Shabbat Shalom!
Welcome to Ha’azinu / Listen - this week’s Prophetic reading
Prophecy 58, 62, 151;
Deuteronomy 31:1-31:30;
Isaiah 55:6-56:8;
Matthew 21:9-17;
2 Samuel 22:1-51
1 David said the words of this song to YAHUVEH on the day YAHUVEH delivered
him from the power of all his enemies and from the power of Sha’ul.
2 He said:“YAHUVEH is my Rock, my fortress and deliverer,
3 the ELOHIM who is my Rock, in whom I find shelter,my shield, the power that
saves me,my stronghold and my refuge.My savior, you have saved me from violence.
4 I call on YAHUVEH, who is worthy of praise;and I am saved from my enemies.
5 “For death’s breakers were closing over me,the floods of B’liya‘al terrified
me,
6 the ropes of Sh’ol were wrapped around me,the snares of death lay there before
me.
7 In my distress I called to YAHUVEH;yes, I called to my ELOHIM.Out of his
temple he heard my voice,and my cry entered his ears.
8 “Then the earth quaked and shook,the foundations of heaven trembled.They were
shaken because he was angry.
9 Smoke arose in his nostrils;and from his mouth, devouring fire,with coals
blazing from it.
10 He lowered heaven and came down with thick darkness under his feet.
11 He rode on a keruv and flew,he was seen on the wings of the wind.
12 He made darkness his canopy around him,thick clouds in the skies dense with
water.
13 From the brightness before him,fiery coals flamed out.
14 “YAHUVEH thundered from heaven,Ha‘Elyon sounded his voice.
15 He sent out arrows and scattered them;with lightning he routed them.
16 The channels of the sea appeared,the foundations of the world were exposed at
YAHUVEH’s rebuke,at the blast of breath from his nostrils.
17 “He sent from on high, he took me and pulled me out of deep water;
18 he rescued me from my powerful enemy,from those who hated me, for they were
stronger than I.
19 They came against me on my day of calamity,but YAHUVEH was my support.
20 “He brought me out to an open place;he rescued me, because he took pleasure
in me.
21 YAHUVEH rewarded me for my uprightness,he repaid me because my hands were
clean.
22 “For I have kept the ways of YAHUVEH,I have not done evil by leaving my
ELOHIM;
23 for all his rulings were before me,I did not depart from his regulations.
24 I was pure-hearted toward him and kept myself from my sin.
25 “Hence YAHUVEH repaid me for my uprightness,according to my purity in his
view.
26 With the merciful, you are merciful;with the champion of purity, you are
pure;
27 with the honest, you are honest;but with the crooked you are cunning.
28 People afflicted, you save;but when your eyes are on the haughty, you humble
them.
29 “For you, YAHUVEH, are my lamp;YAHUVEH lights up my darkness.
30 With you I can run through a whole troop of men,with my ELOHIM I can leap a
wall.
31 “As for ELOHIM, his way is perfect,the word of YAHUVEH has been tested by
fire;he shields all who take refuge in him.
32 For who is ELOHIM but YAHUVEH,and who is a Rock but our ELOHIM?
33 “ELOHIM is my strength and protection;he makes my way go straight.
34 He makes me swift and sure-footed as a deer and enables me to stand on my
high places.
35 He trains my hands for war until my arms can bend a bow of bronze;
36 You give me your shield, which is salvation;your answers make me great.
37 You lengthen the steps I can take,yet my ankles do not turn.
38 “I pursued my enemies and wiped them out,without turning back until they were
destroyed.
39 I destroyed them, crushed them; they can’t get up;they have fallen under my
feet.
40 “For you braced me with strength for the battle and bent down my adversaries
beneath me.
41 You made my enemies turn their backs in flight,so that I could destroy those
who hate me.
42 “They looked, but there was no one to help,even to YAHUVEH, but he didn’t
answer.
43 I pulverized them like dust on the ground,pounded and stamped on them like
mud in the streets.
44 “You also freed me from the quarrels of my people.You kept me to be the head
of the nations;a people I did not know now serve me.
45 Foreigners come cringing to me;the moment they hear of me, they obey me.
46 Foreigners lose heart as they stagger from their fortresses.
47 “YAHUVEH is alive! Blessed is my Rock!Exalted be ELOHIM, the Rock of my
salvation,
48 the ELOHIM who gives me vengeance and makes peoples submit to me.
49 He brings me out from my enemies.You raise me over those who rebel against
me,you rescue me from violent men.
50 “So I give thanks to you, YAHUVEH, among the nations;I sing praises to your
name.
51 He is a tower of salvation for his king;he displays grace to his anointed,to
David and his descendants forever.”
