Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered outside the gate. Therefore, let us go forth to him outside the camp, bearing his reproach. For we have no continuing city here, but we seek one to come.
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Ezekiel
Ezekiel 1
¶1. Now it came to pass in the thirtieth year, in the fourth month, on the fifth day, as I was among the company of exiles by the River Chebar, the heavens were opened, and I saw visions of God.
2. On the fifth day of the month (it was the fifth year of King Jehoiachin’s exile),
3.the word of the Lord certainly came to Ezekiel ben-Buzi, the priest, in the land of the Kasdim, by the River Chebar, and the hand of the Lord was upon him there.
4. And I looked, and behold, a storm-wind came from the north, a great cloud, and a fire enveloping itself,[1] with a brightness around it, and out of the midst of it was, as it were, a spring of brilliance,[2] from the midst of the fire.
5. Also out of the midst of it was the likeness of four living creatures, and this was their appearance: they had the likeness of a man.
6. And each one had four faces, and each one had four wings.
7. And their feet were a straight foot, and the sole of their feet was like the sole of a calf’s foot, and they sparkled, as the appearance of burnished bronze.
8. And hands of a man came from underneath their wings on each of(?) the four sides, and the four of them had faces and wings.
9. Their wings were joined, one to another. They did not turn when they went; each one went straight forward.
10. As for the likeness of their faces, they four (masc) had faces of a man, and faces of a lion on the right side, and they four (fem) had faces of an ox on the left side, and they four (fem) had faces of an eagle.
11. And their faces and their wings divided from above; each had two, joined together, and two covered their bodies.
12. And each one went straight forward; they went wherever the Spirit was going. They did not turn when they went.
13. The creatures were similar in their appearance to burning coals of fire, like the appearance of torches. It went about between the creatures and the brightness of the fire, and lighting came out of the fire.
14. And the creatures ran out and returned like a flash of lightning.
15. And as I looked at the creatures, behold, one wheel was on the earth beside each creature with its four faces.
16. The appearance of the wheels and their workmanship was like the color of beryl, and each was similar to the four creatures, and the wheels’ appearance and their workmanship was like a wheel within a wheel.
17. When they went, they went on all four sides of the creatures; the wheels did not turn when they went.
18. As for the creatures’ wheels, they were tall and terrible, and the wheels’ rims were full of pairs of eyes all around the four creatures.
19. And when the creatures went, the wheels would go beside them (m), and when the creatures were lifted up off the earth, the wheels were lifted up.
20. They went (m) wherever the spirit was going, to wherever the spirit was going, and the wheels were lifted up along with them (m), for the spirit of the creature was in the wheels.
21. When they (m) went, the wheels went, and when they (m) stopped, the wheels stopped, and when they were lifted up off the earth, the wheels were lifted up along with them, for the spirit of the creature was in the wheels.
22. And the expanse over the heads of the creature was like the terrible color of ice stretched out over their heads, above.
23. And under the expanse, their (m) wings were straight, each toward the other. Each had two covering on this side, and each had two covering their bodies on that side.
24. And when they went, I heard the sound of their wings, like the sound of mighty waters, like the voice of the Almighty, the sound of a tumult, like the sound of an army. When they stopped, their wings calmed.
25. And when they had stopped and their wings were calmed, there came a voice from above the expanse that was over their head.
26. And above the expanse that was over their head was something like a sapphire stone, what appeared to be a throne, and upon what appeared to be the throne was what appeared to be something like a man, upon it, above.
27. And I saw something like the color of amber, similar to fire, its house around it. From what appeared to be his loins and up, and from what appeared to be his loins and down, I saw what appeared to be a man, and his brightness was all around.
28. Like how a rainbow looks which is in the cloud on a rainy day, just so was the appearance of the brightness surrounding him; the appearance was like the glory of the Lord. And when I saw, I fell on my face, and I heard a voice of one speaking.
Ezekiel 2
¶1. And He said to me, “Son of man, stand to your feet, and I will speak to you.”
2. And the spirit entered into me as He spoke to me and stood me up on my feet. And I heard Him speaking to me.
3. And He said to me, “Son of man, I am sending you to the children of Israel, to the nations, the rebels who have rebelled against me. They and their fathers have transgressed against me, to this very day.
4.For the children are stiff-necked and hard-hearted. I am sending you to them, and you will say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God.’
5.And whether they listen or whether they refuse (for they are a rebellious house), they will know that a prophet has been among them.
6.But you, son of man, do not be afraid of them and their words. Do not be afraid though briars and thorns are with you, and you dwell among scorpions. Do not be afraid of their words, nor be dismayed at their faces, though they are a rebellious house.
7.But speak my words to them, whether they listen or whether they refuse, for they are rebellious.
