Old/New Testament
1 After Joshua died, the nation of Israel went to the Lord to receive his instructions.
“Which of our tribes should be the first to go to war against the Canaanites?” they inquired.
2 God’s answer came, “Judah. And I will give them a great victory.”
3 The leaders of the tribe of Judah, however, asked help from the tribe of Simeon. “Join us in clearing out the people living in the territory allotted to us,” they said, “and then we will help you conquer yours.” So the army of Simeon went with the army of Judah. 4-6 And the Lord helped them defeat the Canaanites and Perizzites, so that ten thousand of the enemy were slain at Bezek. King Adoni-bezek escaped, but the Israeli army soon captured him and cut off his thumbs and big toes.
7 “I have treated seventy kings in this same manner and have fed them the scraps under my table!” King Adoni-bezek said. “Now God has paid me back.” He was taken to Jerusalem and died there.
8 (Judah had conquered Jerusalem and massacred its people, setting the city on fire.) 9 Afterward the army of Judah fought the Canaanites in the hill country and in the Negeb, as well as on the coastal plains. 10 Then Judah marched against the Canaanites in Hebron (formerly called Kiriath-arba), destroying the cities of Sheshai, Ahiman, and Talmai. 11 Later they attacked the city of Debir (formerly called Kiriath-sepher).
12 “Who will lead the attack against Debir?” Caleb challenged them. “Whoever conquers it shall have my daughter Achsah as his wife!”
13 Caleb’s nephew, Othniel, son of his younger brother Kenaz, volunteered to lead the attack; and he conquered the city and won Achsah as his bride. 14 As they were leaving for their new home,[a] she urged him to ask her father for an additional piece of land. She dismounted from her donkey to speak to Caleb about it.
“What do you wish?” he asked.
15 And she replied, “You have been kind enough to give me land in the Negeb, but please give us springs of water too.”
So Caleb gave her the upper and lower springs.
16 When the tribe of Judah moved into its new land in the Negeb Desert south of Arad, the descendants of Moses’ father-in-law—members of the Kenite tribe—accompanied them. They left their homes in Jericho, “The City of Palm Trees,” and the two tribes lived together after that. 17 Afterwards the army of Judah joined Simeon’s, and they fought the Canaanites at the city of Zephath and massacred all its people. So now the city is named Hormah (meaning, “massacred”). 18 The army of Judah also conquered the cities of Gaza, Ashkelon, and Ekron, with their surrounding villages. 19 The Lord helped the tribe of Judah exterminate the people of the hill country, though they failed in their attempt to conquer the people of the valley, who had iron chariots.
20 The city of Hebron was given to Caleb as the Lord had promised; so Caleb drove out the inhabitants of the city; they were descendants of the three sons of Anak.
21 The tribe of Benjamin failed to exterminate the Jebusites living in their part of the city of Jerusalem, so they still live there today, mingled with the Israelis.
22-23 As for the tribe of Joseph, they attacked the city of Bethel, formerly known as Luz, and the Lord was with them. First they sent scouts, 24 who captured a man coming out of the city. They offered to spare his life and that of his family if he would show them the entrance passage through the wall.[b] 25 So he showed them how to get in, and they massacred the entire population except for this man and his family. 26 Later the man moved to Syria and founded a city there, naming it Luz, too, as it is still known today.
27 The tribe of Manasseh failed to drive out the people living in Beth-shean, Taanach, Dor, Ibleam, Megiddo, with their surrounding towns; so the Canaanites stayed there. 28 In later years when the Israelis were stronger, they put the Canaanites to work as slaves, but never did force them to leave the country. 29 This was also true of the Canaanites living in Gezer; they still live among the tribe of Ephraim.
30 And the tribe of Zebulun did not massacre the people of Kitron or Nahalol, but made them their slaves; 31-32 nor did the tribe of Asher drive out the residents of Acco, Sidon, Ahlab, Achzib, Helbah, Aphik, or Rehob; so the Israelis still live among the Canaanites, who were the original people of that land. 33 And the tribe of Naphtali did not drive out the people of Beth-shemesh or of Beth-anath, so these people continue to live among them as servants.
34 As for the tribe of Dan, the Amorites forced them into the hill country and wouldn’t let them come down into the valley; 35 but when the Amorites later spread into Mount Heres, Aijalon, and Shaalbim, the tribe of Joseph conquered them and made them their slaves. 36 The boundary of the Amorites begins at the ascent of Scorpion Pass, runs to a spot called The Rock, and continues upward from there.
