely bring you back again. And Joseph’s own hand will close your eyes.”

⁵Then Jacob left Beersheba, and Israel’s sons took their father Jacob and their children and their wives in the carts that Pharaoh had sent to transport him.

⁶They also took with them their livestock and the possessions they had acquired in Canaan, and Jacob and all his offspring went to Egypt.

⁷He took with him to Egypt his sons and grandsons and his daughters and granddaughters-all his offspring.

⁸These are the names of the sons of Israel (Jacob and his descendants) who went to Egypt: Reuben the firstborn of Jacob.

⁹The sons of Reuben: Hanoch, Pallu, Hezron and Carmi.

¹⁰The sons of Simeon: Jemuel, Jamin, Ohad, Jakin, Zohar and Shaul the son of a Canaanite woman.

¹¹The sons of Levi: Gershon, Kohath and Merari.

¹²The sons of Judah: Er, Onan, Shelah, Perez and Zerah (but Er and Onan had died in the land of Canaan). The sons of Perez: Hezron and Hamul.

¹³The sons of Issachar: Tola, Puah, Jashub and Shimron.

¹⁴The sons of Zebulun: Sered, Elon and Jahleel.

¹⁵These were the sons Leah bore to Jacob in Paddan Aram, besides his daughter Dinah. These sons and daughters of his were thirty-three in all.

¹⁶The sons of Gad: Zephon, Haggi, Shuni, Ezbon, Eri, Arodi and Areli.

¹⁷The sons of Asher: Imnah, Ishvah, Ishvi and Beriah. Their sister was Serah. The sons of Beriah: Heber and Malkiel.

¹⁸These were the children born to Jacob by Zilpah, whom Laban had given to his daughter Leah-sixteen in all.

¹⁹The sons of Jacob’s wife Rachel: Joseph and Benjamin.

²⁰In Egypt, Manasseh and Ephraim were born to Joseph by Asenath daughter of Potiphera, priest of On.

²¹The sons of Benjamin: Bela, Beker, Ashbel, Gera, Naaman, Ehi, Rosh, Muppim, Huppim and Ard.

²²These were the sons of Rachel who were born to Jacob-fourteen in all.

²³The son of Dan: Hushim.

²⁴The sons of Naphtali: Jahziel, Guni, Jezer and Shillem.

²⁵These were the sons born to Jacob by Bilhah, whom Laban had given to his daughter Rachel-seven in all.

²⁶All those who went to Egypt with Jacob-those who were his direct descendants, not counting his sons’ wives-numbered sixty-six persons.

²⁷With the two sons who had been born to Joseph in Egypt, the members of Jacob’s family, which went to Egypt, were seventy in all.

²⁸Now Jacob sent Judah ahead of him to Joseph to get directions to Goshen. When they arrived in the region of Goshen,

²⁹Joseph had his chariot made ready and went to Goshen to meet his father Israel. As soon as Joseph appeared before him, he threw his arms around his father and wept for a long time.

³⁰Israel said to Joseph, “Now I am ready to die, since I have seen for myself that you are still alive.”

³¹Then Joseph said to his brothers and to his father’s household, “I will go up

and speak to Pharaoh and will say to him, ‘My brothers and my father’s household, who were living in the land of Canaan, have come to me.

³²The men are shepherds; they tend livestock, and they have brought along their flocks and herds and everything they own.’

³³When Pharaoh calls you in and asks, ‘What is your occupation?’

³⁴you should answer, ‘Your servants have tended livestock from our boyhood on, just as our fathers did.’ Then you will be allowed to settle in the region of Goshen, for all shepherds are detestable to the Egyptians.”

47Joseph went and told Pharaoh, “My father and brothers, with their flocks and herds and everything they own, have come from the land of Canaan and are now in Goshen.”

²He chose five of his brothers and presented them before Pharaoh.

³Pharaoh asked the brothers, “What is your occupation?” “Your servants are shepherds,” they replied to Pharaoh, “just as our fathers were.”

⁴They also said to him, “We have come to live here awhile, because the famine is severe in Canaan and your servants’ flocks have no pasture. So now, please let your servants settle in Goshen.”

⁵Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Your father and your brothers have come to you,

⁶and the land of Egypt is before you; settle your father and your brothers in the best part of the land. Let them live in Goshen. And if you know of any among them with special ability, put them in charge of my own livestock.”

