Then ¹  when the Lamb opened the fourth seal I heard the voice of the fourth living creature saying, “Come!”

Let me walk among ¹  all your flocks today and remove from them every speckled or spotted sheep, every dark-colored lamb, ²  and the spotted or speckled goats. ³  These animals will be my wages. ⁴ 

But Jacob ¹  said to him, “My lord knows that the children are young, ²  and that I have to look after the sheep and cattle that are nursing their young. ³  If they are driven too hard for even a single day, all the animals will die.

Our livestock must ¹  also go with us! Not a hoof is to be left behind! For we must take ²  these animals ³  to serve the Lord our God. Until we arrive there, we do not know what we must use to serve the Lord.” ⁴ 

However, you must not eat these ¹  from among those that chew the cud and have divided hooves: The camel is unclean to you ²  because it chews the cud ³  even though its hoof is not divided. ⁴ 

You must not eat anything that crawls ¹  on its belly or anything that walks on all fours or on any number of legs ²  of all the swarming things that swarm on the land, because they are detestable.

However, you may not eat the following animals among those that chew the cud or those that have divided hooves: the camel, the hare, and the rock badger. ¹  (Although they chew the cud, they do not have divided hooves and are therefore ritually impure to you).

However, the women, little children, cattle, and anything else in the city – all its plunder – you may take for yourselves as spoil. You may take from your enemies the plunder that the Lord your God has given you.

Even before they burned the fat, the priest’s attendant would come and say to the person who was making the sacrifice, “Hand over some meat for the priest to roast! He won’t take boiled meat from you, but only raw.” ¹ 

Sound your battle cry ¹  against the wild beast of the reeds, ²  and the nations that assemble like a herd of calves led by bulls! ³  They humble themselves ⁴  and offer gold and silver as tribute. ⁵  God ⁶  scatters ⁷  the nations that like to do battle.

“Of what importance to me are your many sacrifices?” ¹  says the Lord. “I am stuffed with ²  burnt sacrifices of rams and the fat from steers. The blood of bulls, lambs, and goats I do not want. ³ 

Now I will inform you what I am about to do to my vineyard: I will remove its hedge and turn it into pasture, ¹  I will break its wall and allow animals to graze there. ² 

Look at the land of the Chaldeans, these people who have lost their identity! ¹  The Assyrians have made it a home for wild animals. They erected their siege towers, ²  demolished ³  its fortresses, and turned it into a heap of ruins. ⁴ 

The people I call my own attack me like birds of prey or like hyenas. ¹  But other birds of prey are all around them. ²  Let all the nations gather together like wild beasts. Let them come and destroy these people I call my own. ³ 

“I will punish them in four different ways: I will have war kill them. I will have dogs drag off their dead bodies. I will have birds and wild beasts devour and destroy their corpses. ¹ 

In this place I will thwart ¹  the plans of the people of Judah and Jerusalem. I will deliver them over to the power of their enemies who are seeking to kill them. They will die by the sword ²  at the hands of their enemies. ³  I will make their dead bodies food for the birds and wild beasts to eat.

For the king of Babylon stands at the fork ¹  in the road at the head of the two routes. He looks for omens: ²  He shakes arrows, he consults idols, ³  he examines ⁴  animal livers. ⁵ 

The four tables for the burnt offering were of carved stone, 32 inches ¹  long, 32 inches ²  wide, and 21 inches ³  high. They would put the instruments which they used to slaughter the burnt offering and the sacrifice on them.

Yet they will be ministers in my sanctuary, having oversight at the gates of the temple, and serving the temple. They will slaughter the burnt offerings and the sacrifices for the people, and they will stand before them to minister to them.

“After these things, ¹  as I was watching, another beast ²  like a leopard appeared, with four bird-like wings on its back. ³  This beast had four heads, ⁴  and ruling authority was given to it.