Ecclesiastes 9:3

Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it is the wellspring of life.

A man’s pride brings him low, but one of lowly spirit gains honor.

One who trusts in himself is a fool; but one who walks in wisdom is kept safe.

Beware, brothers, lest perhaps there might be in any one of you an evil heart of unbelief, in falling away from the living God;

For God didn’t give us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and self-control.

For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, sexual sins, thefts, false testimony, and blasphemies.

Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? Not one.

You will eat bread by the sweat of your face until you return to the ground, for you were taken out of it. For you are dust, and you shall return to dust.”

for this people’s heart has grown callous, their ears are dull of hearing, they have closed their eyes; or else perhaps they might perceive with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their heart, and would turn again; and I would heal them.’

When his friends heard it, they went out to seize him; for they said, “He is insane.”

Yahweh God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

The wicked go astray from the womb. They are wayward as soon as they are born, speaking lies.

His spirit departs, and he returns to the earth. In that very day, his thoughts perish.

Therefore as sin entered into the world through one man, and death through sin; so death passed to all men, because all sinned.

We also all once lived among them in the lusts of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.

but he shall wash its innards and its legs with water. The priest shall burn all of it on the altar, for a burnt offering, an offering made by fire, of a pleasant aroma to Yahweh.

Behold, he will kill me. I have no hope. Nevertheless, I will maintain my ways before him.

They lie down alike in the dust. The worm covers them.

What man is like Job, who drinks scorn like water,

a heart that devises wicked schemes, feet that are swift in running to mischief,

A corrupt witness mocks justice, and the mouth of the wicked gulps down iniquity.

I turned myself to consider wisdom, madness, and folly; for what can the king’s successor do? Just that which has been done long ago.

Who knows the spirit of man, whether it goes upward, and the spirit of the animal, whether it goes downward to the earth?”

For I will not contend forever, neither will I always be angry; for the spirit would faint before me, and the souls whom I have made.

Yet they didn’t listen to me or incline their ear, but made their neck stiff. They did worse than their fathers.

This evil people, who refuse to hear my words, who walk in the stubbornness of their heart, and have gone after other gods to serve them, and to worship them, will even be as this belt, which is profitable for nothing.

Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.

A revelation, Yahweh’s word concerning Israel. Yahweh, who stretches out the heavens, and lays the foundation of the earth, and forms the spirit of man within him says:

He who acts unjustly, let him act unjustly still. He who is filthy, let him be filthy still. He who is righteous, let him do righteousness still. He who is holy, let him be holy still.”

To Adam he said, “Because you have listened to your wife’s voice, and ate from the tree, about which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ the ground is cursed for your sake. You will eat from it with much labor all the days of your life.

You shall burn the whole ram on the altar: it is a burnt offering to Yahweh; it is a pleasant aroma, an offering made by fire to Yahweh.

and will make an offering by fire to Yahweh—a burnt offering, or a sacrifice, to accomplish a vow, or as a free will offering, or in your set feasts, to make a pleasant aroma to Yahweh, of the herd, or of the flock—

Yahweh opened the mouth of the donkey, and she said to Balaam, “What have I done to you, that you have struck me these three times?”

When the angel stretched out his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, Yahweh relented of the disaster, and said to the angel who destroyed the people, “It is enough. Now withdraw your hand.” Yahweh’s angel was by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.

You, Solomon my son, know the God of your father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind; for Yahweh searches all hearts, and understands all the imaginations of the thoughts. If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will cast you off forever.

He says in his heart, “I shall not be shaken. For generations I shall have no trouble.”

I searched in my heart how to cheer my flesh with wine, my heart yet guiding me with wisdom, and how to lay hold of folly, until I might see what it was good for the sons of men that they should do under heaven all the days of their lives.

Let favor be shown to the wicked, yet he will not learn righteousness. In the land of uprightness he will deal wrongfully, and will not see Yahweh’s majesty.

Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts. Let him return to Yahweh, and he will have mercy on him, to our God, for he will freely pardon.

Our fathers sinned, and are no more. We have borne their iniquities.

Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked by the wise men, was exceedingly angry, and sent out, and killed all the male children who were in Bethlehem and in all the surrounding countryside, from two years old and under, according to the exact time which he had learned from the wise men.

But beware of men: for they will deliver you up to councils, and in their synagogues they will scourge you.

For from within, out of the hearts of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, sexual sins, murders, thefts,

“He said to him, ‘If they don’t listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if one rises from the dead.’ ”

Jesus answered them, “Most certainly I tell you, everyone who commits sin is the bondservant of sin.

When Peter had come to himself, he said, “Now I truly know that the Lord has sent out his angel and delivered me out of the hand of Herod, and from everything the Jewish people were expecting.”

