◀ All Reading Plans / Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous) / Psalm 81:1 10-16 (Honey from the rock); Jeremiah 12:1-13 (Jeremiah complains to God); 1 Peter 4:7-11 (Be hospitable to one another) (New English Translation)

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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 81:1

Psalm 81^[a]

For the music director, according to the gittith style;^[b] by Asaph.

81 Shout for joy to God, our source of strength!
Shout out to the God of Jacob!

Psalm 81:10-16

¹⁰I am the Lord, your God,
the one who brought you out of the land of Egypt.
Open your mouth wide and I will fill it.’
¹¹But my people did not obey me;^[a]
Israel did not submit to me.^[b]
¹²I gave them over to their stubborn desires;^[c]
they did what seemed right to them.^[d]
¹³If only my people would obey me!^[e]
If only Israel would keep my commands!^[f]
¹⁴Then I would quickly subdue their enemies,
and attack^[g] their adversaries.”
¹⁵(May those who hate the Lord^[h] cower in fear^[i] before him.
May they be permanently humiliated.)^[j]
¹⁶“I would feed Israel the best wheat,^[k]
and would satisfy your appetite^[l] with honey from the rocky cliffs.”^[m]

Footnotes

Psalm 81:11 tn Heb “did not listen to my voice.”
Psalm 81:11 tn The Hebrew expression אָבָה לִי (ʾavah li) means “submit to me” (see Deut 13:8).
Psalm 81:12 tn Heb “and I sent him away in the stubbornness of their heart.”
Psalm 81:12 tn Heb “they walked in their counsel.” The prefixed verbal form is either preterite (“walked”) or a customary imperfect (“were walking”).
Psalm 81:13 tn Heb “if only my people were listening to me.” The Hebrew particle לוּ (lu, “if not”) introduces a purely hypothetical or contrary to fact condition (see 2 Sam 18:12).
Psalm 81:13 tn Heb “[and if only] Israel would walk in my ways.”
Psalm 81:14 tn Heb “turn my hand against.” The idiom “turn the hand against” has the nuance of “strike with the hand, attack” (see Isa 1:25; Ezek 38:12; Amos 1:8; Zech 13:7).
Psalm 81:15 tn “Those who hate the Lord” are also mentioned in 2 Chr 19:2 and Ps 139:21.
Psalm 81:15 tn See Deut 33:29; Ps 66:3 for other uses of the verb כָּחַשׁ (kakhash) in the sense “cower in fear.” In Ps 18:44 the verb seems to carry the nuance “to be weak; to be powerless” (see also Ps 109:24). The prefixed verbal form is taken as a jussive, parallel to the jussive form in the next line.
Psalm 81:15 tc Heb “and may their time be forever.” The Hebrew term עִתָּם (ʿittam, “their time”) must refer here to the “time” of the demise and humiliation of those who hate the Lord. Some propose an emendation to בַּעֲתָתָם (baʿatatam) or בִּעֻתָם (biʿutam; “their terror”; i.e., “may their terror last forever”), but the omission of bet (ב) in the present Hebrew text is difficult to explain, making the proposed emendation unlikely.tn The verb form at the beginning of the line is jussive, indicating that this is a prayer. The translation assumes that v. 15 is a parenthetical “curse” offered by the psalmist. Having heard the reference to Israel’s enemies (v. 14), the psalmist inserts this prayer, reminding the Lord that they are God’s enemies as well.
Psalm 81:16 tn Heb “and he fed him from the best of the wheat.” The Hebrew text has a third person form of the preterite with a vav (ו) consecutive attached. However, it is preferable, in light of the use of the first person in v. 14 and in the next line, to emend the verb to a first person form and understand the vav as conjunctive, continuing the apodosis of the conditional sentence of vv. 13-14. The third masculine singular pronominal suffix refers to Israel, as in v. 6.sn I would feed. After the parenthetical “curse” in v. 15, the Lord’s speech continues here.
Psalm 81:16 tn Heb “you.” The second person singular pronominal suffix refers to Israel, as in vv. 7-10.
Psalm 81:16 sn The language in this verse, particularly the references to wheat and honey, is reminiscent of Deut 32:13-14.

