Week of Rosah Hashanah - Friday

Genesis 22:15-24, 1 Samuel 1:2-10, Psalm 138:1-8

Genesis 22:15-24

15 Hashem’s angel called to Abraham a second time out of the sky, 16 and said, “‘I have sworn by Myself,’ says Hashem, ‘because you have done this thing, and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 that I will bless you greatly, and I will multiply your offspring greatly like the stars of the heavens, and like the sand which is on the seashore. Your offspring will possess the gate of his enemies. 18 All the nations of the earth will be blessed by your offspring, because you have obeyed My voice.’”

19 So Abraham returned to his young men, and they rose up and went together to Beersheba. Abraham lived at Beersheba.

20 After these things, Abraham was told, “Behold, Milcah, she also has borne children to your brother Nahor: 21 Uz his firstborn, Buz his brother, Kemuel the father of Aram, 22 Chesed, Hazo, Pildash, Jidlaph, and Bethuel.” 23 Bethuel became the father of Rebekah. These eight Milcah bore to Nahor, Abraham’s brother. 24 His concubine, whose name was Reumah, also bore Tebah, Gaham, Tahash, and Maacah.

1 Samuel 1:2-10

2 He had two wives. The name of one was Hannah, and the name of the other Peninnah. Peninnah had children, but Hannah had no children. 3 This man went up out of his city from year to year to worship and to sacrifice to Hashem of Armies in Shiloh. The two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, priests to Hashem, were there. 

4 When the day came that Elkanah sacrificed, he gave portions to Peninnah his wife and to all her sons and her daughters; 5 but he gave a double portion to Hannah, for he loved Hannah, but Hashem had shut up her womb. 6 Her rival provoked her severely, to irritate her, because Hashem had shut up her womb. 

7 So year by year, when she went up to Hashem’s house, her rival provoked her. Therefore, she wept and didn’t eat. 

8 Elkanah, her husband, said to her, “Hannah, why do you weep? Why don’t you eat? Why is your heart grieved? Am I not better to you than ten sons?”

9 So Hannah rose up after they had finished eating and drinking in Shiloh. Now Eli the priest was sitting on his seat by the doorpost of Hashem’s temple. 10 She was in bitterness of soul, and prayed to Hashem, weeping bitterly.

Psalm 138:1-8

I will give You thanks with my whole heart.
    Before the gods, I will sing praises to You.

2 I will bow down toward Your holy temple,
    and give thanks to Your Name for Your loving kindness and for Your truth;
    for You have exalted Your Name and Your Word above all.

3 In the day that I called,You answered me.
    You encouraged me with strength in my soul.

4 All the kings of the earth will give You thanks, Hashem,
    for they have heard the words of Your mouth.

5 Yes, they will sing of the ways of Hashem,
    for Hashem’s glory is great!

6 For though Hashem is high, yet He looks after the lowly;
    but He knows the proud from afar.

7 Though I walk in the middle of trouble, You will revive me.
    You will stretch out Your hand against the wrath of my enemies.
    Your right hand will save me.

8 Hashem will fulfill that which concerns me.
    Your loving kindness, Hashem, endures forever.
    Don’t forsake the works of your own hands.

Rosh Hashanah - Thursday

Genesis 22:9-14, Joel 1:1-2:11, Psalm 137:1-9

Genesis 22:9-14

9 They came to the place which God had told him of. Abraham built the altar there, and laid the wood in order, bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar, on the wood. 10 Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to kill his son.

11 Hashem’s angel called to him out of the sky, and said, “Abraham, Abraham!”

He said, “Here I am.”

12 He said, “Don’t lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him. For now I know that you fear Elohim, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.”

13 Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and saw that behind him was a ram caught in the thicket by his horns. Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering instead of his son. 

14 Abraham called the name of that place “Hashem Will Provide”. As it is said to this day, “On Hashem’s mountain, it will be provided.”

Joel 1:1-2:11

Hashem’s word that came to Joel, the son of Pethuel.

2 Hear this, you elders,
    and listen, all you inhabitants of the land!
Has this ever happened in your days,
    or in the days of your fathers?

3 Tell your children about it,
    and have your children tell their children,
    and their children, another generation.

4 What the swarming locust has left, the great locust has eaten.
    What the great locust has left, the grasshopper has eaten.
    What the grasshopper has left, the caterpillar has eaten.

5 Wake up, you drunkards, and weep!
    Wail, all you drinkers of wine, because of the sweet wine,
    for it is cut off from your mouth.

6 For a nation has come up on My land, strong, and without number.
    His teeth are the teeth of a lion,
    and he has the fangs of a lioness.

7 He has laid my vine waste,
    and stripped My fig tree.
    He has stripped its bark and thrown it away.
    Its branches are made white.

8 Mourn like a virgin dressed in sackcloth
    for the husband of her youth!

9 The meal offering and the drink offering are cut off from Hashem’s house.
    The priests, Hashem’s ministers, mourn.

10 The field is laid waste.
    The land mourns, for the grain is destroyed,
    The new wine has dried up,
    and the oil languishes.

