Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

¹⁶ “‘But they and our ancestors were arrogant;
they stiffened their necks and ignored your mitzvot;
¹⁷ they refused to listen and paid no attention
to the wonders you had done among them.
No, they stiffened their necks, and in their rebellion
appointed a leader to return them to their slavery.
But because you are a God of forgiveness,
merciful, full of compassion,
slow to grow angry and full of grace,
you did not abandon them.
¹⁸ Even when they cast themselves a metal calf,
saying of it, “This is your god
that brought you up from Egypt,”
and committing other gross provocations;
¹⁹ still, you, in your great compassion,
did not abandon them in the desert.
The column of cloud did not leave them by day;
it kept leading them along the way.
By night the column of fire
kept showing them light and the path to take.
²⁰ You also gave your good Spirit to teach them,
did not withhold man from their mouths
and provided them water to quench their thirst.
²¹ Yes, forty years you sustained them in the desert;
they lacked nothing —
their clothes did not wear out;
their feet did not swell up.

²² “‘You gave them kingdoms and peoples;
you even gave them extra land,
so that they took possession of the land of Sichon,
also the land of the king of Heshbon
and the land of ‘Og king of Bashan.
²³ You made their children as numerous
as the countless stars in the sky.

“‘Then you brought them into the land
about which you had said to their fathers
that they should go in and take possession of it.
²⁴ So the children went in and possessed the land,
as you subdued ahead of them
the Kena‘ani living in the land,
and handed them over to them,
along with their kings and the peoples of the land,
for them to do with as they wished.
²⁵ They took fortified cities and fertile land,
possessed houses full of all kinds of good things,
dug-out cisterns, vineyards, olive groves,
fruit trees in plenty;
so they ate their fill and grew robust,
luxuriating in your great goodness.

²⁶ “‘Yet they disobeyed and rebelled against you,
throwing your Torah behind their backs.
They killed your prophets for warning them
that they should return to you
and committed other gross provocations.
²⁷ So you handed them over to the power
of their adversaries, who oppressed them.
Yet in the time of their trouble,
when they cried out to you,
you heard from heaven, and in keeping
with your great compassion,
you gave them saviors to save them
from the power of their adversaries.
²⁸ But as soon as they had gotten some relief,
they went back to do evil before you.
So you left them in the power of their enemies,
who came down hard on them.
Yet when they returned and cried out to you,
you heard from heaven many times
and saved them, according to your compassion.
²⁹ You warned them, in order to bring them back
to your Torah; yet they were arrogant.
They paid no attention to your mitzvot,
but sinned against your rulings,
which, if a person does them,
he will have life through them.
However, they stubbornly turned their shoulders,
stiffened their necks and refused to hear.
³⁰ Many years you extended them mercy
and warned them by your Spirit through your prophets;
yet they would not listen.
Therefore you handed them over
to the peoples of the lands.
³¹ Even so, in your great compassion,
you didn’t completely destroy them;
nor did you abandon them,
for you are a compassionate and merciful God.