M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

19 In those days, when there was no king in Isra’el, there was a certain Levi living on the far side of the Efrayim hills who took a woman from Beit-Lechem in Y’hudah to be his concubine. ² But his concubine was unfaithful to him and left him to go to her father’s house at Beit-Lechem in Y’hudah, where she stayed for some time, four months. ³ Then her husband went after her to persuade her to return; he had his servant with him and a pair of donkeys. She brought him into her father’s house; and when the girl’s father saw him, he was glad to meet him. ⁴ His father-in-law, the girl’s father, kept him there; so he remained with him three days; they ate, drank and stayed there. ⁵ On the fourth day they got up early in the morning, and he prepared to leave. But the girl’s father said to his son-in-law, “You’ll feel better if you have a bite of food before you leave.” ⁶ So the two of them sat down and ate and drank together. Then the girl’s father said to the man, “Please stay one more night, and have a good time.” ⁷ The man rose to leave, but his father-in-law pressed him, so he stayed there again. ⁸ The morning of the fifth day, he got up early to leave; but the girl’s father said, “Why don’t you have something to eat, and leave this afternoon?” So the two men ate. ⁹ When the man got up to leave with his concubine and servant, his father-in-law, the girl’s father, said to him, “Look, it’s almost evening. Please stay the night — you see that it’s getting late. Stay on, enjoy yourself, and tomorrow get going early on your way home.” ¹⁰ But the man wouldn’t stay that night; so he got up and left with his concubine and his two saddled donkeys; and they arrived at Y’vus, also known as Yerushalayim.

¹¹ By the time they arrived at Y’vus it was nearly evening; and the servant said to his master, “Why don’t we go on into this city of the Y’vusi and stay there?” ¹² But his master said to him, “We won’t go into a city of foreigners which doesn’t belong to the people of Isra’el. We’ll go on across to Giv‘ah.” ¹³ He said to his servant, “Let’s go, and we’ll get to one of those places; we’ll stay in Giv‘ah or Ramah.” ¹⁴ So they went on and kept traveling, until the sun set on them near Giv‘ah, which belongs to Binyamin. ¹⁵ There they turned off the road to go and stay in Giv‘ah. He went in and sat down in the city’s open space, since no one had offered his home for them to spend the night.

¹⁶ In time, at nightfall, an old man came from his work in the field. He was from the Efrayim hills and was staying in Giv‘ah, although the residents were of Binyamin. ¹⁷ The old man looked up, saw the traveler in the city’s open space and said, “Where are you going, and where are you coming from?” ¹⁸ He replied, “We’re crossing from Beit-Lechem in Y’hudah to the far side of the Efrayim hills. That’s where I’m from. I went to Beit-Lechem in Y’hudah, and now I’m going to the house of Adonai; but there’s no one here who will let me spend the night in his home. ¹⁹ We have straw and food for our donkeys, also bread and wine for me, my concubine and the boy there with your servants; we don’t need anything else.” ²⁰ The old man said, “You’re welcome to stay with me. I’ll take care of anything you lack; just don’t spend the night out in the open.” ²¹ So he brought him home and gave food to the donkeys. Then they washed their feet, and ate and drank.

²² They were relaxing, when suddenly some men from the city, good-for-nothings, surrounded the house and began beating at the door. “Send out the man who came home with you!” they demanded of the old man whose house it was. “We want to have sex with him!” ²³ The man whose house it was went out and said to them, “No, my brothers, please don’t do anything as wrong as this. Look, he’s just a guest in my house; don’t do this degrading thing. ²⁴ Here’s my daughter, who’s a virgin, and his concubine. I’ll bring them out. Mistreat them, do what you want to them, but don’t do such a degrading thing to this man.” ²⁵ However, the men wouldn’t listen to him; so the man took hold of his concubine and brought her out to them. They raped her and abused her all night long; only at dawn did they let her go. ²⁶ At daybreak the woman came and fell down at the door of the man’s house where her husband was, and she was still there when it grew light. ²⁷ When her husband got up, opened the doors of the house, and went out to go on his way, he saw the woman lying there with her hands stretched out toward the door. ²⁸ He said to her, “Get up! Let’s go!” But there was no answer. So he loaded her body on the donkey and began his trip home. ²⁹ On arrival at his house, he got a knife, took hold of his concubine’s body, cut her up into twelve pieces, and sent them to all the regions of Isra’el. ³⁰ Everyone who saw it said, “From the day the people of Isra’el came up from Egypt until now, never has such a thing happened or been seen. What are we going to do about it? Talk it over and decide.”