11 Be confounded, you farmers!
    Wail, you vineyard keepers,
    for the wheat and for the barley;
    for the harvest of the field has perished.

12The vine has dried up, and the fig tree withered—
    the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree,
    even all of the trees of the field are withered;
    for joy has withered away from the sons of men.

13 Put on sackcloth and mourn, you priests!
    Wail, you ministers of the altar.
Come, lie all night in sackcloth, you ministers of my Elohim,
    for the meal offering and the drink offering are withheld from your Elohim’s house.

14 Sanctify a fast.
    Call a solemn assembly.
    Gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land to the house of Hashem your Elohim,
    and cry to Hashem.

15 Alas for the day!
    For the day of Hashemis at hand,
    and it will come as destruction from the Almighty.

16 Isn’t the food cut off before our eyes,
    joy and gladness from the house of our Elohim?

17 The seeds rot under their clods.
    The granaries are laid desolate.
    The barns are broken down, for the grain has withered.

18 How the animals groan!
    The herds of livestock are perplexed because they have no pasture.
    Yes, the flocks of sheep are made desolate.

19 Hashem, I cry to you,
    for the fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness,
    and the flame has burned all the trees of the field.

20 Yes, the animals of the field pant to You,
    for the water brooks have dried up,
    and the fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness.

2:1 Blow the trumpet in Zion,
    and sound an alarm in My holy mountain!
Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble,
    for the day of Hashem comes,
    for it is close at hand:

2 A day of darkness and gloominess,
    a day of clouds and thick darkness.
As the dawn spreading on the mountains,
    a great and strong people;
    there has never been the like,
    neither will there be any more after them,
    even to the years of many generations.

3 A fire devours before them,
    and behind them, a flame burns.
The land is as the garden of Eden before them,
    and behind them, a desolate wilderness.
Yes, and no one has escaped them.

4 Their appearance is as the appearance of horses,
    and they run as horsemen.

5 Like the noise of chariots on the tops of the mountains, they leap,
    like the noise of a flame of fire that devours the stubble,
    like a strong people set in battle array.

6 At their presence the peoples are in anguish.
    All faces have grown pale.

7 They run like mighty men.
    They climb the wall like warriors.
    They each march in his line, and they don’t swerve off course.

8 One doesn’t jostle another.
    They each march in their own path.
    They burst through the defenses
    and don’t break ranks.

9 They rush on the city.
    They run on the wall.
    They climb up into the houses.
    They enter in at the windows like thieves.

10 The earth quakes before them.
    The heavens tremble.
    The sun and the moon are darkened,
    and the stars withdraw their shining.

11 Hashem thunders His voice before His army,
    for His forces are very great;
    for he is strong who obeys His command;
    for the day of Hashem is great and very awesome,
    and who can endure it?

Psalm 137:1-9

By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down.
    Yes, we wept, when we remembered Zion.

2 On the willows in that land,
    we hung up our harps.

3 For there, those who led us captive asked us for songs.
    Those who tormented us demanded songs of joy:
    “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

4 How can we sing Hashem’s song in a foreign land?

5 If I forget you, Jerusalem,
    let my right hand forget its skill.

6 Let my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth if I don’t remember you,
    if I don’t prefer Jerusalem above my chief joy.

7 Remember, Hashem, against the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem,
    who said, “Raze it!
    Raze it even to its foundation!”

8 Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction,
    he will be happy who repays you,
    as you have done to us.

9 Happy shall he be,
    who takes and dashes your little ones against the rock.

Week of Rosh Hashanah - Wednesday

Genesis 22:1-8, Hosea 12:1-14:9, Psalm 136:13-26

Genesis 22:1-8

After these things, Hashem tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!”

He said, “Here I am.”

2 He said, “Now take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go into the land of Moriah. Offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains which I will tell you of.”

3 Abraham rose early in the morning, and saddled his donkey; and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son. He split the wood for the burnt offering, and rose up, and went to the place of which Hashem had told him. 4 On the third day Abraham, lifted up his eyes, and saw the place far off. 5 Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey. The boy and I will go over there. We will worship, and come back to you.” 6 Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son. He took in his hand the fire and the knife. They both went together. 

7 Isaac spoke to Abraham his father, and said, “My father?”

He said, “Here I am, my son.”

He said, “Here is the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?”

8 Abraham said, “Hashem will provide himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So they both went together.

Hosea 12:1-14:9

Ephraim feeds on wind,

    and chases the east wind.
    He continually multiplies lies and desolation.
    They make a covenant with Assyria,
    and oil is carried into Egypt.

2 Hashem also has a controversy with Judah,
    and will punish Jacob according to his ways;
    according to his deeds he will repay him.

3 In the womb he took his brother by the heel,
    and in his manhood he contended with Hashem.

4 Indeed, he struggled with the angel, and prevailed;
    he wept, and made supplication to him.
    He found him at Bethel, and there he spoke with us—

5 even Hashem, the Elohim of Armies.
    Hashem is His name of renown!

