30 When Rachel saw that (A)she bore Jacob no children, she envied her sister. She said to Jacob, “Give me children, or I shall die!” Jacob's anger was kindled against Rachel, and he said, “Am I in the place of God, (B)who has withheld from you the fruit of the womb?” Then she said, “Here is my servant (C)Bilhah; go in to her, so that she may give birth (D)on my behalf,[a] that even I may have children[b] through her.” So she gave him her servant Bilhah as a wife, and Jacob went in to her. And Bilhah conceived and bore Jacob a son. Then Rachel said, “God has (E)judged me, and has also heard my voice and given me a son.” Therefore she called his name Dan.[c] Rachel's servant Bilhah conceived again and bore Jacob a second son. Then Rachel said, “With mighty wrestlings[d] I have wrestled with my sister and have prevailed.” So she called his name (F)Naphtali.[e]

When Leah saw that she had ceased bearing children, she took her servant Zilpah and (G)gave her to Jacob as a wife. 10 Then Leah's servant Zilpah bore Jacob a son. 11 And Leah said, (H)“Good fortune has come!” so she called his name (I)Gad.[f] 12 Leah's servant Zilpah bore Jacob a second son. 13 And Leah said, “Happy am I! For women (J)have called me happy.” So she called his name Asher.[g]

14 In the days of wheat harvest Reuben went and found (K)mandrakes in the field and brought them to his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, “Please give me some of your son's mandrakes.” 15 But she said to her, “Is it a small matter that you have taken away my husband? Would you take away my son's mandrakes also?” Rachel said, “Then he may lie with you tonight in exchange for your son's mandrakes.” 16 When Jacob came from the field in the evening, Leah went out to meet him and said, “You must come in to me, for I have hired you with my son's mandrakes.” So he lay with her that night. 17 And God listened to Leah, and she conceived and bore Jacob a fifth son. 18 Leah said, “God has given me my wages because I gave my servant to my husband.” So she called his name Issachar.[h]

19 And Leah conceived again, and she bore Jacob a sixth son. 20 Then Leah said, “God has endowed me with a good endowment; now my husband will honor me, because I have borne him six sons.” So she called his name (L)Zebulun.[i] 21 Afterward she bore a daughter and called her name Dinah.

22 Then God (M)remembered Rachel, and God listened to her and (N)opened her womb. 23 She conceived and bore a son and said, “God has taken away (O)my reproach.” 24 And she called his name Joseph,[j] saying, (P)“May the Lord add to me another son!”

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Footnotes

  1. Genesis 30:3 Hebrew on my knees
  2. Genesis 30:3 Hebrew be built up, which sounds like the Hebrew for children
  3. Genesis 30:6 Dan sounds like the Hebrew for judged
  4. Genesis 30:8 Hebrew With wrestlings of God
  5. Genesis 30:8 Naphtali sounds like the Hebrew for wrestling
  6. Genesis 30:11 Gad sounds like the Hebrew for good fortune
  7. Genesis 30:13 Asher sounds like the Hebrew for happy
  8. Genesis 30:18 Issachar sounds like the Hebrew for wages, or hire
  9. Genesis 30:20 Zebulun sounds like the Hebrew for honor
  10. Genesis 30:24 Joseph means May he add, and sounds like the Hebrew for taken away

Jephthah's Tragic Vow

29 (A)Then the Spirit of the Lord was upon Jephthah, and he passed through Gilead and Manasseh and passed on to Mizpah of Gilead, and from Mizpah of Gilead he passed on to the Ammonites. 30 And Jephthah (B)made a vow to the Lord and said, “If you will give the Ammonites into my hand, 31 then whatever[a] comes out from the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the Ammonites (C)shall be the Lord's, and (D)I will offer it[b] up for a burnt offering.” 32 So Jephthah crossed over to the Ammonites to fight against them, and the Lord gave them into his hand. 33 And he struck them from Aroer to the neighborhood of (E)Minnith, twenty cities, and as far as Abel-keramim, with a great blow. So the Ammonites were subdued before the people of Israel.

34 Then Jephthah came to his home at (F)Mizpah. And behold, his daughter came out to meet him (G)with tambourines and with dances. She was his only child; besides her he had neither son nor daughter. 35 And as soon as he saw her, he tore his clothes and said, “Alas, my daughter! You have brought me very low, and you have become the cause of great trouble to me. For I have opened my mouth to the Lord, (H)and I cannot take back my vow.” 36 And she said to him, “My father, you have opened your mouth to the Lord; do to me according to what has gone out of your mouth, now that the Lord has avenged you on your enemies, on the Ammonites.” 37 So she said to her father, “Let this thing be done for me: leave me alone two months, that I may go up and down on the mountains and weep for my virginity, I and my companions.” 38 So he said, “Go.” Then he sent her away for two months, and she departed, she and her companions, and wept for her virginity on the mountains. 39 And at the end of two months, she returned to her father, (I)who did with her according to his vow that he had made. She had never known a man, and it became a custom in Israel 40 that the daughters of Israel went year by year to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four days in the year.

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Footnotes

  1. Judges 11:31 Or whoever
  2. Judges 11:31 Or him

14 Whom did he consult,
    and who made him understand?
(A)Who taught him the path of justice,
    and taught him knowledge,
    and showed him the way of understanding?
15 Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket,
    and are accounted (B)as the dust on the scales;
    behold, he takes up (C)the coastlands like fine dust.
16 Lebanon would not suffice for fuel,
    nor are (D)its beasts enough for a burnt offering.
17 (E)All the nations are as nothing before him,
    they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness.

