Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

13 Adonai said to me, “Go, buy yourself a linen loincloth, and wrap it around your body; but don’t soften it in water.” ² So I bought a loincloth, as Adonai had said, and put it on.

³ Then the word of Adonai came to me a second time: ⁴ “Take the loincloth you bought and are wearing, get up, go to Parah, and hide it there in a hole in the rock.” ⁵ So I went and hid it in Parah, as Adonai had ordered me.

⁶ A long time afterwards, Adonai said to me, “Get up, go to Parah, and recover the loincloth I ordered you to hide there.” ⁷ So I went to Parah and dug up the loincloth; but when I took it from the place where I had hidden it, I saw that it was ruined and useless for anything. ⁸ Then the word of Adonai came to me: ⁹ “Here is what Adonai says: ‘This is how I will ruin what makes Y’hudah so proud and Yerushalayim so very proud: ¹⁰ I will ruin this evil people, who refuse to hear my words and live according to their own stubborn inclinations, who go after other gods to serve and worship them. They will be like this loincloth, which is useless for anything. ¹¹ For just as a loincloth clings to a man’s body, I made the whole house of Isra’el and the whole house of Y’hudah cling to me,’ says Adonai, ‘so that they could be my people, building me a name and becoming for me a source of praise and honor. But they would not listen.

13 It was just before the festival of Pesach, and Yeshua knew that the time had come for him to pass from this world to the Father. Having loved his own people in the world, he loved them to the end. ² They were at supper, and the Adversary had already put the desire to betray him into the heart of Y’hudah Ben-Shim‘on from K’riot. ³ Yeshua was aware that the Father had put everything in his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God. ⁴ So he rose from the table, removed his outer garments and wrapped a towel around his waist. ⁵ Then he poured some water into a basin and began to wash the feet of the talmidim and wipe them off with the towel wrapped around him.

⁶ He came to Shim‘on Kefa, who said to him, “Lord! You are washing my feet?” ⁷ Yeshua answered him, “You don’t understand yet what I am doing, but in time you will understand.” ⁸ “No!” said Kefa, “You will never wash my feet!” Yeshua answered him, “If I don’t wash you, you have no share with me.” ⁹ “Lord,” Shim‘on Kefa replied, “not only my feet, but my hands and head too!” ¹⁰ Yeshua said to him, “A man who has had a bath doesn’t need to wash, except his feet — his body is already clean. And you people are clean, but not all of you.” ¹¹ (He knew who was betraying him; this is why he said, “Not all of you are clean.”)

¹² After he had washed their feet, taken back his clothes and returned to the table, he said to them, “Do you understand what I have done to you? ¹³ You call me ‘Rabbi’ and ‘Lord,’ and you are right, because I am. ¹⁴ Now if I, the Lord and Rabbi, have washed your feet, you also should wash each other’s feet. ¹⁵ For I have set you an example, so that you may do as I have done to you. ¹⁶ Yes, indeed! I tell you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor is an emissary greater than the one who sent him. ¹⁷ If you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.