8.And as for you, son of man, hear what I am saying to you! Do not be rebellious like the rebellious house. Open your mouth and eat what I give you.”
9. And I looked, and behold, a hand was extended toward me, and behold, and a scroll was in it.
10. And He spread it out before me, and it had writing on front and on back. And written on it were lamentations, and mourning, and woe.
Ezekiel 3
¶1. Again He said to me, “Son of man, what you find, eat. Eat this scroll, and then go speak to the house of Israel.”
2. And so, I opened my mouth, and He fed me the scroll.
3. Then He said to me, “Son of man, feed your belly, and fill your bowels with this scroll that I have given you. And so I ate it, and in my mouth, it was sweet as honey.
4. And He said to me, “Son of man, go! Go to the house of Israel and speak my words to them.
5.For you are not being sent to a people of an unintelligible speech and difficult language, but to the house of Israel,
6.not to many nations of an unintelligible speech and a difficult language, whose words you cannot understand. Surely, if I had sent you to them, they would have heard you.
7.But the house of Israel will not want to hear you, for they do not want to hear me, for the whole house of Israel are hard-headed and hard-hearted.
8.Behold, I have made your face strong against their faces, and your forehead strong against their foreheads.
9.As an adamant harder than flint have I made your forehead. Do not fear them! Do not be dismayed at their faces, though they are a rebellious house.”
10. Moreover, He said to me, “Son of man, take into your heart all the words that I speak to you, and hear them with your ears,
11.and go! Go to the captivity of the children of your people and speak to them, and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God’, whether they hear or refuse.
12. Then the Spirit picked me up, and I heard a great thundering voice behind me, “Blessed be the Glory of the Lord from his post.”
13. And I heard the sound of the wings of the living creatures which were touching each other, and the sound of the wheels that were with them, and the great thundering voice.
14. So the spirit picked me up and took me, and I went bitterly with my spirit angry, but the hand of the Lord prevailed over me.
15. And I came to the captivity at Tel-Aviv, those who dwell by the river Chebar, and awestruck, I sat where they were sitting, seven days in their midst.
16. And it came to pass at the end of the seven days, then the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
17. “Son of man, I have appointed you as a watchman for the house of Israel. So when you hear a word from my mouth, you will give them the warning from me.
18. When I say to the wicked, ‘You will most certainly die,’ and you do not warn him, nor speak out to warn the wicked of his wicked way, that he might live, that wicked man will die in his iniquity, but his blood will I require from your hand.
19. But if you do warn the wicked, and he does not turn from his wickedness or his wicked way, he will die in his iniquity, but you will have delivered your soul.
20. And when a righteous man turns from his righteousness, and he commits iniquity, and I lay a stumbling-block before him so that he dies, because you did not warn him, he will die in his sin, and his righteous deeds which he had done will not be remembered, and his blood will I require from your hand.
21. But when you warn a righteous man that the righteous does not sin, and he does not sin, he will truly live because he has been warned, and you will have delivered your soul.
22. And the hand of the Lord was upon me there, and He said to me, “Rise up, go out to the valley, and I will talk with you there.”
23. So I rose up and went out to the valley, and behold, the Glory of the Lord (see v12) was standing there, just like the Glory that I had seen by the river Chebar, and I fell on my face.
24.Then the Spirit entered into me and stood me up on my feet, and he spoke with me, and said to me, “Go, shut yourself up in your house.
25. As for you, O son of man, behold, they will put ropes on you and bind you with them, and you shall not go out among them.
26. And I will make your tongue cleave to the roof of your mouth, and you will be dumb and you will not be a reprover to them, for they are a rebellious house.
27. But when I speak with you, I will open your mouth and you will say to them, “Thus says my Lord Jehovah: He who hears will hear, and he who refrains will refrain, for they are a rebellious house.”
Ezekiel 4
¶1. “And as for you, son of man, you take a tile, set it before you, and engrave on it a city – Jerusalem.
2.Then make siege-works against it, and build a wall against it, and cast up a mound against it, and make encampments against it, and place battering-rams against it all around.
3.Then take an iron griddle and make it an iron wall between you and the city, and set your face toward it so that it is under siege, and besiege it. This is a sign to the house of Israel.
4.Then you lie down on your left side, and set the iniquity of the house of Israel upon it. You shall bear their iniquity for the number of days that you lie down against it.
5.And I have laid on you three hundred and ninety days, corresponding to the years of their iniquity. And so, you will bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.
6.When you have completed these days, you shall lie down a second time, but on your right side, and bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days, a day for a year. I have appointed you a day for a year.
7.And to the siege of Jerusalem, you shall set your face with your arm bared. Then you shall prophesy against it.