6 Therefore, turn to your Elohim.
    Keep kindness and justice,
    and wait continually for your Elohim.

7 A merchant has dishonest scales in his hand.
    He loves to defraud.

8 Ephraim said, “Surely I have become rich.
    I have found myself wealth.
    In all my wealth they won’t find in me any iniquity that is sin.”

9 “But I am Hashem your Elohim from the land of Egypt.
    I will yet again make you dwell in tents,
    as in the days of the solemn feast.

10 I have also spoken to the prophets,
    and I have multiplied visions;
    and by the ministry of the prophets I have used parables.

11 If Gilead is wicked,
    surely they are worthless.
In Gilgal they sacrifice bulls.
    Indeed, their altars are like heaps in the furrows of the field.

12 Jacob fled into the country of Aram.
    Israel served to get a wife.
    For a wife he tended flocks and herds.

13 By a prophet Hashem brought Israel up out of Egypt,
    and by a prophet he was preserved.

14 Ephraim has bitterly provoked anger.
    Therefore, his blood will be left on him,
    and his Hashem will repay his contempt.

13:1 When Ephraim spoke, there was trembling.

    He exalted himself in Israel,
    but when he became guilty through Baal, he died.

2 Now they sin more and more,
    and have made themselves molten images of their silver,
    even idols according to their own understanding,
    all of them the work of the craftsmen.
    They say of them, ‘They offer human sacrifice and kiss the calves.

3 Therefore, they will be like the morning mist,
    like the dew that passes away early,
    like the chaff that is driven with the whirlwind out of the threshing floor,
    and like the smoke out of the chimney.

 

4 “Yet I am Hashem your Elohim from the land of Egypt;
    and you shall acknowledge no god but Me,
    and besides Me there is no savior.

5 I knew you in the wilderness,
    in the land of great drought.

6 According to their pasture, so were they filled;
    they were filled, and their heart was exalted.
    Therefore, they have forgotten Me.

7 Therefore, I am like a lion to them.
    Like a leopard, I will lurk by the path.

8 I will meet them like a bear that is bereaved of her cubs,
    and will tear the covering of their heart.
    There I will devour them like a lioness.
    The wild animal will tear them.

9 You are destroyed, Israel, because you are against Me,
    against your helper.

10 Where is your king now, that he may save you in all your cities?
    And your judges, of whom you said, ‘Give me a king and princes’?

11 I have given you a king in My anger,
    and have taken him away in My wrath.

12 The guilt of Ephraim is stored up.
    His sin is stored up.

13 The sorrows of a travailing woman will come on him.
    He is an unwise son,
    for when it is time, he doesn’t come to the opening of the womb.

14 I will ransom them from the power of Sheol.
    I will redeem them from death!
    Death, where are your plagues?
    Sheol, where is your destruction?

“Compassion will be hidden from my eyes.

15 Though he is fruitful among his brothers, an east wind will come,
    the breath of Hashen coming up from the wilderness;
    and his spring will become dry,
    and his fountain will be dried up.
    He will plunder the storehouse of treasure.

16 Samaria will bear her guilt,
    for she has rebelled against her Elohim.
    They will fall by the sword.
    Their infants will be dashed in pieces,
    and their pregnant women will be ripped open.”

14:1 Israel, return to Hashem your Elohim;
    for you have fallen because of your sin.

2 Take words with you, and return to Hashem.
    Tell him, “Forgive all our sins,
    and accept that which is good;
    so we offer bulls as we vowed of our lips.

3 Assyria can’t save us.
    We won’t ride on horses;
    neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, ‘Our gods!’
    for in you the fatherless finds mercy.”

 

4 “I will heal their waywardness.
    I will love them freely;
    for My anger is turned away from them.

5 I will be like the dew to Israel.
    He will blossom like the lily,
    and send down his roots like Lebanon.

6 His branches will spread,
    and his beauty will be like the olive tree,
    and his fragrance like Lebanon.

7 Men will dwell in his shade.
    They will revive like the grain,
    and blossom like the vine.
    Their fragrance will be like the wine of Lebanon.

8 Ephraim, what have I to do anymore with idols?
    I answer, and will take care of him.
    I am like a green cypress tree;
    from Me your fruit is found.”

9 Who is wise, that he may understand these things?
    Who is prudent, that he may know them?
    For the ways of Hashem are right,
    and the righteous walk in them,
    but the rebellious stumble in them.

Psalm 136:13-26

13 To Him who divided the Red Sea apart,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

14 and made Israel to pass through the middle of it,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

15 but overthrew Pharaoh and his army in the Red Sea,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

16 to Him who led his people through the wilderness,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

17 to Him who struck great kings,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

18 and killed mighty kings,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

19 Sihon King of the Amorites,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

20 Og King of Bashan,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

21 and gave their land as an inheritance,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

22 even a heritage to Israel his servant,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

23 who remembered us in our low estate,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

24 and has delivered us from our adversaries,
    for His loving kindness endures forever;

25 who gives food to every creature,
    for His loving kindness endures forever.

26 Oh, give thanks to the Elohim of heaven,
    for His loving kindness endures forever.