18 (F)To whom then will you liken God,
    (G)or what likeness compare with him?
19 (H)An idol! A craftsman casts it,
    and a goldsmith overlays it with gold
    and casts for it silver chains.
20 (I)He who is too impoverished for an offering
    chooses wood[a] that will not rot;
he seeks out a skillful craftsman
    to set up an idol that will not move.

21 (J)Do you not know? Do you not hear?
    Has it not been told you from the beginning?
    Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?
22 It is he who sits above the circle of the earth,
    and its inhabitants are (K)like grasshoppers;
(L)who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,
    and spreads them like a tent to dwell in;
23 (M)who brings princes to nothing,
    and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness.

24 Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown,
    scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth,
when he blows on them, and they wither,
    (N)and the tempest carries them off like stubble.

25 (O)To whom then will you compare me,
    that I should be like him? says the Holy One.
26 Lift up your eyes on high and see:
    who created these?
(P)He who brings out their host by number,
    calling them all by name;
by the greatness of his might
    and because he is strong in power,
    not one is missing.

27 Why do you say, O Jacob,
    and speak, O Israel,
(Q)“My way is hidden from the Lord,
    (R)and my right is disregarded by my God”?
28 Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The Lord is (S)the everlasting God,
    the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He does not faint or grow weary;
    (T)his understanding is unsearchable.
29 He gives power to the faint,
    and to him who has no might he increases strength.
30 Even youths shall faint and be weary,
    and young men shall fall exhausted;
31 but (U)they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength;
    they shall mount up with wings (V)like eagles;
they shall run and not be weary;
    they shall walk and not faint.

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Footnotes

  1. Isaiah 40:20 Or He chooses valuable wood

30 “But now they (A)laugh at me,
    men who are (B)younger than I,
whose fathers I would have disdained
    to set with the dogs of my flock.
What could I gain from the strength of their hands,
    (C)men whose (D)vigor is gone?
Through want and hard hunger
    they (E)gnaw (F)the dry ground by night in (G)waste and desolation;
they pick saltwort and the leaves of bushes,
    and the roots of the broom tree for their food.[a]
(H)They are driven out from human company;
    they shout after them as after a thief.
In the gullies of the torrents they must dwell,
    in holes of the earth and of (I)the rocks.
Among the bushes they (J)bray;
    under (K)the nettles they huddle together.
A senseless, a nameless brood,
    they have been whipped out of the land.

“And now I have become their (L)song;
    I am (M)a byword to them.
10 They (N)abhor me; they keep aloof from me;
    they do not hesitate to (O)spit at the sight of me.
11 Because God has loosed my cord and humbled me,
    they have cast off restraint[b] in my presence.
12 On my (P)right hand the rabble rise;
    they push away my feet;
    they (Q)cast up against me their ways of destruction.
13 They break up my path;
    they promote my (R)calamity;
    they need no one to help them.

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Footnotes

  1. Job 30:4 Or warmth
  2. Job 30:11 Hebrew the bridle

Peter Confesses Jesus as the Christ

13 (A)Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” 14 And they said, “Some say (B)John the Baptist, others say (C)Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” 15 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” 16 Simon Peter replied, (D)“You are (E)the Christ, (F)the Son of (G)the living God.” 17 And Jesus answered him, (H)“Blessed are you, (I)Simon Bar-Jonah! For (J)flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, (K)but my Father who is in heaven. 18 And I tell you, (L)you are Peter, and (M)on this rock[a] I will build my church, and (N)the gates of (O)hell[b] shall not prevail against it. 19 I will give you (P)the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and (Q)whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed[c] in heaven.” 20 (R)Then he strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ.

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Footnotes

  1. Matthew 16:18 The Greek words for Peter and rock sound similar
  2. Matthew 16:18 Greek the gates of Hades
  3. Matthew 16:19 Or shall have been bound… shall have been loosed

27 When the jailer woke and saw that the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and (A)was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped. 28 But Paul cried with a loud voice, “Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.” 29 And the jailer[a] called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear he (B)fell down before Paul and Silas. 30 Then he brought them out and said, “Sirs, (C)what must I do to be (D)saved?” 31 And they said, (E)“Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you (F)and your household.” 32 And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. 33 And he took them (G)the same hour of the night and washed their wounds; and he (H)was baptized at once, he and all his family. 34 Then he brought them up into his house and set food before them. And he (I)rejoiced along with his entire household that he had believed in God.

35 But when it was day, the magistrates sent the police, saying, “Let those men go.” 36 And the jailer reported these words to Paul, saying, “The magistrates have sent to let you go. Therefore come out now and go in peace.” 37 But Paul said to them, “They have beaten us publicly, (J)uncondemned, men who are Roman citizens, and have thrown us into prison; and do they now throw us out secretly? No! Let them come themselves and take us out.” 38 The police reported these words to the magistrates, and (K)they were afraid when they heard that they were Roman citizens. 39 So they came and apologized to them. And they took them out and (L)asked them to leave the city. 40 So they went out of the prison and visited (M)Lydia. And when they had seen (N)the brothers, they encouraged them and departed.

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Footnotes

  1. Acts 16:29 Greek he

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