Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

¹² Ashrei is the Goy whose Elohav is Hashem; and HaAm whom He hath chosen for His own nachalah.

¹³ Hashem looketh down from Shomayim: He beholdeth kol Bnei HaAdam.

¹⁴ From the place of His habitation He looketh upon kol yoshvei ha’aretz.

¹⁵ He formeth their hearts yachad; He considereth all their ma’asim (deeds).

¹⁶ There is no melech saved by the multitude of an army; a gibbor is not delivered by rav ko’ach.

¹⁷ A sus is a sheker (vain, false thing) for teshu’ah (deliverance, salvation, safety); neither shall it save any by its great strength.

¹⁸ Hinei, the eye of Hashem is upon them that fear Him, upon them that hope in His chesed;

¹⁹ To deliver their nefesh from mavet (death), and to keep them alive in ra’av (famine).

²⁰ Our nefesh waiteth for Hashem; He is ezrienu (our help) and moginneinu (our shield).

²¹ For libeinu (our heart) shall rejoice in Him, because we have trusted b’Shem Kadsho (in His holy Name).

²² Let Thy chesed, Hashem, be upon us, even as we have hoped in Thee.

6 There is a ra’ah which I have seen under the shemesh, and it is a great weight upon the adam;

² An ish to whom HaElohim hath given osher (riches), nekhasim (possessions), and kavod (honor), so that he wanteth nothing for his nefesh of all that he desireth, yet HaElohim giveth him not shlitah (empowerment) to have enjoyment thereof, but an ish nochri (stranger) hath the enjoyment thereof; this is hevel, and it is a grievous ill.

³ If an ish beget a hundredfold, and live shanim rabbot, so that rav be the yamim of his shanim, and his nefesh be not filled with hatovah, and also that he have no kevurah (grave); I say, that a nefel (stillborn) is better than he.

⁴ For he cometh in with hevel, and departeth in choshech, and shmo shall be shrouded with choshech.

⁵ Moreover though he hath not seen the shemesh, nor known any thing, this hath more nakhat (rest, quietness) than the other.

⁶ Yea, though he live an elef shanim twice over, yet hath he seen no tovah. Do not all go to mekom echad?

7 And the Kohen Gadol said, "Are these things so?"

² And Stefanos said, "Achim and Avot, hear me! Elohei Hakavod appeared to Avraham Avinu while he was in Mesopotamia before he lived in Charan [TEHILLIM 29:3; BERESHIS 11:31; 15:7]

³ “And Hashem said to Avram, ‘Depart from your country and from your people and come to the land which I shall show you.') [Gn 12:1; 48:4]

⁴ "Then having departed from the land of the Chaldeans, he settled in Charan. And from there, after the mavet of his Av, he was settled by Hashem here in this land in which we now are living. [BERESHIS 12:5]

⁵ "And Hashem did not give to him a nachalah (inheritance) in it nor AD MIDRACH KAF REGEL ("even enough to put your foot on" DEVARIM 2:5); and yet, even when he had no ben, the havtachah (promise) of Hashem to him was ES HAARETZ HAZOT E’TEN ("This land I will give") to him and to his zera (seed) after him. [DEVARIM 2:5; BERESHIS 12:7; 13:15; 17:8; 26:3; 48:4]

⁶ "And Hashem spoke thus, that GER YIHIYEH ZAR’ACHA ("your seed will be strangers (aliens)") in another’s [i.e., foreign] land and them they will enslave and they will mistreat them ARBA ME’OT SHANAH ("four hundred years"). [Gn 15:13f; Ex 1:8 11; 12:40]

⁷ "V’GAM ES HAGOY ASHER YA’AVODU DAN ANOCHI ("And whatever nation to which they shall be in bondage I myself will judge" said Hashem, VACHAREI KHEN YETZU ("And after that they will come out") and serve me in this place." [BERESHIS 15:13,14; SHEMOT 3:12]

⁸ "And he gave to him bris milah. And thus Avraham Avinu became the father of Yitzchak and he did his bris milah on the Yom HaShemini and Yitzchak became the father of Ya’akov and Ya’akov of the Sheneym Asar HaAvot. [BERESHIS 17:9-14; 21:2-4; 25:26; 29:31-35; 30:5-13, 17-24; 35:16-26]