He went by stages from the Negev to Bethel, to the place between Bethel and Ai where his tent had formerly been,

When Abram heard that his relative had been taken prisoner, he assembled his 318 trained men, born in his household, and they went in pursuit as far as Dan.

When Isaac had been there for some time, Abimelech king of the Philistines looked down from the window and was surprised to see Isaac caressing his wife Rebekah.

Isaac reopened the water wells that had been dug in the days of his father Abraham and that the Philistines had stopped up after Abraham died. He gave them the same names his father had given them.

They replied, “We have clearly seen how the Lord has been with you. We think there should be an oath between two parties—between us and you. Let us make a covenant with you:

But they replied, “We can’t until all the flocks have been gathered and the stone is rolled from the well’s opening. Then we will water the sheep.”

He said to them, “I can see from your father’s face that his attitude toward me is not the same, but the God of my father has been with me.

And He said, ‘Look up and see: all the males that are mating with the flocks are streaked, spotted, and speckled, for I have seen all that Laban has been doing to you.

I’ve been with you these 20 years. Your ewes and female goats have not miscarried, and I have not eaten the rams from your flock.

If the God of my father, the God of Abraham, the Fear of Isaac, had not been with me, certainly now you would have sent me off empty-handed. But God has seen my affliction and my hard work, and He issued His verdict last night.”

He commanded them, “You are to say to my lord Esau, ‘This is what your servant Jacob says. I have been staying with Laban and have been delayed until now.

Jacob then named the place Peniel, “For I have seen God face to face,” he said, “and I have been delivered.”

Please take my present that was brought to you, because God has been gracious to me and I have everything I need.” So Jacob urged him until he accepted.

Jacob’s other sons came to the slaughter and plundered the city because their sister had been defiled.

We must get up and go to Bethel. I will build an altar there to the God who answered me in my day of distress. He has been with me everywhere I have gone.”

His father recognized it. “It is my son’s robe,” he said. “A vicious animal has devoured him. Joseph has been torn to pieces!”

So she took off her widow’s clothes, veiled her face, covered herself, and sat at the entrance to Enaim, which is on the way to Timnah. For she saw that, though Shelah had grown up, she had not been given to him as a wife.

He asked the men of the place, “Where is the cult prostitute who was beside the road at Enaim?”

“There has been no cult prostitute here,” they answered.

So the Adullamite returned to Judah, saying, “I couldn’t find her, and furthermore, the men of the place said, ‘There has been no cult prostitute here.’”

About three months later Judah was told, “Your daughter-in-law, Tamar, has been acting like a prostitute, and now she is pregnant.”

“Bring her out!” Judah said. “Let her be burned to death!”

Now Joseph had been taken to Egypt. An Egyptian named Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh and the captain of the guard, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had brought him there.

Pharaoh had been angry with his servants, and he put me and the chief baker in the custody of the captain of the guard.

When they had devoured them, you could not tell that they had devoured them; their appearance was as bad as it had been before. Then I woke up.

Since the dream was given twice to Pharaoh, it means that the matter has been determined by God, and He will carry it out soon.

He said to his brothers, “My money has been returned! It’s here in my bag.” Their hearts sank. Trembling, they turned to one another and said, “What is this that God has done to us?”

But the men were afraid because they were taken to Joseph’s house. They said, “We have been brought here because of the money that was returned in our bags the first time. They intend to overpower us, seize us, make us slaves, and take our donkeys.”

One left—I said that he must have been torn to pieces—and I have never seen him again.

For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there will be five more years without plowing or harvesting.

Then they said to Pharaoh, “We have come to live in the land for a while because there is no grazing land for your servants’ sheep, since the famine in the land of Canaan has been severe. So now, please let your servants settle in the land of Goshen.”

Jacob said to Pharaoh, “My pilgrimage has lasted 130 years. My years have been few and hard, and they have not surpassed the years of my fathers during their pilgrimages.”

Then he blessed Joseph and said:

The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked,
the God who has been my shepherd all my life to this day,

“Go and assemble the elders of Israel and say to them: Yahweh, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, has appeared to me and said: I have paid close attention to you and to what has been done to you in Egypt.

But Moses replied to the Lord, “Please, Lord, I have never been eloquent—either in the past or recently or since You have been speaking to Your servant—because I am slow and hesitant in speech.”

