Book of Common Prayer

49 A psalm for Asaph. The God of gods, the Lord hath spoken: and he hath called the earth. From the rising of the sun, to the going down thereof:

² Out of Sion the loveliness of his beauty.

³ God shall come manifestly: our God shall come, and shall not keep silence. A fire shall burn before him: and a mighty tempest shall be round about him.

⁴ He shall call heaven from above, and the earth, to judge his people.

⁵ Gather ye together his saints to him: who set his covenant before sacrifices.

⁶ And the heavens shall declare his justice: for God is judge.

⁷ Hear, O my people, and I will speak: O Israel, and I will testify to thee: I am God, thy God.

⁸ I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices: and thy burnt offerings are always in my sight.

⁹ I will not take calves out of thy house: nor he goats out of thy flocks.

¹⁰ For all the beasts of the woods are mine: the cattle on the hills, and the oxen.

¹¹ I know all the fowls of the air: and with me is the beauty of the field.

¹² If I should be hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is mine, and the fulness thereof.

¹³ Shall I eat the flesh of bullocks? or shall I drink the blood of goats?

¹⁴ Offer to God the sacrifice of praise: and pay thy vows to the most High.

¹⁵ And call upon me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me.

¹⁶ But to the sinner God hath said: Why dost thou declare my justices, and take my covenant in thy mouth?

¹⁷ Seeing thou hast hated discipline: and hast cast my words behind thee.

¹⁸ If thou didst see a thief thou didst run with him: and with adulterers thou hast been a partaker.

¹⁹ Thy mouth hath abounded with evil, and thy tongue framed deceits.

²⁰ Sitting thou didst speak against thy brother, and didst lay a scandal against thy mother's son:

²¹ These things hast thou done, and I was silent. Thou thoughtest unjustly that I should be like to thee: but I will reprove thee, and set before thy face.

²² Understand these things, you that forget God; lest he snatch you away, and there be none to deliver you.

²³ The sacrifice of praise shall glorify me: and there is the way by which I will shew him the salvation of God.

53 Unto the end, In verses, understanding for David.

² When the men of Ziph had come and said to Saul: Is not David hidden with us?

³ Save me, O God, by thy name, and judge me in thy strength.

⁴ O God, hear my prayer: give ear to the words of my mouth.

⁵ For strangers have risen up against me; and the mighty have sought after my soul: and they have not set God before their eyes.

⁶ For behold God is my helper: and the Lord is the protector of my soul.

⁷ Turn back the evils upon my enemies; and cut them off in thy truth.

⁸ I will freely sacrifice to thee, and will give praise, O God, to thy name: because it is good:

⁹ For thou hast delivered me out of all trouble: and my eye hath looked down upon my enemies.

6 Then king Darius gave orders, and they searched in the library of the books that were laid up in Babylon,

² And there was found in Ecbatana, which is a castle in the province of Media, a book in which this record was written.

³ In the first year of Cyrus the king: Cyrus the king decreed, that the house of God should be built, which is in Jerusalem, in the place where they may offer sacrifices, and that they lay the foundations that may support the height of threescore cubits, and the breadth of threescore cubits,

⁴ Three rows of unpolished stones, and so rows of new timber: and the charges shall be given out of the king's house.

⁵ And also let the golden and silver vessels of the temple of God, which Nabuchodonosor took out of the temple of Jerusalem, and brought to Babylon, be restored, and carried back to the temple of Jerusalem to their place, which also were placed in the temple of God.

⁶ Now therefore Thathanai, governor of the country beyond the river, Stharbuzanai, and your counsellors the Apharsachites, who are beyond the river, depart far from them,

⁷ And let that temple of God be built by the governor of the Jews, and by their ancients, that they may build that house of God in its place.

⁸ I also have commanded what must be done by those ancients of the Jews, that the house of God may be built, to wit, that of the king's chest, that is, of the tribute that is paid out of the country beyond the river, the charges be diligently given to those men, lest the work be hindered.

