Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

9 In the first year of Daryavesh the son of Achashverosh, a Mede by birth who was made king over the kingdom of the Kasdim — ² in the first year of his reign, I, Dani’el, was reading the Scriptures and thinking about the number of years which Adonai had told Yirmeyah the prophet would be the period of Yerushalayim’s desolation, seventy years. ³ I turned to Adonai, God, to seek an answer, pleading with him in prayer, with fasting, sackcloth and ashes. ⁴ I prayed to Adonai my God and made this confession:

“Please, Adonai, great and fearsome God, who keeps his covenant and extends grace to those who love him and observe his mitzvot! ⁵ We have sinned, done wrong, acted wickedly, rebelled and turned away from your mitzvot and rulings. ⁶ We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our leaders, our ancestors and to all the people of the land.

⁷ “To you, Adonai, belongs righteousness; but to us today belongs shame — to us, the men of Y’hudah, the inhabitants of Yerushalayim and all Isra’el, including those nearby and those far away, throughout all the countries where you have driven them; because they broke faith with you. ⁸ Yes, Adonai, shame falls on us, our kings, our leaders and our ancestors; because we sinned against you. ⁹ It is for Adonai our God to show compassion and forgiveness, because we rebelled against him. ¹⁰ We didn’t listen to the voice of Adonai our God, so that we could live by his laws, which he presented to us through his servants the prophets. ¹¹ Yes, all Isra’el flouted your Torah and turned away, unwilling to listen to your voice. Therefore the curse and oath written in the Torah of Moshe the servant of God was poured out on us, because we sinned against him. ¹² He carried out the threats he spoke against us and against our judges who judged us, by bringing upon us disaster so great that under all of heaven, nothing has been done like what has been done to Yerushalayim. ¹³ As written in the Torah of Moshe, this whole disaster came upon us. Yet we did not appease Adonai our God by renouncing our wrongdoing and discerning your truth. ¹⁴ So Adonai watched for the right moment to bring this disaster upon us, for Adonai our God was just in everything he did, yet we didn’t listen when he spoke.

⁵ And this is the message which we have heard from him and proclaim to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in him — none!

⁶ If we claim to have fellowship with him while we are walking in the darkness, we are lying and not living out the truth. ⁷ But if we are walking in the light, as he is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other, and the blood of his Son Yeshua purifies us from all sin.

⁸ If we claim not to have sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us. ⁹ If we acknowledge our sins, then, since he is trustworthy and just, he will forgive them and purify us from all wrongdoing.

¹⁰ If we claim we have not been sinning, we are making him out to be a liar, and his Word is not in us.