Jeremiah 12:1-13

Jeremiah Appeals to God

12 Lord, you have always been fair
whenever I have complained to you.^[a]
However, I would like to speak with you about the disposition of justice.^[b]
Why are wicked people successful?^[c]
Why do all dishonest people have such easy lives?
²You plant them like trees and they put down their roots.^[d]
They grow prosperous and are very fruitful.^[e]
They always talk about you,
but they really care nothing about you.^[f]
³But you, Lord, know all about me.
You watch me and test my devotion to you.^[g]
Drag these wicked men away like sheep to be slaughtered!
Appoint a time when they will be killed!^[h]
⁴How long must the land be parched^[i]
and the grass in every field be withered?
How long^[j] must the animals and the birds die
because of the wickedness of the people who live in this land?^[k]
For these people boast,
“God^[l] will not see what happens to us.”^[m]

God Answers Jeremiah

⁵The Lord answered,^[n]

“If you have raced on foot against men and they have worn you out,
how will you be able to compete with horses?
And if you feel secure only^[o] in safe and open country,^[p]
how will you manage in the thick undergrowth along the Jordan River?^[q]
⁶As a matter of fact,^[r] even your own brothers
and the members of your own family have betrayed you as well.
Even they have plotted to do away with you.^[s]
So do not trust them even when they say kind things^[t] to you.
⁷“I will abandon my nation.^[u]

I will forsake the people I call my own.^[v]
I will turn my beloved people^[w]
over to the power^[x] of their enemies.
⁸The people I call my own^[y] have turned on me
like a lion^[z] in the forest.
They have roared defiantly at me,^[aa]
so I will treat them as though I hate them.^[ab]
⁹The people I call my own attack me like birds of prey or like hyenas.^[ac]
But other birds of prey are all around them.^[ad]
Let all the nations gather together like wild beasts.
Let them come and destroy these people I call my own.^[ae]
¹⁰Many foreign rulers^[af] will ruin the land where I planted my people.^[ag]
They will trample all over my chosen land.^[ah]
They will turn my beautiful land
into a desolate wilderness.
¹¹They will lay it waste.
It will lie parched^[ai] and empty before me.
The whole land will be laid waste,
but no one living in it will pay any heed.^[aj]
¹²A destructive army^[ak] will come marching
over the hilltops in the wilderness.
For the Lord will use them as his destructive weapon^[al]
against^[am] everyone from one end of the land to the other.
No one will be safe.^[an]
¹³My people will sow wheat, but will harvest weeds.^[ao]
They will work until they are exhausted, but will get nothing from it.
They will be disappointed in their harvests^[ap]
because the Lord will take them away in his fierce anger.^[aq]

