³⁷ Now while Jesus was speaking, a Pharisee invited Him to take dinner with him, so He entered and reclined at table.

³⁸ The Pharisee noticed and was astonished [to see] that Jesus did not first wash before dinner.

³⁹ But the Lord said to him, Now you Pharisees cleanse the outside of the cup and of the plate, but inside you yourselves are full of greed and robbery and extortion and malice and wickedness.

⁴⁰ You senseless (foolish, stupid) ones [acting without reflection or intelligence]! Did not He Who made the outside make the inside also?

⁴¹ But [dedicate your inner self and] give as donations to the poor of those things which are within [of inward righteousness] and behold, everything is purified and clean for you.

⁴² But woe to you, Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and every [little] herb, but disregard and neglect justice and the love of God. These you ought to have done without leaving the others undone.^(A)

⁴³ Woe to you, Pharisees! For you love the best seats in the synagogues and [you love] to be greeted and bowed down to in the [public] marketplaces.

⁴⁴ Woe to you! For you are like graves which are not marked or seen, and men walk over them without being aware of it [and are ceremonially defiled].

⁴⁵ One of the experts in the [Mosaic] Law answered Him, Teacher, in saying this, You reproach and outrage and affront even us!

⁴⁶ But He said, Woe to you, the lawyers, also! For you load men with oppressive burdens hard to bear, and you do not personally [even ^[a]gently] touch the burdens with one of your fingers.

⁴⁷ Woe to you! For you are ^[b]rebuilding and repairing the tombs of the prophets, whom your fathers killed (destroyed).

⁴⁸ So you bear witness and give your full approval and consent to the deeds of your fathers; for they actually killed them, and you rebuild and repair monuments to them.

⁴⁹ For this reason also the wisdom of God said, I will send them prophets and apostles, [some] of whom they will put to death and persecute,

⁵⁰ So that the blood of all the prophets shed from the foundation of the world may be charged against and required of this age and generation,

⁵¹ From the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was slain between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, it shall be charged against and required of this age and generation.^(B)

⁵² Woe to you, lawyers (experts in the Mosaic Law)! For you have taken away the key to knowledge; you did not go in yourselves, and you hindered and prevented those who were entering.

⁵³ As He left there, the scribes and the Pharisees [followed Him closely, and they] began ^[c]to be enraged with and set themselves violently against Him and to draw Him out and provoke Him to speak of many things,

⁵⁴ Secretly watching and plotting and lying in wait for Him, to seize upon something He might say [that they might accuse Him].

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5 Then sang Deborah and Barak son of Abinoam on that day, saying,

² For the leaders who took the lead in Israel, for the people who offered themselves willingly, bless the Lord!

³ Hear, O kings; give ear, O princes; I will sing to the Lord. I will sing praise to the Lord, the God of Israel.

⁴ Lord, when You went forth out of Seir, when You marched out of the field of Edom, the earth trembled and the heavens also dropped, yes, the clouds dropped water.

⁵ The mountains quaked at the presence of the Lord, yes, yonder Sinai at the presence of the Lord, the God of Israel.

⁶ After the days of Shamgar son of Anath, after the days of Jael [meaning here Ehud] the caravans ceased, travelers walked through byways.

⁷ The villages were unoccupied and rulers ceased in Israel until ^[a]you arose—you, Deborah, arose—a mother in Israel.

⁸ [Formerly] they chose new gods; then war was in the gates. Was there a shield or spear seen among 40,000 in Israel?

⁹ My heart goes out to the commanders of Israel who offered themselves willingly among the people. Bless the Lord!

¹⁰ Tell of it—you who ride on white donkeys, you who sit on rich carpets, and you who walk by the way.

¹¹ Far from the noise of archers in the places of drawing water, there shall they rehearse the righteous acts of the Lord, even the righteous acts toward His villagers in Israel. Then the people of the Lord went down to the gates.

¹² Awake, awake, Deborah! Awake, awake, utter a song! Arise, Barak, and lead away your captives, you son of Abinoam.

¹³ Then down marched the remnant of the nobles, the people of the Lord marched down for Me against the mighty.

¹⁴ Out of Ephraim they came down whose root is in Amalek, after you, Benjamin, with your kinsmen. Out of Machir came down commanders and lawgivers, and out of Zebulun those who ^[b]handle the pen or stylus of the writer.

¹⁵ And the princes of Issachar came with Deborah, and Issachar was faithful to Barak; into the valley they rushed forth at his heels. [But] among the clans of Reuben were great searchings of heart.

¹⁶ Why [Reuben] did you linger among the sheepfolds listening to the piping for the flocks? Among the clans of Reuben there were great searchings of heart.

¹⁷ Gilead remained beyond the Jordan, and why did Dan stay with the ships? Asher sat still on the seacoast and remained by his creeks. [These came not forth to battle for God’s people.]

¹⁸ But Zebulun was a people who endangered their lives to the death; Naphtali did also on the heights of the field.

¹⁹ The kings came and fought, then fought the kings of Canaan at Taanach by the waters of Megiddo. Gain of booty they did not obtain.

²⁰ From the heavens the stars fought, from their courses they fought against Sisera.

²¹ The torrent Kishon swept [the foe] away, the onrushing torrent, the torrent Kishon. O my soul, march on with strength!

²² Then the horses’ hoofs beat loudly because of the galloping of [fleeing] valiant riders.

²³ Curse Meroz, said the messenger of the Lord. Curse bitterly its inhabitants, because they came not to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against the mighty!

²⁴ Blessed above women shall Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, be; blessed shall she be above women in the tent.

²⁵ [Sisera] asked for water, and she gave [him] milk; she brought him curds in a lordly dish.

²⁶ She put her [left] hand to the tent pin, and her right hand to the workmen’s hammer. And with the wooden hammer she smote Sisera, she smote his head, yes, she struck and pierced his temple.

²⁷ He sank, he fell, he lay still at her feet. At her feet he sank, he fell; where he sank, there he fell—dead!

²⁸ The ^[c]mother of Sisera looked out at a window and wailed through the lattice, Why is his chariot so long in coming? Why do the hoofbeats of his chariots tarry?

²⁹ Her wise ladies answered her, yet she repeated her words to herself,

³⁰ Have they not found and been dividing the spoil? A maiden or two for every man, a spoil of dyed garments for Sisera, a spoil of dyed stuffs embroidered, two pieces of dyed work embroidered for my neck as spoil?

³¹ So let all Your enemies perish, O Lord! But let those who love Him be like the sun when it rises in its might. And the land had peace and rest for forty years.

6 But the Israelites did evil in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord gave them into the hand of Midian for seven years.

² And the hand of Midian prevailed against Israel. Because of Midian the Israelites made themselves the dens which are in the mountains and the caves and the strongholds.

³ For whenever Israel had sown their seed, the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people of the east came up against them.

⁴ They would encamp against them and destroy the crops as far as Gaza and leave no nourishment for Israel, and no ox or sheep or donkey.

⁵ For they came up with their cattle and their tents, and they came like locusts for multitude; both they and their camels could not be counted. So they wasted the land as they entered it.

⁶ And Israel was greatly impoverished because of the Midianites, and the Israelites cried to the Lord.

⁷ And when they cried to the Lord because of Midian,

⁸ The Lord sent a prophet to the Israelites, who said to them, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, I brought you up from Egypt and brought you forth out of the house of bondage.

⁹ And I delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of all who oppressed you, and drove them out from before you and gave you their land.

¹⁰ And I said to you, I am the Lord your God; fear not the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But you have not obeyed My voice.

¹¹ Now the ^[d]Angel of the Lord came and sat under the oak (terebinth) at Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, and his son Gideon was beating wheat in the winepress to hide it from the Midianites.

¹² And the Angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, The Lord is with you, you mighty man of [fearless] courage.

¹³ And Gideon said to him, O sir, if the Lord is with us, why is all this befallen us? And where are all His wondrous works of which our fathers told us, saying, Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? But now the Lord has forsaken us and given us into the hand of Midian.

¹⁴ The Lord turned to him and said, Go in this your might, and you shall save Israel from the hand of Midian. Have I not sent you?

¹⁵ Gideon said to Him, Oh Lord, how can I deliver Israel? Behold, my clan is the poorest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father’s house.

¹⁶ The Lord said to him, Surely I will be with you, and you shall smite the Midianites as one man.

¹⁷ Gideon said to Him, If now I have found favor in Your sight, then show me a sign that it is You Who talks with me.

¹⁸ Do not leave here, I pray You, until I return to You and bring my offering and set it before You. And He said, I will wait until you return.

¹⁹ Then Gideon went in and prepared a kid and unleavened cakes of an ephah of flour. The meat he put in a basket and the broth in a pot, and brought them to Him under the oak and presented them.

²⁰ And the Angel of God said to him, Take the meat and unleavened cakes and lay them on this rock and pour the broth over them. And he did so.

²¹ Then the Angel of the Lord reached out the tip of the staff that was in His hand, and touched the meat and the unleavened cakes, and there flared up fire from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened cakes. Then the Angel of the Lord vanished from his sight.

²² And when Gideon perceived that He was the Angel of the Lord, Gideon said, Alas, O Lord God! For now I have seen the Angel of the Lord face to face!

²³ The Lord said to him, Peace be to you, do not fear; you shall not die.

²⁴ Then Gideon built an altar there to the Lord and called it, The Lord is Peace. To this day it still stands in Ophrah, which belongs to the Abiezrites.

²⁵ That night the Lord said to Gideon, Take your father’s bull, the second bull seven years old, and pull down the altar of Baal that your father has and cut down the Asherah [symbol of the goddess Asherah] that is beside it;

²⁶ And build an altar to the Lord your God on top of this stronghold with stones laid in proper order. Then take the second bull and offer a burnt sacrifice with the wood of the Asherah which you shall cut down.

²⁷ Then Gideon took ten men of his servants and did as the Lord had told him, but because he was too afraid of his father’s household and the men of the city to do it by day, he did it by night.

²⁸ And when the men of the city arose early in the morning, behold, the altar of Baal was cast down, and the Asherah was cut down that was beside it, and the second bull was offered on the altar which had been built.

²⁹ And they said to one another, Who has done this thing? And when they searched and asked, they were told, Gideon son of Joash has done this thing.

³⁰ Then the men of the city commanded Joash, Bring out your son, that he may die, for he has pulled down the altar of Baal and cut down the Asherah beside it.

³¹ But Joash said to all who stood against him, Will you contend for Baal? Or will you save him? He who will contend for Baal, let him be put to death while it is still morning. If Baal is a god, let him contend for himself because one has pulled down his altar.

³² Therefore on that day he called Gideon Jerubbaal, meaning, Let Baal contend against him, because he had pulled down his altar.

³³ Then all the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people of the east came together and, crossing the Jordan, encamped in the Valley of Jezreel.

³⁴ But the Spirit of the Lord clothed Gideon with Himself and took possession of him, and he blew a trumpet, and [the clan of] Abiezer was gathered to him.

³⁵ And he sent messengers throughout all Manasseh, and the Manassites were called to follow him; and he sent messengers to Asher, to Zebulun, and to Naphtali, and they came up to meet them.

³⁶ And Gideon said to God, If You will deliver Israel by my hand as You have said,

³⁷ Behold, I will put a fleece of wool on the threshing floor. If there is dew on the fleece only and it is dry on all the ground, then I shall know that You will deliver Israel by my hand, as You have said.

³⁸ And it was so. When he rose early next morning and squeezed the dew out of the fleece, he wrung from it a bowlful of water.

³⁹ And Gideon said to God, Let not your anger be kindled against me, and I will speak but this once. Let me make trial only this once with the fleece, I pray you; let it now be dry only upon the fleece and upon all the ground let there be dew.

⁴⁰ And God did so that night, for it was dry on the fleece only, and there was dew on all the ground.