Romans 11:1–36
1 “In that case, I say, isn’t it that ELOHIM has repudiated his people?” Heaven
forbid! For I myself am a son of Isra’el, from the seed of Avraham,[a] of the
tribe of Binyamin.
2 ELOHIM has not repudiated his people,[b] whom he chose in advance. Or don’t
you know what the Tanakh says about Eliyahu? He pleads with ELOHIM against
Isra’el,
3 “YAHUVEH, they have killed your prophets and torn down your altars, and I’m
the only one left, and now they want to kill me too!”[c]
4 But what is ELOHIM’s answer to him? “I have kept for myself seven thousand men
who have not knelt down to Ba‘al.”[d] 5 It’s the same way in the present age:
there is a remnant, chosen by grace.
6 (Now if it is by grace, it is accordingly not based on legalistic works; if it
were otherwise, grace would no longer be grace.)
7 What follows is that Isra’el has not attained the goal for which she is
striving. The ones chosen have obtained it, but the rest have been made
stonelike,
8 just as the Tanakh says,“ELOHIM has given them a spirit of dullness —eyes that
do not see and ears that do not hear, right down to the present day.”[e]
9 And David says,“Let their dining table become for them a snare and a trap, a
pitfall and a punishment.
10 Let their eyes be darkened, so that they can’t see,with their backs bent
continually.”[f]
11 “In that case, I say, isn’t it that they have stumbled with the result that
they have permanently fallen away?” Heaven forbid! Quite the contrary, it is by
means of their stumbling that the deliverance has come to the Gentiles, in order
to provoke them to jealousy.[g] 12 Moreover, if their stumbling is bringing
riches to the world — that is, if Isra’el’s being placed temporarily in a
condition less favored than that of the Gentiles is bringing riches to the
latter — how much greater riches will Isra’el in its fullness bring them!
13 However, to those of you who are Gentiles I say this: since I myself am an
emissary sent to the Gentiles, I make known the importance of my work
14 in the hope that somehow I may provoke some of my own people to jealousy and
save some of them!
15 For if their casting YAHUSHUA aside means reconciliation for the world, what
will their accepting him mean? It will be life from the dead!
16 Now if the hallah offered as firstfruits is holy, so is the whole loaf. And
if the root is holy, so are the branches.
17 But if some of the branches were broken off, and you — a wild olive — were
grafted in among them and have become equal sharers in the rich root of the
olive tree,
18 then don’t boast as if you were better than the branches! However, if you do
boast, remember that you are not supporting the root, the root is supporting
you.
19 So you will say, “Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.” 20
True, but so what? They were broken off because of their lack of trust. However,
you keep your place only because of your trust. So don’t be arrogant; on the
contrary, be terrified!
21 For if ELOHIM did not spare the natural branches, he certainly won’t spare
you!
22 So take a good look at ELOHIM’s kindness and his severity: on the one hand,
severity toward those who fell off; but, on the other hand, ELOHIM’s kindness
toward you — provided you maintain yourself in that kindness! Otherwise, you too
will be cut off!
23 Moreover, the others, if they do not persist in their lack of trust, will be
grafted in; because ELOHIM is able to graft them back in.
24 For if you were cut out of what is by nature a wild olive tree and grafted,
contrary to nature, into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these
natural branches be grafted back into their own olive tree!
25 For, brothers, I want you to understand this truth which ELOHIM formerly
concealed but has now revealed, so that you won’t imagine you know more than you
actually do. It is that stoniness, to a degree, has come upon Isra’el, until the
Gentile world enters in its fullness;
26 and that it is in this way that all Isra’el will be saved. As the Tanakh
says,“Out of Tziyon will come the Redeemer;he will turn away ungodliness from
Ya‘akov
27 and this will be my covenant with them, . . .when I take away their sins.”[h]
28 With respect to the Good News they are hated for your sake. But with respect
to being chosen they are loved for the Patriarchs’ sake,
29 for ELOHIM’s free gifts and his calling are irrevocable.
30 Just as you yourselves were disobedient to ELOHIM before but have received
mercy now because of Isra’el’s disobedience;
31 so also Isra’el has been disobedient now, so that by your showing them the
same mercy that ELOHIM has shown you, they too may now receive ELOHIM’s mercy.
32 For ELOHIM has shut up all mankind together in disobedience, in order that he
might show mercy to all.
33 O the depth of the riches and the wisdom and knowledge of ELOHIM!How
inscrutable are his judgments!How unsearchable are his ways!
34 For, ‘Who has known the mind of the Lord?Who has been his counselor?’[i]
35 Or, ‘Who has given him anything and made him pay it back?’[j]
36 For from him and through him and to him are all things.To him be the glory
forever!Amen.