| Chapter
9 |
| 1 | Now in
the twenty and fourth day of this month the children of Israel were assembled
with fasting, and with sackclothes, and earth upon them. |
| 2 | And the seed of Israel separated
themselves from all strangers, and stood and confessed their sins, and the
iniquities of their fathers. |
| 3
| And they stood up in their place, and read in the book of the law of
the LORD their God one fourth part of the day; and another fourth part they
confessed, and worshipped the LORD their God. |
| 4 | Then stood up upon the stairs, of the Levites, Jeshua,
and Bani, Kadmiel, Shebaniah, Bunni, Sherebiah, Bani, and Chenani, and cried
with a loud voice unto the LORD their God. |
| 5 | Then the Levites, Jeshua, and Kadmiel, Bani, Hashabniah,
Sherebiah, Hodijah, Shebaniah, and Pethahiah, said, Stand up and bless the LORD
your God for ever and ever: and blessed be thy glorious name, which is exalted
above all blessing and praise. |
| 6
| Thou, even thou, art LORD alone; thou hast made heaven, the heaven of
heavens, with all their host, the earth, and all things that are therein, the
seas, and all that is therein, and thou preservest them all; and the host of
heaven worshippeth thee. |
| 7 |
Thou art the LORD the God, who didst choose Abram, and broughtest him forth
out of Ur of the Chaldees, and gavest him the name of Abraham; |
| 8 | And foundest his heart faithful before
thee, and madest a covenant with him to give the land of the Canaanites, the
Hittites, the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Jebusites, and the
Girgashites, to give it, I say, to his seed, and hast performed thy words; for
thou art righteous: |
| 9 | And
didst see the affliction of our fathers in Egypt, and heardest their cry by the
Red sea; |
| 10 | And shewedst
signs and wonders upon Pharaoh, and on all his servants, and on all the people
of his land: for thou knewest that they dealt proudly against them. So didst
thou get thee a name, as it is this day. |
| 11 | And thou didst divide the sea before them, so that they
went through the midst of the sea on the dry land; and their persecutors thou
threwest into the deeps, as a stone into the mighty waters. |
| 12 | Moreover thou leddest them in the day
by a cloudy pillar; and in the night by a pillar of fire, to give them light in
the way wherein they should go. |
|
13 | Thou camest down also upon mount Sinai, and spakest with them
from heaven, and gavest them right judgments, and true laws, good statutes and
commandments: |
| 14 | And
madest known unto them thy holy sabbath, and commandedst them precepts,
statutes, and laws, by the hand of Moses thy servant: |
| 15 | And gavest them bread from heaven for
their hunger, and broughtest forth water for them out of the rock for their
thirst, and promisedst them that they should go in to possess the land which
thou hadst sworn to give them. |
| 16
| But they and our fathers dealt proudly, and hardened their necks, and
hearkened not to thy commandments, |
|
17 | And refused to obey, neither were mindful of thy wonders that
thou didst among them; but hardened their necks, and in their rebellion
appointed a captain to return to their bondage: but thou art a God ready to
pardon, gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and
forsookest them not. |
| 18 |
Yea, when they had made them a molten calf, and said, This is thy God that
brought thee up out of Egypt, and had wrought great provocations; |
| 19 | Yet thou in thy manifold mercies
forsookest them not in the wilderness: the pillar of the cloud departed not
from them by day, to lead them in the way; neither the pillar of fire by night,
to shew them light, and the way wherein they should go. |
| 20 | Thou gavest also thy good spirit to
instruct them, and withheldest not thy manna from their mouth, and gavest them
water for their thirst. |
| 21 |
Yea, forty years didst thou sustain them in the wilderness, so that they
lacked nothing; their clothes waxed not old, and their feet swelled not. |
| 22 | Moreover thou gavest them
kingdoms and nations, and didst divide them into corners: so they possessed the
land of Sihon, and the land of the king of Heshbon, and the land of Og king of
Bashan. |
| 23 | Their
children also multipliedst thou as the stars of heaven, and broughtest them
into the land, concerning which thou hadst promised to their fathers, that they
should go in to possess it. |
| 24
| So the children went in and possessed the land, and thou subduedst
before them the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, and gavest them into
their hands, with their kings, and the people of the land, that they might do
with them as they would. |
| 25 |
And they took strong cities, and a fat land, and possessed houses full of
all goods, wells digged, vineyards, and oliveyards, and fruit trees in
abundance: so they did eat, and were filled, and became fat, and delighted
themselves in thy great goodness. |
|
26 | Nevertheless they were disobedient, and rebelled against thee,
and cast thy law behind their backs, and slew thy prophets which testified
against them to turn them to thee, and they wrought great provocations. |
| 27 | Therefore thou
deliveredst them into the hand of their enemies, who vexed them: and in the
time of their trouble, when they cried unto thee, thou heardest them from
heaven; and according to thy manifold mercies thou gavest them saviours, who
saved them out of the hand of their enemies. |
| 28 | But after they had rest, they did evil again before
thee: therefore leftest thou them in the land of their enemies, so that they
had the dominion over them: yet when they returned, and cried unto thee, thou
heardest them from heaven; and many times didst thou deliver them according to
thy mercies; |
| 29 | And
testifiedst against them, that thou mightest bring them again unto thy law: yet
they dealt proudly, and hearkened not unto thy commandments, but sinned against
thy judgments, (which if a man do, he shall live in them;) and withdrew the
shoulder, and hardened their neck, and would not hear. |
| 30 | Yet many years didst thou forbear
them, and testifiedst against them by thy spirit in thy prophets: yet would
they not give ear: therefore gavest thou them into the hand of the people of
the lands. |
| 31 |
Nevertheless for thy great mercies' sake thou didst not utterly consume them,
nor forsake them; for thou art a gracious and merciful God. |
| 32 | Now therefore, our God, the great, the
mighty, and the terrible God, who keepest covenant and mercy, let not all the
trouble seem little before thee, that hath come upon us, on our kings, on our
princes, and on our priests, and on our prophets, and on our fathers, and on
all thy people, since the time of the kings of Assyria unto this day. |
| 33 | Howbeit thou art just in all
that is brought upon us; for thou hast done right, but we have done
wickedly: |
| 34 | Neither
have our kings, our princes, our priests, nor our fathers, kept thy law, nor
hearkened unto thy commandments and thy testimonies, wherewith thou didst
testify against them. |
| 35 |
For they have not served thee in their kingdom, and in thy great goodness that
thou gavest them, and in the large and fat land which thou gavest before them,
neither turned they from their wicked works. |
| 36 | Behold, we are servants this day, and for the land that
thou gavest unto our fathers to eat the fruit thereof and the good thereof,
behold, we are servants in it: |
| 37
| And it yieldeth much increase unto the kings whom thou hast set over
us because of our sins: also they have dominion over our bodies, and over our
cattle, at their pleasure, and we are in great distress. |
| 38 | And because of all this we make a sure
covenant, and write it; and our princes, Levites, and priests, seal unto
it. |
