1. Now in the twenty-fourth day of this month, the sons of Israel were assembled with fasting and with sackcloth and earth upon them.
2. And the seed of Israel had 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, Bani, Kadmiel, Shebaniah, Bunni, Sherebiah, Bani, and Chenani and cried with a loud voice unto the Lord their God.
5. Then the Levites, Jeshua, 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, O Lord, art alone; thou hast made the heavens and the heavens of the heavens, with all their host, the earth and all things that are therein, the seas and all that is therein, and thou givest life to them all; and the host of the heavens worship thee.
7. Thou art, O Lord, the God who didst choose Abram and didst bring him forth out of Ur of the Chaldees and didst give him the name of Abraham
8. and didst find his heart faithful before thee and didst make a covenant with him to give the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizzite, the Jebusite, and the Girgashite, to give it, to his seed and hast performed thy word; for thou art righteous.
9. And thou didst see the affliction of our fathers in Egypt and didst hear their cry by the Red sea
10. and didst show signs and wonders upon Pharaoh and on all his slaves and on all the people of his land; for thou didst know that they had dealt proudly against them. So didst thou make 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 didst throw into the deeps, as a stone into the mighty waters.
12. Moreover, thou didst lead them by day with a pillar of cloud and by night with a pillar of fire to give them light in the way by which they should go.
13. Thou didst come down upon Mount Sinai and didst speak with them from heaven and didst give them right judgments and true laws, good statutes and commandments,
14. and didst make known unto them the sabbath of thy holiness and didst prescribe for them commandments, statutes, and law by the hand of Moses, thy slave.
15. And thou didst give them bread from heaven in their hunger and didst bring forth water for them out of the rock in their thirst and didst promise 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 did not hearken unto thy commandments
17. and refused to hear; neither did they remember thy wonders that thou hadst done among them, but hardened their necks and in their rebellion thought to appoint a leader to return to their bondage; but thou art a God of pardons, gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great mercy, for thou didst not leave them.
18. Even when they had made themselves a molten calf and said, This is thy God that brought thee up out of Egypt, and had committed great abominations;