Book of Common Prayer
41 (0) For the leader. A psalm of David:
2 (1) How blessed are those who care for the poor!
When calamity comes, Adonai will save them.
3 (2) Adonai will preserve them, keep them alive,
and make them happy in the land.
You will not hand them over
to the whims of their enemies.
4 (3) Adonai sustains them on their sickbed;
when they lie ill, you make them recover.
5 (4) I said, “Adonai, have pity on me!
Heal me, for I have sinned against you!”
6 (5) My enemies say the worst about me:
“When will he die and his name disappear?”
7 (6) When they come to see me they speak insincerely,
their hearts meanwhile gathering falsehoods;
then they go out and spread bad reports.
8 (7) All who hate me whisper together against me,
imagining the worst about me.
9 (8) “A fatal disease has attached itself to him;
now that he lies ill, he will never get up.”
10 (9) Even my close friend, on whom I relied,
who shared my table, has turned against me.
11 (10) But you, Adonai, have pity on me,
put me on my feet, so I can pay them back.
12 (11) I will know you are pleased with me
if my enemy doesn’t defeat me.
13 (12) You uphold me because of my innocence
you establish me in your presence forever.
14 (13) Blessed be Adonai the God of Isra’el
from eternity past to eternity future.
Amen. Amen.
52 (0) For the leader. A maskil of David, 2 when Do’eg from Edom came and told Sha’ul, “David has arrived at the house of Achimelekh”:
3 (1) Why do you boast of your evil, you tyrant,
when God’s mercy is present every day?
4 (2) Your tongue, as sharp as a razor,
plots destruction and works deception.
5 (3) You love evil more than good,
lies rather than speaking uprightly. (Selah)
6 (4) You love all words that eat people up,
you deceitful tongue!
7 (5) This is why God will strike you down,
seize you, pluck you from your tent
and uproot you from the land of the living. (Selah)
8 (6) The righteous will see and be awestruck;
they will jeer at him, saying,
9 (7) “This fellow would not make God his refuge,
but trusted in his own great wealth,
relying on his evil plots.”
10 (8) But I am like a leafy olive tree
in the house of God;
I put my trust in the grace of God
forever and ever.
11 (9) I will praise you forever for what you have done,
and I will put my hope in your name;
for this is what is good
in the presence of your faithful.
44 (0) For the leader. By the descendants of Korach. A maskil:
2 (1) God, we heard it with our ears;
our fathers told us about it —
a deed which you did in their days,
back in days of old.
3 (2) With your hand you drove out nations
to plant them in [the land],
you crushed peoples
to make room for them.
4 (3) For not by their own swords
did they conquer the land,
nor did their own arm
give them victory;
rather, it was your right hand,
your arm and the light of your face;
because you favored them.
5 (4) God, you are my king;
command complete victory for Ya‘akov.
6 (5) Through you we pushed away our foes,
through your name we trampled down our assailants.
7 (6) For I don’t rely on my bow,
nor can my sword give me victory.
8 (7) No, you saved us from our adversaries;
you put to shame those who hate us.
9 (8) We will boast in our God all day
and give thanks to your name forever. (Selah)
10 (9) Yet now you have thrust us aside and disgraced us;
you don’t march out with our armies.
11 (10) You make us retreat from the adversary,
and those who hate us plunder us at will.
12 (11) You have handed us over like sheep to be eaten
and scattered us among the nations.
13 (12) You sell your people for a pittance,
you don’t even profit on the sale.
14 (13) You make us an object for our neighbors to mock,
one of scorn and derision to those around us.
15 (14) You make us a byword among the nations;
the peoples jeer at us, shaking their heads.
16 (15) All day long my disgrace is on my mind,
and shame has covered my face
17 (16) at the sound of those who revile and insult,
at the sight of the enemy bent on revenge.
18 (17) Though all this came on us, we did not forget you;
we have not been false to your covenant;
19 (18) Our hearts have not turned back,
and our steps did not turn away from your path,
20 (19) though you pressed us into a lair of jackals
and covered us with death-dark gloom.
21 (20) If we had forgotten the name of our God
or spread out our hands to a foreign god,
22 (21) wouldn’t God have discovered this,
since he knows the secrets of the heart?
23 (22) For your sake we are put to death all day long,
we are considered sheep to be slaughtered.
24 (23) Wake up, Adonai! Why are you asleep?
Rouse yourself! Don’t thrust us off forever.