⁹ And if it shall be necessary, let calves also, and lambs, and kids, for holocausts to the God of heaven, wheat, salt, wine, and oil, according to the custom of the priests that are in Jerusalem, be given them day by day, that there be no complaint in any thing.

¹⁰ And let them offer oblations to the God of heaven, and pray for the life of the king, and of his children.

¹¹ And I have made a decree: That if any whosoever, shall alter this commandment, a beam be taken from his house. and set up, and he be nailed upon it, and his house be confiscated.

¹² And may the God, that hath caused his name to dwell there, destroy all kingdoms, and the people that shall put out their hand to resist, and to destroy the house of God, that is in Jerusalem. I Darius have made the decree, which I will have diligently complied with.

¹³ So then Thathanai, governor of the country beyond the river, and Stharbuzanai, and his counsellors diligently executed what Darius the king had commanded.

¹⁴ And the ancients of the Jews built and prospered according to the prophecy of Aggeus the prophet, and of Zacharias the son of Addo: and they built and finished, by the commandment of the God of Israel, and by the commandment of Cyrus, and Darius, and Artaxerxes kings of the Persians.

¹⁵ And they were finishing this house of God, until the third day of the month of Adar, which was in the sixth year of the reign of king Darius.

¹⁶ And the children of Israel, the priests and the Levites, and the rest of the children of the captivity kept the dedication of the house of God with joy.

¹⁷ And they offered at the dedication of the house of God, a, hundred calves, two hundred rams, four hundred lambs, and for a sin offering for all Israel twelve he goats, according to the number of the tribes of Israel.

¹⁸ And they set the priests in their divisions, and the Levites in their courses over the works of God in Jerusalem, as it is written in the book of Moses.

¹⁹ And the children of Israel of the captivity kept the phase, on the fourteenth day of the first month.

²⁰ For all the priests and the Levites were purified as one man: all were clear to kill the phase for all the children of the captivity, and for their brethren the priests, and themselves.

²¹ And the children of Israel that were returned from captivity, and all that had separated themselves from the filthiness of the nations of the earth to them, to seek the Lord the God of Israel, did eat.

²² And they kept the feast of unleavened bread seven days with joy, for the Lord had made them joyful, and had turned the heart of the king of Assyria to them, that he should help their hands in the work of the house of the Lord the God of Israel.

5 And I saw in the right hand of him that sat on the throne, a book written within and without, sealed with seven seals.

² And I saw a strong angel, proclaiming with a loud voice: Who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof?

³ And no man was able, neither in heaven, nor on earth, nor under the earth, to open the book, nor to look on it.

⁴ And I wept much, because no man was found worthy to open the book, nor to see it.

⁵ And one of the ancients said to me: Weep not; behold the lion of the tribe of Juda, the root of David, hath prevailed to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof.

⁶ And I saw: and behold in the midst of the throne and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the ancients, a Lamb standing as it were slain, having seven horns and seven eyes: which are the seven Spirits of God, sent forth into all the earth.

⁷ And he came and took the book out of the right hand of him that sat on the throne.

⁸ And when he had opened the book, the four living creatures, and the four and twenty ancients fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints:

⁹ And they sung a new canticle, saying: Thou art worthy, O Lord, to take the book, and to open the seals thereof; because thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God, in thy blood, out of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation.

¹⁰ And hast made us to our God a kingdom and priests, and we shall reign on the earth.

¹⁰ And his disciples came and said to him: Why speakest thou to them in parables?

¹¹ Who answered and said to them: Because to you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven: but to them it is not given.

¹² For he that hath, to him shall be given, and he shall abound: but he that hath not, from him shall be taken away that also which he hath.

¹³ Therefore do I speak to them in parables: because seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand.

¹⁴ And the prophecy of Isaias is fulfilled in them, who saith: By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand: and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive.

¹⁵ For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them.

¹⁶ But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear.

¹⁷ For, amen, I say to you, many prophets and just men have desired to see the things that you see, and have not seen them, and to hear the things that you hear and have not heard them.