◀ All Reading Plans / Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous) / Psalm 119:89-96 (The law of God gives life); Jeremiah 36:1-10 (The scroll is read in the temple); 1 Corinthians 14:1-12 (The assembly’s gifts) (New English Translation)

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January 27, 2025

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Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Daily Bible readings that follow the church liturgical year, with sequential stories told across multiple weeks.

Duration: 1245 days

Psalm 119:89-96

ל (Lamed)

⁸⁹O Lord, your instructions endure;
they stand secure in heaven.^[a]
⁹⁰You demonstrate your faithfulness to all generations.^[b]
You established the earth and it stood firm.
⁹¹Today they stand firm by your decrees,
for all things are your servants.
⁹²If I had not found encouragement in your law,^[c]
I would have died in my sorrow.^[d]
⁹³I will never forget your precepts,
for by them you have revived me.
⁹⁴I belong to you. Deliver me!
For I seek your precepts.
⁹⁵The wicked prepare to kill me,^[e]
yet I concentrate on your rules.
⁹⁶I realize that everything has its limits,
but your commands are beyond full comprehension.^[f]

Jeremiah 36:1-10

Jehoiakim Burns the Scroll Containing the Lord’s Messages

36 The Lord spoke to Jeremiah in the fourth year^[a] that Jehoiakim son of Josiah was ruling over Judah:^[b] ²“Get a scroll.^[c] Write on it everything I have told you to say^[d] about Israel, Judah, and all the other nations since I began to speak to you in the reign of Josiah until now.^[e] ³Perhaps when the people of Judah hear about all the disaster I intend to bring on them, they will all stop doing the evil things they have been doing.^[f] If they do, I will forgive their sins and the wicked things they have done.”^[g]

⁴So Jeremiah summoned Baruch son of Neriah. Then, Baruch wrote down in a scroll all the Lord’s words that he had told to Jeremiah^[h] as they came from his^[i] mouth. ⁵Then Jeremiah told Baruch, “I am no longer allowed to go^[j] into the Lord’s temple. ⁶So you go there the next time all the people of Judah come in from their towns to fast^[k] in the Lord’s temple. Read out loud where all of them can hear you what I told you the Lord said, which you wrote in the scroll.^[l] ⁷Perhaps then they will ask the Lord for mercy and will all stop doing the evil things they have been doing.^[m] For the Lord has threatened to bring great anger and wrath against these people.”^[n]

⁸So Baruch son of Neriah did exactly what the prophet Jeremiah told him to do. He read what the Lord had said from the scroll in the temple of the Lord.^[o] ⁹All the people living in Jerusalem and all the people who came into Jerusalem from the towns of Judah observed a fast before the Lord. The fast took place in the ninth month of the fifth year that Jehoiakim son of Josiah was ruling over Judah.^[p] ¹⁰At that time Baruch went into the temple of the Lord. He stood in the entrance of the room of Gemariah the son of Shaphan who had been the royal secretary.^[q] That room was in the upper court^[r] near the entrance of the New Gate.^[s] There, where all the people could hear him, he read from the scroll what Jeremiah had said.^[t]

