1 When Rachel saw that bshe bore Jacob no children, she envied her sister. She said to Jacob, “Give me children, or I shall die!” 2 Jacob’s anger was kindled against Rachel, and he said, “Am I in the place of God, cwho has withheld from you the fruit of the womb?” 3 Then she said, “Here is my servant dBilhah; go in to her, so that she may give birth eon my behalf,1 that even I may have children2 through her.” 4 So she gave him her servant Bilhah as a wife, and Jacob went in to her. 5 And Bilhah conceived and bore Jacob a son. 6 Then Rachel said, “God has fjudged me, and has also heard my voice and given me a son.” Therefore she called his name Dan.3 7 Rachel’s servant Bilhah conceived again and bore Jacob a second son. 8 Then Rachel said, “With mighty wrestlings4 I have wrestled with my sister and have prevailed.” So she called his name gNaphtali.5
9 When Leah saw that she had ceased bearing children, she took her servant Zilpah and hgave her to Jacob as a wife. 10 Then Leah’s servant Zilpah bore Jacob a son. 11 And Leah said, i“Good fortune has come!” so she called his name iGad.6 12 Leah’s servant Zilpah bore Jacob a second son. 13 And Leah said, “Happy am I! For women jhave called me happy.” So she called his name Asher.7
14 In the days of wheat harvest Reuben went and found kmandrakes in the field and brought them to his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, “Please give me some of your son’s mandrakes.” 15 But she said to her, “Is it a small matter that you have taken away my husband? Would you take away my son’s mandrakes also?” Rachel said, “Then he may lie with you tonight in exchange for your son’s mandrakes.” 16 When Jacob came from the field in the evening, Leah went out to meet him and said, “You must come in to me, for I have hired you with my son’s mandrakes.” So he lay with her that night. 17 And God listened to Leah, and she conceived and bore Jacob a fifth son. 18 Leah said, “God has given me my wages because I gave my servant to my husband.” So she called his name Issachar.8
19 And Leah conceived again, and she bore Jacob a sixth son. 20 Then Leah said, “God has endowed me with a good endowment; now my husband will honor me, because I have borne him six sons.” So she called his name lZebulun.9 21 Afterward she bore a daughter and called her name Dinah.
22 Then God mremembered Rachel, and God listened to her and nopened her womb. 23 She conceived and bore a son and said, “God has taken away omy reproach.” 24 And she called his name Joseph,10 saying, p“May the Lord add to me another son!”
Jacob’s Prosperity
25 As soon as Rachel had borne Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, “Send me away, that I may go to my own home and country. 26 Give me my wives and my children qfor whom I have served you, that I may go, for you know the service that I have given you.” 27 But Laban said to him, “If I have found favor in your sight, I have learned by divination that11 the Lord has blessed me because of you. 28 rName your wages, and I will give it.” 29 Jacob said to him, s“You yourself know how I have served you, and how your livestock has fared with me. 30 For you had little before I came, tand it has increased abundantly, and the Lord has blessed you wherever I turned. But now when shall I uprovide for my own household also?” 31 He said, “What shall I give you?” Jacob said, “You shall not give me anything. If you will do this for me, I will again pasture your flock and keep it: 32 let me pass through all your flock today, removing from it every speckled and spotted sheep and every black lamb, and the spotted and speckled among the goats, and vthey shall be my wages. 33 So my honesty will answer for me later, when you come to look into my wages with you. Every one that is not speckled and spotted among the goats and black among the lambs, if found with me, shall be counted stolen.” 34 Laban said, “Good! Let it be as you have said.” 35 But that day Laban removed the male goats that were striped and spotted, and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had white on it, and every lamb that was black, and put them in the charge of his sons. 36 And he set a distance of three days’ journey between himself and Jacob, and Jacob pastured the rest of Laban’s flock.
37 Then wJacob took fresh sticks of poplar and almond and plane trees, and peeled white streaks in them, exposing the white of the sticks. 38 He set the sticks that he had peeled in front of the flocks in the troughs, that is, the xwatering places, where the flocks came to drink. And since they bred when they came to drink, 39 the flocks bred in front of the sticks and so the flocks brought forth striped, speckled, and spotted. 40 And Jacob separated the lambs and set the faces of the flocks toward the striped and all the black in the flock of Laban. He put his own droves apart and did not put them with Laban’s flock. 41 Whenever the stronger of the flock were breeding, Jacob would lay the sticks in the troughs before the eyes of the flock, that they might breed among the sticks, 42 but for the feebler of the flock he would not lay them there. So the feebler would be Laban’s, and the stronger Jacob’s. 43 Thus the man yincreased greatly and zhad large flocks, female servants and male servants, and camels and donkeys.
