25th April

¹ At that time the LORD said unto me, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first, and come up unto me into the mount, and make thee an ark of wood.² And I will write on the tables the words that were in the first tables which thou brakest, and thou shalt put them in the ark.³ And I made an ark of shittim wood, and hewed two tables of stone like unto the first, and went up into the mount, having the two tables in mine hand.⁴ And he wrote on the tables, according to the first writing, the ten commandments, which the LORD spake unto you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly: and the LORD gave them unto me.⁵ And I turned myself and came down from the mount, and put the tables in the ark which I had made; and there they be, as the LORD commanded me.⁶ And the children of Israel took their journey from Beeroth of the children of Jaakan to Mosera: there Aaron died, and there he was buried; and Eleazar his son ministered in the priest's office in his stead.⁷ From thence they journeyed unto Gudgodah; and from Gudgodah to Jotbath, a land of rivers of waters.⁸ At that time the LORD separated the tribe of Levi, to bear the ark of the covenant of the LORD, to stand before the LORD to minister unto him, and to bless in his name, unto this day.⁹ Wherefore Levi hath no part nor inheritance with his brethren; the LORD is his inheritance, according as the LORD thy God promised him.¹⁰ And I stayed in the mount, according to the first time, forty days and forty nights; and the LORD hearkened unto me at that time also, and the LORD would not destroy thee.¹¹ And the LORD said unto me, Arise, take thy journey before the people, that they may go in and possess the land, which I sware unto their fathers to give unto them.¹² And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee, but to fear the LORD thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the LORD thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul,¹³ To keep the commandments of the LORD, and his statutes, which I command thee this day for thy good?¹⁴ Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the LORD's thy God, the earth also, with all that therein is.¹⁵ Only the LORD had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day.¹⁶ Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiffnecked.¹⁷ For the LORD your God is God of gods, and Lord of lords, a great God, a mighty, and a terrible, which regardeth not persons, nor taketh reward:¹⁸ He doth execute the judgment of the fatherless and widow, and loveth the stranger, in giving him food and raiment.¹⁹ Love ye therefore the stranger: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.²⁰ Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God; him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave, and swear by his name.²¹ He is thy praise, and he is thy God, that hath done for thee these great and terrible things, which thine eyes have seen.²² Thy fathers went down into Egypt with threescore and ten persons; and now the LORD thy God hath made thee as the stars of heaven for multitude.

¹ Therefore thou shalt love the LORD thy God, and keep his charge, and his statutes, and his judgments, and his commandments, alway.² And know ye this day: for I speak not with your children which have not known, and which have not seen the chastisement of the LORD your God, his greatness, his mighty hand, and his stretched out arm,³ And his miracles, and his acts, which he did in the midst of Egypt unto Pharaoh the king of Egypt, and unto all his land;⁴ And what he did unto the army of Egypt, unto their horses, and to their chariots; how he made the water of the Red sea to overflow them as they pursued after you, and how the LORD hath destroyed them unto this day;⁵ And what he did unto you in the wilderness, until ye came into this place;⁶ And what he did unto Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, the son of Reuben: how the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up, and their households, and their tents, and all the substance that was in their possession, in the midst of all Israel:⁷ But your eyes have seen all the great acts of the LORD which he did.⁸ Therefore shall ye keep all the commandments which I command you this day, that ye may be strong, and go in and possess the land, whither ye go to possess it;⁹ And that ye may prolong your days in the land, which the LORD sware unto your fathers to give unto them and to their seed, a land that floweth with milk and honey.¹⁰ For the land, whither thou goest in to possess it, is not as the land of Egypt, from whence ye came out, where thou sowedst thy seed, and wateredst it with thy foot, as a garden of herbs:¹¹ But the land, whither ye go to possess it, is a land of hills and valleys, and drinketh water of the rain of heaven:¹² A land which the LORD thy God careth for: the eyes of the LORD thy God are always upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year.¹³ And it shall come to pass, if ye shall hearken diligently unto my commandments which I command you this day, to love the LORD your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul,¹⁴ That I will give you the rain of your land in his due season, the first rain and the latter rain, that thou mayest gather in thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil.¹⁵ And I will send grass in thy fields for thy cattle, that thou mayest eat and be full.¹⁶ Take heed to yourselves, that your heart be not deceived, and ye turn aside, and serve other gods, and worship them;¹⁷ And then the LORD's wrath be kindled against you, and he shut up the heaven, that there be no rain, and that the land yield not her fruit; and lest ye perish quickly from off the good land which the LORD giveth you.¹⁸ Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes.¹⁹ And ye shall teach them your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.²⁰ And thou shalt write them upon the door posts of thine house, and upon thy gates:²¹ That your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children, in the land which the LORD sware unto your fathers to give them, as the days of heaven upon the earth.²² For if ye shall diligently keep all these commandments which I command you, to do them, to love the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, and to cleave unto him;²³ Then will the LORD drive out all these nations from before you, and ye shall possess greater nations and mightier than yourselves.²⁴ Every place whereon the soles of your feet shall tread shall be yours: from the wilderness and Lebanon, from the river, the river Euphrates, even unto the uttermost sea shall your coast be.²⁵ There shall no man be able to stand before you: for the LORD your God shall lay the fear of you and the dread of you upon all the land that ye shall tread upon, as he hath said unto you.²⁶ Behold, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse;²⁷ A blessing, if ye obey the commandments of the LORD your God, which I command you this day:²⁸ And a curse, if ye will not obey the commandments of the LORD your God, but turn aside out of the way which I command you this day, to go after other gods, which ye have not known.²⁹ And it shall come to pass, when the LORD thy God hath brought thee in unto the land whither thou goest to possess it, that thou shalt put the blessing upon mount Gerizim, and the curse upon mount Ebal.³⁰ Are they not on the other side Jordan, by the way where the sun goeth down, in the land of the Canaanites, which dwell in the champaign over against Gilgal, beside the plains of Moreh?³¹ For ye shall pass over Jordan to go in to possess the land which the LORD your God giveth you, and ye shall possess it, and dwell therein.³² And ye shall observe to do all the statutes and judgments which I set before you this day.

