[11:55] Improve English Listening: Learn Natural Expressions from the Bible

Learning English is not just about mastering grammar and vocabulary. More importantly, it’s about applying the language naturally in real-life scenarios. Textbook sentences often sound too formal and differ greatly from how English is spoken in everyday life. To speak fluent and natural English, you need exposure to real-world conversations. Here, we select commonly used English expressions from daily life, covering social, work, and travel situations, to help you break away from 'textbook English' and learn what native speakers actually say. Below is the content of this issue: 'Episode 16 of Season 2: The Bible'. Keep practicing and bring English closer to your daily life!

Chapter 4. Adam lay with his wife Eve, and she conceived and gave birth to Cain. She said to him, With the help of the Lord I have brought forth a man. Later she gave birth to his brother Abel. Now Abel kept flux and Cain worked the soil. In the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the Lord. But Abel brought fat portions from some of the first board of his flock. The Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering, but on Cain and his offering he did not look with favor. So Cain was very angry and his face was downcast.

Then the Lord said to Cain, Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouched at your door. It desires to have you, but you must master it. Now Cain said to his brother Abel, Let's go out to the field. And while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him. Then the Lord said to Cain, Where is your brother Abel? I don't know. He replied, Am I my brother's keeper?

The Lord said, What have you done? Listen, your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground. Now you are under a curse and driven from the ground which opens its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. When you work the ground, it will no longer yield its cross for you. You will be a restless wanderer on the earth. Cain said to the Lord, My punishment is more than I can bear. Today you are driving me from the land and I will be hidden from your presence. I will be a restless wanderer on the earth and whoever finds me will kill me.

But the Lord said to him, Not so. If anyone kills Cain, He will suffer vengeance seven times over. Then the Lord put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him. So Cain went out from the Lord's presence and lived in the land of Nahr, the east of Eden. Cain lay with his wife and she became pregnant and gave birth to Inak. Cain was then building a city and he named it after his son Inak. To Inak was born Ired. And Ired was the father of Mahuja El. And Mahuja El was the father of Mathusha El. And Mathusha El was the father of Lama.

Lama married two women, one named Adha and the other Zila. Adha gave birth to Jabo. He was the father of those who live in tents and raise livestock. His brother's name was Jubal. He was the father of all who play the harp and flute. Zila also had a son, Dubal Cain, who forged all kinds of tools out of bronze and iron. Dubal Cain's sister was Nahrama. Lama said to his wives, Adha and Zila listened to me. Wives of Lamek hear my words. I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for injuring me. If Cain is of n seven times, then Lamek 77 times.

Adam lay with his wife again and she gave birth to a son and named him Sath, saying, God has granted me another child in place of Abel since Cain killed him. Sath also had a son and he named him Inosh. At that time, men began to call on the name of the Lord.

Chapter 6. When men began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful and they married any of them they chose. Then the Lord said, My spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal. His days will be a hundred and twenty years. The Nephilim were on the earth in those days and also afterward, when the sons of God went to the daughters of man and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.

The Lord saw how great man's wickedness on the earth had become and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time. The Lord was grieved that he had made man on the earth and his heart was filled with pain. So the Lord said, I will white man kind whom I have created from the face of the earth, men and animals and creatures that move along the ground and birds of the air. But I am grieved that I have made them. But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.

This is the account of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time and he walked with God. Noah had three sons, Sham, Ham and Japheth. Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight and was full of violence. God saw how corrupt the earth had become for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. So God said to Noah, I am going to put an end to all people for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. So make yourself an ark of Cyprus wood. Make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out.

This is how you are to build it. The ark is to be 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high. Make a roof for it and finish the ark to within 18 inches of the top. Put a door on the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. I am going to bring flood waters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens. Every creature that has the breath of life in it, everything on earth will perish. But I will establish my covenant with you and you will enter the ark. You and your sons and your wife and your sons wives with you.

You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive. You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them. Noah did everything just as God commanded here.

Chapter 7. The Lord said to Noah, Go into the ark, you and your whole family because I have found you righteous in this generation. Take with you seven of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and two of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, and also seven of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth.

Seven days from now, I will send rain on the earth for 40 days and 40 nights and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made. And Noah did all that the Lord commanded here. Noah was 600 years old when the flood waters came on the earth and Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons' wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood.

Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, male and female came to Noah and entered the ark as God had commanded Noah. And after the seven days, the flood waters came on the earth. In the 600 year of Noah's life, on the 17th day and the second month, on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth and the floodgates of the heavens were opened, and rain fell on the earth 40 days and 40 nights.

On that very day Noah and his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark. They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind, and every bird according to its kind, everything with wings. Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life in them came to Noah and entered the ark. The animals going in were male and female of every living thing as God had commanded Noah. Then the Lord shut him in.

For 40 days the flood kept coming on the earth and as the waters increased, they lifted the ark high above the earth. The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than 20 feet. Every living thing that moved on the earth perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind.

Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out—men and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds of the air were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark. The waters flooded the earth for 150 days.

But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and he sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded. Now the springs of the deep and the floodgates of the heavens had been closed, and the rain had stopped falling from the sky. The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the 150 days, the water had gone down.

And on the 17th day of the 7th month, the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. The waters continued to recede until the 10th month, and on the first day of the 10th month, the tops of the mountains became visible. After 40 days, Noah opened the window he had made in the ark and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth.

Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. But the dove could find no place to set its feet because there was water over all the surface of the earth, so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark. He waited seven more days, and again sent out the dove from the ark. When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth.

He waited seven more days and sent the dove out again, but this time it did not return to him. By the first day of the first month of Noah's 601st year, the water had dried up from the earth. Noah then removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry. By the 27th day of the second month, the earth was completely dry.

Then God said to Noah, Come out of the ark, you and your wife and your sons and their wives. Bring out every kind of living creature that is with you—the birds, the animals, and all the creatures that move along the ground—so they can multiply on the earth and be fruitful and increase in number upon it. So Noah came out, together with his sons and his wife and his sons' wives.

All the animals and all the creatures that move along the ground and all the birds—everything that moves on the earth—came out of the ark, one kind after another. Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and, taking some of all the clean animals and clean birds, he sacrificed burnt offerings on it. The Lord smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures as I have done. As long as the earth endures—seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night—will never cease.

The above is a summary by Qicai.com of the content from 'Episode 16 of Season 2: The Bible'. We hope it is helpful to you!