8.And, behold, I will put cords around you so that you cannot turn from side to side until you have completed your siege.
9.And take for you wheat, and barley, and beans, and lentils, and millet, and spelt and put them into one vessel, and make them bread and you shall eat it during the days when you are lying on your side, three hundred and ninety days.
10.“Your food, which you will eat, shall be by weight twenty shekels each day. From time to time, you will eat it.
11.And you will drink water by measure one-sixth of a hin each day. From time to time, you will drink.
12.And you will eat it as a cake of barley; before their eyes, you will bake it, using human dung.”
13. And Jehovah said, “Thus will the children of Israel eat their polluted bread among the nations where I will banish them.”
14.Then I said, “Ah! Lord God! Behold, my soul has not been defiled! I have not eaten of a carcass that died of itself or an animal torn a by wild beast! From my youth until now, no unclean flesh has come into my mouth!”
15.Then He said to me, “Very well. I give you cow dung instead of human dung; and you will make your bread with that.”
16. Moreover, He said to me, “I am breaking the staff of bread in Jerusalem, and they shall eat bread by weight, and with anxiety, and they shall drink water by measure and with horror,
17.that they might lack bread and water, and be appalled, each with his brother, and rot away in their iniquity.”
Ezekiel 5
¶1. “And as for you, son of man, you take a sharp sword. Use it on yourself for a barber’s razor and pass over your head and your beard, and then take balances for weighing and divide them.
2.You shall burn a third part in the fire in the midst of the city when the days of the siege are complete, and take a third part and strike it with a sword all around it, and scatter a third part to the wind. Then I will unsheathe a sword after them.
3.And from them you shall take a few in number and bind them in the folds of your garment.
4.And from them again, take and throw them in the midst of the fire and burn them in the fire, From there, a fire will go out into all the house of Israel.”
¶5. “Thus says the Lord God: This is Jerusalem; I have set her in the midst of the Gentiles, with countries all around her.
6.But she has rebelled against my judgments with more wickedness than the Gentiles, and my statutes with more than the nations that surround her, for they have rejected my judgments and have not walked in my statutes.
7.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: Because your confusion is greater than that of the Gentiles who are around you, you have not walked in my statutes nor carried out my judgments. Yea, you have not even done according to the judgments of the Gentiles around you!
8.Therefore, says the Lord God: Behold, I, even I, am against you! And I will execute judgments in your midst in the sight of the Gentiles.
9.And because of all your abominations, I will do to you what I have never done, and the like of which I will not do again.
10.Therefore fathers will eat their sons in your midst, and sons will eat their fathers; yea, I will execute judgments against you, and I will scatter all your remnant to every wind.
11.Therefore, as I live, says the Lord God, I will damn myself if I do not withdraw or my eye spares because you have defiled my sanctuary with your detestable things and all your abominations. Yea, I will have no pity!
12.A third of you shall die by pestilence or be consumed by famine in your midst; and a third shall fall by the sword all around you; and a third will I scatter to every wind and unsheathe a sword after them.
13.When my anger is spent, and I have vented my wrath against them, then I will be appeased. And they will know that I the Lord have spoken in my jealousy, when I shall have spent my wrath against them.
14.Moreover, I will make you a waste, and a reproach among the nations who are around you, in the sight of all who pass by.
15.And she will be a reproach and a taunt, a warning and a horror, to the nations who are around you, when I have executed judgments upon you in anger, and in wrath, and with furious rebukes. I, Jehovah, have spoken!
16.When I send forth the deadly arrows of famine against them, which are for destruction, which I will send to destroy you, then I will increase the famine upon you, and I will break your staff of bread.
17.Yea, I will send against you famine and wild beasts, and they will bereave you, and I will send a sword upon you. I, Jehovah, have spoken.”
Ezekiel 6
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, set your face toward the mountains of Israel and prophesy against them,
3.and say, ‘O mountains of Israel! Hear the word of the Lord God! Thus says the Lord God to the mountains, and to the hills, and to the ravines, and to the valleys: Behold, I am bringing upon your sword, and I will destroy your high places.
4.And your altars will be desolate, and your pillars will be shattered, and I will make your slain to fall before your idols.
5.And I will lay the corpses of the children of Israel before their idols and scatter your bones around your altars.
6.Everywhere you dwell, the cities will be a waste, and the high places, desolate, so that they be a waste and your altars, desolate, and your idols will be shattered and destroyed, and your sun-pillars hewn down, and your works wiped out.
7.The slain will fall in your midst. And you will know that I am the Lord!
8.But I will allow some of you to live, escapees from the sword of the Gentiles, while you are dispersed among the countries.
