M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

32 (Maftir) ^(31:55) Early in the morning Lavan got up, kissed his sons and daughters, and blessed them. Then Lavan left and returned to his own place. ^2 (1) Ya‘akov went on his way, and the angels of God met him. ^3 (2) When Ya‘akov saw them, he said, “This is God’s camp,” and called that place Machanayim [two camps].

Haftarah Vayetze: Hoshea (Hosea) 12:13(12)–14:10(9) (A); 11:7–12:12(11) (S)

B’rit Hadashah suggested reading for Parashah Vayetze: Yochanan (John) 1:43–51

Parashah 8: Vayishlach (He sent) 32:4(3) –36:43

^4 (3) Ya‘akov sent messengers ahead of him to ‘Esav his brother toward the land of Se‘ir, the country of Edom, ^5 (4) with these instructions: “Here is what you are to say to my lord ‘Esav: ‘Your servant Ya‘akov says, “I have been living with Lavan and have stayed until now. ^6 (5) I have cattle, donkeys and flocks, and male and female servants. I am sending to tell this news to my lord, in order to win your favor.” ’” ^7 (6) The messengers returned to Ya‘akov saying, “We went to your brother ‘Esav, and he is coming to meet you; with him are four hundred men.”

^8 (7) Ya‘akov became greatly afraid and distressed. He divided the people, flocks, cattle and camels with him into two camps, ^9 (8) saying, “If ‘Esav comes to the one camp and attacks it, at least the camp that is left will escape.” ^10 (9) Then Ya‘akov said, “God of my father Avraham and God of my father Yitz’chak, Adonai, who told me, ‘Return to your country and your kinsmen, and I will do you good’: ^11 (10) I’m not worthy of all the love and faithfulness you have shown your servant, since I crossed the Yarden with only my staff. But now I have become two camps. ^12 (11) Please! Rescue me from my brother ‘Esav! I’m afraid of him, afraid he’ll come and attack me, without regard for mothers or children. ^13 (12) You said, ‘I will certainly do you good and make your descendants as numerous as the grains of sand by the sea, which are so many they can’t be counted.’”

(ii) ^14 (13) He stayed there that night; then he chose from among his possessions the following as a present for ‘Esav his brother: ^15 (14) two hundred female goats and twenty males, two hundred female sheep and twenty males, ^16 (15) thirty milk-camels and their colts, forty cows and ten bulls, twenty female donkeys and ten colts. ^17 (16) He turned them over to his servants, every drove by itself, and said to his servants, “Cross over in front of me, and keep a space between each drove and the next one.” ^18 (17) He instructed the servant in front, “When ‘Esav my brother meets you and asks you, ‘Whose servant are you? Where are you going? And whose animals are these?’ ^19 (18) then you are to say, ‘They belong to your servant Ya‘akov, and they are a present he has sent to my lord ‘Esav; and Ya‘akov himself is just behind us.’” ^20 (19) He also instructed the second servant, and the third, and all that followed the droves, “When you encounter ‘Esav, you are to speak to him in the same way, ^21 (20) and you are to add, ‘And there, just behind us, is your servant Ya‘akov.’” For he said, “I will appease him first with the present that goes ahead of me; then, after that, I will see him myself — and maybe he will be friendly toward me.” ^22 (21) So the present crossed over ahead of him, and he himself stayed that night in the camp.

^23 (22) He got up that night, took his two wives, his two slave-girls, and his eleven children, and forded the Yabok. ^24 (23) He took them and sent them across the stream, then sent his possessions across; ^25 (24) and Ya‘akov was left alone. Then some man wrestled with him until daybreak. ^26 (25) When he saw that he did not defeat Ya‘akov, he struck Ya‘akov’s hip socket, so that his hip was dislocated while wrestling with him. ^27 (26) The man said, “Let me go, because it’s daybreak.” But Ya‘akov replied, “I won’t let you go unless you bless me.” ^28 (27) The man asked, “What is your name?” and he answered, “Ya‘akov.” ^29 (28) Then the man said, “From now on, you will no longer be called Ya‘akov, but Isra’el; because you have shown your strength to both God and men and have prevailed.” ^30 (29) Ya‘akov asked him, “Please tell me your name.” But he answered, “Why are you asking about my name?” and blessed him there.

(iii) ^31 (30) Ya‘akov called the place P’ni-El [face of God], “Because I have seen God face to face, yet my life is spared.” ^32 (31) As the sun rose upon him he went on past P’ni-El, limping at the hip. ^33 (32) This is why, to this day, the people of Isra’el do not eat the thigh muscle that passes along the hip socket — because the man struck Ya‘akov’s hip at its socket.