No straw has been given to your servants, yet they say to us, ‘Make bricks!’ Look, your servants are being beaten, but it is your own people who are at fault.”

By now I could have stretched out My hand and struck you and your people with a plague, and you would have been obliterated from the earth.

Make an appeal to Yahweh. There has been enough of God’s thunder and hail. I will let you go; you don’t need to stay any longer.”

No, only the men may go and worship Yahweh, for that is what you have been asking for.” And they were driven from Pharaoh’s presence.

The locusts went up over the entire land of Egypt and settled on the whole territory of Egypt. Never before had there been such a large number of locusts, and there never will be again.

The people baked the dough they had brought out of Egypt into unleavened loaves, since it had no yeast; for when they had been driven out of Egypt they could not delay and had not prepared any provisions for themselves.

Isn’t this what we told you in Egypt: Leave us alone so that we may serve the Egyptians? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.”

along with her two sons, one of whom was named Gershom (because Moses had said, “I have been a foreigner in a foreign land”)

So Moses went out to meet his father-in-law, bowed down, and then kissed him. They asked each other how they had been and went into the tent.

However, if the ox was in the habit of goring, and its owner has been warned yet does not restrain it, and it kills a man or a woman, the ox must be stoned, and its owner must also be put to death.

Be careful to make them according to the pattern you have been shown on the mountain.

You are to set up the tabernacle according to the plan for it that you have been shown on the mountain.

Afterward Moses said, “Today you have been dedicated to the Lord, since each man went against his son and his brother. Therefore you have brought a blessing on yourselves today.”

And the Lord responded: “Look, I am making a covenant. I will perform wonders in the presence of all your people that have never been done in all the earth or in any nation. All the people you live among will see the Lord’s work, for what I am doing with you is awe-inspiring.

But whenever Moses went before the Lord to speak with Him, he would remove the veil until he came out. After he came out, he would tell the Israelites what he had been commanded,

But no sin offering may be eaten if its blood has been brought into the tent of meeting to make atonement in the holy place; it must be burned up.

The Lord commanded what has been done today in order to make atonement for you.

But you and your sons and your daughters may eat the breast of the presentation offering and the thigh of the contribution in any ceremonially clean place, because these portions have been assigned to you and your children from the Israelites’ fellowship sacrifices.

Later, Moses inquired about the male goat of the sin offering, but it had already been burned up. He was angry with Eleazar and Ithamar, Aaron’s surviving sons, and asked,

But Aaron replied to Moses, “See, today they presented their sin offering and their burnt offering before the Lord. Since these things have happened to me, if I had eaten the sin offering today, would it have been acceptable in the Lord’s sight?”

but if water has been put on the seed and one of their carcasses falls on it, it is unclean for you.

After it has been washed, the priest is to reexamine the contamination. If the appearance of the contaminated article has not changed, it is unclean. Even though the contamination has not spread, you must burn up the fabric. It is a fungus on the front or back of the fabric.

“If the priest examines it, and the contamination has faded after it has been washed, he must cut the contaminated section out of the fabric, the leather, or the warp or woof.

But if the contamination disappears from the fabric, the warp or woof, or any leather article, which have been washed, it is to be washed again, and it will be clean.

“If the contamination reappears in the house after the stones have been pulled out, and after the house has been scraped and replastered,

“When the man with the discharge has been cured of it, he is to count seven days for his cleansing, wash his clothes, and bathe his body in fresh water; he will be clean.

This is so the Israelites will bring to the Lord the sacrifices they have been offering in the open country. They are to bring them to the priest at the entrance to the tent of meeting and offer them as fellowship sacrifices to the Lord.

“If a man has sexual intercourse with a woman who is a slave designated for another man, but she has not been redeemed or given her freedom, there must be punishment. They are not to be put to death, because she had not been freed.

“The priest who is highest among his brothers, who has had the anointing oil poured on his head and has been ordained to wear the garments, must not dishevel his hair or tear his garments.

he has the right of redemption after he has been sold. One of his brothers may redeem him.

No person who has been set apart for destruction is to be ransomed; he must be put to death.

So Moses and Aaron took these men who had been designated by name,

Assign the Levites to Aaron and his sons; they have been assigned exclusively to him from the Israelites.

So Moses registered them in obedience to the Lord as he had been commanded:

“When he makes her drink the water, if she has defiled herself and been unfaithful to her husband, the water that brings a curse will enter her and cause bitter suffering; her belly will swell, and her thigh will shrivel. She will become a curse among her people.

