2043 verses about trials

There was a famine in the land. Abram went down into Egypt to live as a foreigner there, for the famine was severe in the land.

He said, “Hagar, Sarai’s servant, where did you come from? Where are you going?” She said, “I am fleeing from the face of my mistress Sarai.”

Abraham rose up early in the morning, and took bread and a bottle of water, and gave it to Hagar, putting it on her shoulder; and gave her the child, and sent her away. She departed, and wandered in the wilderness of Beersheba.

The water in the bottle was spent, and she put the child under one of the shrubs.

After these things, God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!” He said, “Here I am.”

He said, “Now take your son, your only son, whom you love, even Isaac, and go into the land of Moriah. Offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains which I will tell you of.”

They came to the place which God had told him of. Abraham built the altar there, and laid the wood in order, bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar, on the wood.

Abraham stretched out his hand, and took the knife to kill his son.

The children struggled together within her. She said, “If it is so, why do I live?” She went to inquire of Yahweh.

There was a famine in the land, besides the first famine that was in the days of Abraham. Isaac went to Abimelech king of the Philistines, to Gerar.

Now all the wells which his father’s servants had dug in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines had stopped, and filled with earth.

The herdsmen of Gerar argued with Isaac’s herdsmen, saying, “The water is ours.” He called the name of the well Esek, because they contended with him.

They dug another well, and they argued over that, also. He called its name Sitnah.

Isaac said to them, “Why have you come to me, since you hate me, and have sent me away from you?”

Your father has deceived me, and changed my wages ten times, but God didn’t allow him to hurt me.

This was my situation: in the day the drought consumed me, and the frost by night; and my sleep fled from my eyes.

Jacob was left alone, and wrestled with a man there until the breaking of the day.

Let us arise, and go up to Bethel. I will make there an altar to God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me on the way which I went.”

They traveled from Bethel. There was still some distance to come to Ephrath, and Rachel travailed. She had hard labor.

He said to them, “Please hear this dream which I have dreamed:

and they took him, and threw him into the pit. The pit was empty. There was no water in it.

Joseph’s master took him, and put him into the prison, the place where the king’s prisoners were bound, and he was there in custody.

But Yahweh was with Joseph, and showed kindness to him, and gave him favor in the sight of the keeper of the prison.

They both dreamed a dream, each man his dream, in one night, each man according to the interpretation of his dream, the cup bearer and the baker of the king of Egypt, who were bound in the prison.

For indeed, I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews, and here also I have done nothing that they should put me into the dungeon.”

Yet the chief cup bearer didn’t remember Joseph, but forgot him.

and behold, seven heads of grain, withered, thin, and blasted with the east wind, sprung up after them.

The seven thin and ugly cattle that came up after them are seven years, and also the seven empty heads of grain blasted with the east wind; they will be seven years of famine.

There will arise after them seven years of famine, and all the plenty will be forgotten in the land of Egypt. The famine will consume the land,

and the plenty will not be known in the land by reason of that famine which follows; for it will be very grievous.

The name of the second, he called Ephraim: “For God has made me fruitful in the land of my affliction.”

By this you shall be tested. By the life of Pharaoh, you shall not go out from here, unless your youngest brother comes here.

Send one of you, and let him get your brother, and you shall be bound, that your words may be tested, whether there is truth in you, or else by the life of Pharaoh surely you are spies.”

He put them all together into custody for three days.

“The man, the lord of the land, spoke roughly with us, and took us for spies of the country.

The famine was severe in the land.

Israel said, “Why did you treat me so badly, telling the man that you had another brother?”

May God Almighty give you mercy before the man, that he may release to you your other brother and Benjamin. If I am bereaved of my children, I am bereaved.”

He searched, beginning with the oldest, and ending at the youngest. The cup was found in Benjamin’s sack.

For these two years the famine has been in the land, and there are yet five years, in which there will be no plowing and no harvest.

The archers have severely grieved him, shot at him, and persecuted him:

But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and the more they spread out. They were grieved because of the children of Israel.

and they made their lives bitter with hard service, in mortar and in brick, and in all kinds of service in the field, all their service, in which they ruthlessly made them serve.

Now when Pharaoh heard this thing, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from the face of Pharaoh, and lived in the land of Midian, and he sat down by a well.

“You shall no longer give the people straw to make brick, as before. Let them go and gather straw for themselves.

Let heavier work be laid on the men, that they may labor in it; and don’t let them pay any attention to lying words.”

The taskmasters of the people went out, and their officers, and they spoke to the people, saying, “This is what Pharaoh says: ‘I will not give you straw.

Go yourselves, get straw where you can find it, for nothing of your work shall be diminished.’”

The taskmasters were urgent saying, “Fulfill your work quota daily, as when there was straw!”

The officers of the children of Israel, whom Pharaoh’s taskmasters had set over them, were beaten, and demanded, “Why haven’t you fulfilled your quota both yesterday and today, in making brick as before?”

Go therefore now, and work, for no straw shall be given to you, yet you shall deliver the same number of bricks!”

The officers of the children of Israel saw that they were in trouble, when it was said, “You shall not diminish anything from your daily quota of bricks!”

