In the first year of Darius ¹  son of Ahasuerus, ²  who was of Median descent and who had been ³  appointed king over the Babylonian ⁴  empire –

God said, “Let the land produce vegetation: ¹  plants yielding seeds according to their kinds, ²  and ³  trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds.” It was so.

Then God said, “I now ¹  give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the entire earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. ² 

I will indeed bless you, ¹  and I will greatly multiply ²  your descendants ³  so that they will be as countless as the stars in the sky or the grains of sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession ⁴  of the strongholds ⁵  of their enemies.

But Onan knew that the child ¹  would not be considered his. ²  So whenever ³  he had sexual relations with ⁴  his brother’s wife, he withdrew prematurely ⁵  so as not to give his brother a descendant.

Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel your servants, to whom you swore by yourself and told them, ‘I will multiply your descendants ¹  like the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have spoken about ²  I will give to your descendants, ³  and they will inherit it forever.’”

No man ¹  from the descendants of Aaron who is diseased or has a discharge ²  may eat the holy offerings until he becomes clean. The one ³  who touches anything made unclean by contact with a dead person, ⁴  or a man who has a seminal emission, ⁵ 

Jonathan said to David, “Go in peace, for the two of us have sworn together in the name of the Lord saying, ‘The Lord will be between me and you and between my descendants and your descendants forever.’”(21:1) ¹ Then David ²  got up and left, while Jonathan went back to the city.

and also seven ¹  of every kind of bird in the sky, male and female, ²  to preserve their offspring ³  on the face of the earth.

“While the earth continues to exist, ¹  planting time ²  and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, and day and night will not cease.”

The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your descendants ¹  I will give this land.” So Abram ²  built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.

The Lord ¹  took him outside and said, “Gaze into the sky and count the stars – if you are able to count them!” Then he said to him, “So will your descendants be.”

Then the Lord said to Abram, “Know for certain ¹  that your descendants will be strangers ²  in a foreign country. ³  They will be enslaved and oppressed ⁴  for four hundred years.

I will give the whole land of Canaan – the land where you are now residing ¹  – to you and your descendants after you as a permanent ²  possession. I will be their God.”

This is my requirement that you and your descendants after you must keep: ¹  Every male among you must be circumcised. ² 

They blessed Rebekah with these words: ¹  “Our sister, may you become the mother ²  of thousands of ten thousands! May your descendants possess the strongholds ³  of their enemies.”

May he give you and your descendants the blessing he gave to Abraham ¹  so that you may possess the land ²  God gave to Abraham, the land where you have been living as a temporary resident.” ³ 

But you ¹  said, ‘I will certainly make you prosper ²  and will make ³  your descendants like the sand on the seashore, too numerous to count.’” ⁴ 

The land I gave ¹  to Abraham and Isaac I will give to you. To your descendants ²  I will also give this land.”

Jacob and all his descendants took their livestock and the possessions they had acquired in the land of Canaan, and they went to Egypt. ¹