For they have been exclusively assigned to Me from the Israelites. I have taken them for Myself in place of all who come first from the womb, every Israelite firstborn.

Only don’t rebel against the Lord, and don’t be afraid of the people of the land, for we will devour them. Their protection has been removed from them, and the Lord is with us. Don’t be afraid of them!”

They placed him in custody because it had not been decided what should be done to him.

Aaron then returned to Moses at the entrance to the tent of meeting, since the plague had been halted.

The staff of the man I choose will sprout, and I will rid Myself of the Israelites’ complaints that they have been making about you.”

“This is the legal statute that the Lord has commanded: Instruct the Israelites to bring you an unblemished red cow that has no defect and has never been yoked.

Anyone who touches a body of a person who has died, and does not purify himself, defiles the tabernacle of the Lord. That person will be cut off from Israel. He remains unclean because the water for impurity has not been sprinkled on him, and his uncleanness is still on him.

Anyone in the open field who touches a person who has been killed by the sword or has died, or who even touches a human bone, or a grave, will be unclean for seven days.

A person who is clean is to take hyssop, dip it in the water, and sprinkle the tent, all the furnishings, and the people who were there. He is also to sprinkle the one who touched a bone, a grave, a corpse, or a person who had been killed.

But a person who is unclean and does not purify himself, that person will be cut off from the assembly because he has defiled the sanctuary of the Lord. The water for impurity has not been sprinkled on him; he is unclean.

Woe to you, Moab!
You have been destroyed, people of Chemosh!
He gave up his sons as refugees,
and his daughters into captivity
to Sihon the Amorite king.

We threw them down;
Heshbon has been destroyed as far as Dibon.
We caused desolation as far as Nophah,
which reaches as far as Medeba.

But among them there was not one of those who had been registered by Moses and Aaron the priest when they registered the Israelites in the Wilderness of Sinai.

‘You’ve been traveling around this hill country long enough; turn north.

For the Lord your God has blessed you in all the work of your hands. He has watched over your journey through this immense wilderness. The Lord your God has been with you this past 40 years, and you have lacked nothing.’

“When you have children and grandchildren and have been in the land a long time, and if you act corruptly, make an idol in the form of anything, and do what is evil in the sight of the Lord your God, provoking Him to anger,

“Indeed, ask about the earlier days that preceded you, from the day God created man on the earth and from one end of the heavens to the other: Has anything like this great event ever happened, or has anything like it been heard of?

Keep in mind that the Lord your God has been disciplining you just as a man disciplines his son.

“Remember and do not forget how you provoked the Lord your God in the wilderness. You have been rebelling against the Lord from the day you left the land of Egypt until you reached this place.

You have been rebelling against the Lord ever since I have known you.

Then on the day of the assembly, the Lord wrote on the tablets what had been written previously, the Ten Commandments that He had spoken to you on the mountain from the fire. The Lord gave them to me,

be careful not to be ensnared by their ways after they have been destroyed before you. Do not inquire about their gods, asking, ‘How did these nations worship their gods? I’ll also do the same.’

This is how to cancel debt: Every creditor is to cancel what he has lent his neighbor. He is not to collect anything from his neighbor or brother, because the Lord’s release of debts has been proclaimed.

The elders of the city nearest to the victim are to get a young cow that has not been yoked or used for work.

All the elders of the city nearest to the victim will wash their hands by the stream over the young cow whose neck has been broken.

“No man whose testicles have been crushed or whose penis has been cut off may enter the Lord’s assembly.

the first husband who sent her away may not marry her again after she has been defiled, because that would be detestable to the Lord. You must not bring guilt on the land the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance.

For fire has been kindled because of My anger
and burns to the depths of Sheol;
it devours the land and its produce,
and scorches the foundations of the mountains.

Joshua raised up their sons in their place; it was these he circumcised. They were still uncircumcised, since they had not been circumcised along the way.

After the entire nation had been circumcised, they stayed where they were in the camp until they recovered.

The Lord then said to Joshua, “Today I have rolled away the disgrace of Egypt from you.” Therefore, that place is called Gilgal to this day.

“Oh, Lord God,” Joshua said, “why did You ever bring these people across the Jordan to hand us over to the Amorites for our destruction? If only we had been content to remain on the other side of the Jordan!