When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of pieces did you pick up?” They replied, “Twelve.”

“When I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand, how many baskets full of pieces did you pick up?” They replied, ¹  “Seven.”

He ¹  said to them, “Take nothing for your ²  journey – no staff, ³  no bag, ⁴  no bread, no money, and do not take an extra tunic. ⁵ 

For I was afraid of you, because you are a severe ¹  man. You withdraw ²  what you did not deposit ³  and reap what you did not sow.’

(Now Judas ¹  said this not because he was concerned about the poor, but because he was a thief. As keeper of the money box, ²  he used to steal what was put into it.) ³ 

Do you not know that you are God’s temple ¹  and that God’s Spirit lives in you?

But I am sending ¹  these brothers so that our boasting about you may not be empty in this case, so that you may be ready ²  just as I kept telling them.

The overseer ¹  then must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, ²  temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, an able teacher,

and in one case tithes are received by mortal men, while in the other by him who is affirmed to be alive.

King Jehoash of Judah collected all the sacred items that his ancestors Jehoshaphat, Jehoram, and Ahaziah, kings of Judah, had consecrated, as well as his own sacred items and all the gold that could be found in the treasuries of the Lord’s temple and the royal palace. He sent it all ¹  to King Hazael of Syria, who then withdrew ²  from Jerusalem.

“Everything is fine,” ¹  the man in charge of Joseph’s household told them. “Don’t be afraid. Your God and the God of your father has given you treasure in your sacks. ²  I had your money.” ³  Then he brought Simeon out to them.

“Take ¹  choice spices: ²  twelve and a half pounds ³  of free-flowing myrrh, ⁴  half that – about six and a quarter pounds – of sweet-smelling cinnamon, six and a quarter pounds of sweet-smelling cane,

one beka per person, that is, a half shekel, ¹  according to the sanctuary shekel, for everyone who crossed over to those numbered, from twenty years old or older, ²  603,550 in all. ³ 

On the first day you must take for yourselves branches from majestic trees ¹  – palm branches, branches of leafy trees, and willows of the brook – and you must rejoice before the Lord your God for seven days.

And the people went about and gathered it, and ground it with mills or pounded it in mortars; they baked it in pans and made cakes of it. It tasted like fresh olive oil. ¹ 

“‘Then a man who is ceremonially clean must gather up the ashes of the red heifer and put them in a ceremonially clean place outside the camp. They must be kept ¹  for the community of the Israelites for use in the water of purification ²  – it is a purification for sin. ³ 

You must gather all of its plunder into the middle of the plaza ¹  and burn the city and all its plunder as a whole burnt offering to the Lord your God. It will be an abandoned ruin ²  forever – it must never be rebuilt again.

The men ¹  who were chosen ²  took supplies ³  and their trumpets. Gideon ⁴  sent all the men of Israel back to their homes; ⁵  he kept only three hundred men. Now the Midianites ⁶  were camped down below ⁷  in the valley.

Gideon continued, ¹  “I would like to make one request. Each of you give me an earring from the plunder you have taken.” ²  (The Midianites ³  had gold earrings because they were Ishmaelites.)

When I send a boy after them, I will say, “Go and find the arrows.” If I say to the boy, ‘Look, the arrows are on this side of you; ¹  get them,’ then come back. For as surely as the Lord lives, you will be safe and there will no problem.