3 Yeshua went again into a synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. ² Looking for a reason to accuse him of something, people watched him carefully to see if he would heal him on Shabbat. ³ He said to the man with the shriveled hand, “Come up where we can see you!” ⁴ Then to them he said, “What is permitted on Shabbat? Doing good or doing evil? Saving life or killing?” But they said nothing. ⁵ Then, looking them over and feeling both anger with them and sympathy for them at the stoniness of their hearts, he said to the man, “Hold out your hand.” As he held it out, it became restored. ⁶ The P’rushim went out and immediately began plotting with some members of Herod’s party how to do away with him.

⁷ Yeshua went off with his talmidim to the lake, and great numbers followed him from the Galil. ⁸ When they heard what he was doing, great numbers also followed him from Y’hudah, Yerushalayim, Idumea, the territory beyond the Yarden, and the Tzor-Tzidon area. ⁹ He told his talmidim to have a boat ready for him, so that he could escape the crush of the crowd if necessary, ¹⁰ for he had healed many people, and all the sick kept pressing forward to touch him. ¹¹ Whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they would fall down in front of him and scream, “You are the Son of God!” ¹² But he warned them strictly not to make him known.

¹³ Then he went up into the hill country and summoned to himself those he wanted, and they came to him. ¹⁴ He appointed twelve to be with him, to be sent out to preach ¹⁵ and to have authority to expel demons:

¹⁶ Shim‘on, to whom he gave another name, “Kefa”;

¹⁷ Ya‘akov Ben-Zavdai and Yochanan, Ya‘akov’s brother — to them he gave the name “B’nei-Regesh” (that is, “Thunderers”);

¹⁸ Andrew, Philip, Bar-Talmai, Mattityahu, T’oma, Ya‘akov Ben-Halfai, Taddai, Shim‘on the Zealot,

¹⁹ and Y’hudah from K’riot, the one who betrayed him.

Then he entered a house; ²⁰ and once more, such a crowd came together that they couldn’t even eat. ²¹ When his family heard about this, they set out to take charge of him; for they said, “He’s out of his mind!”

²² The Torah-teachers who came down from Yerushalayim said, “He has Ba‘al-Zibbul in him,” and “It is by the ruler of the demons that he expels the demons.” ²³ But he called them and spoke to them in parables: “How can Satan expel Satan? ²⁴ If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom can’t survive; ²⁵ and if a household is divided against itself, that household can’t survive. ²⁶ So if Satan has rebelled against himself and is divided, he can’t survive either; and that’s the end of him. ²⁷ Furthermore, no one can break into a strong man’s house and make off with his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man. After that, he can ransack his house. ²⁸ Yes! I tell you that people will be forgiven all sins and whatever blasphemies they utter; ²⁹ however, someone who blasphemes against the Ruach HaKodesh never has forgiveness but is guilty of an eternal sin.” ³⁰ For they had been saying, “He has an unclean spirit in him.”

³¹ Then his mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent a message asking for him. ³² A crowd was sitting around him; and they said to him, “Your mother and your brothers are outside, asking for you.” ³³ He replied, “Who are my mother and my brothers?” ³⁴ Looking at those seated in a circle around him, he said, “See! Here are my mother and my brothers! ³⁵ Whoever does what God wants is my brother, sister and mother!”

8 That same day King Achashverosh gave the house of Haman, the enemy of the Jews, to Ester the queen. Also Mordekhai appeared before the king, for Ester had revealed his relationship to her. ² The king removed his signet ring, which he had taken back from Haman, and gave it to Mordekhai. Then Ester put Mordekhai in charge of Haman’s house.

³ Again Ester spoke to the king; she fell at his feet and begged him with tears to put an end to the mischief Haman the Agagi had caused by the scheme he had worked out against the Jews. ⁴ The king extended the gold scepter toward Ester. So Ester got up and stood in front of the king. ⁵ She said, “If it pleases the king, if I have won his favor, if the matter seem right to the king and if I have his approval, then let an order be written rescinding the letters devised by Haman the son of Hamdata the Agagi, which he wrote to destroy the Jews in all the royal provinces. ⁶ For how can I bear to see the disaster that will overcome my people? How can I endure seeing the extermination of my kinsmen?” ⁷ King Achashverosh said to Ester the queen and Mordekhai the Jew, “Listen! I gave Ester the house of Haman, and they hanged him on the gallows, because he threatened the lives of the Jews. ⁸ You should issue a decree in the king’s name for whatever you want concerning the Jews, and seal it with the king’s signet ring; because a decree written in the king’s name and sealed with the king’s ring can’t be rescinded by anyone.”

