Day 253 The Bible in a Year (Orthodox canon)

Song of Songs 1

1 The Song of songs, which is Solomon's. 2 Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for thy breasts are better than wine. 3 And the smell of thine ointments is better than all spices: thy name is ointment poured forth; therefore do the young maidens love thee. 4 They have drawn thee: we will run after thee, for the smell of thine ointments: the king has brought me into his closet: let us rejoice and be glad in thee; we will love thy breasts more than wine: righteousness loves thee. 5 I am black, but beautiful, ye daughters of Jerusalem, as the tents of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon. 6 Look not upon me, because I am dark, because the sun has looked unfavourably upon me: my mother's sons strove with me; they made me keeper in the vineyards; I have not kept my own vineyard. 7 Tell me, [thou] whom my soul loves, where thou tendest thy flock, where thou causest [them] to rest at noon, lest I become as one that is veiled by the flocks of thy companions. 8 If thou know not thyself, thou fair one among women, go thou forth by the footsteps of the flocks, and feed thy kids by the shepherds' tents. 9 I have likened thee, my companion, to my horses in the chariots of Pharao. 10 How are thy cheeks beautiful as [those] of a dove, thy neck as chains! 11 We will make thee figures of gold with studs of silver. 12 So long as the king was at table, my spikenard gave forth its smell. 13 My kinsman is to me a bundle of myrrh; he shall lie between my breasts. 14 My kinsman is to me a cluster of camphor in the vineyards of Engaddi. 15 Behold, thou art fair, my companion; behold, thou art fair; thine eyes are doves. 16 Behold, thou art fair, my kinsman, yea, beautiful, overshadowing our bed. 17 The beams of our house are cedars, our ceilings are of cypress.

Song of Songs 2

1 I am a flower of the plain, a lily of the valleys. 2 As a lily among thorns, so is my companion among the daughters. 3 As the apple among the trees of the wood, so is my kinsman among the sons. I desired his shadow, and sat down, and his fruit was sweet in my throat. 4 Bring me into the wine house; set love before me. 5 Strengthen me with perfumes, stay me with apples: for I [am] wounded with love. 6 His left [hand shall be] under my head, and his right hand shall embrace me. 7 I have charged you, ye daughters of Jerusalem, by the powers and by the virtues of the field, that ye do not rouse or wake [my] love, until he please. 8 The voice of my kinsman! behold, he comes leaping over the mountains, bounding over the hills. 9 My kinsman is like a roe or a young hart on the mountains of Bæthel: behold, he is behind our wall, looking through the windows, peeping through the lattices. 10 My kinsman answers, and says to me, Rise up, come, my companion, my fair one, my dove. 11 For, behold, the winter is past, the rain is gone, it has departed. 12 The flowers are seen in the land; the time of pruning has arrived; the voice of the turtle-dove has been heard in our land. 13 The fig-tree has put forth its young figs, the vines put forth the tender grape, they yield a smell: arise, come, my companion, my fair one, my dove; yea, come. 14 [Thou art] my dove, in the shelter of the rock, near the wall: shew me thy face, and cause me to hear thy voice; for thy voice is sweet, and thy countenance is beautiful. 15 Take us the little foxes that spoil the vines: for our vines put forth tender grapes. 16 My kinsman is mine, and I am his: he feeds [his flock] among the lilies. 17 Until the day dawn, and the shadows depart, turn, my kinsman, be thou like to a roe or young hart on the mountains of the ravines.

