You must not charge interest on a loan to your fellow Israelite, whether on money, food, or anything else that has been loaned with interest.

If a man marries a woman and she does not please him because he has found something offensive in her, then he may draw up a divorce document, give it to her, and evict her from his house.

When she has left him she may go and become someone else's wife.

her first husband who divorced her is not permitted to remarry her after she has become ritually impure, for that is offensive to the Lord. You must not bring guilt on the land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance.

When a man is newly married, he need not go into the army nor be obligated in any way; he must be free to stay at home for a full year and bring joy to the wife he has married.

You will celebrate all the good things that the Lord your God has given you and your family, along with the Levites and the resident foreigners among you.

And today the Lord has declared you to be his special people (as he already promised you) so you may keep all his commandments.

Then he will elevate you above all the nations he has made and you will receive praise, fame, and honor. You will be a people holy to the Lord your God, as he has said.

Cursed is the one who has sexual relations with his father's former wife, for he dishonors his father.' Then all the people will say, 'Amen!'

Cursed is the one who has sexual relations with his sister, the daughter of either his father or mother.' Then all the people will say, 'Amen!'

Cursed is the one who has sexual relations with his mother-in-law.' Then all the people will say, 'Amen!'

The Lord will plague you with deadly diseases until he has completely removed you from the land you are about to possess.

All these curses will fall on you, pursuing and overtaking you until you are destroyed, because you would not obey the Lord your God by keeping his commandments and statutes that he has given you.

They will besiege all of your villages until all of your high and fortified walls collapse -- those in which you put your confidence throughout the land. They will besiege all your villages throughout the land the Lord your God has given you.

You will then eat your own offspring, the flesh of the sons and daughters the Lord your God has given you, because of the severity of the siege by which your enemies will constrict you.

and will secretly eat her afterbirth and her newborn children (since she has nothing else), because of the severity of the siege by which your enemy will constrict you in your villages.

But to this very day the Lord has not given you an understanding mind, perceptive eyes, or discerning ears!

I have led you through the desert for forty years. Your clothing has not worn out nor have your sandals deteriorated.

The generation to come -- your descendants who will rise up after you, as well as the foreigner who will come from distant places -- will see the afflictions of that land and the illnesses that the Lord has brought on it.

Then all the nations will ask, "Why has the Lord done all this to this land? What is this fierce, heated display of anger all about?"

So the Lord has uprooted them from their land in anger, wrath, and great rage and has deported them to another land, as is clear today."

"When you have experienced all these things, both the blessings and the curses I have set before you, you will reflect upon them in all the nations where the Lord your God has banished you.

the Lord your God will reverse your captivity and have pity on you. He will turn and gather you from all the peoples among whom he has scattered you.

He said to them, "Today I am a hundred and twenty years old. I am no longer able to get about, and the Lord has said to me, 'You will not cross the Jordan.'

As for the Lord your God, he is about to cross over before you; he will destroy these nations before you and dispossess them. As for Joshua, he is about to cross before you just as the Lord has said.

Is this how you repay the Lord, you foolish, unwise people? Is he not your father, your creator? He has made you and established you.

For a fire has been kindled by my anger, and it burns to lowest Sheol; it consumes the earth and its produce, and ignites the foundations of the mountains.

But I fear the reaction of their enemies, for their adversaries would misunderstand and say, "Our power is great, and the Lord has not done all this!"'

The Lord will judge his people, and will change his plans concerning his servants; when he sees that their power has disappeared, and that no one is left, whether confined or set free.

He has selected the best part for himself, for the portion of the ruler is set aside there; he came with the leaders of the people, he obeyed the righteous laws of the Lord and his ordinances with Israel.

The everlasting God is a refuge, and underneath you are his eternal arms; he has driven out enemies before you, and has said, "Destroy!"

He has done this so all the nations of the earth might recognize the Lord's power and so you might always obey the Lord your God."

If only we had been satisfied to live on the other side of the Jordan! O Lord, what can I say now that Israel has retreated before its enemies?

Israel has sinned; they have violated my covenantal commandment! They have taken some of the riches; they have stolen them and deceitfully put them among their own possessions.

The Israelites are unable to stand before their enemies; they retreat because they have become subject to annihilation. I will no longer be with you, unless you destroy what has contaminated you.

These wineskins we filled were brand new, but look how they have ripped. Our clothes and sandals have worn out because it has been a very long journey."

"Come to my aid so we can attack Gibeon, for it has made peace with Joshua and the Israelites."

There has not been a day like it before or since. The Lord obeyed a man, for the Lord fought for Israel!