Joy Comes with the Morning
A Psalm of David. A song at the dedication of rthe temple.
1 I will sextol you, O Lord, for you have drawn me up
and have not let my foes trejoice over me.
2 O Lord my God, I ucried to you for help,
and you have vhealed me.
3 O Lord, you have brought up my soul from wSheol;
you restored me to life from among those who xgo down to the pit.1
4 Sing praises to the Lord, O you yhis saints,
and zgive thanks to his holy name.2
5 aFor his anger is but for a moment,
and bhis favor is for a lifetime.3
cWeeping may tarry for the night,
but djoy comes with the morning.
6 As for me, I said in my eprosperity,
“I shall never be fmoved.”
7 By your favor, O Lord,
you made my gmountain stand strong;
you hhid your face;
I was idismayed.
8 To you, O Lord, I cry,
and jto the Lord I plead for mercy:
9 “What profit is there in my death,4
if I go down to the pit?5
Will kthe dust praise you?
Will it tell of your faithfulness?
10 lHear, O Lord, and be merciful to me!
O Lord, be my helper!”
11 You have turned for me my mourning into mdancing;
you have loosed my sackcloth
and clothed me with gladness,
12 that my nglory may sing your praise and not be silent.
O Lord my God, I will give thanks to you forever!
Midian Oppresses Israel
1 kThe people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord gave them into the hand of lMidian seven years. 2 And the hand of Midian overpowered Israel, and because of Midian the people of Israel made for themselves the dens that are in the mountains and mthe caves and the strongholds. 3 For whenever the Israelites planted crops, the Midianites and nthe Amalekites and othe people of the East would come up against them. 4 They would encamp against them pand devour the produce of the land, as far as Gaza, and leave no sustenance in Israel and no sheep or ox or donkey. 5 For they would come up with their livestock and their tents; they would come qlike locusts in number—both they and their camels could not be counted—so that they laid waste the land as they came in. 6 And Israel was brought very low because of Midian. And the people of Israel rcried out for help to the Lord.
7 When the people of Israel cried out to the Lord on account of the Midianites, 8 the Lord sent a prophet to the people of Israel. And he said to them, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: sI led you up from Egypt and brought you out of the house of slavery. 9 And I delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and from the hand of all who oppressed you, and tdrove them out before you and gave you their land. 10 And I said to you, ‘I am the Lord your God; uyou shall not fear the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell.’ But you have not obeyed my voice.”
The Call of Gideon
11 Now the angel of the Lord came and sat under the terebinth at Ophrah, which belonged to Joash vthe Abiezrite, while his son wGideon was beating out wheat in the winepress to hide it from the Midianites. 12 And xthe angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, y“The Lord is with you, O mighty man of valor.” 13 And Gideon said to him, “Please, my lord, if the Lord is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are zall his wonderful deeds athat our fathers recounted to us, saying, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt?’ But now the Lord has forsaken us and given us into the hand of Midian.” 14 And the Lord1 turned to him and said, “Go in this might of yours and save Israel from the hand of Midian; bdo not I send you?” 15 And he said to him, c“Please, Lord, how can I save Israel? Behold, dmy clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father’s house.” 16 And the Lord said to him, e“But I will be with you, and you shall strike the Midianites as one man.” 17 And he said to him, f“If now I have found favor in your eyes, then gshow me a sign that it is you who speak with me. 18 Please hdo not depart from here until I come to you and bring out my present and set it before you.” And he said, “I will stay till you return.”
19 So Gideon went into his house iand prepared a young goat and unleavened cakes from an ephah2 of flour. The meat he put in a basket, and the broth he put in a pot, and brought them to him under the terebinth and presented them. 20 And the angel of God said to him, “Take the meat and the unleavened cakes, and put them jon this rock, and kpour the broth over them.” And he did so. 21 Then the angel of the Lord reached out the tip of the staff that was in his hand and touched the meat and the unleavened cakes. lAnd fire sprang up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened cakes. And the angel of the Lord vanished from his sight. 22 Then Gideon perceived that he was the angel of the Lord. And Gideon said, m“Alas, O Lord God! For now I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face.” 23 But the Lord said to him, n“Peace be to you. Do not fear; you shall not die.” 24 Then Gideon built an altar there to the Lord and called it, oThe Lord Is Peace. To this day it still stands at pOphrah, which belongs to the Abiezrites.
