Old Testament

New Testament

2 Esdras 14:21-36 Common English Bible (CEB)

21. because your Law has been burned, and so no one knows what things you have done or what works are about to come to pass.

22. If then I have found favor before you, send a holy spirit into me, and I will write everything that has happened in the world from the beginning, the things that were written in your Law, so that human beings can find the path, and those who want to live in the last days may live."

23. He replied to me: "Go, gather the people and say to them that they shouldn’t seek you for forty days.

24. Gather up many writing tablets, and take with you Sarea, Dabria, Selemia, Ethanus, and Asiel, these five, who are trained to write fast.

25. Come here, and I will light in your heart the lamp of understanding. It won’t be extinguished until you have written everything down.

26. When you are finished, you will make some things public, others you will transmit secretly to the wise. You will begin to write tomorrow at this time."

27. I did as he commanded me. I gathered all the people and said,

28. "Hear these words, Israel.

29. At first our fathers lived as strangers in Egypt, and they were liberated from there.

30. They received the Law of life, but they didn’t keep it, and you also transgressed after them.

31. You were given land by allotment in the region of Zion. You and your fathers did evil and didn’t keep the ways that the Most High had commanded you.

32. Since he is a just judge, in time he took away from you what he granted.

33. Now you are here, and your relatives live even farther away.

34. If then you will rule your mind and instruct your heart, you will be kept alive, and after death you will attain mercy.

35. Judgment comes after death, when we are restored to life, and then the names of the just will appear and the deeds of the wicked will be exposed.

36. But let no one approach me now or come looking for me for forty days."

Read complete chapter 2 Esdras 14