They met Moses and Aaron, who stood in the way, as they came out from Pharaoh:

and they said to them, “May Yahweh look at you, and judge, because you have made us a stench to be abhorred in the eyes of Pharaoh, and in the eyes of his servants, to put a sword in their hand to kill us.”

Moses returned to Yahweh, and said, “Lord, why have you brought trouble on this people? Why is it that you have sent me?

For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has brought trouble on this people; and you have not rescued your people at all.”

Moses spoke so to the children of Israel, but they didn’t listen to Moses for anguish of spirit, and for cruel bondage.

All the Egyptians dug around the river for water to drink; for they couldn’t drink the river water.

Pharaoh will say of the children of Israel, ‘They are entangled in the land. The wilderness has shut them in.’

The Egyptians pursued them. All the horses and chariots of Pharaoh, his horsemen, and his army overtook them encamping by the sea, beside Pihahiroth, before Baal Zephon.

When Pharaoh came near, the children of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them; and they were very afraid. The children of Israel cried out to Yahweh.

They said to Moses, “Because there were no graves in Egypt, have you taken us away to die in the wilderness? Why have you treated us this way, to bring us out of Egypt?

Isn’t this the word that we spoke to you in Egypt, saying, ‘Leave us alone, that we may serve the Egyptians?’ For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.”

Moses led Israel onward from the Red Sea, and they went out into the wilderness of Shur; and they went three days in the wilderness, and found no water.

When they came to Marah, they couldn’t drink from the waters of Marah, for they were bitter. Therefore its name was called Marah.

The people murmured against Moses, saying, “What shall we drink?”

Then he cried to Yahweh. Yahweh showed him a tree, and he threw it into the waters, and the waters were made sweet. There he made a statute and an ordinance for them, and there he tested them;

They took their journey from Elim, and all the congregation of the children of Israel came to the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after their departing out of the land of Egypt.

The whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron in the wilderness;

All the congregation of the children of Israel traveled from the wilderness of Sin, by their journeys, according to Yahweh’s commandment, and encamped in Rephidim; but there was no water for the people to drink.

Therefore the people quarreled with Moses, and said, “Give us water to drink.” Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test Yahweh?”

The people were thirsty for water there; and the people murmured against Moses, and said, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us, our children, and our livestock with thirst?”

Moses cried to Yahweh, saying, “What shall I do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me.”

He called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because the children of Israel quarreled, and because they tested Yahweh, saying, “Is Yahweh among us, or not?”

Then Amalek came and fought with Israel in Rephidim.

Moses told his father-in-law all that Yahweh had done to Pharaoh and to the Egyptians for Israel’s sake, all the hardships that had come on them on the way, and how Yahweh delivered them.

On the third day, when it was morning, there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud on the mountain, and the sound of an exceedingly loud trumpet; and all the people who were in the camp trembled.

Moses said to the people, “Don’t be afraid, for God has come to test you, and that his fear may be before you, that you won’t sin.”

When Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, “There is the noise of war in the camp.”

I also will do this to you: I will appoint terror over you, even consumption and fever, that shall consume the eyes, and make the soul to pine away. You will sow your seed in vain, for your enemies will eat it.

I will break the pride of your power, and I will make your sky like iron, and your soil like brass.

Moses said to Yahweh, “Why have you treated your servant so badly? Why haven’t I found favor in your sight, that you lay the burden of all this people on me?

Have I conceived all this people? Have I brought them out, that you should tell me, ‘Carry them in your bosom, as a nurse carries a nursing infant, to the land which you swore to their fathers?’

If you treat me this way, please kill me right now, if I have found favor in your sight; and don’t let me see my wretchedness.”

but a whole month, until it comes out at your nostrils, and it is loathsome to you; because you have rejected Yahweh who is among you, and have wept before him, saying, “Why did we come out of Egypt?”’”

From Kibroth Hattaavah the people traveled to Hazeroth; and they stayed at Hazeroth.

Miriam was shut up outside of the camp seven days, and the people didn’t travel until Miriam was brought in again.

However the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. Moreover, we saw the children of Anak there.

All the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron. The whole congregation said to them, “We wish that we had died in the land of Egypt, or that we had died in this wilderness!

Why does Yahweh bring us to this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will be captured or killed! Wouldn’t it be better for us to return into Egypt?”

The men, whom Moses sent to spy out the land, who returned, and made all the congregation to murmur against him, by bringing up an evil report against the land,

Then the Amalekites came down, and the Canaanites who lived in that mountain, and struck them and beat them down, even to Hormah.

Is it a small thing that you have brought us up out of a land flowing with milk and honey, to kill us in the wilderness, but you must also make yourself a prince over us?

The children of Israel spoke to Moses, saying, “Behold, we perish! We are undone! We are all undone!

There was no water for the congregation; and they assembled themselves together against Moses and against Aaron.

The people quarreled with Moses, and spoke, saying, “We wish that we had died when our brothers died before Yahweh!

Why have you brought Yahweh’s assembly into this wilderness, that we should die there, we and our animals?

Why have you made us to come up out of Egypt, to bring us in to this evil place? It is no place of seed, or of figs, or of vines, or of pomegranates; neither is there any water to drink.”

These are the waters of Meribah; because the children of Israel strove with Yahweh, and he was sanctified in them.

Moses sent messengers from Kadesh to the king of Edom, saying: “Thus says your brother Israel: You know all the travail that has happened to us;