Footnotes

Jeremiah 12:1 tn Or “Lord, you are fair when I present my case before you.”
Jeremiah 12:1 tn Heb “judgments” or “matters of justice.” For the nuances of “complain to,” “fair,” and “disposition of justice” assumed here, see BDB 936 s.v. רִיב Qal.4 (cf. Judg 21:22); BDB 843 s.v. צַדִּיק 1.d (cf. Pss 7:12; 11:7); and BDB 1049 s.v. מִשְׁפָּט 1.f (cf. Isa 26:8; Ps 10:5; Ezek 7:27).
Jeremiah 12:1 tn Heb “Why does the way [= course of life] of the wicked prosper?”
Jeremiah 12:2 tn Heb “You planted them, and they took root.”
Jeremiah 12:2 tn Heb “they grow and produce fruit.” For the nuance “grow” for the verb, which normally means “go, walk,” see BDB 232 s.v. חָלַךְ Qal.I.3 and compare Hos 14:7.
Jeremiah 12:2 tn Heb “You are near in their mouths, but far from their kidneys.” The figure of substitution is being used here, “mouth” for “words” and “kidneys” for passions and affections. A contemporary equivalent might be, “your name is always on their lips, but their hearts are far from you.”
Jeremiah 12:3 tn Heb “You, Lord, know me. You watch me and you test my heart toward you.”sn Jeremiah appears to be complaining like Job that God cares nothing about the prosperity of the wicked, but watches Jeremiah’s every move. The reverse ought to be true. Jeremiah should not be suffering the onslaughts of his fellow countrymen as he is. The wicked who are prospering should be experiencing punishment.
Jeremiah 12:3 tn Heb “set aside for them a day of killing.”
Jeremiah 12:4 tn The verb here is often translated “mourn.” However, this verb is from a homonymic root meaning “to be dry” (cf. HALOT 7 s.v. II אָבַל and compare Hos 4:3 for usage).
Jeremiah 12:4 tn The words “How long” are not in the text. They are carried over from the first line.
Jeremiah 12:4 tn Heb “because of the wickedness of those who live in it.”
Jeremiah 12:4 tn Heb “he.” The referent is usually identified as God and is supplied here for clarity. Some identify the referent with Jeremiah. If that is the case, then he returns to his complaint about the conspirators. It is more likely, however, that it refers to God and Jeremiah’s complaint that the people live their lives apart from concern about God.
Jeremiah 12:4 tc Or reading with the Greek version, “God does not see what we are doing.” In place of “what will happen to us (אַחֲרִיתֵנוּ, ʾakharitenu, “our end”) the Greek version understands a Hebrew text which reads “our ways” (אָרְחוֹתֵנו, ʾorkhotenu), which is graphically very close to the MT. The Masoretic is supported by the Latin and is retained here on the basis of external evidence. Either text makes good sense in the context. Some identify the “he” with Jeremiah and understand the text to be saying that the conspirators are certain that they will succeed and he will not live to see his prophecies fulfilled.sn The words here may be an outright rejection of the Lord’s words in Deut 32:20, which is part of a song that was to be taught to Israel in the light of their predicted rejection of the Lord.
Jeremiah 12:5 tn The words “The Lord answered” are not in the text but are implicit from the context. They are supplied in the translation for clarity.
Jeremiah 12:5 tn Some commentaries and English versions follow the suggestion given in HALOT 116 s.v. II בָּטַח that a homonym meaning “to stumble, fall down” is involved here and in Prov 14:16. The evidence for this homonym is questionable because both passages can be explained on other grounds with the usual root.
Jeremiah 12:5 tn Heb “a land of tranquility.” The expression involves a figure of substitution where the feeling engendered is substituted for the conditions that engender it. For the idea see Isa 32:18. The translation both here and in the following line is intended to bring out the contrast implicit in the emotive connotations connected with “peaceful country” and “thicket along the Jordan.”
Jeremiah 12:5 tn Heb “the thicket along the Jordan.” The word “River” is not in the Hebrew text but has been supplied in the translation for clarity.sn The thick undergrowth along the Jordan River refers to the thick woods and underbrush alongside the Jordan where lions were known to have lived, and hence the area was considered dangerous. See Jer 49:19; 50:44. The Lord here seems to be telling Jeremiah that the situation will only get worse. If he has trouble contending with the plot from his fellow townsmen, what will he do when the whole country sets up a cry against him?
Jeremiah 12:6 tn This is an attempt to give some contextual sense to the particle “for, indeed” (כִּי, ki).sn If the truth be known, Jeremiah was not safe even in the context of his own family. They were apparently part of the plot by the people of Anathoth to kill him.