2 One day the Angel of the Lord arrived at Bochim, coming from Gilgal, and announced to the people of Israel, “I brought you out of Egypt into this land that I promised to your ancestors, and I said that I would never break my covenant with you, 2 if you, on your part, would make no peace treaties with the people living in this land; I told you to destroy their heathen altars. Why have you not obeyed? 3 And now since you have broken the contract, it is no longer in effect, and I no longer promise to destroy the nations living in your land; rather, they shall be thorns in your sides, and their gods will be a constant temptation to you.”
4 The people broke into tears as the Angel finished speaking; 5 so the name of that place was called “Bochim” (meaning, “the place where people wept”). Then they offered sacrifices to the Lord.
6 When Joshua finally disbanded the armies of Israel, the tribes moved into their new territories and took possession of the land. 7-9 Joshua, the man of God, died at the age of 110 and was buried at the edge of his property in Timnath-heres, in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash. The people had remained true to the Lord throughout Joshua’s lifetime, and as long afterward as the old men of his generation were still living—those who had seen the mighty miracles the Lord had done for Israel.
10 But finally all that generation died; and the next generation did not worship Jehovah as their God and did not care about the mighty miracles he had done for Israel. 11 They did many things that the Lord had expressly forbidden, including the worshiping of heathen gods. 12-14 They abandoned Jehovah, the God loved and worshiped by their ancestors—the God who had brought them out of Egypt. Instead, they were worshiping and bowing low before the idols of the neighboring nations. So the anger of the Lord flamed out against all Israel. He left them to the mercy of their enemies, for they had departed from Jehovah and were worshiping Baal and the Ashtaroth idols.
15 So now when the nation of Israel went out to battle against its enemies, the Lord blocked their path. He had warned them about this, and in fact had vowed that he would do it. But when the people were in this terrible plight, 16 the Lord raised up judges to save them from their enemies.
17 Yet even then Israel would not listen to the judges, but broke faith with Jehovah by worshiping other gods instead. How quickly they turned away from the true faith of their ancestors, for they refused to obey God’s commands. 18 Each judge rescued the people of Israel from their enemies throughout his lifetime, for the Lord was moved to pity by the groaning of his people under their crushing oppressions; so he helped them as long as that judge lived. 19 But when the judge died, the people turned from doing right and behaved even worse than their ancestors had. They prayed to heathen gods again, throwing themselves to the ground in humble worship. They stubbornly returned to the evil customs of the nations around them.
20 Then the anger of the Lord would flame out against Israel again. He declared, “Because these people have violated the treaty I made with their ancestors, 21 I will no longer drive out the nations left unconquered by Joshua when he died. 22 Instead, I will use these nations to test my people, to see whether or not they will obey the Lord as their ancestors did.”
23 So the Lord left those nations in the land and did not drive them out, nor let Israel destroy them.
3 1-3 Here is a list of the nations the Lord left in the land to test the new generation of Israel who had not experienced the wars of Canaan. For God wanted to give opportunity to the youth of Israel to exercise faith and obedience[c] in conquering their enemies: the Philistines (five cities), the Canaanites, the Sidonians, the Hivites living in Mount Lebanon, from Baal-hermon to the entrance of Hamath. 4 These people were a test to the new generation of Israel, to see whether they would obey the commandments the Lord had given to them through Moses.
5 So Israel lived among the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Amorites, and Jebusites. 6 But instead of destroying them, the people of Israel intermarried with them. The young men of Israel took their girls as wives, and the Israeli girls married their men. And soon Israel was worshiping their gods. 7 So the people of Israel were very evil in God’s sight, for they turned against Jehovah their God and worshiped Baal and the Asheroth idols.
8 Then the anger of the Lord flamed out against Israel, and he let King Cushan-rishathaim of eastern Syria conquer them. They were under his rule for eight years. 9 But when Israel cried out to the Lord, he gave them Caleb’s nephew, Othniel (son of Kenaz, Caleb’s younger brother) to save them. 10 The Spirit of the Lord took control of him, and he reformed and purged Israel so that when he led the forces of Israel against the army of King Cushan-rishathaim, the Lord helped Israel conquer him completely.
11 Then, for forty years under Othniel, there was peace in the land. But when Othniel died, 12 the people of Israel turned once again to their sinful ways, so God helped King Eglon of Moab to conquer part of Israel at that time. 13 Allied with him were the armies of the Ammonites and the Amalekites. These forces defeated the Israelis and took possession of Jericho, often called “The City of Palm Trees.” 14 For the next eighteen years the people of Israel were required to pay crushing taxes to King Eglon.