9.And those of you who escape will remember me among the nations where they are taken captive, how I was crushed by their whorish heart that turned away from me and by their wanton eyes that followed after their idols. And they will loathe themselves because of the evils that they did, and for all their abominations.
10.And they will know that I, Jehovah, did not say in vain that I would bring this evil upon them.
11.Thus says the Lord God: Clap your hand and stomp your feet, and say, ‘Ah, for all the evil abominations of the house of Israel, for which they shall fall by the sword, and by famine, and pestilence.
12.He who is far off will die by the pestilence, and he who is near will fall by the sword, and he who is left and he who is preserved will die by famine. I will fully satisfy my wrath.
13.And you will know that I am the Lord when their slain men are among their idols around their altars on every high hill, in the tops of every mountain, and beneath every green tree and every leafy terebinth where they offered aromatic incense to all their idols.
14.And I will stretch out my hand against you, and I will make the land a desolation and a waste from the wilderness of Diblah, in all their dwellings. And they will know that I am the Lord!
Ezekiel 7
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“As For you, O son of man, thus says the Lord God concerning the country of Israel: An end, the end, has come upon the four corners of the land.
3.Yea, the end is upon you now. And I will send my anger upon you, and I will judge you according to your ways and bring upon you a recompense for all your abominations.
4.My eye will not spare you, and I will have no pity, but I will bring your ways upon you, and your abominations will be in your midst. And you will know that I am the Lord!
5.Thus says the Lord God: Disaster – a singular disaster – behold, it is coming.
6.An end has come. The end has come. It has awakened for you. Behold, it is coming.
7.Doom has come to you, O inhabitant of the land. The time has come; the day is near, with panic instead of a joyful shouting on the mountains.
8.Now, I will soon pour out my wrath on you and fully satisfy my anger against you, and judge you according to your deeds, and repay you for all your abominations.
9.My eye will not spare, and I will have no pity, but I will bring your ways upon you, and your abominations will be in your midst. And you will know that I am the Lord who strikes!
10.Behold, the day! Behold, the day has come! The doom has gone forth; the rod has budded; the insolence has sprouted.
11.The violence has grown to a rod of wickedness. None of them will remain, nor of their multitude, nor of their abundance[3], nor any eminence among them.
12.The time has come; the day at hand. Let not the buyer rejoice, and let not the seller mourn, for burning wrath is upon the whole multitude.
13.For the seller will not return to his wares, though they continue to exist. For the vision concerns their whole multitude, and it will not be revoked. And no one by his iniquity will save his life. They cannot save themselves.
14.They have blown the trumpet and made everything ready, but no one is going to war because my wrath is on their whole multitude.
15.The sword is without, and within is pestilence and famine. Whoever is in the field will die by the sword, and famine and pestilence will consume whoever is the city.
16.Though some escape, they will be on the mountains, like doves of the valleys, all of them moaning, each for his own iniquity.
17.All hands will be feeble, and all knees will be weak as water.
18.They will put on sackcloth. Horrors will cover them, and shame will be upon all faces, and baldness on all their heads.
19.Their silver will they cast away into the streets, and their gold will be an unclean thing. They will not be able to deliver them in the day of Jehovah’s overflowing wrath. They will not satisfy their souls, nor fill their bellies, for their iniquity was a stumbling-block.
20.His beautiful ornament, he set in pride, and with it they made their images of detestable abominations. Therefore, I will make him an unclean thing for them.
21.Yea, I will give him into the hand of foreigners for prey, and to wicked men of earth for spoil, and they will defile him.
22.And I will turn my face from them, and they will defile my treasure; yea, violent men will go in and defile it.
23.Forge the chain! For the land is filled with bloody judgments, and the city is filled with violence.
24.And I will bring the most evil of nations, and they will possess their houses. And I will put an end to the pride of strong men, and their sanctuaries will be profaned.
25.Anguish is coming. Then they will seek peace, but there will be none.
26.Calamity upon calamity will come, and rumor upon rumor, and they will seek a vision from a prophet, but the law will perish from the priest, and counsel from the elders.
27.The king will mourn, and the prince is clothed with desolation, and the hands of the people of the land are dismayed. Because of their ways, I will deal with them, and I will judge them according to their judgments. And they will know that I am the Lord!”
Ezekiel 8
¶1. Now, it came to pass in the sixth year, in the sixth month, on the fifth day of the month, that I was sitting in my house, and elders of Judah were sitting before me, and the hand of the Lord God fell on me there.
2. And I looked, and behold, there was a man’s form with the appearance of fire; the appearance from his loins downward was of fire, but from the loins upward was an appearance of brightness, like the gleam of metal[4].
3. And the figure sent a hand and took me by a lock of my head, and the Spirit lifted me up between the earth and heaven, and it brought me to Jerusalem in the visions of God, to the entrance of the inner gate that faces north, where was a seat for the image that provokes jealousy.
