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The Song of Moses

30 Then Moses recited the words of this song, to the very end, in the hearing of the whole assembly of Israel:

32 “Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak;
    let the earth hear the words of my mouth.(A)
May my teaching drop like the rain,
    my speech condense like the dew,
like gentle rain on grass,
    like showers on new growth.(B)
For I will proclaim the name of the Lord,
    ascribe greatness to our God!(C)

The Rock, his work is perfect,
    and all his ways are just.
A faithful God, without deceit,
    just and upright is he;(D)
yet his degenerate children have dealt falsely with him,[a]
    a perverse and crooked generation.(E)
Do you thus repay the Lord,
    O foolish and senseless people?
Is not he your father who created you,
    who made you and established you?(F)
Remember the days of old;
    consider the years long past;
ask your father, and he will inform you,
    your elders, and they will tell you.(G)
When the Most High[b] apportioned the nations,
    when he divided humankind,
he fixed the boundaries of the peoples
    according to the number of the gods;[c](H)
the Lord’s own portion was his people,
    Jacob his allotted share.(I)

10 He sustained[d] him in a desert land,
    in a howling wilderness waste;
he shielded him, cared for him,
    guarded him as the apple of his eye.(J)
11 As an eagle stirs up its nest
    and hovers over its young,
as it spreads its wings, takes them up,
    and bears them aloft on its pinions,(K)
12 the Lord alone guided him;
    no foreign god was with him.(L)
13 He set him atop the heights of the land
    and fed him with[e] produce of the field;
he nursed him with honey from the crags,
    with oil from flinty rock,(M)
14 curds from the herd, and milk from the flock,
    with fat of lambs and rams,
Bashan bulls and goats,
    together with the choicest wheat—
    you drank fine wine from the blood of grapes.(N)

Footnotes

  1. 32.5 Meaning of Heb uncertain
  2. 32.8 Traditional rendering of Heb Elyon
  3. 32.8 Q ms Compare Gk Tg: MT the Israelites
  4. 32.10 Sam Gk Compare Tg: MT found
  5. 32.13 Sam Gk Syr Tg: MT he ate

He entered the synagogue and for three months spoke out boldly and argued persuasively about the kingdom of God.(A) When some stubbornly refused to believe and spoke evil of the Way before the congregation, he left them, taking the disciples with him, and argued daily in the lecture hall of Tyrannus.[a](B) 10 This continued for two years, so that all the residents of Asia, both Jews and Greeks, heard the word of the Lord.(C)

The Sons of Sceva

11 God did extraordinary miracles through Paul,(D) 12 so that when the handkerchiefs or aprons that had touched his skin were brought to the sick, their diseases left them, and the evil spirits came out of them.(E) 13 Then some itinerant Jewish exorcists tried to use the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, “I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul proclaims.”(F) 14 Seven sons of a Jewish high priest named Sceva were doing this. 15 But the evil spirit said to them in reply, “Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are you?” 16 Then the man with the evil spirit leaped on them, mastered them all, and so overpowered them that they fled out of the house naked and wounded. 17 When this became known to all residents of Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks, everyone was awestruck, and the name of the Lord Jesus was praised.(G) 18 Also many of those who became believers confessed and disclosed their practices. 19 A number of those who practiced magic collected their books and burned them publicly; when the value of these books[b] was calculated, it was found to come to fifty thousand silver coins. 20 So the word of the Lord grew mightily and prevailed.(H)

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Footnotes

  1. 19.9 Other ancient authorities read of a certain Tyrannus, from eleven o’clock in the morning to four in the afternoon
  2. 19.19 Gk them

15 Jacob ate his fill;[a]
    Jeshurun grew fat and kicked.
    You grew fat, bloated, and gorged!
He abandoned God who made him
    and scoffed at the Rock of his salvation.(A)
16 They made him jealous with strange gods;
    with abhorrent things they provoked him.(B)
17 They sacrificed to demons, not God,
    to deities they had never known,
to new ones recently arrived,
    whom your ancestors had not feared.(C)
18 You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you;[b]
    you forgot the God who gave you birth.(D)

19 The Lord saw it and was jealous;[c]
    he spurned[d] his sons and daughters.(E)
20 He said, ‘I will hide my face from them;
    I will see what their end will be,
for they are a perverse generation,
    children in whom there is no faithfulness.(F)
21 They made me jealous with what is no god,
    provoked me with their idols.
So I will make them jealous with what is no people,
    provoke them with a foolish nation.(G)
22 For a fire is kindled by my anger
    and burns to the depths of Sheol;
it devours the earth and its increase
    and sets on fire the foundations of the mountains.(H)
23 I will heap disasters upon them,
    spend my arrows against them:(I)
24 wasting hunger,
    burning consumption,
    bitter pestilence.
The teeth of beasts I will send against them,
    with venom of things crawling in the dust.(J)
25 In the street the sword shall bereave,
    and in the chambers terror
for young man and woman alike,
    nursing child and old gray head.(K)
26 I said, “I will make an end of them[e]
    and blot out the memory of them from humankind,”(L)
27 but I feared provocation by the enemy,
    for their adversaries might misunderstand
and say, “Our hand is triumphant;
    it was not the Lord who did all this.” ’(M)