25 (24) Why are you turning your face away,
forgetting our pain and misery?
26 (25) For we are lying flat in the dust,
our bodies cling to the ground.
27 (26) Get up, and come to help us!
For the sake of your grace, redeem us!
32 So these three men stopped trying to answer Iyov, because he remained convinced of his own righteousness.
2 But then the anger of Elihu the son of Barakh’el the Buzi, from the family of Ram, blazed up against Iyov for thinking he was right and God wrong. 3 His anger also blazed up against his three friends, because they had found no answer to Iyov but condemned him anyway. 4 Elihu had waited to speak to Iyov because they were older than he; 5 however, when Elihu saw that these three had no answer, his anger flared up. 6 Elihu the son of Barakh’el the Buzi said:
“I am young, and you are old,
so I held back from telling you my opinion.
7 I said, ‘Age should speak;
an abundance of years should teach wisdom.’
8 But it is the spirit in a person, the breath from Shaddai,
that gives him understanding —
9 it isn’t [only] the great who are wise
or the aged who know how to judge.
10 Therefore, I say, listen to me;
I too will express my opinion.
19 Yes, my insides feel like new wine under pressure,
like new wineskins ready to burst.
20 I must speak, to find relief;
I will open my lips and answer.
21 I will show no favor to anyone,
and I will flatter no one;
22 I don’t know how to flatter;
if I did, my maker would soon put an end to me.
33 “So, Iyov, please, hear my speech;
listen to all my words.
19 “He is also warned by pain when in bed,
when all his bones are hurting;
20 so that he detests bread
as well as richer food.
21 His flesh wastes away, till one can’t stand to look;
his bones protrude and become unsightly.
22 His soul comes close to the pit
and his life to those who bring death.
23 “If there is for him an angel,
a mediator, one among a thousand,
who can vouch for the man’s uprightness;
24 then [God] is gracious to him and says,
‘Redeem him from going down to the pit;
I have found a ransom.’
25 His flesh becomes fresher than that of a child,
he returns to the days of his youth.
26 He prays to God and is accepted by him,
so that he sees [God’s] face with joy,
and [God] repays the man for his righteousness.
27 He declares before everyone, ‘I sinned;
I perverted what was right,
and it gained me nothing.
28 [God] redeemed me from going into the pit,
and now my life sees light.’
44 The next Shabbat, nearly the whole city gathered together to hear the message about the Lord; 45 but when the Jews who had not believed saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy and spoke up against what Sha’ul was saying and insulted him. 46 However, Sha’ul and Bar-Nabba answered boldly: “It was necessary that God’s word be spoken first to you. But since you are rejecting it and are judging yourselves unworthy of eternal life — why, we’re turning to the Goyim! 47 For that is what Adonai has ordered us to do:
‘I have set you as a light for the Goyim,
to be for deliverance to the ends of the earth.’ ”[a]
48 The Gentiles were very happy to hear this. They honored the message about the Lord, and as many as had been appointed to eternal life came to trust. 49 And the message about the Lord was carried throughout the whole region.
50 But the unbelieving Jews stirred up the women ‘God-fearers’ of high social standing and the leading men of the city, and they organized persecution against Sha’ul and Bar-Nabba and expelled them from their district. 51 However, Sha’ul and Bar-Nabba shook off the dust of their feet against them and went on to Iconium; 52 and the talmidim were filled with joy and with the Ruach HaKodesh.
19 Again there was a split among the Judeans because of what he said. 20 Many of them said, “He has a demon!” and “He’s meshugga! Why do you listen to him?” 21 Others said, “These are not the deeds of a man who is demonized — how can a demon open blind people’s eyes?”
22 Then came Hanukkah in Yerushalayim. It was winter, 23 and Yeshua was walking around inside the Temple area, in Shlomo’s Colonnade. 24 So the Judeans surrounded him and said to him, “How much longer are you going to keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us publicly!” 25 Yeshua answered them, “I have already told you, and you don’t trust me. The works I do in my Father’s name testify on my behalf, 26 but the reason you don’t trust is that you are not included among my sheep. 27 My sheep listen to my voice, I recognize them, they follow me, 28 and I give them eternal life. They will absolutely never be destroyed, and no one will snatch them from my hands. 29 My Father, who gave them to me, is greater than all; and no one can snatch them from the Father’s hands. 30 I and the Father are one.”
Copyright © 1998 by David H. Stern. All rights reserved.