4. And, behold, the glory of the God of Israel was there, as in the vision which I saw in the valley.
5. Then He said to me, “Son of man, now lift up your eyes to the north!” And so, I lifted up my eyes to the north, and behold, northward, at the gate of the altar, was this idol of jealousy at the entrance.
6. And He said to me, “Son of man, do you see what they are doing – the great abominations which the house of Israel is committing here – to drive me away from my sanctuary? Yet, you will see even greater abominations.”
7. Then He brought me to the entrance of the court, and I looked, and behold, a hole in the wall!
8. And He said to me, Son of man, now dig in the wall.” And so, I dug in the wall, and behold, an opening.
9. Then He said to me, “Go in, and see the wicked abominations that they are doing here.”
10. And so, I went in and looked, and behold, every form of creeping thing, and detestable beast, and all the idols of the house of Israel were engraved in the wall all around.
11. And before them were seventy men of the elders of the house of Israel, with Jaazaniah ben-Shaphan standing in their midst, and each with his incense in his hand, and the aromatic smoke from the incense was rising.
12. And He said to me, “Do you see, O son of man, what the elders of the house of Israel are doing in the dark, each in the chamber of his carved figures? For they are thinking, Jehovah doesn’t see us; Jehovah has forsaken the land.”
13. Then He said to me, “Yet, you will see still greater abominations that they are doing.”
14. Then He brought me to the entrance of the gate of the house of the Lord that is to the north, and behold, women were sitting there, weeping for Tammuz.
15. And He said to me, “Do you see, O son of man? Yet, you will see still greater abominations than these.”
16. Then He brought me to the inner court of the house of the Lord, and, behold, at the entrance of the temple of the Lord, between the porch and the altar, were about twenty-five men, their backs to the temple of the Lord and their faces toward the east. And they were worshipping the sun, toward the east.
17. And He said to me, “Do you see, O son of man? Is it too light a thing for the house of Judah to commit the abominations that they commit here, that they should fill the land with violence and provoke me to still more anger? And, behold, they put the twig to their nose!
18.I will indeed act in my wrath. My eye will not spare, and I will have no pity. Yea, they will cry in my ears with a loud voice, but I will not hear them.”
Ezekiel 9
¶1. Then a loud voice cried out in my ears, saying, “Bring near the overseers of the city, each with his destroying weapon in his hand!”
2. And, behold, six men came from the way of the upper gate that faces north, and each with his slaughter-weapon in his hand, and in their midst was one man clothed in linen and a scribe’s inkhorn at his waist. And they came in and stood beside the bronze altar.
3. Now, the glory of the God of Israel was taken up from above the cherub over whom it had been to the threshold of the house. And he called to the man dressed in linen, who had the scribe’s inkhorn at his waist.
4. And Jehovah said to him, “Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and put a mark on the foreheads of the men and women who are sighing and crying over of all the abominations committed in the midst of it.”
5. And to these he said in my hearing, “Pass through the city after him and strike down. Your eyes shall not spare, and you will have no pity.
6.Utterly slay old man, young man, maiden, little child, and woman. But do not come near anyone upon whom is the mark. And you shall start at my sanctuary.” So, they started with the elders who were before the temple.
7. He also said to them, “Defile the temple and fill the courts with the slain! Go!” And they went out and began killing in the city.
8. And it came to pass while they were killing and I was left by myself, that I fell on my face and cried out, saying, “Ah, Lord God! Will you annihilate all that’s left of Israel with the outpouring of your wrath on Jerusalem‽”
9. And He saids to me, “The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceedingly great, and the land is filled with bloodshed, and the city with perversion, because they say, ‘Jehovah has forsaken the land,’ and ‘Jehovah does not see.’
10.My eye will not spare, and I will have no pity. I will bring down their way upon their head!
11. And, behold, the man clothed in linen with the inkhorn at his waist reported back, saying, “I have done as you commanded me.”
Ezekiel 10
¶1. Then I looked, and behold, in the firmament that was above the cherubim there was something like a sapphire stone appeared above them, with an appearance like a throne.
2. And He spoke to the man clothed in linen, and said, “Go in among the wheels, beneath the cherub, and fill your hands with coals of the fire between the cherubim, and scatter them over the city.” And in my sight, he went in.
3. Now, when the man went in, the cherubim were standing to the right of the temple, and the cloud filled the inner court.
4. Then the glory of the Lord rose from above the cherubim to above the threshold of the temple, and the house was filled with the cloud, and the court was filled with the brightness of the glory of the Lord.
5. And the sound of the wings of the cherubim was heard as far as the outer court, like the sound of God Almighty when He speaks.