⁷Then Joseph brought his father Jacob in and presented him before Pharaoh. After Jacob blessed Pharaoh,

⁸Pharaoh asked him, “How old are you?”

⁹And Jacob said to Pharaoh, “The years of my pilgrimage are a hundred and thirty. My years have been few and difficult, and they do not equal the years of the pilgrimage of my fathers.”

¹⁰Then Jacob blessed Pharaoh and went out from his presence.

¹¹So Joseph settled his father and his brothers in Egypt and gave them property in the best part of the land, the district of Rameses, as Pharaoh directed.

¹²Joseph also provided his father and his brothers and all his father’s household with food, according to the number of their children.

¹³There was no food, however, in the whole region because the famine was severe; both Egypt and Canaan wasted away because of the famine.

¹⁴Joseph collected all the money that was to be found in Egypt and Canaan in payment for the grain they were buying, and he brought it to Pharaoh’s palace.

¹⁵When the money of the people of Egypt and Canaan was gone, all Egypt came to Joseph and said, “Give us food. Why should we die before your eyes? Our money is used up.”

¹⁶“Then bring your livestock,” said Joseph. “I will sell you food in exchange for your livestock, since your money is gone.”

¹⁷So they brought their livestock to Joseph, and he gave them food in exchange for their horses, their sheep and goats, their cattle and donkeys. And he brought them through that year with food in exchange for all their livestock.

¹⁸When that year was over, they came to him the following year and said, “We cannot hide from our lord the fact that since our money is gone and our livestock belongs to you, there is nothing left for our lord except our bodies and our land.

¹⁹Why should we perish before your eyes-we and our land as well? Buy us and our land in exchange for food, and we with our land will be in bondage to Pharaoh. Give us seed so that we may live and not die, and that the land may not become desolate.”

²⁰So Joseph bought all the land in Egypt for Pharaoh. The Egyptians, one and all, sold their fields, because the famine was too severe for them. The land became Pharaoh’s,

²¹and Joseph reduced the people to servitude, from one end of Egypt to the other.

²²However, he did not buy the land of the priests, because they received a regular allotment from Pharaoh and had food enough from the allotment Pharaoh gave them. That is why they did not sell their land.

²³Joseph said to the people, “Now that I have bought you and your land today for Pharaoh, here is seed for you so you can plant the ground.

²⁴But when the crop comes in, give a fifth of it to Pharaoh. The other four-fifths you may keep as seed for the fields and as food for yourselves and your households and your children.”

²⁵“You have saved our lives,” they said. “May we find favor in the eyes of our lord; we will be in bondage to Pharaoh.”

²⁶So Joseph established it as a law concerning land in Egypt-still in force today-that a fifth of the produce belongs to Pharaoh. It was only the land of the priests that did not become Pharaoh’s.

²⁷Now the Israelites settled in Egypt in the region of Goshen. They acquired property there and were fruitful and increased greatly in number.

²⁸Jacob lived in Egypt seventeen years, and the years of his life were a hundred and forty-seven.

²⁹When the time drew near for Israel to die, he called for his son Joseph and said to him, “If I have found favor in your eyes, put your hand under my thigh and promise that you will show me kindness

and faithfulness. Do not bury me in Egypt,

³⁰but when I rest with my fathers, carry me out of Egypt and bury me where they are buried.” “I will do as you say,” he said.

³¹“Swear to me,” he said. Then Joseph swore to him, and Israel worshiped as he leaned on the top of his staff.

48Some time later Joseph was told, “Your father is ill.” So he took his two sons Manasseh and Ephraim along with him.

²When Jacob was told, “Your son Joseph has come to you,” Israel rallied his strength and sat up on the bed.

³Jacob said to Joseph, “God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan, and there he blessed me

⁴and said to me, ‘I am going to make you fruitful and will increase your numbers. I will make you a community of peoples, and I will give this land as an everlasting possession to your descendants after you.’

⁵“Now then, your two sons born to you in Egypt before I came to you here will be reckoned as mine; Ephraim and Manasseh will be mine, just as Reuben and Simeon are mine.

⁶Any children born to you after them will be yours; in the territory they inherit they will be reckoned under the names of their brothers.

⁷As I was returning from Paddan, to my sorrow Rachel died in the land of Canaan while we were still on the way, a little distance from Ephrath. So I buried her there beside the road to Ephrath” (that is, Bethlehem).

⁸When Israel saw the sons of Joseph, he asked, “Who are these?”

