Provision for Priests and Levites

¹“The Levitical priests, all the tribe of Levi, nshall have no portion or inheritance with Israel. They oshall eat the Lord's food offerings1 as their2 inheritance. ²They shall have no inheritance among their brothers; the Lord is their inheritance, as he promised them. ³And this shall be the priests' due from the people, from those offering a sacrifice, whether an ox or a sheep: pthey shall give to the priest the shoulder and the two cheeks and the stomach. ⁴qThe firstfruits of your grain, of your wine and of your oil, and the first fleece of your sheep, you shall give him. ⁵For the Lord your God has chosen him out of all your tribes rto stand and minister in the name of the Lord, him and his sons for all time.

⁶“And if a Levite comes from any of your towns out of all Israel, swhere he lives—and he may come when he desires3—tto the place that the Lord will choose, ⁷and ministers in the name of the Lord his God, ulike all his fellow Levites who stand to minister there before the Lord, ⁸then he may have equal vportions to eat, besides what he receives from the sale of his patrimony.4

Abominable Practices

⁹“When you come into the land that the Lord your God is giving you, wyou shall not learn to follow the abominable practices of those nations. ¹⁰There shall not be found among you anyone xwho burns his son or his daughter as an offering,5 anyone who ypractices divination or ztells fortunes or interprets omens, or aa sorcerer ¹¹or a charmer or ba medium or a necromancer or cone who inquires of the dead, ¹²dfor whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord. And ebecause of these abominations the Lord your God is driving them out before you. ¹³You shall be blameless before the Lord your God, ¹⁴for these nations, which you are about to dispossess, listen to fortune-tellers and to diviners. But as for you, the Lord your God has not allowed you to do this.

A New Prophet like Moses

¹⁵f“The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers—it is to him you shall listen— ¹⁶just as you desired of the Lord your God at Horeb gon the day of the assembly, when you said, h‘Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.’ ¹⁷And the Lord said to me, i‘They are right in what they have spoken. ¹⁸fI will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. jAnd I will put my words in his mouth, and khe shall speak to them all that I command him. ¹⁹lAnd whoever will mnot listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I myself will require it of him. ²⁰nBut the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak, or6 who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die.’ ²¹And if you say in your heart, ‘How may we know the word that the Lord has not spoken?’— ²²owhen a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the Lord has not spoken; nthe prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him.

Tell of All His Wondrous Works

¹tOh give thanks to the Lord; ucall upon his name;

vmake known his deeds among the peoples!

²Sing to him, sing praises to him;

wtell of all his wondrous works!

³Glory in his holy name;

let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice!

⁴Seek the Lord and his xstrength;

yseek his presence continually!

⁵Remember the zwondrous works that he has done,

his miracles, and athe judgments he uttered,

⁶O offspring of bAbraham, his servant,

children of Jacob, his cchosen ones!

⁷He is the Lord our God;

his djudgments are in all the earth.

⁸He eremembers his covenant forever,

the word that he commanded, for fa thousand generations,

⁹gthe covenant that he made with Abraham,

his hsworn promise to Isaac,

¹⁰which he confirmed to iJacob as a statute,

to Israel as an everlasting covenant,

¹¹saying, j“To you I will give the land of Canaan

as kyour portion for an inheritance.”

¹²When they were lfew in number,

of little account, and msojourners in it,

¹³wandering from nation to nation,

from one kingdom to another people,

¹⁴he nallowed no one to oppress them;

he orebuked kings on their account,

¹⁵saying, p“Touch not my anointed ones,

do my prophets no harm!”

¹⁶When he qsummoned a famine on the land

and rbroke all supply1 of bread,

¹⁷he had ssent a man ahead of them,

Joseph, who was tsold as a slave.

¹⁸His ufeet were hurt with fetters;

his neck was put in a collar of iron;

¹⁹until vwhat he had said came to pass,

the word of the Lord wtested him.

²⁰xThe king sent and yreleased him;

the ruler of the peoples set him free;

²¹he zmade him lord of his house

and ruler of all his possessions,

²²to bind2 his princes at his pleasure

and to teach his elders wisdom.

²³Then aIsrael came to Egypt;

Jacob bsojourned in cthe land of Ham.

²⁴And the Lord dmade his people very fruitful

and made them stronger than their foes.

²⁵He eturned their hearts to hate his people,

to fdeal craftily with his servants.

²⁶He gsent Moses, his servant,

and Aaron, hwhom he had chosen.

²⁷iThey performed his signs among them

and miracles in cthe land of Ham.

²⁸He jsent darkness, and made the land dark;

they kdid not rebel3 against his words.

²⁹He turned their waters into blood

and lcaused their fish to die.

³⁰Their land swarmed with frogs,

even in mthe chambers of their kings.

³¹He spoke, and there came nswarms of flies,

oand gnats throughout their country.

³²He gave them hail for rain,

and fiery plightning bolts through their land.

³³He struck down their vines and fig trees,

and qshattered the trees of their country.

³⁴He spoke, and the rlocusts came,

young locusts without number,

³⁵which devoured all the vegetation in their land

and ate up the fruit of their ground.

³⁶He sstruck down all the firstborn in their land,

sthe firstfruits of all their strength.

³⁷Then he brought out Israel with tsilver and gold,

and there was none among his tribes who stumbled.

³⁸uEgypt was glad when they departed,

for vdread of them had fallen upon it.

³⁹He wspread a cloud for a covering,

and fire to give light by night.

⁴⁰xThey asked, and he ybrought quail,

and gave them zbread from heaven in abundance.

