The priests and the Levites had purified themselves, every last one, ¹  and they all were ceremonially pure. They sacrificed the Passover lamb for all the exiles, for their colleagues ²  the priests, and for themselves.

You stood aloof ¹  while strangers took his army ²  captive, and foreigners advanced to his gates. ³  When they cast lots ⁴  over Jerusalem, ⁵  you behaved as though you were in league ⁶  with them.

Then he turned from those who were nearby to someone else and asked the same question, ¹  but they ²  gave him the same answer as before.

In King Rehoboam’s fifth year, King Shishak of Egypt attacked Jerusalem.

My brothers ¹  have been as treacherous ²  as a seasonal stream, ³  and as the riverbeds of the intermittent streams ⁴  that flow away. ⁵ 

Who let the wild donkey go free? Who released the bonds of the donkey,

Join with us! ¹  We will all share ²  equally in what we steal.” ³ 

For wisdom will enter your heart, ¹  and moral knowledge ²  will be attractive ³  to you. ⁴ 

The ¹  patriarchs, because they were jealous of Joseph, sold ²  him into Egypt. But ³  God was with him,

But be careful that this liberty of yours does not become a hindrance to the weak.

to Apphia ¹  our sister, ²  to Archippus our ³  fellow soldier, and to the church that meets in your house.

But Jacob said, “Swear an oath to me now.” ¹  So Esau ²  swore an oath to him and sold his birthright ³  to Jacob.

When Jacob explained ¹  to Rachel that he was a relative of her father ²  and the son of Rebekah, she ran and told her father.

We are from a family of twelve brothers; we are the sons of one father. ¹  One is no longer alive, ²  and the youngest is with our father at this time ³  in the land of Canaan.’

Then the man ¹  searched. He began with the oldest and finished with the youngest. The cup was found in Benjamin’s sack!

If you take ¹  this one from me too and an accident happens to him, then you will bring down my gray hair ²  in tragedy ³  to the grave.’ ⁴ 

If you make a sale ¹  to your fellow citizen ²  or buy ³  from your fellow citizen, no one is to wrong his brother. ⁴ 

¹ Then Miriam and Aaron spoke against ²  Moses because of the Cushite ³  woman he had married ⁴  (for he had married an Ethiopian woman).

and serves in the name of the Lord his God like his fellow Levites who stand there before the Lord.

Then the elders of his city must summon him and speak to him. If he persists, saying, “I don’t want to marry her,”