⁹ The king’s secretaries were summoned at that time, on the twenty-third day of the third month, the month of Sivan; and a decree was written according to everything Mordekhai ordered concerning the Jews, to the army commanders, governors and officials of the provinces from India to Ethiopia, 127 provinces, to each province in its script and to each people in their language, also to the Jews in their script and language. ¹⁰ They wrote in the name of King Achashverosh and sealed it with the king’s signet ring; they sent the letters by couriers on horseback riding fast horses used in the king’s service and bred from the royal stock. ¹¹ The letters said that the king had granted the Jews in every city the right “to assemble and defend their lives by destroying, killing and exterminating any forces of any people or province that would attack them, their little ones or their women or would try to seize their goods as plunder ¹² on the designated day in any of the provinces of King Achashverosh, namely, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar.” ¹³ A copy of the edict was to be issued as a decree in every province and proclaimed to all the peoples, and the Jews were to be ready on that day to take vengeance against their enemies. ¹⁴ Couriers riding fast horses used in the king’s service left quickly, pressed by the king’s order; and the decree was issued in Shushan the capital.

¹⁵ Meanwhile, Mordekhai left the king’s presence arrayed in royal blue and white, wearing a large gold crown and a robe of fine linen and purple; and the city of Shushan shouted for joy. ¹⁶ For the Jews, all was light, gladness, joy and honor. ¹⁷ In every province and city where the king’s order and decree arrived, the Jews had gladness and joy, a feast and a holiday. Many from the peoples of the land became Jews, because fear of the Jews had overcome them.

3 Then what advantage has the Jew? What is the value of being circumcised? ² Much in every way! In the first place, the Jews were entrusted with the very words of God. ³ If some of them were unfaithful, so what? Does their faithlessness cancel God’s faithfulness? ⁴ Heaven forbid! God would be true even if everyone were a liar! — as the Tanakh says,

⁵ Now if our unrighteousness highlights God’s righteousness, what should we say? That God is unrighteous to inflict his anger on us? (I am speaking here the way people commonly do.) ⁶ Heaven forbid! Else, how could God judge the world? ⁷ “But,” you say, “if, through my lie, God’s truth is enhanced and brings him greater glory, why am I still judged merely for being a sinner?” ⁸ Indeed! Why not say (as some people slander us by claiming we do say), “Let us do evil, so that good may come of it”? Against them the judgment is a just one!

⁹ So are we Jews better off? Not entirely; for I have already made the charge that all people, Jews and Gentiles alike, are controlled by sin. ¹⁰ As the Tanakh puts it,

¹⁹ Moreover, we know that whatever the Torah says, it says to those living within the framework of the Torah, in order that every mouth may be stopped and the whole world be shown to deserve God’s adverse judgment. ²⁰ For in his sight no one alive will be considered righteous^[h] on the ground of legalistic observance of Torah commands, because what Torah really does is show people how sinful they are.

²¹ But now, quite apart from Torah, God’s way of making people righteous in his sight has been made clear — although the Torah and the Prophets give their witness to it as well — ²² and it is a righteousness that comes from God, through the faithfulness of Yeshua the Messiah, to all who continue trusting. For it makes no difference whether one is a Jew or a Gentile, ²³ since all have sinned and come short of earning God’s praise. ²⁴ By God’s grace, without earning it, all are granted the status of being considered righteous before him, through the act redeeming us from our enslavement to sin that was accomplished by the Messiah Yeshua. ²⁵ God put Yeshua forward as the kapparah for sin through his faithfulness in respect to his bloody sacrificial death. This vindicated God’s righteousness; because, in his forbearance, he had passed over [with neither punishment nor remission] the sins people had committed in the past; ²⁶ and it vindicates his righteousness in the present age by showing that he is righteous himself and is also the one who makes people righteous on the ground of Yeshua’s faithfulness.

²⁷ So what room is left for boasting? None at all! What kind of Torah excludes it? One that has to do with legalistic observance of rules? No, rather, a Torah that has to do with trusting. ²⁸ Therefore, we hold the view that a person comes to be considered righteous by God on the ground of trusting, which has nothing to do with legalistic observance of Torah commands.

²⁹ Or is God the God of the Jews only? Isn’t he also the God of the Gentiles? Yes, he is indeed the God of the Gentiles; ³⁰ because, as you will admit, God is one.^[i] Therefore, he will consider righteous the circumcised on the ground of trusting and the uncircumcised through that same trusting. ³¹ Does it follow that we abolish Torah by this trusting? Heaven forbid! On the contrary, we confirm Torah.