6. And it came to pass when He commanded the man clothed in linen garments, saying, “Take fire from between the wheels, from between the cherubim,” that he went and stood next to a wheel.
7. And the cherub stretched out his hand from between the cherubim to the fire that was between the cherubim, and he took it and put it into the hands of the one clothed in linen garments. And he took it, and went out.
8. And the form of a man’s hand appeared in the cherubim, beneath their wings.
9. And I looked, and behold, four wheels were next to the cherubim, one wheel beside the one cherub, and another wheel beside the other cherub, and the appearance of the wheels was like a glittering stone of Tarshish.
10. As for their appearances, they four had one likeness, as if a wheel was in the middle of a wheel.
11. When they went, they four would go to any of their four directions. They did not turn when they went, but to the place where the head faced, they would follow. They did not turn when they went.
12. And their whole body, their back, and their hands, and their wings, and their wheels, were full of eyes all around. The four of them had their wheels.
13. As for the wheels, in my hearing, one called to them, “O whirling[?] wheel!”
14. And each had four faces. The face of the first was the face of a cherub; the face of the second, the face of a man; and the third, the face of a lion; the fourth, the face of an eagle.
15. Then the cherubim mounted up. This was the living creature which I saw by the River Chebar.
16. And when the cherubim went away, the wheels went beside them. And when the cherubim lifted their wings to mount up from the earth, the wheels did not turn from beside them.
17. When they stood still, they stood still, and when they mounted up, they mounted up. For the spirit of the living creature was in them.
18. And the glory of the Lord departed from the threshold of the house and stood above the cherubim.
19. Then the cherubim lifted their wings and mounted up from the earth in my sight, and when they went, then their wings were beside them. And they stood[5] at the entrance of the east gate of the Lord’s house, and the glory of the God of Israel was above them.
20. These are the living creatures which I saw under the God of Israel by the River Chebar, and I knew that they were cherubim.
21. Each of the four had four faces, and each had four wings, and the likeness of man’s hands was under their wings.
22. As for the likeness of their faces, they were the faces I saw along the river Chebar in their appearance, and they each went straight forward.
Ezekiel 11
¶1. Then the Spirit picked me up and carried me to the east gate of the house of the Lord that faces eastward, and behold, at the entrance of the gate were twenty-five men. And among them I saw Jaazaniah ben-Azur and Palatial ben-Benaiah, princes of the people.
2. And he said to me, “Son of man, these are the men who are devising iniquity and who give evil counsel in this city,
3.who say, ‘It is not near; let us build houses. This city is the pot, and we are the flesh.’
4.Therefore, prophesy against them! Prophesy, O son of man!”
5. Then the Spirit of the Lord fell on me, and He said to me, “Say, ‘Thus says the Lord: So you think, O house of Israel. Yea, things that come up in your mind, I know.
6.You have multiplied your slain in this city; indeed, you have filled its streets with the slain.
7.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: Your slain that you have laid out in its midst, they are the flesh, and this city is the pot, but one will take you out of it.
8.You have feared the sword, and I will bring a sword upon you, says the Lord God.
9.Moreover, I will bring you out of its midst and give you into the hand of foreigners, and execute judgment upon you.
10.By the sword will you fall. At the border of Israel will I judge you. And you will know that I am the Lord!
11.This city will not be your pot, nor shall you be flesh in the midst of it. At the border of Israel will I judge you.
12.And you will know that I am the Lord! For you have not walked in my statutes, nor have you not executed my judgments, but you have executed judgments of the Gentiles who are around you.’”
¶13. Then, when I prophesied, it came to pass that Pelatial ben-Benaiah dropped dead, and fell on his face. And I fell on my face and cried out in a loud voice and said, “O Lord God, you are making a complete end to the remnant of Israel!”
¶14. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
15.“Son of man, your brothers – your brothers! – men who are close to you, and the whole house of Israel in its entirety are those to whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, ‘Get far from Jehovah. This land is given to us for a possession.’
16.Therefore say, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Though I remove them far away among the Gentiles, and though I scatter them among the countries, yet will I be a little sanctuary for them wherever they go.’
17.Therefore, say, ‘Thus says the Lord God: I will indeed gather you from the nations, and I will assemble you from the countries in which you were scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.’
18.And when they arrive, they will take away from the land all its detested things and all its abominations.
19.And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you, and I will take away the stony heart from their flesh, and I will give them a heart of flesh
20.so that they may walk in my statutes, and keep my judgments and do them, and they will be my people, and I will be their God.
21.But as for the heart that goes after their heart, their detestable things and their abominations, I will bring their way down upon their heads, says the Lord God.”
