The People of Israel Confess Their Sin

¹Now on the twenty-fourth day of vthis month the people of Israel were assembled wwith fasting xand in sackcloth, yand with earth on their heads. ²zAnd the Israelites1 separated themselves from all foreigners and stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers. ³aAnd they stood up in their place and read from the Book of the Law of the Lord their God for a quarter of the day; for another quarter of it they made confession and worshiped the Lord their God. ⁴On the stairs of the Levites stood bJeshua, Bani, Kadmiel, Shebaniah, Bunni, Sherebiah, Bani, and Chenani; and they cried with a loud voice to the Lord their God. ⁵Then the Levites, Jeshua, Kadmiel, Bani, Hashabneiah, Sherebiah, Hodiah, Shebaniah, and Pethahiah, said, “Stand up and bless the Lord your God from everlasting to everlasting. cBlessed be your glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise.

⁶2 d“You are the Lord, you alone. eYou have made heaven, fthe heaven of heavens, gwith all their host, ethe earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them; hand you preserve all of them; and the host of heaven worships you. ⁷You are the Lord, the God iwho chose Abram and brought him out of jUr of the Chaldeans kand gave him the name Abraham. ⁸lYou found his heart faithful before you, mand made with him the covenant to give to his offspring nthe land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizzite, the Jebusite, and the Girgashite. oAnd you have kept your promise, for you are righteous.

⁹p“And you saw the affliction of our fathers in Egypt and heard qtheir cry at the Red Sea, ¹⁰rand performed signs and wonders against Pharaoh and all his servants and all the people of his land, for you knew that sthey acted arrogantly against our fathers. And tyou made a name for yourself, as it is to this day. ¹¹uAnd you divided the sea before them, so that they went through the midst of the sea on dry land, and you cast their pursuers into the depths, vas a stone into mighty waters. ¹²By wa pillar of cloud you led them in the day, and by a pillar of fire in the night to light for them the way in which they should go. ¹³xYou came down on Mount Sinai yand spoke with them from heaven and gave them zright rules and true laws, good statutes and commandments, ¹⁴aand you made known to them your holy Sabbath and commanded them commandments and statutes and a law by Moses your servant. ¹⁵bYou gave them bread from heaven for their hunger and cbrought water for them out of the rock for their thirst, and you dtold them to go in to possess the land that you had sworn to give them.

¹⁶“But they and our fathers eacted presumptuously and stiffened their neck and did not obey your commandments. ¹⁷They refused to obey fand were not mindful of the wonders that you performed among them, but they stiffened their neck and appointed a leader to return to their slavery in Egypt.3 But you are a God ready to forgive, ggracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and did not forsake them. ¹⁸Even hwhen they had made for themselves a golden4 calf and said, ‘This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt,’ iand had committed great blasphemies, ¹⁹you jin your great mercies did not forsake them in the wilderness. kThe pillar of cloud to lead them in the way did not depart from them by day, knor the pillar of fire by night to light for them the way by which they should go. ²⁰lYou gave your good Spirit to instruct them mand did not withhold your manna from their mouth and gave them water for their thirst. ²¹nForty years you sustained them in the wilderness, and they lacked nothing. Their clothes did not wear out and their feet did not swell.

²²“And you gave them kingdoms and peoples and allotted to them every corner. oSo they took possession of the land of Sihon king of Heshbon pand the land of Og king of Bashan. ²³You multiplied their children qas the stars of heaven, and you brought them into the land that you had told their fathers to enter and possess. ²⁴rSo the descendants went in and possessed the land, sand you subdued before them the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, and gave them into their hand, with their kings and the peoples of the land, that they might do with them as they would. ²⁵And they captured tfortified cities and ua rich land, and took possession of vhouses full of all good things, cisterns already hewn, vineyards, olive orchards and fruit trees in abundance. So they ate and were filled wand became fat and delighted themselves in xyour great goodness.

²⁶y“Nevertheless, they were disobedient and rebelled against you zand cast your law behind their back aand killed your prophets, who bhad warned them in order to turn them back to you, cand they committed great blasphemies. ²⁷dTherefore you gave them into the hand of their enemies, who made them suffer. eAnd in the time of their suffering they cried out to you and you heard them from heaven, and according to your great mercies you gave them fsaviors who saved them from the hand of their enemies. ²⁸gBut after they had rest they did evil again before you, and you abandoned them to the hand of their enemies, so that they had dominion over them. Yet when they turned and cried to you, you heard from heaven, hand many times you delivered them according to your mercies. ²⁹bAnd you warned them in order to turn them back to your law. Yet ithey acted presumptuously and did not obey your commandments, but sinned against your rules, jwhich if a person does them, he shall live by them, kand they turned a stubborn shoulder land stiffened their neck and would not obey. ³⁰Many years myou bore with them nand warned them oby your Spirit through your prophets. pYet they would not give ear. qTherefore you gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands. ³¹Nevertheless, rin your great mercies syou did not make an end of them or forsake them, tfor you are a gracious and merciful God.

³²“Now, therefore, our God, uthe great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love, let not all the hardship seem little to you that has come upon us, upon our kings, our princes, our priests, our prophets, our fathers, and all your people, vsince the time of the kings of Assyria until this day. ³³wYet you have been righteous in all that has come upon us, for you have dealt faithfully xand we have acted wickedly. ³⁴Our kings, our princes, our priests, and our fathers have not kept your law or paid attention to your commandments and your warnings that you gave them. ³⁵Even in their own kingdom, yand amid your great goodness that you gave them, and in the large and yrich land that you set before them, zthey did not serve you or turn from their wicked works. ³⁶Behold, awe are slaves this day; in the land that you gave to our fathers to enjoy its fruit and its good gifts, behold, we are slaves. ³⁷bAnd its rich yield goes to the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins. They rule over our bodies and over our livestock as they please, and we are in great distress.

³⁸5 “Because of all this cwe make a firm covenant in writing; on dthe sealed document are the names of6 our princes, our Levites, and our priests.