Daily Readings - 21/08/2026

^107:1 Alleluia! Give thanks to Yahweh, for he is good, his love is everlasting:

^107:2 let these be the words of Yahweh’s redeemed, those he has redeemed from the oppressor’s clutches,

^107:3 by bringing them home from foreign countries, from east and west, from north and south.

^107:4 Some had lost their way in the wilds and the desert, not knowing how to reach an inhabited town;

^107:5 they were hungry and desperately thirsty, their courage was running low.

^107:6 Then they called to Yahweh in their trouble and he rescued them from their sufferings,

^107:7 guiding them by a route leading direct to an inhabited town.

^107:8 Let these thank Yahweh for his love, for his marvels on behalf of men;

^107:9 satisfying the hungry, he fills the starving with good things.

^107:10 Some were living in gloom and darkness, fettered in misery and irons

^107:11 for defying the orders of God, for scorning the advice of the Most High;

^107:12 who bent them double with hardship, to breaking point, with no one to help them.

^107:13 Then they called to Yahweh in their trouble

^107:14 releasing them from gloom and darkness, shattering their chains.

^107:15 Let these thank Yahweh for his love, for his marvels on behalf of men;

^107:16 breaking bronze gates open, he smashes iron bars.

^107:17 Some, driven frantic by their sins, made miserable by their own guilt

^107:18 and finding all food repugnant, were nearly at death’s door.

^107:19 Then they called to Yahweh in their trouble and he rescued them from their sufferings;

^107:20 sending his word and curing them, he snatched them from the Pit.

^107:21 Let these thank Yahweh for his love, for his marvels on behalf of men.

^107:22 Let them offer thanksgiving sacrifices and proclaim with shouts of joy what he has done.

^107:23 Others, taking ship and going to sea, were plying their business across the ocean;

^107:24 they too saw what Yahweh could do, what marvels on the deep!

^107:25 He spoke and raised a gale, lashing up towering waves.

^107:26 Flung to the sky, then plunged to the depths, they lost their nerve in the ordeal,

^107:27 staggering and reeling like drunkards with all their seamanship adrift.

^107:28 Then they called to Yahweh in their trouble and he rescued them from their sufferings,

^107:29 reducing the storm to a whisper until the waves grew quiet,

^107:30 bringing them, glad at the calm, safe to the port they were bound for.

^107:31 Let these thank Yahweh for his love, for his marvels on behalf of men.

^107:32 Let them extol him at the Great Assembly and praise him in the Council of Elders.

^107:33 Sometimes he turned rivers into desert, springs of water into arid ground,

^107:34 or a fertile country into salt-flats, because the people living there were wicked.

^107:35 Or again, he turned a desert into sheets of water, and an arid country into flowing springs,

^107:36 where he gave the hungry a home in which to found a habitable town.

^107:37 There, they sow the fields and plant their vines, there, they show a profitable harvest.

^107:38 He blesses them, they grow in number, he sees that their livestock does not decrease.

^107:39 Their numbers had fallen, they had grown weak under pressure of disaster and hardship.

^107:40 Pouring his contempt upon the nobly born, he left them to wander in a trackless waste.

^107:41 But now, he lifts the needy out of their misery, and gives them a flock of new families;

^107:42 at the sight of which, upright hearts rejoice and wickedness must hold its tongue.

^107:43 If you are wise, study these things and realise how Yahweh shows his love.

^22:34 But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees they got together

^22:35 and, to disconcert him, one of them put a question,

^22:36 ‘Master, which is the greatest commandment of the Law?’

^22:37 Jesus said, ‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.

^22:38 This is the greatest and the first commandment.

^22:39 The second resembles it: You must love your neighbour as yourself.

^22:40 On these two commandments hang the whole Law, and the Prophets also.’