God said, "Let there be light." And there was light!

God said, "Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters and let it separate water from water.

God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place and let dry ground appear." It was so.

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

The land produced vegetation -- plants yielding seeds according to their kinds, and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. God saw that it was good.

God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them be signs to indicate seasons and days and years,

God said, "Let the water swarm with swarms of living creatures and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky."

God blessed them and said, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds multiply on the earth."

God said, "Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: cattle, creeping things, and wild animals, each according to its kind." It was so.

Then God said, "Let us make humankind in our image, after our likeness, so they may rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move on the earth."

God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply! Fill the earth and subdue it! Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that moves on the ground."

Then God said, "I now 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.

The name of the third river is Tigris; it runs along the east side of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.

The Lord God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a companion for him who corresponds to him."

So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep, and while he was asleep, he took part of the man's side and closed up the place with flesh.

Then the man said, "This one at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one will be called 'woman,' for she was taken out of man."

Now the serpent was more shrewd than any of the wild animals that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, "Is it really true that God said, 'You must not eat from any tree of the orchard'?"

The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat of the fruit from the trees of the orchard;

but concerning the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the orchard God said, 'You must not eat from it, and you must not touch it, or else you will die.'"

The serpent said to the woman, "Surely you will not die,

But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, "Where are you?"

And the Lord God said, "Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?"

The man said, "The woman whom you gave me, she gave me some fruit from the tree and I ate it."

So the Lord God said to the woman, "What is this you have done?" And the woman replied, "The serpent tricked me, and I ate."

The Lord God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, cursed are you above all the wild beasts and all the living creatures of the field! On your belly you will crawl and dust you will eat all the days of your life.

To the woman he said, "I will greatly increase your labor pains; with pain you will give birth to children. You will want to control your husband, but he will dominate you."

But to Adam he said, "Because you obeyed your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat from it,' cursed is the ground thanks to you; in painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.

By the sweat of your brow you will eat food until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you will return."

And the Lord God said, "Now that the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil, he must not be allowed to stretch out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever."

When he drove the man out, he placed on the eastern side of the orchard in Eden angelic sentries who used the flame of a whirling sword to guard the way to the tree of life.

Now the man had marital relations with his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. Then she said, "I have created a man just as the Lord did!"

Then the Lord said to Cain, "Why are you angry, and why is your expression downcast?

Cain said to his brother Abel, "Let's go out to the field." While they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.

Then the Lord said to Cain, "Where is your brother Abel?" And he replied, "I don't know! Am I my brother's guardian?"

But the Lord said, "What have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground!

Then Cain said to the Lord, "My punishment is too great to endure!

But the Lord said to him, "All right then, if anyone kills Cain, Cain will be avenged seven times as much." Then the Lord put a special mark on Cain so that no one who found him would strike him down.

Lamech said to his wives, "Adah and Zillah! Listen to me! You wives of Lamech, hear my words! I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for hurting me.

So the Lord said, "My spirit will not remain in humankind indefinitely, since they are mortal. They will remain for 120 more years."

So the Lord said, "I will wipe humankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth -- everything from humankind to animals, including creatures that move on the ground and birds of the air, for I regret that I have made them."

But Noah found favor in the sight of the Lord.

The earth was ruined in the sight of God; the earth was filled with violence.

So God said to Noah, "I have decided that all living creatures must die, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. Now I am about to destroy them and the earth.

Make a roof for the ark and finish it, leaving 18 inches from the top. Put a door in the side of the ark, and make lower, middle, and upper decks.

The Lord said to Noah, "Come into the ark, you and all your household, for I consider you godly among this generation.

Then God spoke to Noah and said,

And the Lord smelled the soothing aroma and said to himself, "I will never again curse the ground because of humankind, even though the inclination of their minds is evil from childhood on. I will never again destroy everything that lives, as I have just done.

Then God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

God said to Noah and his sons,

And God said, "This is the guarantee of the covenant I am making with you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all subsequent generations:

So God said to Noah, "This is the guarantee of the covenant that I am confirming between me and all living things that are on the earth."

So he said, "Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves he will be to his brothers."

He also said, "Worthy of praise is the Lord, the God of Shem! May Canaan be the slave of Shem!

He was a mighty hunter before the Lord. (That is why it is said, "Like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the Lord.")

Then they said to one another, "Come, let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly." (They had brick instead of stone and tar instead of mortar.)