⁴¹He opened the rock, and awater gushed out;

it flowed through bthe desert like a river.

⁴²For he cremembered his holy promise,

and dAbraham, his servant.

⁴³So he brought his people out with joy,

his dchosen ones with esinging.

⁴⁴And he fgave them the lands of the nations,

and they took possession of the fruit of the peoples' toil,

⁴⁵that they might gkeep his statutes

and hobserve his laws.

iPraise the Lord!

Cyrus, God's Instrument

¹Thus says the Lord to phis anointed, to Cyrus,

qwhose right hand I have grasped,

to subdue nations before him

and rto loose the belts of kings,

to open doors before him

that gates may not be closed:

²“I will go before you

and slevel the exalted places,1

tI will break in pieces the doors of bronze

and cut through the bars of iron,

³uI will give you the treasures of darkness

and the hoards in secret places,

that you may know that it is I, the Lord,

the God of Israel, vwho call you by your name.

⁴For the sake of my servant Jacob,

and Israel my chosen,

vI call you by your name,

wI name you, though you do not know me.

⁵xI am the Lord, and there is no other,

besides me there is no God;

yI equip you, though you do not know me,

⁶zthat people may know, from the rising of the sun

and from the west, that there is none besides me;

I am the Lord, and there is no other.

⁷I form light and create darkness;

I make well-being and acreate calamity;

I am the Lord, who does all these things.

⁸b“Shower, O heavens, from above,

and clet the clouds rain down righteousness;

let the earth open, that salvation and righteousness may bear fruit;

let the earth cause them both to sprout;

I the Lord have created it.

⁹d“Woe to him who strives with him who formed him,

a pot among earthen pots!

eDoes the clay say to him who forms it, ‘What are you making?’

or ‘Your work has no handles’?

¹⁰Woe to him who says to a father, ‘What are you begetting?’

or to a woman, ‘With what are you in labor?’”

¹¹Thus says fthe Lord,

the Holy One of Israel, and the one who formed him:

g“Ask me of things to come;

will you command me hconcerning my children and ithe work of my hands?2

¹²jI made the earth

and created man on it;

it was my hands kthat stretched out the heavens,

and lI commanded all their host.

¹³mI have stirred him up in righteousness,

nand I will make all his ways level;

ohe shall build my city

pand set my exiles free,

not for price or reward,”

says the Lord of hosts.

The Lord, the Only Savior

¹⁴Thus says the Lord:

q“The wealth of Egypt and the merchandise of Cush,

and the Sabeans, men of stature,

shall come over to you rand be yours;

they shall follow you;

they shall come over in chains and bow down to you.

They will plead with you, saying:

‘Surely God is in you, and there is no other,

no god besides him.’”

¹⁵sTruly, you are a God who hides himself,

O God of Israel, the Savior.

¹⁶tAll of them are put to shame and confounded;

the makers of idols go in confusion together.

¹⁷But Israel is saved by the Lord

with everlasting salvation;

uyou shall not be put to shame or confounded

to all eternity.

¹⁸vFor thus says the Lord,

who created the heavens

(he is God!),

who formed the earth and made it

(he established it;

he wdid not create it empty,

xhe formed it to be inhabited!):

“I am the Lord, and there is no other.

¹⁹yI did not speak in secret,

in a land of darkness;

I did not say to the offspring of Jacob,

z‘Seek me in vain.’3

I the Lord speak athe truth;

I declare what is right.

²⁰b“Assemble yourselves and come;

draw near together,

you survivors of the nations!

cThey have no knowledge

who dcarry about their wooden idols,

eand keep on praying to a god

that cannot save.

²¹fDeclare and present your case;

let them take counsel together!

Who told this long ago?

Who declared it of old?

Was it not I, the Lord?

And there is no other god besides me,

a righteous God gand a Savior;

there is none besides me.

²²“Turn to me and be saved,

hall the ends of the earth!

For I am God, and there is no other.

²³iBy myself I have sworn;

from my mouth has gone out in jrighteousness

a word that shall not return:

k‘To me every knee shall bow,

every tongue shall swear allegiance.’4

²⁴l“Only in the Lord, it shall be said of me,

are righteousness and mstrength;

to him shall come and be ashamed

nall who were incensed against him.

²⁵In the Lord all the offspring of Israel

shall be justified and shall glory.”

The Seven Angels with Seven Plagues

¹Then rI saw another sign in heaven, great and amazing, sseven angels with seven plagues, which are the last, for with them the wrath of God is finished.

²And I saw twhat appeared to be a sea of glass mingled with fire—and also those uwho had conquered the beast and its image and vthe number of its name, standing beside the sea of glass wwith harps of God in their hands. ³And they sing xthe song of Moses, ythe servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying,

z“Great and amazing are your deeds,

O Lord God the Almighty!

aJust and true are your ways,

O King of the nations!1

⁴bWho will not fear, O Lord,

and glorify your name?

For you alone are choly.

dAll nations will come

and worship you,

for your righteous acts have been revealed.”

⁵After this I looked, and ethe sanctuary of fthe tent2 of witness in heaven was opened, ⁶and out of the sanctuary came gthe seven angels with the seven plagues, clothed in pure, bright ilinen, jwith golden sashes around their chests. ⁷And one of kthe four living creatures gave to the seven angels seven lgolden bowls full of the wrath of God mwho lives forever and ever, ⁸and nthe sanctuary was filled with smoke from the glory of God and from his power, and ono one could enter the sanctuary until the seven plagues of the seven angels were finished.