Then Saul said to Samuel, “But I have obeyed ¹  the Lord! I went on the campaign ²  the Lord sent me on. I brought back King Agag of the Amalekites after exterminating the Amalekites.

Now Saul had a concubine named Rizpah daughter of Aiah. Ish-bosheth ¹  said to Abner, “Why did you have sexual relations with ²  my father’s concubine?” ³ 

(Pharaoh, king of Egypt, had attacked and captured Gezer. He burned it and killed the Canaanites who lived in the city. He gave it as a wedding present to his daughter, who had married Solomon.)

I was with you wherever you went and I defeated ¹  all your enemies before you. Now I will make you as famous as the great men of the earth. ² 

The days of our lives add up to seventy years, ¹  or eighty, if one is especially strong. ²  But even one’s best years are marred by trouble and oppression. ³  Yes, ⁴  they pass quickly ⁵  and we fly away. ⁶ 

So then I, the Lord who rules over all, ¹  have something to say concerning the prophets of Jerusalem: ²  ‘I will make these prophets eat the bitter food of suffering and drink the poison water of judgment. ³  For the prophets of Jerusalem are the reason ⁴  that ungodliness ⁵  has spread throughout the land.’”

Then the glory of the God of Israel went up from the cherub where it had rested to the threshold of the temple. ¹  He called to the man dressed in linen who had the writing kit at his side.

A fire has gone out from its branch; it has consumed its shoot and its fruit. ¹  No strong branch was left in it, nor a scepter to rule.’ This is a lament song, and has become a lament song.”

“‘Therefore this is what the sovereign Lord says: Woe to the city of bloodshed, the pot whose rot ¹  is in it, whose rot has not been removed ²  from it! Empty it piece by piece. No lot has fallen on it. ³ 

Whenever ¹  they persecute you in one place, ²  flee to another. I tell you the truth, ³  you will not finish going through all the towns ⁴  of Israel before the Son of Man comes.

He ¹  will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death will not exist any more – or mourning, or crying, or pain, for the former things have ceased to exist.” ² 

They had not gone very far from the city ¹  when Joseph said ²  to the servant who was over his household, “Pursue the men at once! ³  When you overtake ⁴  them, say to them, ‘Why have you repaid good with evil?

I thought about the days of old, about ancient times. ¹ 

“They cry, ¹  ‘Harvest time has come and gone, and the summer is over, ²  and still we have not been delivered.’

“From its earliest days Moab has lived undisturbed. It has never been taken into exile. Its people are like wine allowed to settle undisturbed on its dregs, never poured out from one jar to another. They are like wine which tastes like it always did, whose aroma has remained unchanged. ¹ 

For some have already wandered away to follow Satan. ¹ 

When the sun had gone down and it was dark, a smoking firepot with a flaming torch ¹  passed between the animal parts. ² 

When they got near Jebus, it was getting quite late ¹  and the servant ²  said to his master, “Come on, let’s stop at ³  this Jebusite city and spend the night in it.”

Then Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet anointed ¹  him king in Gihon. They went up from there rejoicing, and the city is in an uproar. That is the sound you hear.

As the prophet from Judah was traveling, a lion attacked him on the road and killed him. ¹  His corpse was lying on the road, and the donkey and the lion just stood there beside it. ²