23 Sha’ul looked straight at them and said, “Brothers, I have been discharging my obligations to God with a perfectly clear conscience, right up until today.” ² But the cohen hagadol, Hananyah, ordered those standing near him to strike him on the mouth. ³ Then Sha’ul said to him, “God will strike you, you whitewashed wall! Will you sit there judging me according to the Torah, yet in violation of the Torah order me to be struck?” ⁴ The men nearby said, “This is the cohen hagadol of God that you’re insulting!” ⁵ Sha’ul said, “I didn’t know, brothers, that he was the cohen hagadol; for it says in the Torah, ‘You are not to speak disparagingly of a ruler of your people.’”^[a]

⁶ But knowing that one part of the Sanhedrin consisted of Tz’dukim and the other of P’rushim, Sha’ul shouted, “Brothers, I myself am a Parush and the son of P’rushim; and it is concerning the hope of the resurrection of the dead that I am being tried!” ⁷ When he said this, an argument arose between the P’rushim and the Tz’dukim, and the crowd was divided. ⁸ For the Tz’dukim deny the resurrection and the existence of angels and spirits; whereas the P’rushim acknowledge both. ⁹ So there was a great uproar, with some of the Torah-teachers who were on the side of the P’rushim standing up and joining in — “We don’t find anything wrong with this man; and if a spirit or an angel spoke to him, what of it?” ¹⁰ The dispute became so violent that the commander, fearing that Sha’ul would be torn apart by them, ordered the soldiers to go down, take him by force and bring him back into the barracks.

¹¹ The following night, the Lord stood by him and said, “Take courage! For just as you have borne a faithful witness to me in Yerushalayim, so now you must bear witness in Rome.”

¹² The next day, some of the Judeans formed a conspiracy. They took an oath, saying they would neither eat nor drink until they had killed Sha’ul; ¹³ more than forty were involved in this plot. ¹⁴ They went to the head cohanim and the elders and said, “We have bound ourselves by an oath to taste no food until we have killed Sha’ul. ¹⁵ What you are to do is make it appear to the commander that you and the Sanhedrin want to get more accurate information about Sha’ul’s case, so that he will bring him down to you; while we, for our part, are prepared to kill him before he ever gets here.”

¹⁶ But the son of Sha’ul’s sister got wind of the planned ambush, and he went into the barracks and told Sha’ul. ¹⁷ Sha’ul called one of the officers and said, “Take this man up to the commander; he has something to tell him.” ¹⁸ So he took him and brought him to the commander and said, “The prisoner Sha’ul called me and asked me to bring this young man to you, because he has something to tell you.” ¹⁹ The commander took him by the hand, led him aside privately and asked, “What is it you have to tell me?” ²⁰ He said, “The Judeans have agreed to ask you tomorrow to bring Sha’ul down to the Sanhedrin on the pretext that they want to investigate his case more thoroughly. ²¹ But don’t let yourself be talked into it, because more than forty men are lying in wait for him. They have taken an oath neither to eat nor to drink until they kill him; and they are ready now, only waiting for you to give your consent to their request.”