Jeremiah 12:6 tn Heb “they have called after you fully”; or “have lifted up loud voices against you.” The word “against” does not seem quite adequate for the preposition “after.” The preposition “against” would be Hebrew עַל (ʿal). The idea appears to be that they are chasing after him, raising their voices, along with those of the conspirators, to have him killed.
Jeremiah 12:6 tn Heb “good things.” See BDB 373 s.v. II טוֹב 2 for this nuance and compare Prov 12:25 for usage.
Jeremiah 12:7 tn Heb “my house.” Or, “I have abandoned my nation.” The word “house” has been used throughout Jeremiah for the temple (e.g., 7:2, 10), the nation or people of Israel or Judah (e.g. 3:18, 20), and the descendants of Jacob (i.e., the Israelites, e.g., 2:4). Here the parallelism argues that it refers to the nation of Judah. The translation throughout vv. 5-17 assumes that the verb forms are prophetic perfects, the form that conceives of the action as being as good as done. It is possible that the forms are true perfects and refer to a past destruction of Judah. If so, it may have been connected with the assaults against Judah in 598/7 b.c. by the Babylonians and the nations surrounding Judah that are recorded in 2 Kgs 24:14. No other major recent English version reflects these as prophetic perfects besides NIV and NCV, which does not use the future until v. 10. Hence the translation is somewhat tentative. C. Feinberg, “Jeremiah,” EBC 6:459 takes them as prophetic perfects, and H. Freedman (Jeremiah [SoBB], 88) mentions that as a possibility for explaining the presence of this passage here. For another example of an extended use of the prophetic perfect without imperfects interspersed, see Isa 8:23-9:6 HT (9:1-7 ET). The translation assumes they are prophetic and are part of the Lord’s answer to the complaint about the prosperity of the wicked; both the wicked Judeans and the wicked nations God will use to punish them will be punished.
Jeremiah 12:7 tn Heb “my inheritance.”
Jeremiah 12:7 tn Heb “the beloved of my soul.” Here “soul” stands for the person and is equivalent to “my.”
Jeremiah 12:7 tn Heb “will give…into the hands of.”
Jeremiah 12:8 tn See the note on the previous verse.
Jeremiah 12:8 tn Heb “have become to me like a lion.”
Jeremiah 12:8 tn Heb “have given against me with her voice.”
Jeremiah 12:8 tn Or “so I will reject her.” The word “hate” is sometimes used in a figurative way to refer to being neglected, i.e., treated as though unloved. In these contexts it does not have the same emotive connotations that a typical modern reader would associate with hate. See Gen 29:31, 33 and E. W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech, 556.
Jeremiah 12:9 tn Or “like speckled birds of prey.” The meanings of these words are uncertain. In the Hebrew text the sentence is a question, either, “Is not my inheritance to me a bird of prey, [or] a hyena?” or, “Is not my inheritance to me a speckled bird of prey?” The question, expecting a positive answer, appears here as an affirmative statement. The meaning of the second Hebrew word in the verse, occurring only here, is debated. BDB 840 s.v. צָבוּעַ relates it to a word translated “dyed stuff” that also occurs only once (Judg 5:30). HALOT 936 s.v. צָבוּעַ compares a word found in the cognates meaning “hyena.” This is more likely and is the interpretation followed by the Greek, which reads the first two words as “cave of a hyena.” This translation has led some scholars to posit a homonym for the word “bird of prey” meaning “cave” that is based on Arabic parallels. The metaphor would then be of Israel carried off by hyenas and surrounded by birds of prey. The evidence for the meaning “cave” is weak and would involve a wordplay of a rare homonym with another word that is better known. For a discussion of the issues see J. Barr, Comparative Philology and the Text of the Old Testament, 128-29, 153.
Jeremiah 12:9 tn Heb “Are birds of prey around her?” The question is again rhetorical and expects a positive answer. The birds of prey are, of course, the hostile nations surrounding her. The metaphor involved in these two lines may be interpreted differently. God could consider Israel a proud bird of prey (hence the word for speckled) but one surrounded and under attack by other birds of prey. The fact that the sentences are divided into two rhetorical questions speaks somewhat against this.
Jeremiah 12:9 tn Heb “Go, gather all the beasts of the field [= wild beasts]. Bring them to devour.” The verbs are masculine plural imperatives addressed rhetorically to some unidentified group (the heavenly counsel?). See the notes on 5:1 for further discussion. Since translating literally would raise a question about who the commands are addressed to, they have been turned into passive third person commands to avoid confusion. The metaphor has likewise been turned into a simile to help the modern reader. By the way, the imperatives here implying future action argue that the passage is future and that it is correct to take the verb forms as prophetic perfects.
