“Listen! A sower went out to sow. ¹ 

“You will take much seed to the field but gather little harvest, because locusts will consume it.

Indeed ¹  Israel ²  is the vineyard of the Lord who commands armies, the people ³  of Judah are the cultivated place in which he took delight. He waited for justice, but look what he got – disobedience! ⁴  He waited for fairness, but look what he got – cries for help! ⁵ 

Joseph said to the people, “Since I have bought you and your land today for Pharaoh, here is seed for you. Cultivate ¹  the land.

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Extend your hand toward the sky ¹  that there may be ²  hail in all the land of Egypt, on people and on animals, ³  and on everything that grows ⁴  in the field in the land of Egypt.”

The hail struck everything in the open fields, both ¹  people and animals, throughout all the land of Egypt. The hail struck everything that grows ²  in the field, and it broke all the trees of the field to pieces.

You must keep my statutes. You must not allow two different kinds of your animals to breed, ¹  you must not sow your field with two different kinds of seed, and you must not wear ²  a garment made of two different kinds of fabric. ³ 

and you may sow the eighth year and eat from that sixth year’s produce ¹  – old produce. Until you bring in the ninth year’s produce, ²  you may eat old produce.

Can horses run on rocky cliffs? Can one plow the sea with oxen? ¹  Yet you have turned justice into a poisonous plant, and the fruit of righteous actions into a bitter plant. ² 

They ¹  were told ²  not to damage the grass of the earth, or any green plant or tree, but only those people ³  who did not have the seal of God on their ⁴  forehead.

But God gives it a body just as he planned, and to each of the seeds a body of its own.

The Lord said to Moses, “Extend your hand over the land of Egypt for ¹  the locusts, that they may come up over the land of Egypt and eat everything that grows ²  in the ground, everything that the hail has left.”

¹ “For six years ²  you are to sow your land and gather in its produce.

It ranges the hills as its pasture, and searches after every green plant.

Under the lotus trees it lies, in the secrecy of the reeds and the marsh.

Faithfulness grows from the ground, and deliverance looks down from the sky. ¹ 

The naive inherit ¹  folly, but the shrewd ²  are crowned ³  with knowledge.

Then I will plant her as my own ¹  in the land. I will have pity on ‘No Pity’ (Lo-Ruhamah). I will say to ‘Not My People’ (Lo-Ammi), ‘You are my people!’ And he ²  will say, ‘You are ³  my God!’”

I planted, ¹  Apollos watered, but God caused it to grow.

He produced manuals on botany, describing every kind of plant, ¹  from the cedars of Lebanon to the hyssop that grows on walls. He also produced manuals on biology, describing ²  animals, birds, insects, and fish.