22. Then the chrerubim lifted up their wings, with their wheels by their side, and the glory of the God of Israel was over them, above.
23. And the glory of the Lord went up from the midst of the city and stood on the mountain that is east of the city.
24. And the Spirit picked me up and carried me in the vision by the Spirit of God to Chaldea, to the captivity, Then the vision that I had seen went up from me.
25. And I told the captives all the things of Jehovah that He had shown me.
Ezekiel 12
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, you dwell in the midst of the house of rebels, whose eyes see, but do not see. They have ears, but they do not hear, for they are a rebellious house.
3.So, you, O son of man, prepare for yourself baggage for an exile, and go into exile daily in their sight. Yea, go into exile from your place to another place in their sight. It may be that they will see that they are a rebellious house.
4.You will bring out your baggage daily, like the baggage of an exile, in their sight, and you will go out in the evening in their sight, like those going out in exile.
5.In their sight, dig for yourself a hole in the wall, and take your stuff out by it.
6.In their sight, when it is dark, put it on your shoulder and go out. Cover your face so that you do not see the ground, for I have made you a sign to the house of Israel.”
7. And so, I did as I was commanded. Daily, I brought out my bags, as bags of an exile, and in the evening, I dug a hole for myself in the wall with my hands. When it was dark, I brought my bags out, and I carried them on my shoulder in their sight.
8. Then, in the morning, the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
9.“Son of man, has not the house of Israel, the rebellious house, said to you, ‘What are you doing?’
10.Say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: This burden concerns the prince in Jerusalem and the whole house of Israel who are among them.’
11.Say, ‘I am a sign for you. Just as I have done, so shall it be done to them. They shall go into exile, into captivity.’
12.And the prince who is among them will lift his belongings to his shoulder in the dark and go out. They will dig through the wall to bring him out. He will cover his face because he would not see the ground with his eye.
13.And I will spread my net out over him, and he will be taken in my snare, and I will bring him to Babylon, the land of the Chaldeans, but he will not see it, and there will he die.
14.And I will scatter to every wind all who are about him, with all his army, and I will draw out my sword after them.’
15.And they will know that I am the Lord when I disperse them among the Gentiles and scatter them among countries!
16.But I will cause a few of their men to escape from the sword, from famine, and from pestilence so that they may declare among the Gentiles where they go all their abominations. And they will know I am the Lord!”
¶17. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
18.“Son of man, eat your food with trembling, and drink your water anxiously, with quivering.
19.And say to the people of the land, ‘Thus says the Lord God concerning the inhabitants of Jerusalem and concerning the land of Israel: They shall eat their food with quivering and drink their water in dismay because her land is emptied because of what fills it – because of the violence of all who live in it.
20.Yea, the cities that are inhabited will be a waste, and the land will be a desolation. And they will know that I am the Lord!’”
¶21. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
22.“Son of man, what is this proverb you people have about the land of Israel, which says, ‘The days grow long, and every vision has perished’?
23.Therefore, say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: I will put a stop to this parable, and they will no longer use it as a parable in Israel.’ And say to them, ‘The days are at hand, and the fulfillment of every vision!’
24.For there will no longer be any false vision or flattering divination within the house of Israel.
25.For I, Jehovah, speak whatever I will speak, and it will be done. It will not be delayed any longer, but in your days, O rebellious house, I will both speak a thing and I will do it, says the Lord God.”
¶26. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
27.“Behold, they of the house of Israel are saying, ‘The vision which he sees is for many days from now, and he is prophesying about times far off.’
28.Therefore, say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Not one of my words will be delayed any longer. Whatever I speak will also be done, says the Lord God.’”
Ezekiel 13
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, prophesy to the prophets of Israel who are prophesying, and you say to those who prophesy out of their own hearts, ‘Hear the word of the Lord!
3.Thus says the Lord God: Woe to the prophets who prophesy, following after their own spirit, but have seen nothing!
4.Your prophets, O Israel, are like jackals among the ruins.
5.You have not gone up into the breaches, nor have you built a wall for the house of Israel to make a stand in the battle in the Day of the Lord.
6.They have seen a vain vision and speak false divination who say, ‘Jehovah has spoken,’ when Jehovah has not sent them. And yet, they expect their word to come to pass.
7.Isn’t it so, that you have seen a vain vision and have spoken false divination when you say, ‘Jehovah has spoken,’ when I have not spoken?
8.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: Because you have spoken vanity and seen a lying vision, behold, I am against you, says the Lord God.
9.And my hand shall be upon the prophets who see vain visions and who practice false divination in the Assembly of my people. They shall not be on the roll of the house of Israel! They shall not be enrolled, and they shall not enter into the land of Israel. And then shall you know that I am the Lord God.