⁹“They are the sons God has given me here,” Joseph said to his father. Then Israel said, “Bring them to me so I may bless them.”

¹⁰Now Israel’s eyes were failing because of old age, and he could hardly see. So Joseph brought his sons close to him, and his father kissed them and embraced them.

¹¹Israel said to Joseph, “I never expected to see your face again, and now God has allowed me to see your children too.”

¹²Then Joseph removed them from Israel’s knees and bowed down with his face to the ground.

¹³And Joseph took both of them, Ephraim on his right toward Israel’s left hand and Manasseh on his left toward Israel’s right hand, and brought them close to him.

¹⁴But Israel reached out his right hand and put it on Ephraim’s head, though he was the younger, and crossing his arms, he put his left hand on Manasseh’s head, even though Manasseh was the firstborn.

¹⁵Then he blessed Joseph and said, “May the God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who has been my shepherd all my life to this day,

¹⁶the Angel who has delivered me from all harm -may he bless these boys. May they be called by my name and the names of my fathers Abraham and Isaac, and may they increase greatly upon the earth.”

¹⁷When Joseph saw his father placing his right hand on Ephraim’s head he was displeased; so he took hold of his father’s hand to move it from Ephraim’s head to Manasseh’s head.

¹⁸Joseph said to him, “No, my father, this one is the firstborn; put your right hand on his head.”

¹⁹But his father refused and said, “I know, my son, I know. He too will become a people, and he too will become great. Nevertheless, his younger brother will be greater than he, and his descendants will become a group of nations.”

²⁰He blessed them that day and said, “In your name will Israel pronounce this blessing: ‘May God make you like Ephraim and Manasseh.’ ” So he put Ephraim ahead of Manasseh.

²¹Then Israel said to Joseph, “I am about to die, but God will be with you and take you back to the land of your fathers.

²²And to you, as one who is over your brothers, I give the ridge of land I took from the Amorites with my sword and my bow.”

49Then Jacob called for his sons and said: “Gather around so I can tell you what will happen to you in days to come.

²“Assemble and listen, sons of Jacob; listen to your father Israel.

³“Reuben, you are my firstborn, my might, the first sign of my strength, excelling in honor, excelling in power.

⁴Turbulent as the waters, you will no longer excel, for you went up onto your father’s bed, onto my couch and defiled it.

⁵“Simeon and Levi are brothers- their swords are weapons of violence.

⁶Let me not enter their council, let me not join their assembly, for they have killed men in their anger and hamstrung oxen as they pleased.

⁷Cursed be their anger, so fierce, and their fury, so cruel! I will scatter them in Jacob and disperse them in Israel.

⁸“Judah, your brothers will praise you; your hand will be on the neck of your enemies; your father’s sons will bow down to you.

⁹You are a lion’s cub, O Judah; you return from the prey, my son. Like a lion

he crouches and lies down, like a lioness-who dares to rouse him?

¹⁰The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his.

¹¹He will tether his donkey to a vine, his colt to the choicest branch; he will wash his garments in wine, his robes in the blood of grapes.

¹²His eyes will be darker than wine, his teeth whiter than milk.

¹³“Zebulun will live by the seashore and become a haven for ships; his border will extend toward Sidon.

¹⁴“Issachar is a rawboned donkey lying down between two saddlebags.

¹⁵When he sees how good is his resting place and how pleasant is his land, he will bend his shoulder to the burden and submit to forced labor.

¹⁶“Dan will provide justice for his people as one of the tribes of Israel.

¹⁷Dan will be a serpent by the roadside, a viper along the path, that bites the horse’s heels so that its rider tumbles backward.

¹⁸“I look for your deliverance, O Lord .

¹⁹“Gad will be attacked by a band of raiders, but he will attack them at their heels.

²⁰“Asher’s food will be rich; he will provide delicacies fit for a king.

²¹“Naphtali is a doe set free that bears beautiful fawns.

²²“Joseph is a fruitful vine, a fruitful vine near a spring, whose branches climb over a wall.

²³With bitterness archers attacked him; they shot at him with hostility.

²⁴But his bow remained steady, his strong arms stayed limber, because of the hand of the Mighty One of Jacob, because of the Shepherd, the Rock of Israel,

²⁵because of your father’s God, who helps you, because of the Almighty, who blesses you with blessings of the heavens above, blessings of the deep that lies below, blessings of the breast and womb.