Then they said, "Come, let's build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens so that we may make a name for ourselves. Otherwise we will be scattered across the face of the entire earth."

And the Lord said, "If as one people all sharing a common language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be beyond them.

Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot (the son of Haran), and his daughter-in-law Sarai, his son Abram's wife, and with them he set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. When they came to Haran, they settled there.

Now the Lord said to Abram, "Go out from your country, your relatives, and your father's household to the land that I will show you.

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

There was a famine in the land, so Abram went down to Egypt to stay for a while because the famine was severe.

As he approached Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, "Look, I know that you are a beautiful woman.

So Pharaoh summoned Abram and said, "What is this you have done to me? Why didn't you tell me that she was your wife?

But the land could not support them while they were living side by side. Because their possessions were so great, they were not able to live alongside one another.

Abram said to Lot, "Let there be no quarreling between me and you, and between my herdsmen and your herdsmen, for we are close relatives.

After Lot had departed, the Lord said to Abram, "Look from the place where you stand to the north, south, east, and west.

Then the king of Sodom said to Abram, "Give me the people and take the possessions for yourself."

But Abram said, "O sovereign Lord, what will you give me since I continue to be childless, and my heir is Eliezer of Damascus?"

The Lord 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."

The Lord said to him, "I am the Lord who brought you out from Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to possess."

But Abram said, "O sovereign Lord, by what can I know that I am to possess it?"

The Lord said to him, "Take for me a heifer, a goat, and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon."

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

So Sarai said to Abram, "Since the Lord has prevented me from having children, have sexual relations with my servant. Perhaps I can have a family by her." Abram did what Sarai told him.

Then Sarai said to Abram, "You have brought this wrong on me! I allowed my servant to have sexual relations with you, but when she realized that she was pregnant, she despised me. May the Lord judge between you and me!"

Abram said to Sarai, "Since your servant is under your authority, do to her whatever you think best." Then Sarai treated Hagar harshly, so she ran away from Sarai.

He said, "Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from, and where are you going?" She replied, "I'm running away from my mistress, Sarai."

Then the Lord's angel said to her, "Return to your mistress and submit to her authority.

Then the Lord's angel said to her, "You are now pregnant and are about to give birth to a son. You are to name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard your painful groans.

So Hagar named the Lord who spoke to her, "You are the God who sees me," for she said, "Here I have seen one who sees me!"

When Abram was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, "I am the sovereign God. Walk before me and be blameless.

Abram bowed down with his face to the ground, and God said to him,

Then God said to Abraham, "As for you, you must keep the covenantal requirement I am imposing on you and your descendants after you throughout their generations.

Then God said to Abraham, "As for your wife, you must no longer call her Sarai; Sarah will be her name.

Then Abraham bowed down with his face to the ground and laughed as he said to himself, "Can a son be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Can Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?"

Abraham said to God, "O that Ishmael might live before you!"

God said, "No, Sarah your wife is going to bear you a son, and you will name him Isaac. I will confirm my covenant with him as a perpetual covenant for his descendants after him.

But I will establish my covenant with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you at this set time next year."

He said, "My lord, if I have found favor in your sight, do not pass by and leave your servant.

So Abraham hurried into the tent and said to Sarah, "Quick! Take three measures of fine flour, knead it, and make bread."

One of them said, "I will surely return to you when the season comes round again, and your wife Sarah will have a son!" (Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, not far behind him.

The Lord said to Abraham, "Why did Sarah laugh and say, 'Will I really have a child when I am old?'

Then Sarah lied, saying, "I did not laugh," because she was afraid. But the Lord said, "No! You did laugh."

Then the Lord said, "Should I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?

So the Lord said, "The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin so blatant

Abraham approached and said, "Will you sweep away the godly along with the wicked?

Then Abraham said, "May the Lord not be angry so that I may speak! What if thirty are found there?" He replied, "I will not do it if I find thirty there."

Abraham said, "Since I have undertaken to speak to the Lord, what if only twenty are found there?" He replied, "I will not destroy it for the sake of the twenty."

Finally Abraham said, "May the Lord not be angry so that I may speak just once more. What if ten are found there?" He replied, "I will not destroy it for the sake of the ten."

He said, "Here, my lords, please turn aside to your servant's house. Stay the night and wash your feet. Then you can be on your way early in the morning." "No," they replied, "we'll spend the night in the town square."