Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

²⁸ On the day when Adonai spoke to Moshe in the land of Egypt, (iii) ²⁹ he said, “I am Adonai. Tell Pharaoh, king of Egypt, everything I say to you.”

³⁰ Moshe answered Adonai, “Look, I’m such a poor speaker that Pharaoh won’t listen to me.”

7 But Adonai said to Moshe, “I have put you in the place of God to Pharaoh, and Aharon your brother will be your prophet. ² You are to say everything I order you, and Aharon your brother is to speak to Pharaoh and tell him to let the people of Isra’el leave his land. ³ But I will make him hardhearted. Even though I will increase my signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, ⁴ Pharaoh will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and bring my armies, my people the sons of Isra’el, out of the land of Egypt with great acts of judgment. ⁵ Then, when I stretch out my hand over Egypt and bring the people of Isra’el out from among them, the Egyptians will know that I am Adonai.”

⁶ Moshe and Aharon did exactly what Adonai ordered them to do. ⁷ Moshe was eighty years old and Aharon eighty-three when they spoke to Pharaoh.

(iv) ⁸ Adonai said to Moshe and Aharon, ⁹ “When Pharaoh says to you, ‘Perform a miracle,’ tell Aharon to take his staff and throw it down in front of Pharaoh, so that it can become a snake.” ¹⁰ Moshe and Aharon went in to Pharaoh and did this, as Adonai had ordered — Aharon threw down his staff in front of Pharaoh and his servants, and it turned into a snake. ¹¹ But Pharaoh in turn called for the sages and sorcerers; and they too, the magicians of Egypt, did the same thing, making use of their secret arts. ¹² Each one threw his staff down, and they turned into snakes. But Aharon’s staff swallowed up theirs. ¹³ Nevertheless, Pharaoh was made hardhearted; and he didn’t listen to them, as Adonai had said would happen.

7 The P’rushim and some of the Torah-teachers who had come from Yerushalayim gathered together with Yeshua ² and saw that some of his talmidim ate with ritually unclean hands, that is, without doing n’tilat-yadayim. ³ (For the P’rushim, and indeed all the Judeans, holding fast to the Tradition of the Elders, do not eat unless they have given their hands a ceremonial washing. ⁴ Also, when they come from the marketplace they do not eat unless they have rinsed their hands up to the wrist; and they adhere to many other traditions, such as washing cups, pots and bronze vessels.)

⁵ The P’rushim and the Torah-teachers asked him, “Why don’t your talmidim live in accordance with the Tradition of the Elders, but instead eat with ritually unclean hands?” ⁶ Yeshua answered them, “Yesha‘yahu was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites — as it is written,

⁸ “You depart from God’s command and hold onto human tradition. ⁹ Indeed,” he said to them, “you have made a fine art of departing from God’s command in order to keep your tradition! ¹⁰ For Moshe said, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’^[b] and ‘Anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death.’^{[c] 11} But you say, ‘If someone says to his father or mother, “I have promised as a korban” ’ ” (that is, as a gift to God) “ ‘ “what I might have used to help you,” ’ ¹² then you no longer let him do anything for his father or mother. ¹³ Thus, with your tradition which you had handed down to you, you nullify the Word of God! And you do other things like this.”