25 That night the Lord said to him, “Take your father’s bull, and the second bull seven years old, and pull down the altar of Baal that your father has, and cut down qthe Asherah that is beside it 26 and build an altar to the Lord your God on the top of the rstronghold here, with stones laid in due order. Then take the second bull and offer it as a burnt offering with the wood of the Asherah that you shall cut down.” 27 So Gideon took ten men of his servants and did as the Lord had told him. But because he was too afraid of his family and the men of the town to do it by day, he did it by night.
Gideon Destroys the Altar of Baal
28 When the men of the town rose early in the morning, behold, the altar of Baal was broken down, and the Asherah beside it was cut down, and the second bull was offered on the altar that had been built. 29 And they said to one another, “Who has done this thing?” And after they had searched and inquired, they said, “Gideon the son of Joash has done this thing.” 30 Then the men of the town said to Joash, “Bring out your son, that he may die, for he has broken down the altar of Baal and cut down the Asherah beside it.” 31 But Joash said to all who stood against him, “Will you contend for Baal? Or will you save him? Whoever contends for him shall be put to death by morning. If he is a god, let him contend for himself, because his altar has been broken down.” 32 Therefore on that day Gideon3 was called sJerubbaal, that is to say, “Let Baal contend against him,” because he broke down his altar.
33 Now tall the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people of the East came together, and they crossed the Jordan and encamped in uthe Valley of Jezreel. 34 But vthe Spirit of the Lord clothed Gideon, wand he sounded the trumpet, and the Abiezrites were called out to follow him. 35 xAnd he sent messengers throughout all Manasseh, and they too were called out to follow him. xAnd he sent messengers to Asher, Zebulun, and Naphtali, and they went up to meet them.
The Sign of the Fleece
36 yThen Gideon said to God, “If you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said, 37 behold, I am laying a fleece of wool on the threshing floor. If there is dew on the fleece alone, and it is dry on all the ground, then I shall know that you will save Israel by my hand, as you have said.” 38 And it was so. When he rose early next morning and squeezed the fleece, he wrung enough dew from the fleece to fill a bowl with water. 39 Then Gideon said to God, z“Let not your anger burn against me; let me speak just once more. Please let me test just once more with the fleece. Please let it be dry on the fleece only, and on all the ground let there be dew.” 40 And God did so that night; and it was dry on the fleece only, and on all the ground there was dew.
Do Not Go Down to Egypt
1 “Ah, nstubborn children,” declares the Lord,
o“who carry out a plan, but not mine,
and who make pan alliance,1 but not of my Spirit,
that they may add sin to sin;
2 qwho set out to go down to Egypt,
without asking for my direction,
to take refuge in the protection of Pharaoh
and to seek shelter in the shadow of Egypt!
3 rTherefore shall the protection of Pharaoh turn to your shame,
and the shelter in the shadow of Egypt to your humiliation.
4 For though his officials are at sZoan
5 everyone comes to shame
through va people that cannot profit them,
that brings neither help nor profit,
but shame and disgrace.”
6 An woracle on xthe beasts of ythe Negeb.
Through a land of trouble and anguish,
from where come the lioness and the lion,
the adder and the zflying fiery serpent,
they carry their riches on the backs of donkeys,
and their treasures on the humps of camels,
to a people that cannot profit them.
7 Egypt’s ahelp is worthless and empty;
therefore I have called her
b“Rahab who sits still.”
A Rebellious People
8 And now, go, cwrite it before them on a tablet
and inscribe it in a book,
that it may be for the time to come
as a witness forever.2
9 dFor they are a rebellious people,
lying children,
children unwilling to hear
the instruction of the Lord;
10 ewho say to fthe seers, “Do not see,”
and to the prophets, “Do not prophesy to us what is right;
speak to us gsmooth things,
prophesy illusions,
11 leave the way, turn aside from the path,
let us hear no more about the Holy One of Israel.”
12 Therefore thus says the Holy One of Israel,
“Because you despise this word
and trust in hoppression and perverseness
and rely on them,
13 therefore this iniquity shall be to you
ilike a breach in a high wall, bulging out and about to collapse,
whose breaking comes suddenly, in an instant;
14 and its breaking is jlike that of a potter’s vessel
that is smashed so ruthlessly
that among its fragments not a shard is found
with which to take fire from the hearth,
or to dip up water out of the cistern.”
15 For thus said the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel,
“In kreturning3 and lrest you shall be saved;
in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.”
But you were unwilling, 16 and you said,
“No! We will flee upon mhorses”;
therefore you shall flee away;
and, “We will ride upon swift steeds”;
therefore your pursuers shall be swift.