So now, look, the Lord has preserved my life, just as he promised, these past forty-five years since the Lord spoke these words to Moses, during which Israel traveled through the wilderness. Now look, I am today eighty-five years old.

The descendants of Joseph said to Joshua, "Why have you assigned us only one tribal allotment? After all, we have many people, for until now the Lord has enabled us to increase in number."

So Joshua said to the Israelites: "How long do you intend to put off occupying the land the Lord God of your ancestors has given you?

Now the Lord your God has made your fellow Israelites secure, just as he promised them. So now you may turn around and go to your homes in your own land which Moses the Lord's servant assigned to you east of the Jordan.

"The Lord drove out from before you great and mighty nations; no one has been able to resist you to this very day.

But in the same way every faithful promise the Lord your God made to you has been realized, it is just as certain, if you disobey, that the Lord will bring on you every judgment until he destroys you from this good land which the Lord your God gave you.

Joshua said to all the people, "Look, this stone will be a witness against you, for it has heard everything the Lord said to us. It will be a witness against you if you deny your God."

Adoni-Bezek said, "Seventy kings, with thumbs and big toes cut off, used to lick up food scraps under my table. God has repaid me for what I did to them." They brought him to Jerusalem, where he died.

He moved to Hittite country and built a city. He named it Luz, and it has kept that name to this very day.

The Lord was furious with Israel. He said, "This nation has violated the terms of the agreement I made with their ancestors by disobeying me.

Deborah said to Barak, "Spring into action, for this is the day the Lord is handing Sisera over to you! Has the Lord not taken the lead?" Barak quickly went down from Mount Tabor with ten thousand men following him.

Gideon said to him, "Pardon me, but if the Lord is with us, why has such disaster overtaken us? Where are all his miraculous deeds our ancestors told us about? They said, 'Did the Lord not bring us up from Egypt?' But now the Lord has abandoned us and handed us over to Midian."

The Lord said to Gideon, "You have too many men for me to hand Midian over to you. Israel might brag, 'Our own strength has delivered us.'

Since the Lord God of Israel has driven out the Amorites before his people Israel, do you think you can just take it from them?

You have the right to take what Chemosh your god gives you, but we will take the land of all whom the Lord our God has driven out before us.

Israel has been living in Heshbon and its nearby towns, in Aroer and its nearby towns, and in all the cities along the Arnon for three hundred years! Why did you not reclaim them during that time?

The woman ran at once and told her husband, "Come quickly, the man who visited me the other day has appeared to me!"

When he got home, he told his father and mother, "A Philistine girl in Timnah has caught my eye. Now get her for my wife."

The men of Judah said, "Why are you attacking us?" The Philistines said, "We have come up to take Samson prisoner so we can do to him what he has done to us."

The Gazites were told, "Samson has come here!" So they surrounded the town and hid all night at the city gate, waiting for him to leave. They relaxed all night, thinking, "He will not leave until morning comes; then we will kill him!"

Finally he told her his secret. He said to her, "My hair has never been cut, for I have been dedicated to God from the time I was conceived. If my head were shaved, my strength would leave me; I would become weak, and be just like all other men."

When Delilah saw that he had told her his secret, she sent for the rulers of the Philistines, saying, "Come up here again, for he has told me his secret." So the rulers of the Philistines went up to visit her, bringing the silver in their hands.

The rulers of the Philistines gathered to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god and to celebrate. They said, "Our god has handed Samson, our enemy, over to us."

When the people saw him, they praised their god, saying, "Our god has handed our enemy over to us, the one who ruined our land and killed so many of us!"

The Levite said to him, "We are traveling from Bethlehem in Judah to the remote region of the Ephraimite hill country. That's where I'm from. I had business in Bethlehem in Judah, but now I'm heading home. But no one has invited me into their home.

Everyone who saw the sight said, "Nothing like this has happened or been witnessed during the entire time since the Israelites left the land of Egypt! Take careful note of it! Discuss it and speak!"

They said, "Why, O Lord God of Israel, has this happened in Israel?" An entire tribe has disappeared from Israel today!"

The Israelites asked, "Who from all the Israelite tribes has not assembled before the Lord?" They had made a solemn oath that whoever did not assemble before the Lord at Mizpah must certainly be executed.

Do this: exterminate every male, as well as every woman who has had sexual relations with a male. But spare the lives of any virgins." So they did as instructed.

But she replied to them, "Don't call me 'Naomi'! Call me 'Mara' because the Sovereign One has treated me very harshly.

I left here full, but the Lord has caused me to return empty-handed. Why do you call me 'Naomi,' seeing that the Lord has opposed me, and the Sovereign One has caused me to suffer?"