Footnotes

Jeremiah 36:1 sn The fourth year that Jehoiakim…was ruling over Judah would have been 605/4 b.c. Jehoiakim began his rule in 609/8 b.c. after his father Josiah was killed by Pharaoh Necho at Megiddo. Necho had installed him as puppet king in place of his brother Jehoahaz, who was deposed by Necho after a reign of only three months (2 Kgs 23:31-35). According to Jer 46:2, that was the year in which Nebuchadnezzar defeated Jehoiakim’s suzerain Necho at Carchemish. That was also the year that Jerusalem came under attack and submitted to Babylonian control after a brief siege (Dan 1:1; see the study note on 25:1 for the reason for the difference in the dating between Jer 25:1; 36:2; and Dan 1:1). These events confirmed what Jeremiah had been saying about the foe from the north (4:6; 6:1; 15:12) and would have provided the impetus for the hopes that the people would repent if they were reminded about what Jeremiah had been saying.
Jeremiah 36:1 tn Heb “This word came to Jeremiah from the Lord in the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah the king of Judah, saying.”
Jeremiah 36:2 sn Heb “a roll [or scroll] of a document.” Scrolls consisted of pieces of leather or parchment sewn together and rolled up on wooden rollers. The writing was written from right to left and from top to bottom in columns, and the scroll unrolled from the left roller and rolled onto the right one as the scroll was read. The scroll varied in length depending on the contents. This scroll was probably not all that long since it was read three times in a single day (vv. 10-11, 15-16, 21-23).
Jeremiah 36:2 sn The intent is hardly that of giving a verbatim report of everything that the Lord had told him to say or of everything that he had actually said. What the scroll undoubtedly contained was a synopsis of Jeremiah’s messages as constructed from his memory.
Jeremiah 36:2 sn This refers to the messages that Jeremiah delivered during the last eighteen years of Josiah, the three-month reign of Jehoahaz, and the first four years of Jehoiakim’s reign (the period between Josiah’s thirteenth year [cf. 1:2] and the fourth year of Jehoiakim [v. 1]). The exact content of this scroll is unknown since many of the messages in the present book are undated. It is also not known what relation this scroll had to the present form of the book of Jeremiah, since this scroll was destroyed and another one written that contained more than this one did (cf. v. 32). Since Jeremiah continued his ministry down to the fall of Jerusalem in 587/6 b.c. (1:2) and beyond (cf. Jer 40-44), much more was added to those two scrolls even later.
Jeremiah 36:3 tn Heb “will turn each one from his wicked way.”
Jeremiah 36:3 tn Heb “their iniquity and their sin.”sn The offer of withdrawal of punishment for sin is consistent with the principles of Jer 18:7-8 and the temple sermon delivered early in the reign of this king (cf. 26:1-3; 7:5-7).
Jeremiah 36:4 tn Heb “him.”
Jeremiah 36:4 tn Heb “Jeremiah’s.”
Jeremiah 36:5 tn Heb “I am restrained; I cannot go into.” The word “restrained” is used elsewhere in Jeremiah of his being confined to the courtyard of the guardhouse (33:1; 39:15). However, that occurred only later during the tenth year of Zedekiah (Jer 32:1-2), and Jeremiah appears here to be free to come and go as he pleases (vv. 19, 26). The word is used in the active voice of the Lord preventing Sarah from having a baby (Gen 16:2). The probable nuance here is “I am prevented/debarred” from being able to go. No reason is given why he was prevented/debarred. It has been plausibly suggested that he was prohibited from going into the temple any longer because of the scathing sermon he delivered there earlier (Jer 26:1-3; 7:1-15).
Jeremiah 36:6 sn Regular fast days were not a part of Israel’s religious calendar. Rather, fast days were called on special occasions, i.e., in times of drought or a locust plague (Joel 1:14; 2:15), during a military crisis (2 Chr 20:3), or after defeat in battle (1 Sam 31:13; 2 Sam 1:12). A fast day was likely chosen for the reading of the scroll because the people would be more mindful of the crisis they were in and be in more of a repentant mood. The events referred to in the study note on v. 1 would have provided the basis for Jeremiah’s anticipation of a fast day when the scroll could be read.
Jeremiah 36:6 tn Heb “So you go and read from the scroll that you have written from my mouth the words of the Lord in the ears of the people in the house of the Lord on a fast day, and in that way [for the explanation of this rendering see below] you will be reading them in the ears of all Judah [= the people of Judah] who come from their towns [i.e., to the temple to fast].” Again the syntax of the original is awkward, separating several of the qualifying phrases from the word or phrase they are intended to modify. In most of the “literal” English versions the emphasis on “what the Lord said” tends to get lost, and it looks like two separate groups are to be addressed rather than one. The intent of the phrase is to define who the people are who will hear; the וַ that introduces the clause is explicative (BDB 252 s.v. וַ 1.b), and the גַּם (gam) is used to emphasize the explicative “all Judah who come in from their towns” (cf. BDB 169 s.v. גַּם 2). If some force were to be given to the “literal” rendering of that particle here, it would be “actually.” This is the group that is to be addressed according to v. 3. The complex Hebrew sentence has been restructured to include all the relevant information in more comprehensible and shorter English sentences.
Jeremiah 36:7 tn Heb “will turn each one from his wicked way.”
Jeremiah 36:7 tn Heb “For great are the anger and the wrath that the Lord has spoken against this people.” The translation uses the more active form, which is more in keeping with contemporary English style.
Jeremiah 36:8 tn Heb “And Baruch son of Neriah did according to all that the prophet Jeremiah commanded him with regard to reading from the scroll the words of the Lord in the temple of the Lord.” The sentence has been broken down and the modifiers placed where they belong to better conform to contemporary English style.
Jeremiah 36:9 tn There is some debate about the syntax of the words translated “All the people living in Jerusalem and all the people who came into Jerusalem from the towns in Judah.” As the sentence is structured in Hebrew, it looks like these words are the subject of “proclaim a fast.” However, most commentaries point out that the people themselves would hardly proclaim a fast; they would be summoned to fast (cf. 1 Kgs 21:9, 12; Jonah 3:7). Hence many see these words as the object of the verb, which has an impersonal subject “they.” This is most likely unless, as J. Bright thinks (Jeremiah [AB], 180), the word “proclaim” is used in a looser sense as “observed.” The translation has chosen to follow this latter tack rather than use the impersonal (or an equivalent passive) construction in English. For a similar problem see Jonah 3:5, which precedes the official proclamation in 3:7. Jeremiah's Hebrew text reads, “In the fifth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, in the ninth month they proclaimed a fast before the Lord, all the people in Jerusalem and all the people who came from the cities of Judah into Jerusalem.” The sentence has been broken down and restructured to better conform with contemporary English style.sn Judging from v. 22, this was one of the winter months, meaning that the reckoning is based on the calendar that starts with April rather than the one that starts with September (Nisan to Nisan rather than Tishri to Tishri). The ninth month would have been Kislev, which corresponds roughly to December. According to Babylonian historical records, this is the same year and the same month when Ashkelon was captured and sacked. The surrender of Jerusalem and the subsequent looting of the temple in the previous year (Dan 1:1), and the return of the menacing presence of Nebuchadnezzar in the near vicinity, were probably the impetus for the fast.
Jeremiah 36:10 sn Shaphan had been the royal secretary under Jehoiakim’s father’s rule. During the course of his official duties the book of the law had been discovered, and he had read it and reported its contents to Josiah, who instituted sweeping reforms on the basis of his obedience to it. (See 2 Kgs 22 and note especially vv. 3, 8, 10.) If the Shaphan mentioned in 22:14 is the same person as this, Gemariah would have been the brother of the man who spoke up on Jeremiah’s behalf when the priests and prophets sought to have him killed.
Jeremiah 36:10 sn It is generally agreed that this is the same as the inner court mentioned in 1 Kgs 6:36 and 7:12. It is called “upper” here because it stood above (cf. 1 Kgs 7:12) the outer court where all the people were standing.
Jeremiah 36:10 sn The New Gate is the same gate where Jeremiah had been accused of falsely claiming the Lord’s authority for his “treasonous” prophecies, according to 26:10-11. See the study note on 26:10 for more details about the location of this gate.
Jeremiah 36:10 tn The syntax of the original is complicated due to all the qualifying terms: Heb “And Baruch read from the scroll the words of Jeremiah in the house of the Lord in (i.e., in the entrance of) the room of Gemariah, son of Shaphan the scribe, in the upper court at the entrance of the New Gate in the house of the Lord in the ears of all the people.” The sentence has been broken down and restructured to contain all the same information in shorter English sentences that better conform with contemporary English style.