Jeremiah 12:10 tn Heb “Many shepherds.” For the use of the term “shepherd” as a figure for rulers see the notes on 10:21.
Jeremiah 12:10 tn Heb “my vineyard.” To translate literally would presuppose an unlikely familiarity with this figure on the part of some readers. Some translate as “vineyards,” but that is misleading because it misses the figurative nuance altogether.sn The figures of Israel as God’s vine and the land as God’s vineyard are found several times in the Bible. The best known of these is the extended metaphor in Isa 5:1-7. This figure also appears in Jer 2:20.
Jeremiah 12:10 tn Heb “my portion.”
Jeremiah 12:11 tn For the use of this verb see the notes on 12:4. Some understand the homonym here as meaning “it [the desolated land] will mourn to me.” However, the only other use of the preposition עַל (ʿal) with this root means “to mourn over” not “to” (cf. Hos 10:5). For the use of the preposition here see BDB 753 s.v. עַל II.1.b and compare the use in Gen 48:7.
Jeremiah 12:11 tn Heb “But there is no man laying it to heart.” For the idiom here see BDB 525 s.v. לֵב II.3.d and compare the usage in Isa 42:25; 47:7.sn There is a very interesting play on words and sounds in this verse that paints a picture of desolation and the pathos it evokes. Part of this is reflected in the translation. The same Hebrew word referring to a desolation or a waste (שְׁמֵמָה, sh^ememah) is repeated three times at the end of three successive lines (the first is the last line of v. 10), and the related verb is found at the beginning of the fourth (נָשַׁמָּה, nashammah). A similar sounding word is found in the second of the three successive lines (שָׁמָהּ, shamah = “he [they] will make it”). This latter word is part of a further play because it is repeated in a different form (שָׁם, sham = “laying”) in the last two lines of the verse: they lay it waste, but no one lays it to heart. There is also an interesting contrast between the sorrow the Lord feels and the inattention of the people.
Jeremiah 12:12 tn Heb “destroyers.”
Jeremiah 12:12 tn Heb “It is the Lord’s consuming sword.”
Jeremiah 12:12 tn Heb “For a sword of the Lord will devour.” The sword is often symbolic for destructive forces of all kinds. Here and in Isa 34:6; Jer 47:6, it is symbolic of the enemy armies that the Lord uses to carry out destructive punishment against his enemies, hence the translation “his destructive weapon.” A similar figure is use in Isa 10:5, where the figure is more clearly identified; Assyria is the rod/club that the Lord will use to discipline unfaithful Israel.
Jeremiah 12:12 tn Heb “There is no peace to all flesh.”
Jeremiah 12:13 sn Invading armies lived off the land, using up all the produce and destroying everything they could not consume.
Jeremiah 12:13 tn The pronouns here are actually second plural: Heb “Be ashamed/disconcerted because of your harvests.” Because the verb form (וּבֹשׁוּ, uvoshu) can either be Qal perfect third plural or Qal imperative masculine plural, many emend the pronoun on the noun to third plural (see, e.g., BHS). However, this is the easier reading and is not supported by either the Latin or the Greek, which have second plural. This is probably another case of the shift from description to direct address that has been met with several times already in Jeremiah (the figure of speech called apostrophe; for other examples see, e.g., 9:4; 11:13). As in other cases, the translation has been leveled to third plural to avoid confusion for the contemporary English reader. For the meaning of the verb here see BDB 101 s.v. בּוֹשׁ Qal.2 and compare the usage in Jer 48:13.
Jeremiah 12:13 tn Heb “be disappointed in their harvests from the fierce anger of the Lord.” The translation makes explicit what is implicit in the elliptical poetry of the Hebrew original.

1 Peter 4:7-11

Service, Suffering, and Judgment

⁷For the culmination of all things is near. So be self-controlled and sober-minded for the sake of prayer.^[a] ⁸Above all keep^[b] your love for one another fervent,^[c] because love covers a multitude of sins.^[d] ⁹Show hospitality^[e] to one another without complaining. ¹⁰Just as each one has received a gift, use it to serve one another^[f] as good stewards of the varied grace of God. ¹¹Whoever speaks, let it be with^[g] God’s words.^[h] Whoever serves, do so with the strength^[i] that God supplies, so that in everything God will be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong^[j] the glory and the power forever and ever. Amen.

New English Translation (NET)

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Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Psalm 81[a]

For the music director, according to the gittith style;[b] by Asaph.

Footnotes

Footnotes

Jeremiah Appeals to God

God Answers Jeremiah

Footnotes

Service, Suffering, and Judgment

Footnotes

Psalm 81^[a]

For the music director, according to the gittith style;^[b] by Asaph.