¹ So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of their oppressors there was power; but they had no comforter.² Wherefore I praised the dead which are already dead more than the living which are yet alive.³ Yea, better is he than both they, which hath not yet been, who hath not seen the evil work that is done under the sun.⁴ Again, I considered all travail, and every right work, that for this a man is envied of his neighbour. This is also vanity and vexation of spirit.⁵ The fool foldeth his hands together, and eateth his own flesh.⁶ Better is an handful with quietness, than both the hands full with travail and vexation of spirit.⁷ Then I returned, and I saw vanity under the sun.⁸ There is one alone, and there is not a second; yea, he hath neither child nor brother: yet is there no end of all his labour; neither is his eye satisfied with riches; neither saith he, For whom do I labour, and bereave my soul of good? This is also vanity, yea, it is a sore travail.⁹ Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labour.¹⁰ For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow: but woe to him that is alone when he falleth; for he hath not another to help him up.¹¹ Again, if two lie together, then they have heat: but how can one be warm alone?¹² And if one prevail against him, two shall withstand him; and a threefold cord is not quickly broken.¹³ Better is a poor and a wise child than an old and foolish king, who will no more be admonished.¹⁴ For out of prison he cometh to reign; whereas also he that is born in his kingdom becometh poor.¹⁵ I considered all the living which walk under the sun, with the second child that shall stand up in his stead.¹⁶ There is no end of all the people, even of all that have been before them: they also that come after shall not rejoice in him. Surely this also is vanity and vexation of spirit.

¹ The former treatise have I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach,² Until the day in which he was taken up, after that he through the Holy Ghost had given commandments unto the apostles whom he had chosen:³ To whom also he shewed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God:⁴ And, being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard of me.⁵ For John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.⁶ When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?⁷ And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power.⁸ But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.⁹ And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight.¹⁰ And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel;¹¹ Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.¹² Then returned they unto Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is from Jerusalem a sabbath day's journey.¹³ And when they were come in, they went up into an upper room, where abode both Peter, and James, and John, and Andrew, Philip, and Thomas, Bartholomew, and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon Zelotes, and Judas the brother of James.¹⁴ These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.¹⁵ And in those days Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples, and said, (the number of names together were about an hundred and twenty,)¹⁶ Men and brethren, this scripture must needs have been fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning Judas, which was guide to them that took Jesus.¹⁷ For he was numbered with us, and had obtained part of this ministry.¹⁸ Now this man purchased a field with the reward of iniquity; and falling headlong, he burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels gushed out.¹⁹ And it was known unto all the dwellers at Jerusalem; insomuch as that field is called in their proper tongue, Aceldama, that is to say, The field of blood.²⁰ For it is written in the book of Psalms, Let his habitation be desolate, and let no man dwell therein: and his bishoprick let another take.²¹ Wherefore of these men which have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us,²² Beginning from the baptism of John, unto that same day that he was taken up from us, must one be ordained to be a witness with us of his resurrection.²³ And they appointed two, Joseph called Barsabas, who was surnamed Justus, and Matthias.²⁴ And they prayed, and said, Thou, Lord, which knowest the hearts of all men, shew whether of these two thou hast chosen,²⁵ That he may take part of this ministry and apostleship, from which Judas by transgression fell, that he might go to his own place.²⁶ And they gave forth their lots; and the lot fell upon Matthias; and he was numbered with the eleven apostles.