7:1And the chief of the priests said: "Are these things so?" 7:2And he said: "Men, brothers and fathers, hear: the God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he stayed in Haran, and said to him: 'Go out from your land, and from your kindred, and come into the land which I shall show you.' 7:4Then he went out from the land of the Chaldeans, and lived in Haran. 7:4And from there, after his father had died, he moved him into this land, in which you now live. 7:5And he did not give him an inheritance in it, not even the step of a foot: but he promised to give it to him into possession, and to his seed after him, though he did not have a son.
7:6And God spoke to him: 'His seed will be a sojourner in a foreign land, and they will subject them to slavery, and will treat them badly for four hundred years: and the nation which they serve, I will judge,' said the Lord: 'and after these things they will go out, and will serve me in this place.' 7:8And he gave him the covenant of circumcision: and so he begot Isaac, and circumcised him on the eighth day: and Isaac begot Jacob: and Jacob the twelve patriarchs. 7:9And the patriarchs, being jealous, sold Joseph into Egypt: and God was with him, and snatched him out of all his tribulations, and gave him favour and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh, king of Egypt: and he appointed him governor over Egypt, and over all his house.
7:11And there came a famine upon all Egypt and Canaan, and great tribulation: and our fathers were not finding food. 7:12But when Jacob had heard that there was grain in Egypt, he sent our fathers first: and the second time Joseph was recognized by his brothers, and his family was made manifest to Pharaoh. 7:14And Joseph, sending, summoned Jacob his father and all his kindred, seventy-five souls. 7:15And Jacob went down into Egypt: and he himself died, and our fathers. 7:16And they were carried over to Shechem, and were placed in the tomb which Abraham bought for a price of silver from the sons of Hamor, son of Shechem. 7:17But when the time of the promise which God had declared to Abraham was drawing near, the people grew, and was multiplied in Egypt, until another king arose in Egypt, who did not know Joseph.
7:19This man, dealing craftily with our race, afflicted our fathers, so that they would expose their infants, so that they might not be kept alive. 7:20At the same time Moses was born, and he was pleasing to God: who was nourished for three months in the house of his father. 7:21And when he had been exposed, the daughter of Pharaoh took him up, and nourished him for herself as a son. 7:22And Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was mighty in his words and in his deeds. 7:23But when the time of forty years was being completed for him, it came up into his heart to visit his brothers, the sons of Israel.
7:24And when he had seen a certain man suffering injury, he defended him, and took vengeance for him who was enduring the injury, the Egyptian having been struck down. 7:25And he supposed that his brothers understood that God through his hand was giving salvation to them: but they did not understand. 7:26And on the following day he appeared to them as they were quarrelling: and he was reconciling them in peace, saying: 'Men, you are brothers: why do you harm one another?' 7:27But he who was doing injury to his neighbour pushed him away, saying: 'Who appointed you ruler and judge over us? 7:28Surely you do not want to kill me, in the way that you killed the Egyptian yesterday?' 7:29And Moses fled at this word: and he became a stranger in the land of Midian, where he begot two sons.
7:30And forty years having been completed, there appeared to him in the desert of mount Sinai an angel in the fire of a flame of a bush. 7:31And Moses, seeing it, wondered at the sight. 7:31And as he approached to consider it, there came to him the voice of the Lord, saying: 'I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.' 7:32And Moses, made to tremble, did not dare to consider it. 7:33And the Lord said to him: 'Loosen the shoe of your feet: for the place in which you stand is holy ground. 7:34Seeing, I have seen the affliction of my people which is in Egypt, and I have heard their groaning, and I have come down to free them.
7:34And now come, and I will send you into Egypt.' 7:35This Moses, whom they denied, saying: 'Who appointed you ruler and judge?' 7:35this man God sent as ruler and redeemer, with the hand of the angel who appeared to him in the bush. 7:36This man led them out, doing wonders and signs in the land of Egypt, and in the Red Sea, and in the desert for forty years. 7:37This is the Moses who said to the sons of Israel: 'A prophet will God raise up for you from your brothers, like me: him you will hear.' 7:38This is he who was in the assembly in the wilderness with the angel, who was speaking to him on mount Sinai, and with our fathers: who received words of life to give to us.
7:39To whom our fathers were unwilling to be obedient: but they pushed him away, and in their hearts they turned back to Egypt, saying to Aaron: 'Make us gods who may go before us: for this Moses, who led us out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has happened to him.' 7:41And they made a calf in those days, and offered a sacrifice to the idol, and were rejoicing in the works of their hands. 7:42But God turned, and handed them over to serve the army of heaven, as it is written in the book of the prophets: 'Surely you did not offer victims and sacrifices to me for forty years in the desert, house of Israel?
7:43And you took up the tent of Moloch, and the star of your god Rephan, figures which you made to worship them: and I will carry you away beyond Babylon.' The tent of testimony was with our fathers in the desert, as God arranged for them, speaking to Moses, that he should make it according to the form which he had seen. 7:45Which also our fathers, receiving it, brought in with Joshua into the possession of the nations which God drove out from the face of our fathers, until the days of David, who found favour before God, and asked that he might find a tent for the God of Jacob.
7:47But Solomon built him a house. 7:48But the Most High does not dwell in things made by hand, as the prophet says: 'Heaven is my seat: and earth the footstool of my feet. 7:49What house will you build for me? 7:49says the Lord: or what is the place of my rest? 7:50Did not my hand make all these things?' Stiff of neck, and uncircumcised in hearts and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit: as your fathers did, so also do you. 7:52Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? 7:52And they killed those who foretold the coming of the Just One, of whom you have now been the betrayers and murderers: you who received the law by the arrangement of angels, and have not kept it."
7:54And hearing these things, they were cut to their hearts, and they were gnashing their teeth at him. 7:55But since he was full of the Holy Spirit, gazing into heaven, he saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. 7:55And he said: "Look, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God." 7:56And crying out with a great voice they stopped their ears, and made a rush with one mind at him. 7:57And throwing him out of the city, they were stoning him: and the witnesses laid down their clothes beside the feet of a young man who was called Saul.
7:58And they were stoning Stephen as he was calling on him, and saying: "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." 7:59And his knees having been placed on the ground, he shouted with a great voice, saying: "Lord, do not set this sin against them." 7:59And when he had said this, he fell asleep in the Lord. 7:59And Saul was consenting to his death.