She asked, 'May I follow the harvesters and gather grain among the bundles?' Since she arrived she has been working hard from this morning until now -- except for sitting in the resting hut a short time."

Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, "May he be rewarded by the Lord because he has shown loyalty to the living on behalf of the dead!" Then Naomi said to her, "This man is a close relative of ours; he is our guardian."

Then Naomi said, "Stay put, my daughter, until you know how the matter turns out. For the man will not rest until he has taken care of the matter today."

Then Boaz said to the guardian, "Naomi, who has returned from the region of Moab, is selling the portion of land that belongs to our relative Elimelech.

The village women said to Naomi, "May the Lord be praised because he has not left you without a guardian today! May he become famous in Israel!

He will encourage you and provide for you when you are old, for your daughter-in-law, who loves you, has given him birth. She is better to you than seven sons!"

The neighbor women named him, saying, "A son has been born to Naomi." They named him Obed. Now he became the father of Jesse -- David's father!

I prayed for this boy, and the Lord has given me the request that I asked of him.

He lifts the weak from the dust; he raises the poor from the ash heap to seat them with princes and to bestow on them an honored position. The foundations of the earth belong to the Lord, and he has placed the world on them.

The messenger replied, "Israel has fled from the Philistines! The army has suffered a great defeat! Your two sons, Hophni and Phineas, are dead! The ark of God has been captured!"

She named the boy Ichabod, saying, "The glory has departed from Israel," referring to the capture of the ark of God and the deaths of her father-in-law and her husband.

She said, "The glory has departed from Israel, because the ark of God has been captured."

When the people of Ashdod saw what was happening, they said, "The ark of the God of Israel should not remain with us, for he has attacked both us and our god Dagon!"

They inquired, "What is the guilt offering that we should send to him?" They replied, "The Philistine leaders number five. So send five gold sores and five gold mice, for it is the same plague that has afflicted both you and your leaders.

But keep an eye on it. If it should go up by the way of its own border to Beth Shemesh, then he has brought this great calamity on us. But if that is not the case, then we will know that it was not his hand that struck us; rather, it just happened to us by accident."

Samuel took a stone and placed it between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer, saying, "Up to here the Lord has helped us."

"At this time tomorrow I will send to you a man from the land of Benjamin. You must consecrate him as a leader over my people Israel. He will save my people from the hand of the Philistines. For I have looked with favor on my people. Their cry has reached me!"

So the cook picked up the leg and brought it and set it in front of Saul. Samuel said, "What was kept is now set before you! Eat, for it has been kept for you for this meeting time, from the time I said, 'I have invited the people.'" So Saul ate with Samuel that day.

Then Samuel took a small container of olive oil and poured it on Saul's head. Samuel kissed him and said, "The Lord has chosen you to lead his people Israel! You will rule over the Lord's people and you will deliver them from the power of the enemies who surround them. This will be your sign that the Lord has chosen you as leader over his inheritance.

When you leave me today, you will find two men near Rachel's tomb at Zelzah on Benjamin's border. They will say to you, 'The donkeys you have gone looking for have been found. Your father is no longer concerned about the donkeys but has become anxious about you two! He is asking, "What should I do about my son?"'

When everyone who had known him previously saw him prophesying with the prophets, the people all asked one another, "What on earth has happened to the son of Kish? Does even Saul belong with the prophets?"

So they inquired again of the Lord, "Has the man arrived here yet?" The Lord said, "He has hidden himself among the equipment."

Then Samuel said to all the people, "Do you see the one whom the Lord has chosen? Indeed, there is no one like him among all the people!" All the people shouted out, "Long live the king!"

Now Saul was walking behind the oxen as he came from the field. Saul asked, "What has happened to the people? Why are they weeping?" So they told him about the men of Jabesh.

But Saul said, "No one will be killed on this day. For today the Lord has given Israel a victory!"

Now look! Here is the king you have chosen -- the one that you asked for! Look, the Lord has given you a king!

However, fear the Lord and serve him faithfully with all your heart. Just look at the great things he has done for you!

All Israel heard this message, "Saul has attacked the Philistine outpost, and now Israel is repulsive to the Philistines!" So the people were summoned to join Saul at Gilgal.

But now your kingdom will not continue! The Lord has sought out for himself a man who is loyal to him and the Lord has appointed him to be leader over his people, for you have not obeyed what the Lord commanded you."

But if they say, 'Come up against us,' we will go up. For in that case the Lord has given them into our hand -- it will be a sign to us."

Then the men of the garrison said to Jonathan and his armor bearer, "Come on up to us so we can teach you a thing or two!" Then Jonathan said to his armor bearer, "Come up behind me, for the Lord has given them into the hand of Israel!"