²⁶Your father’s blessings are greater than the blessings of the ancient mountains, than the bounty of the age- old hills. Let all these rest on the head of Joseph, on the brow of the prince among his brothers.

²⁷“Benjamin is a ravenous wolf; in the morning he devours the prey, in the evening he divides the plunder.”

²⁸All these are the twelve tribes of Israel, and this is what their father said to them when he blessed them, giving each the blessing appropriate to him.

²⁹Then he gave them these instructions: “I am about to be gathered to my people. Bury me with my fathers in the cave in the field of Ephron the Hittite,

³⁰the cave in the field of Machpelah, near Mamre in Canaan, which Abraham bought as a burial place from Ephron the Hittite, along with the field.

³¹There Abraham and his wife Sarah were buried, there Isaac and his wife Rebekah were buried, and there I buried Leah.

³²The field and the cave in it were bought from the Hittites. “

³³When Jacob had finished giving instructions to his sons, he drew his feet up into the bed, breathed his last and was gathered to his people.

50Joseph threw himself upon his father and wept over him and kissed him.

²Then Joseph directed the physicians in his service to embalm his father Israel. So the physicians embalmed him,

³taking a full forty days, for that was the time required for embalming. And the Egyptians mourned for him seventy days.

⁴When the days of mourning had passed, Joseph said to Pharaoh’s court, “If I have found favor in your eyes, speak to Pharaoh for me. Tell him,

⁵‘My father made me swear an oath and said, “I am about to die; bury me in the

tomb I dug for myself in the land of Canaan.” Now let me go up and bury my father; then I will return.’ “

⁶Pharaoh said, “Go up and bury your father, as he made you swear to do.”

⁷So Joseph went up to bury his father. All Pharaoh’s officials accompanied him- the dignitaries of his court and all the dignitaries of Egypt-

⁸besides all the members of Joseph’s household and his brothers and those belonging to his father’s household. Only their children and their flocks and herds were left in Goshen.

⁹Chariots and horsemen also went up with him. It was a very large company.

¹⁰When they reached the threshing floor of Atad, near the Jordan, they lamented loudly and bitterly; and there Joseph observed a seven-day period of mourning for his father.

¹¹When the Canaanites who lived there saw the mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “The Egyptians are holding a solemn ceremony of mourning.” That is why that place near the Jordan is called Abel Mizraim.

¹²So Jacob’s sons did as he had commanded them:

¹³They carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave in the field of Machpelah, near Mamre, which Abraham had bought as a burial place from Ephron the Hittite, along with the field.

¹⁴After burying his father, Joseph returned to Egypt, together with his brothers and all the others who had gone with him to bury his father.

¹⁵When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “What if Joseph holds a grudge against us and pays us back for all the wrongs we did to him?”

¹⁶So they sent word to Joseph, saying, “Your father left these instructions before he died:

¹⁷‘This is what you are to say to Joseph: I ask you to forgive your brothers the sins and the wrongs they committed in treating you so badly.’ Now please forgive the sins of the servants of the God of your father.” When their message came to him, Joseph wept.

¹⁸His brothers then came and threw themselves down before him. “We are your slaves,” they said.

¹⁹But Joseph said to them, “Don’t be afraid. Am I in the place of God?

²⁰You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.

²¹So then, don’t be afraid. I will provide for you and your children.” And he reassured them and spoke kindly to them.

²²Joseph stayed in Egypt, along with all his father’s family. He lived a hundred and ten years

²³and saw the third generation of Ephraim’s children. Also the children of Makir son of Manasseh were placed at birth on Joseph’s knees.

²⁴Then Joseph said to his brothers, “I am about to die. But God will surely come to your aid and take you up out of this land to the land he promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”

²⁵And Joseph made the sons of Israel swear an oath and said, “God will surely come to your aid, and then you must carry my bones up from this place.”

²⁶So Joseph died at the age of a hundred and ten. And after they embalmed him, he was placed in a coffin in Egypt.

John Chapter 1

Posted on March 20, 2025March 20, 2025 by robertmacsbible_hpehg4

John

1 In the beginning was the Word, and
the Word was with God, and the Word
was God.
2
He was with God in the beginning.

3
Through him all things were made;
without him nothing was made that has
been made.

4
In him was life, and that life was the
light of men.
5
The light shines in the darkness, but
the darkness has not understood it.

