 1 Then the high priest said: Are these things so? 2 In reply, Stephen said: Men, family+, and fathers, listen carefully+. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived+ in Haran, 3 and said to him: Get out of your country and from your family+ and come into the land that I will show you. Genesis 12:1 4 Then Abraham came out of the land of the Chaldeans and lived+ in Haran. From there+, when his father was dead, he moved into this land in which you now dwell. 5 God gave Abraham no inheritance in it. No, not so much as to set his foot on. Yet He promised that He would give it to him for a possession, and to his seed after him, even when he did not yet have a child. 6 God spoke in this way knowing that Abraham's seed would journey+ into a strange land that would bring them into bondage and mistreat+ them with evil for four hundred years. 7 The nation to whom they shall be in bondage I will judge, said God. After that, they shall come forth and serve me in this place. Genesis 15:14 8 Then God gave the covenant~ of circumcision to Abraham and Abraham fathered+ Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day. Then Isaac fathered Jacob and Jacob fathered the twelve patriarchs. 9 The patriarchs, moved with envy, sold Joseph into Egypt. But God was with him. 10 God delivered Joseph out of all his afflictions~ and gave him favor and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, who made Joseph governor over Egypt and all his house. 11 Now a famine+ came over all the land of Egypt and Canaan, a great affliction~, and our fathers found no sustenance. 12 But when Jacob heard that there was corn in Egypt, at first, he sent out our fathers. 13 At a second time, Joseph was made known to his family+ and Joseph's family+ was made known to Pharaoh. 14 Then Joseph summoned+ and sent for his father Jacob and all his family+, seventy five souls. 15 So Jacob went down into Egypt and died. He and our fathers 16 were carried into Sychem and laid in the tomb+ that Abraham bought for a sum of money from the sons of Emmor the father of Sychem. 17 But when the time of the promise that God had sworn to Abraham drew near, the people grew and multiplied in Egypt, 18 until another king arose who did not know Joseph. 19 That king oppressed+ our ancestors+ and treated our fathers wickedly so that they cast out their young children, to the end they might not live. 20 During this time, Moses was born and he was very fair to God. He was nurtured+ in his father's house for three months. 21 When he was cast out, Pharaoh's daughter took him and nurtured+ him as her own son. 22 Moses was educated+ in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and he was mighty in words and deeds. 23 When he was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his family+, the children of Israel. 24 Seeing one of them suffer wrong, he defended and avenged the one who was oppressed and struck+ down an Egyptian. 25 Moses thought+ that his brothers would have understood that God, by his hand, would deliver them. But they did not understand. 26 The next day, he appeared+ to them as they argued+ and he tried to set them at peace+ saying: Sirs, you are brothers. Why do you do wrong to one another? 27 But the one who did his neighbor wrong, pushed+ Moses away saying: Who made you a ruler and a judge over us? Exodus 2:14 28 Will you kill me as you did the Egyptian yesterday? Exodus 2:14 29 At this saying, Moses fled and became a stranger in the land of Midian where he fathered+ two sons. 30 After forty years passed+, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai in a flame of fire in a bush. 31 When Moses saw this, he wondered at the sight. As he drew near to behold it, the voice of the Lord came to him 32 saying: I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. Then Moses trembled and did not dare+ to behold. Exodus 3:6 33 Then the Lord said to him: Take your sandals+ off of your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground. Exodus 3:5 34 I have seen the suffering+ of my people in Egypt and I have heard their groaning and I have come down to deliver them. Now come, I will send you into Egypt. Exodus 2:24 35 This Moses whom they refused saying: Who made you a ruler and a judge? The same did God send to be a ruler and a deliverer by the hand of the angel who appeared to him in the bush. 36 He brought them out after he had shown wonders and signs in the land of Egypt, and in the Red sea, and in the wilderness forty years. 37 This is that Moses who said to the children of Israel: The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet from among your brothers, like me. You shall hear Him. Deuteronomy 18:15 38 This is the man who was in the assembly+ in the wilderness with the angel who spoke to him on Mount Sinai, and with our fathers. It was he who received the living+ oracles to give to us. 39 But our fathers would not obey him. Instead, they thrust him away from them and in their hearts turned back again to Egypt. 40 They said to Aaron: Make gods for us to go before us. For as for this Moses who brought us out of the land of Egypt, we do not know+ what has become of him. Exodus 32:23 41 They made a calf in those days and offered sacrifice to the idol and rejoiced in the works of their own hands. 42 But God turned and gave them up to worship the host of heaven. As it is written in the book of the prophets: O house of Israel, did you offer to me slain beasts and sacrifices for forty years in the wilderness? Amos 5:25 43 And you also took up the tabernacle of Moloch and the star of your god Remphan, with figures that you made to worship. I will carry you away beyond Babylon. Amos 5:26..27 44 Our fathers had the tabernacle of witness in the wilderness, as God who spoke to Moses instructed+, so he would make it according to the pattern+ he had seen. 45 Our fathers who came after brought this in with Joshua+ into the possession of the Gentiles whom God drove out before the face of our fathers, until the days of David. 46 But then David found favor before God and desired to find a tabernacle for the God of Jacob. 47 But then it was Solomon who built a house for God. 48 However the most High does not dwell in temples made with hands. As the prophet said: 49 Heaven is my throne and Earth is my footstool. What house will you build for me? says the Lord. Or what place of my rest? Isaiah 66:1 50 Has not my hand made all these things? Isaiah 66:2 51 You stiff necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears. You always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so you do. 52 Which of the prophets have your fathers not persecuted? And they have slain those who foretold+ of the coming of the Just One of whom you have now been the betrayers and murderers. 53 You have received the law by the disposition of angels but have not kept it. 54 When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart and gnashed their teeth at him. 55 But Stephen, being full of the Holy Spirit, looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. 56 He said: Behold I see the heavens opened and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God. 57 Then they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and ran upon him with one accord. 58 They cast Stephen out of the city and stoned him and the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man whose name was Saul. 59 They stoned Stephen as he called upon God saying: Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. 60 Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice: Lord, do not lay this sin to their charge. When he had said this, he fell asleep.
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