But Baruch son of Neriah is stirring you up against us. He wants to hand us over to the Babylonians so that they will kill us or carry us off into exile in Babylon.”

“The man, the lord of the land, spoke harshly to us and treated us as if we were spying on the land.

You complained among yourselves privately and said, “Because the Lord hates us he brought us from Egypt to deliver us over to the Amorites so they could destroy us!

But the Egyptians mistreated and oppressed us, forcing us to do burdensome labor.

But Rebekah’s brother and her mother replied, “Let the girl stay with us a few more days, perhaps ten. Then she can go.”

Intermarry with us. Let us marry your daughters, and take our daughters as wives for yourselves.

If we do so, won’t their livestock, their property, and all their animals become ours? So let’s consent to their demand, so they will live among us.”

If you send our brother with us, we’ll go down and buy food for you.

“So now, when I return to your servant my father, and the boy is not with us – his very life is bound up in his son’s life.

So Balaam got up in the morning, saddled his donkey, and went with the princes of Moab.

He replied, “Don’t be afraid, for our side outnumbers them.”

They say, “We speak persuasively; we know how to flatter and boast. Who is our master?”

For the music director; to be accompanied by stringed instruments; a psalm, a song. May God show us his favor and bless us! May he smile on us! (Selah)

We do not see any signs of God’s presence; there are no longer any prophets and we have no one to tell us how long this will last.

If they say, “Come with us! We will lie in wait to shed blood; we will ambush an innocent person capriciously.

For you are aware of our many rebellious deeds, and our sins testify against us; indeed, we are aware of our rebellious deeds; we know our sins all too well.

Come back to me, you wayward people. I want to cure your waywardness. Say, ‘Here we are. We come to you because you are the Lord our God.

But we replied, ‘We cannot go down there. If our youngest brother is with us, then we will go, for we won’t be permitted to see the man’s face if our youngest brother is not with us.’

They did not ask: ‘Where is the Lord who delivered us out of Egypt, who brought us through the wilderness, through a land of desert sands and rift valleys, through a land of drought and deep darkness, through a land in which no one travels, and where no one lives?’

Only on this one condition will these men consent to live with us and become one people: They demand that every male among us be circumcised just as they are circumcised.