28 They are a nation void of sense;
    there is no understanding in them.
29 If they were wise, they would understand this;
    they would discern what their end would be.(N)
30 How could one have routed a thousand
    and two put a myriad to flight,
unless their Rock had sold them,
    the Lord had given them up?(O)
31 Indeed, their rock is not like our Rock;
    our enemies are fools.[f](P)
32 Their vine comes from the vinestock of Sodom,
    from the vineyards of Gomorrah;
their grapes are grapes of poison;
    their clusters are bitter;
33 their wine is the poison of serpents,
    the cruel venom of asps.(Q)

34 Is not this laid up in store with me,
    sealed up in my treasuries,(R)
35 for the day of vengeance[g] and recompense,
    for the time when their foot shall slip?
Because the day of their calamity is at hand;
    their doom comes swiftly.(S)

36 Indeed, the Lord will vindicate his people,
    have compassion on his servants,
when he sees that their power is gone,
    neither bond nor free remaining.(T)
37 Then he will say, ‘Where are their gods,
    the rock in which they took refuge,(U)
38 who ate the fat of their sacrifices
    and drank the wine of their libations?
Let them rise up and help you;
    let them be your protection!

39 See now that I, even I, am he;
    there is no god besides me.
I kill, and I make alive;
    I wound, and I heal;
    and no one can deliver from my hand.(V)
40 For I lift up my hand to heaven
    and swear, As I live forever,
41 when I whet my flashing sword
    and my hand takes hold on judgment,
I will take vengeance on my adversaries
    and will repay those who hate me.(W)
42 I will make my arrows drunk with blood,
    and my sword shall devour flesh—
with the blood of the slain and the captives,
    from the long-haired enemy.’(X)

43 Praise, O heavens,[h] his people;
    worship him, all you gods![i]
For he will avenge the blood of his children[j]
    and take vengeance on his adversaries;
he will repay those who hate him[k]
    and cleanse the land for his people.”[l](Y)

44 Moses came and recited all the words of this song in the hearing of the people, he and Joshua[m] son of Nun. 45 When Moses had finished reciting all these words to all Israel, 46 he said to them, “Take to heart all the words that I am giving in witness against you today; give them as a command to your children, so that they may diligently observe all the words of this law.(Z) 47 This is no trifling matter for you but rather your very life; through it you may live long in the land that you are crossing over the Jordan to possess.”(AA)

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Footnotes

  1. 32.15 Q mss Sam Gk: MT lacks Jacob ate his fill
  2. 32.18 Or that fathered you
  3. 32.19 Q mss Gk: MT lacks was jealous
  4. 32.19 Cn: Heb he spurned because of provocation
  5. 32.26 Gk: Meaning of Heb uncertain
  6. 32.31 Gk: Heb judges
  7. 32.35 Sam Gk: MT vengeance is mine
  8. 32.43 Q ms Gk: MT nations
  9. 32.43 Q ms Gk: MT lacks this line
  10. 32.43 Q ms Gk: MT his servants
  11. 32.43 Q ms Gk: MT lacks this line
  12. 32.43 Q ms Sam Gk Vg: MT his land his people
  13. 32.44 Sam Gk Syr Vg: MT Hoshea

The Riot in Ephesus

21 Now after these things had been accomplished, Paul resolved in the Spirit to go through Macedonia and Achaia and then to go on to Jerusalem. He said, “After I have gone there, I must also see Rome.”(A) 22 So he sent two of his helpers, Timothy and Erastus, to Macedonia, while he himself stayed for some time longer in Asia.(B)

23 About that time no little disturbance broke out concerning the Way.(C) 24 A man named Demetrius, a silversmith who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the artisans.(D) 25 These he gathered together, with the workers of the same trade, and said, “Men, you know that we get our wealth from this business. 26 You also see and hear that not only in Ephesus but in almost the whole of Asia this Paul has persuaded and drawn away a considerable number of people by saying that gods made with hands are not gods.(E) 27 And there is danger not only that this trade of ours may come into disrepute but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis will be scorned, and she will be deprived of her majesty that brought all Asia and the world to worship her.”

28 When they heard this, they were enraged and shouted, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!”(F) 29 The city was filled with the confusion, and people[a] rushed together to the theater, dragging with them Gaius and Aristarchus, Macedonians who were Paul’s travel companions.(G) 30 Paul wished to go into the crowd, but the disciples would not let him; 31 even some officials of the province of Asia[b] who were friendly to him sent him a message urging him not to venture into the theater. 32 Meanwhile, some were shouting one thing, some another, for the assembly was in confusion, and most of them did not know why they had come together.(H) 33 Some of the crowd gave instructions to Alexander, whom the Jews had pushed forward. And Alexander motioned for silence and tried to make a defense before the people.(I) 34 But when they recognized that he was a Jew, for about two hours all of them shouted in unison, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” 35 But when the town clerk had quieted the crowd, he said, “Citizens of Ephesus, who is there who does not know that the city of the Ephesians is the temple keeper of the great Artemis and of the statue that fell from heaven?(J) 36 Since these things cannot be denied, you ought to be quiet and do nothing rash. 37 You have brought these men here who are neither temple robbers nor blasphemers of our[c] goddess.(K) 38 If therefore Demetrius and the artisans with him have a complaint against anyone, the courts are open, and there are proconsuls; let them bring charges there against one another.(L) 39 If there is anything further[d] you want to know, it must be settled in the regular assembly. 40 For we are in danger of being charged with rioting today, since there is no cause that we can give to justify this commotion.” 41 When he had said this, he dismissed the assembly.

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Footnotes

  1. 19.29 Gk they
  2. 19.31 Gk some of the Asiarchs
  3. 19.37 Other ancient authorities read your
  4. 19.39 Other ancient authorities read about other matters