Basic English Version : Read the Bible in 1 Year

Leviticus 26 / Basic English

1. Do not make images of false gods, or put up an image cut in stone or a pillar or any pictured stone in your land, to give worship to it; for I am the Lord your God.
2. Keep my Sabbaths and give honour to my holy place: I am the Lord.
3. If you are guided by my rules, and keep my laws and do them,
4. Then I will give you rain at the right time, and the land will give her increase and the trees of the field will give their fruit;
5. And the crushing of the grain will overtake the cutting of the grapes, and the cutting of the grapes will overtake the planting of the seed, and there will be bread in full measure, and you will be living in your land safely.
6. And I will give you peace in the land, and you will take your rest and no one will give you cause for fear; and I will put an end to all evil beasts in the land, and no sword of war will go through your land.
7. And you will put to flight those who are against you, and they will be put to death by your swords.
8. Then five of you will put to flight a hundred, and a hundred of you will put to flight ten thousand, and all who are against you will be put to death by your swords.
9. And I will have pleasure in you and make you fertile and greater in number; and I will keep my agreement with you.
10. And old stores long kept will be your food, and you will take out the old because of the new;
11. And I will put my holy House among you, and my soul will not be turned away from you in disgust.
12. And I will be present among you and will be your God and you will be my people.
13. I am the Lord your God, who took you out of the land of Egypt so that you might not be servants to them; by me the cords of your yoke were broken and I made you go upright.
14. But if you do not give ear to me, and do not keep all these my laws;
15. And if you go against my rules and if you have hate in your souls for my decisions and you do not do all my orders, but go against my agreement;
16. This will I do to you: I will put fear in your hearts, even wasting disease and burning pain, drying up the eyes and making the soul feeble, and you will get no profit from your seed, for your haters will take it for food.
17. And my face will be turned from you, and you will be broken before those who are against you, and your haters will become your rulers, and you will go in flight when no man comes after you.
18. And if, even after these things, you will not give ear to me, then I will send you punishment seven times more for your sins.
19. And the pride of your strength will be broken, and I will make your heaven as iron and your earth as brass;
20. And your strength will be used up without profit; for your land will not give her increase and the trees of the field will not give their fruit.
21. And if you still go against me and will not give ear to me, I will put seven times more punishments on you because of your sins.
22. I will let loose the beasts of the field among you, and they will take away your children and send destruction on your cattle, so that your numbers will become small and your roads become waste.
23. And if by these things you will not be turned to me, but still go against me;
24. Then I will go against you, and I will give you punishment, I myself, seven times for all your sins.
25. And I will send a sword on you to give effect to the punishment of my agreement; and when you come together into your towns I will send disease among you and you will be given up into the hands of your haters.
26. When I take away your bread of life, ten women will be cooking bread in one oven, and your bread will be measured out by weight; you will have food but never enough.
27. And if, after all this, you do not give ear to me, but go against me still,
28. Then my wrath will be burning against you, and I will give you punishment, I myself, seven times for your sins.
29. Then you will take the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters for food;
30. And I will send destruction on your high places, overturning your perfume altars, and will put your dead bodies on your broken images, and my soul will be turned from you in disgust.
31. And I will make your towns waste and send destruction on your holy places; I will take no pleasure in the smell of your sweet perfumes;
32. And I will make your land a waste, a wonder to your haters living in it.
33. And I will send you out in all directions among the nations, and my sword will be uncovered against you, and your land will be without any living thing, and your towns will be made waste.
34. Then will the land take pleasure in its Sabbaths while it is waste and you are living in the land of your haters; then will the land have rest.
35. All the days while it is waste will the land have rest, such rest as it never had in your Sabbaths, when you were living in it.
36. And as for the rest of you, I will make their hearts feeble in the land of their haters, and the sound of a leaf moved by the wind will send them in flight, and they will go in flight as from the sword, falling down when no one comes after them;
37. Falling on one another, as before the sword, when no one comes after them; you will give way before your haters.
38. And death will overtake you among strange nations, and the land of your haters will be your destruction.
39. And those of you who are still living will be wasting away in their sins in the land of your haters; in the sins of their fathers they will be wasting away.
40. And they will have grief for their sins and for the sins of their fathers, when their hearts were untrue to me, and they went against me;
41. So that I went against them and sent them away into the land of their haters: if then the pride of their hearts is broken and they take the punishment of their sins,
42. Then I will keep in mind the agreement which I made with Jacob and with Isaac and with Abraham, and I will keep in mind the land.
43. And the land, while she is without them, will keep her Sabbaths; and they will undergo the punishment of their sins, because they were turned away from my decisions and in their souls was hate for my laws.
44. But for all that, when they are in the land of their haters I will not let them go, or be turned away from them, or give them up completely; my agreement with them will not be broken, for I am the Lord their God.
45. And because of them I will keep in mind the agreement which I made with their fathers, whom I took out of the land of Egypt before the eyes of the nations, to be their God: I am the Lord.
46. These are the rules, decisions, and laws, which the Lord made between himself and the children of Israel in Mount Sinai, by the hand of Moses.