²² The commander let the young man go, cautioning him, “Don’t tell anyone that you have reported this to me.” ²³ Then he summoned two of the captains and said, “Get two hundred infantry soldiers ready to leave for Caesarea at nine o’clock tonight, and seventy mounted cavalry and two hundred spearmen; ²⁴ also provide replacements for Sha’ul’s horse when it gets tired; and bring him through safely to Felix the governor.” ²⁵ And the commander wrote the following letter:

Greetings!

³¹ So the soldiers, following their orders, took Sha’ul during the night and brought him to Antipatris, ³² then returned to the barracks after leaving the cavalry to go on with him. ³³ The cavalry took him to Caesarea, delivered the letter to the governor, and handed Sha’ul over to him. ³⁴ The governor read the letter and asked what province he was from. On learning he was from Cilicia, ³⁵ he said, “I will give you a full hearing after your accusers have also arrived,” and ordered him to be kept under guard in Herod’s headquarters.

33 The word of Adonai came to Yirmeyahu a second time while he was still imprisoned in the guards’ quarters:

⁴ For here is what Adonai the God of Isra’el says concerning the houses of this city and the palaces of the kings of Y’hudah which are about to be destroyed and used as siege-works and ramparts, ⁵ where they will come to fight the Kasdim: “These places will eventually be filled with the corpses of people whom I am striking down in my anger and fury, everyone whose wickedness has caused me to hide my face from this city. ⁶ However, I will bring it health and healing; I will heal them and reveal to them peace and truth in plenty. ⁷ I will cause the captives of Y’hudah and the captives of Isra’el to return; and I will build them up as I did at first. ⁸ I will cleanse them from all their sins, through which they offended me; and I will pardon all their sins, through which they offended and rebelled against me. ⁹ Then the name of this city will bring me joy, praise and glory before all the nations of the earth that hear about all the good I am doing for them; they will be overcome with fear and trembling at all the good and peace I am securing for it.”

¹⁰ Here is what Adonai says: “You say that this place is a wasteland, with neither people nor animals in the cities of Y’hudah, and that the streets of Yerushalayim are desolate, without people or animals — no inhabitants. Yet there will again be heard here ¹¹ the sounds of joy and gladness and the voices of bridegroom and bride, the voices of those who sing, ‘Give thanks to Adonai-Tzva’ot, for Adonai is good, for his grace continues forever,’ as they bring offerings of thanksgiving into the house of Adonai. For I will cause those captured from the land to return, as before,” says Adonai.

¹² Adonai-Tzva’ot says, “In this place, which is a wasteland without people or animals, and in all its cities, there will once again be pasture-lands where shepherds can let their flocks rest. ¹³ In the cities of the hill-country, in the cities of the Sh’felah, in the cities of the Negev, in the territory of Binyamin, in the areas around Yerushalayim and in the cities of Y’hudah flocks will again pass under the hands of the one who counts them,” says Adonai.

¹⁴ “Here, the days are coming,” says Adonai, “when I will fulfill this good promise which I have proclaimed for the house of Isra’el and the house of Y’hudah.

¹⁷ For this is what Adonai says: “There will never be cut off from David a man to occupy the throne of the house of Isra’el. ¹⁸ Nor will there ever be cut off from the cohanim who are L’vi’im a man before me to offer burnt offerings, burn grain offerings and offer sacrifices every day.”

¹⁹ This word of Adonai came to Yirmeyahu: ²⁰ “Here is what Adonai says:

²³ This word of Adonai came to Yirmeyahu: ²⁴ “Haven’t you noticed that these people are saying, ‘Adonai has rejected the two families he chose’? Hence they despise my people and no longer look at them as a nation. ²⁵ Here is what Adonai says: ‘If I have not established my covenant with day and night and fixed the laws for sky and earth, ²⁶ then I will also reject the descendants of Ya‘akov and of my servant David, not choosing from his descendants people to rule over the descendants of Avraham, Yis’chak and Ya‘akov. For I will cause their captives to come back, and I will show them compassion.’”

3 ⁽⁰⁾ A psalm of David, when he fled from Avshalom his son: