Book of Common Prayer
ז (Zayin)
49 Remember your promise to your servant,
through which you have given me hope.
50 In my distress my comfort is this:
that your promise gives me life.
51 Though the arrogant scorn me completely,
I have not turned away from your Torah.
52 Adonai, I keep in mind your age-old rulings;
in them I take comfort.
53 Fury seizes me when I think of the wicked,
because they abandon your Torah.
54 Your laws have become my songs
wherever I make my home.
55 I remember your name, Adonai, at night;
and I observe your Torah.
56 This [comfort] has come to me,
because I observe your precepts.
ח (Het)
57 Adonai, I say that my task
is to observe your words.
58 I beg your favor with my whole heart;
show pity to me, in keeping with your promise.
59 I thought about my ways
and turned my feet toward your instruction.
60 I hurry, I don’t delay,
to observe your mitzvot.
61 Even when the cords of the wicked close around me,
I don’t forget your Torah.
62 At midnight I rise to give you thanks
because of your righteous rulings.
63 I am a friend of all who fear you,
of those who observe your precepts.
64 The earth, Adonai, is full of your grace;
teach me your laws.
ט (Tet)
65 You have treated your servant well,
Adonai, in keeping with your word.
66 Teach me good judgment and knowledge,
because I trust in your mitzvot.
67 Before I was humbled, I used to go astray;
but now I observe your word.
68 You are good, and you do good;
teach me your laws.
69 The arrogant are slandering me,
but I will wholeheartedly keep your precepts.
70 Their hearts are as thick as fat,
but I take delight in your Torah.
71 It is for my good that I have been humbled;
it was so that I would learn your laws.
72 The Torah you have spoken means more to me
than a fortune in gold and silver.
49 (0) For the leader. A psalm of the descendants of Korach:
2 (1) Hear this, all you peoples!
Listen, everyone living on earth,
3 (2) regardless of whether low or high,
regardless of whether rich or poor!
4 (3) My mouth is about to speak wisdom;
my heart’s deepest thoughts will give understanding.
5 (4) I will listen with care to [God’s] parable,
I will set my enigma to the music of the lyre.
6 (5) Why should I fear when the days bring trouble,
when the evil of my pursuers surrounds me,
7 (6) the evil of those who rely on their wealth
and boast how rich they are?
8 (7) No one can ever redeem his brother
or give God a ransom for him ,
9 (8) because the price for him is too high
(leave the idea completely alone!)
10 (9) to have him live on eternally
and never see the pit.
11 (10) For he can see that wise men will die,
likewise the fool and the brute will perish
and leave their wealth to others.
12 (11) They think their homes will last forever,
their dwellings through all generations;
they give their own names to their estates.
13 (12) But people, even rich ones, will live only briefly;
then, like animals, they will die.
14 (13) This is the manner of life of the foolish
and those who come after, approving their words. (Selah)
15 (14) Like sheep, they are destined for Sh’ol;
death will be their shepherd.
The upright will rule them in the morning;
and their forms will waste away in Sh’ol,
until they need no dwelling.
16 (15) But God will redeem me from Sh’ol’s control,
because he will receive me. (Selah)
17 (16) Don’t be afraid when someone gets rich,
when the wealth of his family grows.
18 (17) For when he dies, he won’t take it with him;
his wealth will not go down after him.
19 (18) True, while he lived, he thought himself happy —
people praise you when you do well for yourself —
20 (19) but he will join his ancestors’ generations
and never again see light.
21 (20) People, even rich ones, can fail to grasp
that, like animals, they will die.
53 (0) For the leader. On machalat. A maskil of David:
2 (1) A brutish fool tells himself,
“There isn’t any God.”
Such people are depraved, all their deeds are vile,
not one of them does what is good.
3 (2) God looks out from heaven
upon the human race
to see if even one is wise,
if even one seeks God.
4 (3) Every one of them is unclean,
altogether corrupt;
not one of them does what is good,
not a single one.
5 (4) Won’t these evildoers ever learn?
They devour my people
as if they were eating bread,
and they never call on God!
6 (5) They will be gripped with terror,
even though now they are not afraid;
for God will scatter the bones
of him who is besieging you.
You are putting them to shame,
because God has rejected them.