Mark 9 / Basic English

1. And he said to them, Truly I say to you, There are some here who will have no taste of death till they see the kingdom of God come with power.
2. And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and made them go up with him into a high mountain by themselves: and he was changed in form before them:
3. And his clothing became shining, very white, as no cleaner on earth would make it.
4. And there came before them Elijah with Moses, and they were talking with Jesus.
5. And Peter said to Jesus, Master, it is good for us to be here: and let us make three tents; one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.
6. Because he was not certain what to say, for they were in great fear.
7. And a cloud came over them; and a voice came out of the cloud, saying, This is my dearly loved Son, give ear to him.
8. And suddenly looking round about, they saw no one any longer, but Jesus only with themselves.
9. And while they were coming down from the mountain, he gave them orders not to give word to any man of the things they had seen, till the Son of man had come back from the dead.
10. And they kept the saying, questioning among themselves what the coming back from the dead might be.
11. And they put a question to him, saying, Why do the scribes say that Elijah has to come first?
12. And he said to them, Truly, Elijah does come first, and puts all things in order; and how is it said in the Writings that the Son of man will go through much sorrow and be made as nothing?
13. But I say to you that Elijah has come, and they have done to him whatever they were pleased to do, even as the Writings say about him.
14. And when they came to the disciples, they saw a great mass of people about them, and scribes questioning them.
15. And straight away all the people, when they saw him, were full of wonder, and running to him, gave him worship.
16. And he said, What are you questioning them about?
17. And one of the number said to him in answer, Master, I came to you with my son, who has in him a spirit which takes away his power of talking;
18. And wherever it takes him, it puts him down violently, streaming at the lips and twisted with pain; and his strength goes from him; and I made a request to your disciples to send it out, and they were not able.
19. And he said to them in answer, O generation without faith, how long will I have to be with you? how long will I put up with you? let him come to me.
20. And they took him to him: and when he saw him, the spirit in him straight away became violent; and he went down on the earth, rolling about and streaming at the lips.
21. And Jesus questioning the father said, How long has he been like this? And he said, From a child.
22. And frequently it has sent him into the fire and into the water, for his destruction; but if you are able to do anything, have pity on us, and give us help.
23. And Jesus said to him, If you are able! All things are possible to him who has faith.
24. Straight away the father of the child gave a cry, saying, I have faith; make my feeble faith stronger.
25. And when Jesus saw that the people came running together, he gave orders to the unclean spirit, saying to him, You, spirit, who are the cause of his loss of voice and hearing, I say to you, come out of him, and never again go into him.
26. And after crying out and shaking him violently, it came out: and the child became like one dead; so that most of them said, He is dead.
27. But Jesus took him by the hand, lifting him up; and he got up.
28. And when he had gone into the house, his disciples said to him privately, Why were we unable to send it out?
29. And he said to them, Nothing will make this sort come out but prayer.
30. And they went out from there, through Galilee; and it was his desire that no man might have knowledge of it;
31. For he was giving his disciples teaching, and saying to them, The Son of man is given up into the hands of men, and they will put him to death; and when he is dead, after three days he will come back from the dead.
32. But the saying was not clear to them, and they were in fear of questioning him about it.
33. And they came to Capernaum: and when he was in the house, he put the question to them, What were you talking about on the way?
34. But they said nothing: because they had had an argument between themselves on the way, about who was the greatest.
35. And seating himself, he made the twelve come to him; and he said to them, If any man has the desire to be first, he will be last of all and servant of all.
36. And he took a little child, and put him in the middle of them; and taking him in his arms, he said to them,
37. Whoever will give honour to one such little child in my name, gives honour to me: and whoever gives honour to me, gives honour not to me, but to him who sent me.
38. John said to him, Master, we saw one driving out evil spirits in your name: and we said that he might not, because he is not one of us.
39. But Jesus said, Say not so: for there is no man who will do a great work in my name, and be able at the same time to say evil of me.
40. He who is not against us is for us.
41. Whoever gives you a cup of water, because you are Christ's, truly I say to you, he will in no way be without his reward.
42. And whoever is a cause of trouble to one of these little ones who have faith in me, it would be better for him if a great stone was put round his neck and he was dropped into the sea.
43. And if your hand is a cause of trouble to you, let it be cut off; it is better for you to go into life with one hand than to have two hands and go into hell, into the eternal fire.
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45. And if your foot is a cause of trouble to you, let it be cut off: it is better for you to go into life with one foot than to have two feet and go into hell.
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47. And if your eye is a cause of trouble to you, take it out: it is better for you to go into the kingdom of God with one eye than, having two eyes, to go into hell,
48. Where their worm is ever living and the fire is not put out.
49. Everyone will be salted with fire.
50. Salt is good; but if the taste goes from it, how will you make it salt again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace one with another.