The Daily Audio Bible

The Lamps and the Bread Before Yahweh

24 Then Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, ² “Command the sons of Israel that they bring to you ^(A)clear oil from beaten olives for the ^[a]light, to make a lamp ^[b]burn continually. ³ Outside the veil of testimony in the tent of meeting, Aaron shall keep it in order from evening to morning before Yahweh continually; it shall be a perpetual statute throughout your generations. ⁴ He shall keep the lamps in order on the ^(B)pure gold lampstand before Yahweh continually.

⁵ “^(C)Then you shall take fine flour and bake twelve cakes with it; two-tenths of an ephah shall be in each cake. ⁶ And you shall set them in two rows, six to a row, on the ^(D)pure gold table before Yahweh. ⁷ And you shall put pure frankincense on each row that it may be ^(E)a memorial portion for the bread, even an offering by fire to Yahweh. ^8 (F)Every sabbath day he shall set it in order before Yahweh ^(G)continually; it is an everlasting covenant ^[c]for the sons of Israel. ^9 (H)And it shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place; for it is most holy to him from the offerings to Yahweh by fire, his portion forever.”

¹⁰ Now the son of an Israelite woman, whose father was an Egyptian, went out among the sons of Israel; and the Israelite woman’s son and a man of Israel struggled with each other in the camp. ¹¹ And the son of the Israelite woman blasphemed the ^(I)Name and cursed. So they brought him to Moses. (Now his mother’s name was Shelomith, the daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan.) ¹² And they put him in ^[d]custody ^[e]so that ^(J)the command of Yahweh might be made clear to them.

¹³ Then Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, ¹⁴ “Bring the one who has cursed outside the camp, and let all who heard him ^(K)lay their hands on his head; then ^(L)let all the congregation stone him. ¹⁵ And you shall speak to the sons of Israel, saying, ‘^(M)If anyone curses his God, then he will bear his sin. ¹⁶ Moreover, the one who ^(N)blasphemes the name of Yahweh shall surely be put to death; all the congregation shall certainly stone him. The sojourner as well as the native, when he blasphemes the Name, shall be put to death.

An Eye for an Eye

¹⁷ ‘^(O)If a man strikes down the life of any human being, he shall surely be put to death. ^18 (P)And the one who strikes down the life of an animal shall make restitution for it, life for life. ¹⁹ If a man ^[f]injures his neighbor, just as he has done, so it shall be done to him: ^20 (Q)fracture for fracture, ^(R)eye for eye, tooth for tooth; just as he has ^[g]injured a man, so it shall be ^[h]inflicted on him. ²¹ Thus the one who strikes down an animal shall make restitution for it, but ^(S)the one who strikes down a man shall be put to death. ²² There shall be ^(T)one standard of judgment for you; it shall be for the sojourner as well as the native, for I am Yahweh your God.’” ²³ Then Moses spoke to the sons of Israel, and they brought the one who had cursed outside the camp and stoned him with stones. Thus the sons of Israel did, just as Yahweh had commanded Moses.

The Sabbatical Year

25 Yahweh then spoke to Moses ^[i]at Mount Sinai, saying, ² “Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, ‘When you come into the land which I am giving to you, then the land shall have a sabbath to Yahweh. ^3 (U)Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in its produce, ⁴ but during ^(V)the seventh year the land shall have a sabbath rest, a sabbath to Yahweh; you shall not sow your field nor prune your vineyard. ^5 [j]What grows of its own accord from your harvest you shall not reap, and your grapes of untrimmed vines you shall not gather; the land shall have a sabbatical year. ^6 (W)And the sabbath produce of the land shall be for food; for you and your male and female slaves and your hired man and your foreign resident, those who sojourn with you. ⁷ Even your cattle and the beasts that are in your land shall have all its produce to eat.

The Year of Jubilee

⁸ ‘You are also to count off seven sabbaths of years for yourself, seven times seven years, so that you have the time of the seven sabbaths of years, namely, forty-nine years. ⁹ You shall then sound a ram’s horn abroad on ^(X)the tenth day of the seventh month; on the day of atonement you shall sound a horn all through your land. ¹⁰ You shall thus set apart as holy the fiftieth year and ^(Y)proclaim ^[k]a release through the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you, ^[l]and ^(Z)each of you shall return to his own possession of land, ^[m]and each of you shall return to his family. ¹¹ You shall have the fiftieth year as a jubilee; you shall not sow; you shall not reap what grows of its own accord; you shall not gather in from its untrimmed vines. ¹² For it is a jubilee; it shall be holy to you. You shall eat its produce out of the field.

¹³ ‘^(AA)On this year of jubilee, each of you shall return to his own possession of land. ¹⁴ If you make a sale, moreover, to your companion or buy from your friend’s hand, ^(AB)you shall not mistreat one another. ¹⁵ Corresponding to the number of years after the jubilee, you shall buy from your ^[n]companion; he is to sell to you according to the number of years of produce. ^16 (AC)In proportion to the ^[o]extent of the years you shall increase its price, and in proportion to the fewness of the years you shall diminish its price, for it is the number of crops it produces that he is selling to you. ¹⁷ So ^(AD)you shall not mistreat one another, but you shall ^[p]fear your God; for I am Yahweh your God.

¹⁸ ‘You shall thus observe My statutes and keep My judgments, so as to do them, that ^(AE)you may live securely on the land. ¹⁹ Then the land will yield its fruit, so that you can eat your fill and live securely on it. ²⁰ But if you say, “^(AF)What are we going to eat on the seventh year ^[q]if we do not sow or gather in our produce?” ²¹ then ^(AG)I will command My blessing for you in the sixth year that it will bring forth the produce for three years. ²² So you shall sow the eighth year and eat ^(AH)old things from that produce, eating the old until the ninth year when its produce comes in.