1 Corinthians 14:1-12

Prophecy and Tongues

14 Pursue love and be eager for the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy. ²For the one speaking in a tongue does not speak to people but to God, for no one understands; he is speaking mysteries by the Spirit.^[a] ³But the one who prophesies speaks to people for their strengthening,^[b] encouragement, and consolation. ⁴The one who speaks in a tongue builds himself up,^[c] but the one who prophesies builds up the church. ⁵I wish you all spoke in tongues, but even more that you would prophesy. The one who prophesies is greater than the one who speaks in tongues, unless he interprets so that the church may be strengthened.

⁶Now, brothers and sisters,^[d] if I come to you speaking in tongues, how will I help you unless I speak to you with a revelation or with knowledge or prophecy or teaching? ⁷It is similar for lifeless things that make a sound, like a flute or harp. Unless they make a distinction in the notes, how can what is played on the flute or harp be understood? ⁸If, for example, the trumpet makes an unclear sound, who will get ready for battle? ⁹It is the same for you. If you do not speak clearly with your tongue, how will anyone know what is being said? For you will be speaking into the air. ¹⁰There are probably many kinds of languages in the world, and none is without meaning. ¹¹If then I do not know the meaning of a language, I will be a foreigner to the speaker and the speaker a foreigner to me. ¹²It is the same with you. Since you are eager for manifestations of the Spirit,^[e] seek to abound in order to strengthen the church.

New English Translation (NET)

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Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

ל (Lamed)

Footnotes

Jehoiakim Burns the Scroll Containing the Lord’s Messages

Footnotes

Prophecy and Tongues

Footnotes