We are fools for Christ’s sake, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You have honor, but we have dishonor.

You also once walked in those, when you lived in them;

And the Lord will deliver me from every evil work, and will preserve me for his heavenly Kingdom. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

Inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once, and after this, judgment,

who before were disobedient, when God waited patiently in the days of Noah, while the ship was being built. In it, few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water.

I have waited for your salvation, Yahweh.

but the innards and the legs he shall wash with water. The priest shall offer the whole, and burn it on the altar. It is a burnt offering, an offering made by fire, of a pleasant aroma to Yahweh.

“It is all the same. Therefore I say he destroys the blameless and the wicked.

For I was envious of the arrogant, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.

You turn man to destruction, saying, “Return, you children of men.”

I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly. I perceived that this also was a chasing after wind.

Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.

The beginning of the words of his mouth is foolishness; and the end of his talk is mischievous madness.

but have walked after the stubbornness of their own heart and after the Baals, which their fathers taught them.”

You have done evil more than your fathers, for behold, you each walk after the stubbornness of his evil heart, so that you don’t listen to me.

The heart is deceitful above all things and it is exceedingly corrupt. Who can know it?

Then you shall return and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him who serves God and him who doesn’t serve him.

That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

But the chief priests conspired to put Lazarus to death also,

Because knowing God, they didn’t glorify him as God, and didn’t give thanks, but became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless heart was darkened.

For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwells no good thing. For desire is present with me, but I don’t find it doing that which is good.

For we are a sweet aroma of Christ to God, in those who are saved and in those who perish:

We are courageous, I say, and are willing rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord.

Furthermore, we had the fathers of our flesh to chasten us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits, and live?

to the festal gathering and assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, to God the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect,

Yahweh smelled the pleasant aroma. Yahweh said in his heart, “I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake because the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth. I will never again strike every living thing, as I have done.

They said, “Stand back!” Then they said, “This one fellow came in to live as a foreigner, and he appoints himself a judge. Now we will deal worse with you than with them!” They pressed hard on the man Lot, and came near to break the door.

The Egyptians pursued, and went in after them into the middle of the sea: all of Pharaoh’s horses, his chariots, and his horsemen.

They rose up early in the morning and went up to the top of the mountain, saying, “Behold, we are here, and will go up to the place which Yahweh has promised; for we have sinned.”

Balaam said to the donkey, “Because you have mocked me, I wish there were a sword in my hand, for now I would have killed you.”

Jonathan answered Saul his father, and said to him, “Why should he be put to death? What has he done?”

Again he sent the captain of a third fifty with his fifty. The third captain of fifty went up, and came and fell on his knees before Elijah, and begged him, and said to him, “Man of God, please let my life, and the life of these fifty of your servants, be precious in your sight.

how much less one who is abominable and corrupt, a man who drinks iniquity like water!

the wicked man writhes in pain all his days, even the number of years that are laid up for the oppressor.

You sons of men, how long shall my glory be turned into dishonor? Will you love vanity and seek after falsehood?

Behold, I was born in iniquity. My mother conceived me in sin.

The wicked is brought down in his calamity, but in death, the righteous has a refuge.

The way of the guilty is devious, but the conduct of the innocent is upright.

What does man gain from all his labor in which he labors under the sun?

I turned around, and my heart sought to know and to search out, and to seek wisdom and the scheme of things, and to know that wickedness is stupidity, and that foolishness is madness.

All things come alike to all. There is one event to the righteous and to the wicked; to the good, to the clean, to the unclean, to him who sacrifices, and to him who doesn’t sacrifice. As is the good, so is the sinner; he who takes an oath, as he who fears an oath.

There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, the sort of error which proceeds from the ruler.

and the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.

But they were filled with rage, and talked with one another about what they might do to Jesus.

But when he came to himself he said, ‘How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough to spare, and I’m dying with hunger!

After the piece of bread, then Satan entered into him. Then Jesus said to him, “What you do, do quickly.”

Immediately an angel of the Lord struck him, because he didn’t give God the glory. Then he was eaten by worms and died.

and said, “You son of the devil, full of all deceit and all cunning, you enemy of all righteousness, will you not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord?

As he thus made his defense, Festus said with a loud voice, “Paul, you are crazy! Your great learning is driving you insane!”

The soldiers’ counsel was to kill the prisoners, so that none of them would swim out and escape.

For we were also once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another.

but he was rebuked for his own disobedience. A mute donkey spoke with a man’s voice and stopped the madness of the prophet.

Yahweh saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of man’s heart was continually only evil.

Punishing them often in all the synagogues, I tried to make them blaspheme. Being exceedingly enraged against them, I persecuted them even to foreign cities.