Death of the Animals

¹The Lord said to Moses, “Go to the king and tell him that the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, says, ‘Let my people go, so that they may worship me.

²If you again refuse to let them go,

³I will punish you by sending a terrible disease on all your animals—your horses, donkeys, camels, cattle, sheep, and goats.

⁴I will make a distinction between the animals of the Israelites and those of the Egyptians, and no animal that belongs to the Israelites will die.

⁵I, the Lord, have set tomorrow as the time when I will do this.’”

⁶The next day the Lord did as he had said, and all the animals of the Egyptians died, but not one of the animals of the Israelites died.

⁷The king asked what had happened and was told that none of the animals of the Israelites had died. But he was stubborn and would not let the people go.

Boils

⁸Then the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Take a few handfuls of ashes from a furnace; Moses is to throw them into the air in front of the king.

⁹They will spread out like fine dust over all the land of Egypt, and everywhere they will produce boils that become open sores on the people and the animals.”

¹⁰So they got some ashes and stood before the king; Moses threw them into the air, and they produced boils that became open sores on the people and the animals.

¹¹The magicians were not able to appear before Moses, because they were covered with boils, like all the other Egyptians.

¹²But the Lord made the king stubborn and, just as the Lord had said, the king would not listen to Moses and Aaron.

Hail

¹³The Lord then said to Moses, “Early tomorrow morning meet with the king and tell him that the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, says, ‘Let my people go, so that they may worship me.

¹⁴This time I will punish not only your officials and your people, but I will punish you as well, so that you may know that there is no one like me in all the world.

¹⁵If I had raised my hand to strike you and your people with disease, you would have been completely destroyed.

¹⁶But to show you my power I have let you live so that my fame might spread over the whole world.

¹⁷Yet you are still arrogant and refuse to let my people go.

¹⁸This time tomorrow I will cause a heavy hailstorm, such as Egypt has never known in all its history.

¹⁹Now give orders for your livestock and everything else you have in the open to be put under shelter. Hail will fall on the people and animals left outside unprotected, and they will all die.’”

²⁰Some of the king's officials were afraid because of what the Lord had said, and they brought their slaves and animals indoors for shelter.

²¹Others, however, paid no attention to the Lord's warning and left their slaves and animals out in the open.

²²Then the Lord said to Moses, “Raise your hand toward the sky, and hail will fall over the whole land of Egypt—on the people, the animals, and all the plants in the fields.”

²³So Moses raised his stick toward the sky, and the Lord sent thunder and hail, and lightning struck the ground. The Lord sent

²⁴a heavy hailstorm, with lightning flashing back and forth. It was the worst storm that Egypt had ever known in all its history.

²⁵All over Egypt the hail struck down everything in the open, including all the people and all the animals. It beat down all the plants in the fields and broke all the trees.

²⁶The region of Goshen, where the Israelites lived, was the only place where there was no hail.

²⁷The king sent for Moses and Aaron and said, “This time I have sinned; the Lord is in the right, and my people and I are in the wrong.

²⁸Pray to the Lord! We have had enough of this thunder and hail! I promise to let you go; you don't have to stay here any longer.”

²⁹Moses said to him, “As soon as I go out of the city, I will lift up my hands in prayer to the Lord. The thunder will stop, and there will be no more hail, so that you may know that the earth belongs to the Lord.

³⁰But I know that you and your officials do not yet fear the Lord God.”

³¹The flax and the barley were ruined, because the barley was ripe, and the flax was budding.

³²But none of the wheat was ruined, because it ripens later.

³³Moses left the king, went out of the city, and lifted up his hands in prayer to the Lord. The thunder, the hail, and the rain all stopped.

³⁴When the king saw what had happened, he sinned again. He and his officials remained as stubborn as ever

³⁵and, just as the Lord had foretold through Moses, the king would not let the Israelites go.

Repayment Offerings

¹The following are the regulations for repayment offerings, which are very holy.

²The animal for this offering is to be killed on the north side of the altar, where the animals for the burnt offerings are killed, and its blood is to be thrown against all four sides of the altar.

³All of its fat shall be removed and offered on the altar: the fat tail, the fat covering the internal organs,

⁴the kidneys and the fat on them, and the best part of the liver.

⁵The priest shall burn all the fat on the altar as a food offering to the Lord. It is a repayment offering.

⁶Any male of the priestly families may eat it, but it must be eaten in a holy place, because it is very holy.

⁷There is one regulation that applies to both the sin offering and the repayment offering: the meat belongs to the priest who offers the sacrifice.

⁸The skin of an animal offered as a burnt offering belongs to the priest who offers the sacrifice.

⁹Every grain offering that has been baked in an oven or prepared in a pan or on a griddle belongs to the priest who has offered it to God.

