Konaniah and his brothers Shemaiah and Nethanel, along with Hashabiah, Jeiel, and Jozabad, the officials of the Levites, supplied the Levites with 5,000 Passover sacrifices and 500 cattle.

All the leaders of the priests and people became more unfaithful and committed the same horrible sins practiced by the nations. ¹  They defiled the Lord’s temple which he had consecrated in Jerusalem.

“I hereby give orders that if anyone changes this directive a beam is to be pulled out from his house and he is to be raised up and impaled ¹  on it, and his house is to be reduced ²  to a rubbish heap ³  for this indiscretion. ⁴ 

Nehemiah son of Azbuk, head of a half-district of Beth Zur, worked after him as far as the tombs of David and the artificial pool and the House of the Warriors.

You performed awesome signs ¹  against Pharaoh, against his servants, and against all the people of his land, for you knew that the Egyptians ²  had acted presumptuously ³  against them. You made for yourself a name that is celebrated to this day.

These are the provincial leaders ¹  who settled in Jerusalem. (While other Israelites, the priests, the Levites, the temple attendants, and the sons of the servants of Solomon settled in the cities of Judah, each on his own property in their cities,

When those days ¹  were completed, the king then provided a seven-day ²  banquet for all the people who were present ³  in Susa the citadel, for those of highest standing to the most lowly. ⁴  It was held in the court located in the garden of the royal palace.

In those days while Mordecai was sitting at the king’s gate, Bigthan ¹  and Teresh, ²  two of the king’s eunuchs who protected the entrance, ³  became angry and plotted to assassinate ⁴  King Ahasuerus.

If the king is so inclined, ¹  let an edict be issued ²  to destroy them. I will pay ten thousand talents of silver ³  to be conveyed to the king’s treasuries for the officials who carry out this business.”

Your officials are rebels, ¹  they associate with ²  thieves. All of them love bribery, and look for ³  payoffs. ⁴  They do not take up the cause of the orphan, ⁵  or defend the rights of the widow. ⁶ 

The king of Assyria sent his chief adviser ¹  from Lachish to King Hezekiah in Jerusalem, ²  along with a large army. The chief adviser ³  stood at the conduit of the upper pool which is located on the road to the field where they wash and dry cloth. ⁴ 

Eliakim son of Hilkiah, the palace supervisor, accompanied by Shebna the scribe and Joah son of Asaph, the secretary, went to Hezekiah with their clothes torn in grief ¹  and reported to him what the chief adviser had said.

Recently, however, you yourselves ¹  showed a change of heart and did what is pleasing to me. You granted your fellow countrymen their freedom and you made a covenant to that effect in my presence in the house that I have claimed for my own. ² 

Gedaliah, the son of Ahikam and grandson of Shaphan, took an oath so as to give them and their troops some assurance of safety. ¹  “Do not be afraid to submit to the Babylonians. ²  Settle down in the land and submit to the king of Babylon. Then things will go well for you.

On the tenth ¹  day of the fifth month, ²  in the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, Nebuzaradan, the captain of the royal guard ³  who served ⁴  the king of Babylon, arrived in Jerusalem.

Cry out and moan, son of man, for it is wielded against my people; against all the princes of Israel. They are delivered up to the sword, along with my people. Therefore, strike your thigh. ¹ 

Then King Nebuchadnezzar was startled and quickly got up. He said to his ministers, “Wasn’t it three men that we tied up and threw ¹  into ²  the fire?” They replied to the king, “For sure, O king.”

There will arise after him ¹  one ²  who will send out an exactor ³  of tribute to enhance the splendor of the kingdom, but after a few days he will be destroyed, ⁴  though not in anger or battle.

Because of all their evil in Gilgal, I hate them there. On account of their evil deeds, I will drive them out of my land. ¹  I will no longer love them; all their rulers are rebels.

But the president of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, said to the crowd, “There are six days on which work ¹  should be done! ²  So come ³  and be healed on those days, and not on the Sabbath day.”