Song of Songs 3

1 By night on my bed I sought him whom my soul loves: I sought him, but found him not; I called him, but he hearkened not to me. 2 I will rise now, and go about in the city, in the market-places, and in the streets, and I will seek him whom my soul loves: I sought him, but I found him not. 3 The watchmen who go their rounds in the city found me. [I said], Have ye seen him whom my soul loves? 4 [It was] as a little [while] after I parted from them, that I found him whom my soul loves: I held him, and did not let him go, until I brought him into my mother's house, and into the chamber of her that conceived me. 5 I have charged you, O daughters of Jerusalem, by the powers and by the virtues of the field, that ye rouse not nor awake [my] love, until he please. 6 Who is this that comes up from the wilderness as pillars of smoke, perfumed with myrrh and frankincense, with all powders of the perfumer? 7 Behold Solomon's bed; sixty mighty men of the mighty ones of Israel are round about it. 8 They all hold a sword, being expert in war: every man [has] his sword upon his thigh because of fear by night. 9 King Solomon made himself a litter of woods of Lebanon. 10 He made the pillars of it silver, the bottom of it gold, the covering of it scarlet, in the midst of it a pavement of love, for the daughters of Jerusalem. 11 Go forth, ye daughters of Sion, and behold king Solomon, with the crown wherewith his mother crowned him, in the day of his espousals, and in the day of the gladness of his heart.

2 Corinthians 11

1 I wish that you would bear with me in a little foolishness, but indeed you do bear with me. 2 For I am jealous over you with a godly jealousy. For I promised you in marriage to one husband, that I might present you as a pure virgin to Christ. 3 But I am afraid that somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve in his craftiness, so your minds might be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. 4 For if he who comes preaches another Jesus whom we didn’t preach, or if you receive a different spirit which you didn’t receive, or a different “good news” which you didn’t accept, you put up with that well enough. 5 For I reckon that I am not at all behind the very best apostles. 6 But though I am unskilled in speech, yet I am not unskilled in knowledge. No, in every way we have been revealed to you in all things. 7 Or did I commit a sin in humbling myself that you might be exalted, because I preached to you God’s Good News free of charge? 8 I robbed other assemblies, taking wages from them that I might serve you. 9 When I was present with you and was in need, I wasn’t a burden on anyone, for the brothers, when they came from Macedonia, supplied the measure of my need. In everything I kept myself from being burdensome to you, and I will continue to do so. 10 As the truth of Christ is in me, no one will stop me from this boasting in the regions of Achaia. 11 Why? Because I don’t love you? God knows. 12 But what I do, that I will continue to do, that I may cut off opportunity from those who desire an opportunity, that in which they boast, they may be recognized just like us. 13 For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as Christ’s apostles. 14 And no wonder, for even Satan masquerades as an angel of light. 15 It is no great thing therefore if his servants also masquerade as servants of righteousness, whose end will be according to their works. 16 I say again, let no one think me foolish. But if so, yet receive me as foolish, that I also may boast a little. 17 That which I speak, I don’t speak according to the Lord, but as in foolishness, in this confidence of boasting. 18 Seeing that many boast after the flesh, I will also boast. 19 For you bear with the foolish gladly, being wise. 20 For you bear with a man if he brings you into bondage, if he devours you, if he takes you captive, if he exalts himself, or if he strikes you on the face. 21 To my shame, I speak as though we had been weak. Yet in whatever way anyone is bold (I speak in foolishness), I am bold also. 22 Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they the offspring of Abraham? So am I. 23 Are they servants of Christ? (I speak as one beside himself.) I am more so: in labors more abundantly, in prisons more abundantly, in stripes above measure, and in deaths often. 24 Five times I received forty stripes minus one from the Jews. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I suffered shipwreck. I have been a night and a day in the deep. 26 I have been in travels often, perils of rivers, perils of robbers, perils from my countrymen, perils from the Gentiles, perils in the city, perils in the wilderness, perils in the sea, perils among false brothers; 27 in labor and travail, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, and in cold and nakedness. 28 Besides those things that are outside, there is that which presses on me daily: anxiety for all the assemblies. 29 Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is caused to stumble, and I don’t burn with indignation? 30 If I must boast, I will boast of the things that concern my weakness. 31 The God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, he who is blessed forever more, knows that I don’t lie. 32 In Damascus the governor under King Aretas guarded the Damascenes’ city, desiring to arrest me. 33 I was let down in a basket through a window by the wall, and escaped his hands.