17 nA thousand shall flee at the threat of one;
at the threat of five you shall flee,
till you are left
like a flagstaff on the top of a mountain,
like a signal on a hill.
The Lord Will Be Gracious
18 Therefore the Lord owaits to be gracious to you,
and therefore he pexalts himself to show mercy to you.
For the Lord is a God of justice;
qblessed are all those who wait for him.
19 For a people shall dwell rin Zion, in Jerusalem; you shall weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. As soon as he hears it, he answers you. 20 And though the Lord give you the sbread of adversity and the swater of affliction, tyet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher. 21 uAnd your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is vthe way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left. 22 Then you will defile your carved idols overlaid with silver and your gold-plated metal images. wYou will scatter them as unclean things. You will say to them, “Be gone!”
23 xAnd he will give yrain for the seed with which you sow the ground, and bread, the produce of the ground, which will be rich and plenteous. zIn that day your livestock will graze in large pastures, 24 and athe oxen and the donkeys that work the ground will eat seasoned fodder, which has been winnowed with shovel and fork. 25 And bon every lofty mountain and every high hill there will be brooks running with water, in the day of the great slaughter, cwhen the towers fall. 26 dMoreover, the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day when ethe Lord binds up fthe brokenness of his people, and heals the wounds inflicted by his blow.
27 Behold, the name of the Lord comes from afar,
burning with his anger, and in thick rising smoke;4
his lips are full of fury,
and his tongue is like a devouring fire;
28 ghis breath is hlike an overflowing stream
that reaches up to the neck;
to sift the nations with the sieve of destruction,
and to place on the jaws of the peoples ia bridle that leads astray.
29 You shall have a song as in the night when a holy feast is kept, and gladness of heart, jas when one sets out to the sound of the flute to go to kthe mountain of the Lord, to lthe Rock of Israel. 30 And the Lord mwill cause his majestic voice to be heard and the descending blow of his arm to be seen, in furious anger nand a flame of devouring fire, with a cloudburst oand storm and hailstones. 31 The Assyrians will be terror-stricken at the voice of the Lord, pwhen he strikes with his rod. 32 And every stroke of the appointed staff that the Lord lays on them qwill be to the sound of tambourines and lyres. rBattling with brandished arm, he will fight with them. 33 For sa burning place5 has long been prepared; indeed, for the king it is made ready, tits pyre made deep and wide, with fire and wood in abundance; uthe breath of the Lord, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it.
Jesus Heals a Paralytic
1 And when he returned to tCapernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home. 2 And many were gathered together, so that there was no more room, not even at the door. And he was preaching the word to them. 3 uAnd they came, bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men. 4 And when they could not get near him because of the crowd, vthey removed the roof above him, and when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay. 5 And when Jesus wsaw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, xyour sins are forgiven.” 6 Now some of the scribes were sitting there, questioning in their hearts, 7 “Why does this man speak like that? yHe is blaspheming! zWho can forgive sins but God alone?” 8 And immediately Jesus, aperceiving in his spirit that they thus questioned within themselves, said to them, “Why do you question these things in your hearts? 9 Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise, take up your bed and walk’? 10 But that you may know that bthe Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he said to the paralytic— 11 “I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home.” 12 And he rose and immediately picked up his bed and went out before them all, so that they were all amazed and cglorified God, saying, “We never saw anything like this!”
Jesus Calls Levi
13 He went out again beside the sea, and dall the crowd was coming to him, and he was teaching them. 14 eAnd as he passed by, he saw fLevi the son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, “Follow me.” And he rose and followed him.
15 And as he reclined at table in his house, many gtax collectors and sinners were reclining with Jesus and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. 16 And hthe scribes of1 the Pharisees, when they saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, said to his disciples, g“Why does he eat2 with tax collectors and sinners?” 17 And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. iI came not to call the righteous, jbut sinners.”
A Question About Fasting
18 Now kJohn’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. And people came and said to him, l“Why do John’s disciples and mthe disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?” 19 And Jesus said to them, n“Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. 20 oThe days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and pthen they will fast in that day. 21 No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. 22 And no one puts new wine into old qwineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins—and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins.”3
Jesus Is Lord of the Sabbath
23 rOne Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and as they made their way, his disciples sbegan to pluck heads of grain. 24 And the Pharisees were saying to him, “Look, twhy are they doing uwhat is not lawful on the Sabbath?” 25 And he said to them, v“Have you never read wwhat David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him: 26 how he entered the house of God, in the time of4 xAbiathar the high priest, and ate ythe bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?” 27 And he said to them, z“The Sabbath was made for man, anot man for the Sabbath. 28 So bthe Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.”