6
There came a man who was sent from
God; his name was John.
7
He came as a witness to testify
concerning that light, so that through
him all men might believe.8
He himself was not the light; he came
only as a witness to the light.
9
The true light that gives light to every
man was coming into the world.
10
He was in the world, and though the
world was made through him, the world
did not recognize him.

11
He came to that which was his own,
but his own did not receive him.
12
Yet to all who received him, to those
who believed in his name, he gave the
right to become children of God–
13
children born not of natural descent,
nor of human decision or a husband’s
will, but born of God.
14
The Word became flesh and made his
dwelling among us. We have seen his
glory, the glory of the One and Only,
who came from the Father, full of grace
and truth.

15
John testifies concerning him. He cries
out, saying, “This was he of whom I said,
‘He who comes after me has surpassed
me because he was before me.’ ”
16
From the fullness of his grace we have
all received one blessing after another.
17
For the law was given through Moses;
grace and truth came through Jesus
Christ.
18
No one has ever seen God, but God
the One and Only, , who is at the
Father’s side, has made him known.
19
Now this was John’s testimony when
the Jews of Jerusalem sent priests and
Levites to ask him who he was.

20
He did not fail to confess, but
confessed freely, “I am not the Christ. ”
21
They asked him, “Then who are you?
Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.”
“Are you the Prophet?” He answered,
“No.”
22
Finally they said, “Who are you? Give
us an answer to take back to those who
sent us. What do you say about
yourself?”

23
John replied in the words of Isaiah the
prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in
the desert, ‘Make straight the way for
the Lord.’ ”
24
Now some Pharisees who had been
sent
25
questioned him, “Why then do you
baptize if you are not the Christ, nor
Elijah, nor the Prophet?”

26
“I baptize with water,” John replied,
“but among you stands one you do not
know.
27
He is the one who comes after me, the
thongs of whose sandals I am not
worthy to untie.”
28
This all happened at Bethany on the
other side of the Jordan, where John
was baptizing.
29
The next day John saw Jesus coming
toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of
God, who takes away the sin of the
world!
30
This is the one I meant when I said, ‘A
man who comes after me has
surpassed me because he was before
me.’
31
I myself did not know him, but the
reason I came baptizing with water was
that he might be revealed to Israel.”
32
Then John gave this testimony: “I saw
the Spirit come down from heaven as a
dove and remain on him.

33
I would not have known him, except
that the one who sent me to baptize with
water told me, ‘The man on whom you
see the Spirit come down and remain is
he who will baptize with the Holy Spirit.’
34
I have seen and I testify that this is the
Son of God.”
35
The next day John was there again
with two of his disciples.
36
When he saw Jesus passing by, he
said, “Look, the Lamb of God!”

37
When the two disciples heard him say
this, they followed Jesus.
38
Turning around, Jesus saw them
following and asked, “What do you
want?” They said, “Rabbi” (which means
Teacher), “where are you staying?”
39
“Come,” he replied, “and you will see.”
So they went and saw where he was
staying, and spent that day with him. It
was about the tenth hour.
40
Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was
one of the two who heard what John
had said and who had followed Jesus.

41
The first thing Andrew did was to find
his brother Simon and tell him, “We
have found the Messiah” (that is, the
Christ).
42
And he brought him to Jesus. Jesus
looked at him and said, “You are Simon
son of John. You will be called Cephas”
(which, when translated, is Peter ).
43
The next day Jesus decided to leave
for Galilee. Finding Philip, he said to him,
“Follow me.”
44
Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was
from the town of Bethsaida.
45
Philip found Nathanael and told him,
“We have found the one Moses wrote
about in the Law, and about whom the
prophets also wrote–Jesus of Nazareth,
the son of Joseph.”
46
“Nazareth! Can anything good come
from there?” Nathanael asked. “Come
and see,” said Philip.
47
When Jesus saw Nathanael
approaching, he said of him, “Here is a
true Israelite, in whom there is nothing
false.”
48
“How do you know me?” Nathanael
asked. Jesus answered, “I saw you
while you were still under the fig tree
before Philip called you.”
49
Then Nathanael declared, “Rabbi, you
are the Son of God; you are the King of
Israel.”
50
Jesus said, “You believe because I
told you I saw you under the fig tree.
You shall see greater things than that.”
51
He then added, “I tell you the truth,
you shall see heaven open, and the
angels of God ascending and
descending on the Son of Man.”

Month: March 2025

Bibles

Exodus

Exodus

Genesis

Genesis

John Chapter 1