15 But when they cried to the Lord, he sent them a savior, Ehud (son of Gera, a Benjaminite), who was left-handed. Ehud was the man chosen to carry Israel’s annual tax money to the Moabite capital. 16 Before he went on this journey, he made himself a double-edged dagger eighteen inches long and hid it in his clothing, strapped against his right thigh. 17-19 After delivering the money to King Eglon (who, by the way, was very fat!), he started home again. But outside the city, at the quarries of Gilgal, he sent his companions on and returned alone to the king.
“I have a secret message for you,” he told him.
The king immediately dismissed all those who were with him so that he could have a private interview. 20 Ehud walked over to him as he was sitting in a cool upstairs room and said to him, “It is a message from God!”
King Eglon stood up at once to receive it, 21 whereupon Ehud reached beneath his robe with his strong left hand, pulled out the double-bladed dagger strapped against his right thigh, and plunged it deep into the king’s belly. 22-23 The hilt of the dagger disappeared beneath the flesh, and the fat closed over it as the entrails oozed out. Leaving the dagger there, Ehud locked the doors behind him and escaped across an upstairs porch.
24 When the king’s servants returned and saw that the doors were locked, they waited, thinking that perhaps he was using the bathroom. 25 But when, after a long time, he still didn’t come out, they became concerned and got a key. And when they opened the door, they found their master dead on the floor.
26 Meanwhile Ehud had escaped past the quarries to Seirah. 27 When he arrived in the hill country of Ephraim, he blew a trumpet as a call to arms and mustered an army under his own command.
28 “Follow me,” he told them, “for the Lord has put your enemies, the Moabites, at your mercy!”
The army then proceeded to seize the fords of the Jordan River near Moab, preventing anyone from crossing. 29 Then they attacked the Moabites and killed about ten thousand of the strongest and most skillful of their fighting men, letting not one escape. 30 So Moab was conquered by Israel that day, and the land was at peace for the next eighty years.
31 The next judge after Ehud was Shamgar (son of Anath). He once killed six hundred Philistines with an ox goad, thereby saving Israel from disaster.
4 1-2 Then Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, left the Jordan River, being urged by the Spirit out into the barren wastelands of Judea, where Satan tempted him for forty days. He ate nothing all that time and was very hungry.
3 Satan said, “If you are God’s Son, tell this stone to become a loaf of bread.”
4 But Jesus replied, “It is written in the Scriptures, ‘Other things in life are much more important than bread!’”[a]
5 Then Satan took him up and revealed to him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time; 6-7 and the devil told him, “I will give you all these splendid kingdoms and their glory—for they are mine to give to anyone I wish—if you will only get down on your knees and worship me.”
8 Jesus replied, “We must worship God, and him alone. So it is written in the Scriptures.”
9-11 Then Satan took him to Jerusalem to a high roof of the Temple and said, “If you are the Son of God, jump off! For the Scriptures say that God will send his angels to guard you and to keep you from crashing to the pavement below!”
12 Jesus replied, “The Scriptures also say, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to a foolish test.’”
13 When the devil had ended all the temptations, he left Jesus for a while and went away.
14 Then Jesus returned to Galilee, full of the Holy Spirit’s power. Soon he became well known throughout all that region 15 for his sermons in the synagogues; everyone praised him.
16 When he came to the village of Nazareth, his boyhood home, he went as usual to the synagogue on Saturday, and stood up to read the Scriptures. 17 The book of Isaiah the prophet was handed to him, and he opened it to the place where it says:
18-19 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me; he has appointed me to preach Good News to the poor; he has sent me to heal the brokenhearted and to announce that captives shall be released and the blind shall see, that the downtrodden shall be freed from their oppressors, and that God is ready to give blessings to all who come to him.”[b]
20 He closed the book and handed it back to the attendant and sat down, while everyone in the synagogue gazed at him intently. 21 Then he added, “These Scriptures came true today!”
22 All who were there spoke well of him and were amazed by the beautiful words that fell from his lips. “How can this be?” they asked. “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?”
23 Then he said, “Probably you will quote me that proverb, ‘Physician, heal yourself’—meaning, ‘Why don’t you do miracles here in your hometown like those you did in Capernaum?’ 24 But I solemnly declare to you that no prophet is accepted in his own hometown! 25-26 For example, remember how Elijah the prophet used a miracle to help the widow of Zarephath—a foreigner from the land of Sidon. There were many Jewish widows needing help in those days of famine, for there had been no rain for three and a half years, and hunger stalked the land; yet Elijah was not sent to them. 27 Or think of the prophet Elisha, who healed Naaman, a Syrian, rather than the many Jewish lepers needing help.”
28 These remarks stung them to fury; 29 and jumping up, they mobbed him and took him to the edge of the hill on which the city was built, to push him over the cliff. 30 But he walked away through the crowd and left them.
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.