7 (6) If only salvation for Isra’el
would come out of Tziyon!
When God restores his people’s fortunes,
what joy for Ya‘akov! what gladness for Isra’el!
29 Iyov went on speaking:
30 “But now those younger than I
hold me in derision,
men whose fathers I wouldn’t even
have put with the dogs that guarded my sheep.
2 What use to me was the strength in their hands?
All their vigor had left them.
16 “So now my life is ebbing away,
days of grief have seized me.
17 At night pain pierces me to the bone,
so that I never rest.
18 My clothes are disfigured by the force [of my disease];
they choke me like the collar of my coat.
19 [God] has thrown me into the mud;
I have become like dust and ashes.
20 “I call out to you [God], but you don’t answer me;
I stand up to plead, but you just look at me.
21 You have turned cruelly against me;
with your powerful hand you keep persecuting me.
22 You snatch me up on the wind and make me ride it;
you toss me about in the tempest.
23 For I know that you will bring me to death,
the house assigned to everyone living.
24 “Surely [God] wouldn’t strike at a ruin,
if in one’s calamity one cried out to him for help.
25 Didn’t I weep for those who were in trouble?
Didn’t I grieve for the needy?
26 Yet when I hoped for good, what came was bad;
when I expected light, what came was darkness.
27 My insides are in turmoil; they can’t find rest;
days of misery confront me.
28 I go about in sunless gloom,
I rise in the assembly and cry for help.
29 I have become a brother to jackals
and a companion of ostriches.
30 My skin is black and falling off me,
and my bones are burning with heat.
31 So my lyre is tuned for mourning,
my pipe to the voice of those who weep.
19 Then some unbelieving Jews came from Antioch and Iconium. They won over the crowds, stoned Sha’ul and dragged him outside the city, thinking he was dead. 20 But as the talmidim gathered around him, he got up and went back into the town. The next day, he left with Bar-Nabba for Derbe.
21 After proclaiming the Good News in that city and making many people into talmidim, they returned to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch, 22 strengthening the talmidim, encouraging them to remain true to the faith, and reminding them that it is through many hardships that we must enter the Kingdom of God. 23 After appointing elders for them in every congregation, Sha’ul and Bar-Nabba, with prayer and fasting, committed them to the Lord in whom they had put their trust.
24 Passing through Pisidia, they came to Pamphylia. 25 After speaking the message in Perga, they came down to Attalia; and from there, they sailed back to Antioch, 26 the place where they had been handed over to the care of God for the work which they had now completed.
27 When they arrived, they gathered the Messianic community together and reported what God had done through them, that he had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles. 28 And they stayed for some time there with the talmidim.
11 There was a man who had fallen sick. His name was El‘azar, and he came from Beit-Anyah, the village where Miryam and her sister Marta lived. 2 (This Miryam, whose brother El‘azar had become sick, is the one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.) 3 So the sisters sent a message to Yeshua, “Lord, the man you love is sick.” 4 On hearing it, he said, “This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory, so that the Son of God may receive glory through it.”
5 Yeshua loved Marta and her sister and El‘azar; 6 so when he heard he was sick, first he stayed where he was two more days; 7 then, after this, he said to the talmidim, “Let’s go back to Y’hudah.” 8 The talmidim replied, “Rabbi! Just a short while ago the Judeans were out to stone you — and you want to go back there?” 9 Yeshua answered, “Aren’t there twelve hours of daylight? If a person walks during daylight, he doesn’t stumble; because he sees the light of this world. 10 But if a person walks at night, he does stumble; because he has no light with him.”
11 Yeshua said these things, and afterwards he said to the talmidim, “Our friend El‘azar has gone to sleep; but I am going in order to wake him up.” 12 The talmidim said to him, “Lord, if he has gone to sleep, he will get better.” 13 Now Yeshua had used the phrase to speak about El‘azar’s death, but they thought he had been talking literally about sleep. 14 So Yeshua told them in plain language, “El‘azar has died. 15 And for your sakes, I am glad that I wasn’t there, so that you may come to trust. But let’s go to him.” 16 Then T’oma (the name means “twin”) said to his fellow talmidim, “Yes, we should go, so that we can die with him!”
Copyright © 1998 by David H. Stern. All rights reserved.