The Redemption of Land

²³ ‘The land, moreover, shall not be sold permanently, for ^(AI)the land is Mine; for ^(AJ)you are but sojourners and foreign residents with Me. ²⁴ Thus for every ^[r]piece of land of your possession, you shall provide for the redemption of the land.

²⁵ ‘^(AK)If a brother of yours becomes so poor he has to sell part of his possession of land, then his nearest kinsman redeemer is to come and redeem what his brother has sold. ²⁶ Or in case a man has no kinsman redeemer, but ^[s]recovers his means and finds sufficient payment for its redemption, ^27 (AL)then he shall calculate the years since its sale and return the balance to the man to whom he sold it, and so return to his possession of land. ²⁸ But if ^[t]he has not found sufficient means to return it to himself, then what he has sold shall remain in the hands of its purchaser until the year of jubilee; but at the jubilee it shall ^[u]revert, that ^(AM)he may return to his possession of land.

²⁹ ‘Likewise, if a man sells a house for habitation in a walled city, then his redemption right remains valid until a full year from its sale; his right of redemption lasts a full year. ³⁰ But if it is not redeemed for him within the space of a full year, then the house that is in the walled city passes permanently to its purchaser throughout his generations; it does not ^[v]revert in the jubilee. ³¹ The houses of the villages, however, which have no surrounding wall, shall be considered ^[w]as open fields; they have redemption rights and ^[x]revert in the jubilee. ³² As for ^(AN)cities of the Levites, the Levites have a permanent right of redemption for the houses of the cities which are their possession. ³³ What, therefore, ^[y]belongs to the Levites may be redeemed, and a house sale ^[z]in the city of ^[aa]their possession ^[ab]reverts in the jubilee, for the houses of the cities of the Levites are their possession among the sons of Israel. ^34 (AO)But pasture fields of their cities shall not be sold, for that is their perpetual possession.

Redemption Rights for Poor Brothers

³⁵ ‘^(AP)Now if a brother of yours becomes poor and his ^[ac]means with regard to you falter, then you are to sustain him, like a sojourner or a foreign resident, that he may live with you. ^36 (AQ)Do not take ^[ad]usurious interest from him, but fear your God, that your brother may live with you. ³⁷ You shall not give him your silver at interest nor your food for gain. ^38 (AR)I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan and ^(AS)to be your God.

³⁹ ‘^(AT)If a brother of yours becomes so poor with regard to you that he sells himself to you, you shall not subject him to a slave’s service. ⁴⁰ He shall be with you as a hired man, as ^(AU)if he were a foreign resident; he shall serve with you until the year of jubilee. ⁴¹ He shall then go out from you, he and his sons with him, and shall return to his family, that he may return to the possession of the land of his fathers. ⁴² For they are My slaves whom I brought out from the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold in a slave sale. ^43 (AV)You shall not have dominion over him with brutality, but you shall fear your God. ⁴⁴ As for your male and female slaves whom you may have—you may acquire male and female slaves from the nations that are around you. ⁴⁵ And also you may acquire from the sons of the foreign residents who sojourn among you, from them and their families who are with you; as for those whom they have begotten in your land, they also may become your possession. ⁴⁶ You may even give them as an inheritance to your sons after you, to receive as a possession; you can use them as permanent slaves. ^(AW)But in respect to your brothers, the sons of Israel, you shall not have dominion over one another with brutality.

Jesus Blesses Little Children

^13 (A)And they were bringing children to Him so that He might touch them; but the disciples rebuked them. ¹⁴ But when Jesus saw this, He was indignant and said to them, “Permit the children to come to Me; do not hinder them; ^(B)for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. ¹⁵ Truly I say to you, ^(C)whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it at all.” ¹⁶ And He ^(D)took them in His arms and began blessing them, laying His hands on them.

The Rich Young Ruler

^17 (E)And as He was setting out on a journey, a man ran up to Him and ^(F)knelt before Him, and began asking Him, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to ^(G)inherit eternal life?” ¹⁸ And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone. ¹⁹ You know the commandments, ‘^(H)Do not murder, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.’” ²⁰ And he said to Him, “Teacher, I have kept ^(I)all these things from my youth up.” ²¹ And looking at him, Jesus loved him and said to him, “One thing you lack: go and sell all you possess and give to the poor, and you will have ^(J)treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” ²² But at these words ^[a]he was saddened, and he went away grieving, for he was one who owned much property.

²³ And Jesus, looking around, *said to His disciples, “^(K)How hard it will be for those who are wealthy to enter the kingdom of God!” ²⁴ And the disciples ^(L)were amazed at His words. But Jesus *answered again and *said to them, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! ^25 (M)It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” ²⁶ And they were even more astonished, saying to ^[b]Him, “^[c]Then who can be saved?” ²⁷ Looking at them, Jesus *said, “^(N)With people it is impossible, but not with God; for all things are possible with God.”

^28 (O)Peter began to say to Him, “Behold, we have left everything and followed You.” ²⁹ Jesus said, “Truly I say to you, ^(P)there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or farms, for My sake and for the gospel’s sake, ^30 [d]except one who will receive one hundred times as much now in ^[e]the present age—houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and farms, along with persecutions—and in ^(Q)the age to come, eternal life. ³¹ But ^(R)many who are first will be last, and the last, first.”