¹⁴ You have said, ^(A)‘It is vain to serve God. ^(B)What is the profit of our keeping his charge or of walking as in mourning before the Lord of hosts?

The Pharisee and the Tax Collector

⁹ He also told this parable to some ^(A)who trusted ^(B)in themselves that they were righteous, ^(C)and treated others with contempt: ¹⁰ “Two men ^(D)went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. ¹¹ The Pharisee, ^(E)standing by himself, prayed^{[a] (F)}thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. ^12 (G)I fast twice a week; ^(H)I give tithes of all that I get.’

⁵ “Say to all the people of the land and the priests, ‘When you fasted and mourned in ^(A)the fifth month and in ^(B)the seventh, for these ^(C)seventy years, ^(D)was it ^(E)for me that you fasted? ^6 (F)And when you eat and when you drink, do you not eat for yourselves and drink for yourselves? ^7 (G)Were not these the words that the Lord proclaimed ^(H)by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and prosperous, ^(I)with her cities around her, and the ^(J)South and the ^(K)lowland were inhabited?’”

The People of Nineveh Repent

⁶ The word reached^[a] the king of Nineveh, and ^(A)he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, ^(B)and sat in ashes. ⁷ And he issued a proclamation and published through Nineveh, ^(C)“By the decree of the king and his nobles: Let neither man nor ^(D)beast, herd nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed or drink water, ⁸ but let man and ^(E)beast be covered with sackcloth, and let them call out mightily to God. ^(F)Let everyone turn from his evil way and from ^(G)the violence that is in his hands.

⁷ I took counsel with myself, and I brought charges against the nobles and the officials. I said to them, ^(A)“You are exacting interest, each from his brother.” And I held a great assembly against them

²⁹ “And it shall be a statute to you forever that ^(A)in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, you shall ^(B)afflict yourselves^[a] and shall do no work, either ^(C)the native or the stranger who sojourns among you.