¹⁰But all uncooked grain offerings, whether mixed with oil or dry, belong to all the Aaronite priests and must be shared equally among them.

Fellowship Offerings

¹¹The following are the regulations for the fellowship offerings presented to the Lord.

¹²If you make this offering as a thanksgiving offering to God, you shall present, together with the animal to be sacrificed, an offering of bread made without yeast: either thick loaves made of flour mixed with olive oil or thin cakes brushed with olive oil or cakes made of flour mixed with olive oil.

¹³In addition, you shall offer loaves of bread baked with yeast.

¹⁴You shall present one part of each kind of bread as a special contribution to the Lord; it belongs to the priest who takes the blood of the animal and throws it against the altar.

¹⁵The flesh of the animal must be eaten on the day it is sacrificed; none of it may be left until the next morning.

¹⁶If you bring a fellowship offering as fulfillment of a vow or as your own freewill offering, not all of it has to be eaten on the day it is offered, but any that is left over may be eaten on the following day.

¹⁷Any meat that still remains on the third day must be burned.

¹⁸If any of it is eaten on the third day, God will not accept your offering. The offering will not be counted to your credit but will be considered unclean, and whoever eats it will suffer the consequences.

¹⁹If the meat comes into contact with anything ritually unclean, it must not be eaten, but must be burned. Any of you that are ritually clean may eat the meat,

²⁰but if any of you who are not clean eat it, you shall no longer be considered one of God's people.

²¹Also, if you eat the meat of this offering after you have touched anything ritually unclean, whether from a person or an animal, you shall no longer be considered one of God's people.

²²The Lord gave Moses the following regulations

²³for the people of Israel. No fat of cattle, sheep, or goats shall be eaten.

²⁴The fat of an animal that has died a natural death or has been killed by a wild animal must not be eaten, but it may be used for any other purpose.

²⁵Anyone who eats the fat of an animal that may be offered as a food offering to the Lord will no longer be considered one of God's people.

²⁶No matter where the Israelites live, they must never use the blood of birds or animals for food.

²⁷Anyone who breaks this law will no longer be considered one of God's people.

²⁸The Lord gave Moses the following regulations

²⁹for the people of Israel. When any of you offer a fellowship offering you must bring part of it as a special gift to the Lord,

³⁰bringing it with your own hands as a food offering. You shall bring the fat of the animal with its breast and present it as a special gift to the Lord.

³¹The priest shall burn the fat on the altar, but the breast shall belong to the priests.

³²The right hind leg of the animal shall be given as a special contribution

³³to the priest who offers the blood and the fat of the fellowship offering.

³⁴The breast of the animal is a special gift, and the right hind leg is a special contribution that the Lord has taken from the people of Israel and given to the priests. This is what the people of Israel must give to the priests for all time to come.

³⁵This is the part of the food offered to the Lord that was given to Aaron and his sons on the day they were ordained as priests.

³⁶On that day the Lord commanded the people of Israel to give them this part of the offering. It is a regulation that the people of Israel must obey for all time to come.

³⁷These, then, are the regulations for the burnt offerings, the grain offerings, the sin offerings, the repayment offerings, the ordination offerings, and the fellowship offerings.

³⁸There on Mount Sinai in the desert, the Lord gave these commands to Moses on the day he told the people of Israel to make their offerings.

The Foolishness of Trusting in Riches

¹Hear this, everyone! Listen, all people everywhere,

²great and small alike, rich and poor together.

³My thoughts will be clear; I will speak words of wisdom.

⁴I will turn my attention to proverbs and explain their meaning as I play the harp.

⁵I am not afraid in times of danger when I am surrounded by enemies,

⁶by evil people who trust in their riches and boast of their great wealth.

⁷We can never redeem ourselves; we cannot pay God the price for our lives,

⁸because the payment for a human life is too great. What we could pay would never be enough

⁹to keep us from the grave, to let us live forever.

¹⁰Anyone can see that even the wise die, as well as the foolish and stupid. They all leave their riches to their descendants.

¹¹Their graves are their homes forever; there they stay for all time, though they once had lands of their own.

¹²Our greatness cannot keep us from death; we will still die like the animals.

¹³See what happens to those who trust in themselves, the fate of those who are satisfied with their wealth—

¹⁴they are doomed to die like sheep, and Death will be their shepherd. The righteous will triumph over them, as their bodies quickly decay in the world of the dead far from their homes.

¹⁵But God will rescue me; he will save me from the power of death.

¹⁶Don't be upset when someone becomes rich, when his wealth grows even greater;

¹⁷he cannot take it with him when he dies; his wealth will not go with him to the grave.

¹⁸Even if someone is satisfied with this life and is praised because he is successful,

¹⁹he will join all his ancestors in death, where the darkness lasts forever.

²⁰Our greatness cannot keep us from death; we will still die like the animals.