10.Because, O because they have caused my people to err, saying, ‘Peace!’ when there is no peace, and one man builds a wall, and behold, they smear it with whitewash,
11.you say to those who smear it with whitewash, that, behold, there will be an overflowing rain, and you, O hailstones, shall fall, and a stormy wind shall tear it apart.
12.Yea, behold, the wall shall fall! Shall it not be said to you, ‘What happened to the coating that you smeared on?’
13.Therefore, thus says the Lord God, In my wrath will I tear it apart with stormy winds, and an overwhelming rain in my anger, and hailstones in my wrath, unto complete destruction.
14.And I will tear down the wall that you have smeared with whitewash, and I will strike the land and remove its foundation, and it will fall and you will be destroyed in its midst. And then, you will know that I am the Lord!
15.And I will fully satisfy my wrath on the wall and those who smeared it with whitewash, and I will say to you, ‘The wall is gone, and they are gone who smeared it,’
16.namely, the prophets of Israel who kept on prophesying to Israel and who kept on seeing for it a vision of peace, when there was no peace, says the Lord God.
¶17. “Now as for you, O son of man, set your face against the daughters of your people who are prophesying out of their own heart, and you prophesy to them!
18.And you say, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Woe to the women who sew charms for every wrist and make long veils for the heads of those of all heights in order to hunt for souls! Do you think you will hunt down souls belonging to my people, and keep your own souls alive‽
19.You have profaned me among my own people for handfuls of barley and for pieces of bread, by your lies to my people, who listen to lies, putting to death souls that should not have died, and keeping souls alive who should not live.
20.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am against your bands with which you women there so eagerly hunt souls like birds, and I will tear them out of your arms and let go free the souls that you have been hunting, the souls like birds.
21.And I will tear off your veils and deliver my people out of your hands, and they will no longer be as prey in your hands. And you women will know that I am the Lord!
22.Because you have discouraged the heart of the righteous man with deceit, when I have not put him to grief, and strengthened the hand of the wicked man so that the wicked man would not turn from his way, that he might live,
23.therefore, you women will no longer see a false vision or practice divination, for I will deliver my people from your power. And you will know that I am the Lord!”
Ezekiel 14
¶1. Now, men from the elders came in and sat down before me.
2. Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
3.“Son of man, these men have erected their idols upon their heart, and the stumbling-block of their iniquity have they put before their faces. Will I be inquired of at all for them?
4.Therefore, speak with them, and you say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Every man of the house of Israel who erects his idols in his heart, and sets up the stumbling-block of his iniquity before his face, and then comes to the prophet – I, Jehovah, will answer him accordingly, according to the multitude of his idols,
5.in order to take the house of Israel by their own heart, those who are alienated from me by their idols, all of them.’
6.Therefore, you say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Repent! Turn away from your idols, and turn your faces away from all your abominations!
7.For every man of the house of Israel or of the sojourners who sojourn in Israel who separates himself from following after me, and erects his idols in his heart, and sets up the stumbling-block of his iniquity before his face, and then comes to the prophet to inquire of me by him, I, Jehovah, will answer him myself.
8.And I will set my face against that man, and I will make him a sign and a byword, and I will cut him off from the midst of my people. And you will know that I am the Lord.
9.And as for the prophet, when he is deceived and gives a message, I, Jehovah, have deceived that prophet, and I will stretch out my hand against him, and I will destroy him from the midst of my people Israel.
10.And so, they will bear their punishment. The punishment of the one who inquires will be the same as the punishment of the prophet,
11.so that the house of Israel will no more go astray from following me, and they will no longer defile themselves with all their transgressions. And they will be my people, and I will be their God, says the Lord God.’”
¶12. And the word of the Lord came to me saying,
13.“Son of man! When a country sins against me, committing treachery, and I stretch out my hand against it, and I break its staff of bread and send famine against it, and I cut off from it man and beast,
14.though these three men were in its midst, Noah, Daniel, and Job, by their righteousness, they would deliver but their own souls, says the Lord God.
15.If I were to cause a wild beast to pass through the land, and it bereaves it so that it is desolate, with no one passing through because of the beast,
16.though these three men were in its midst, as I live, says the Lord God, neither sons nor daughters would they deliver. They themselves would be delivered, but the land would be desolate.
17.Or if I bring a sword against that land, and I say, ‘O sword, pass through the land! and I cut off from it both man and beast,
18.though these three men were in its midst, as I live, says the Lord God, they would not deliver sons or daughters, but they themselves would be delivered.
19.Or if I send a plague on that land and I pour out my wrath on it because of bloodshed, to cut off from it man and beast,
20.though Noah, Daniel, and Job were in its midst, as I live, says the Lord God, neither son nor daughter would be delivered. They, by their righteousness, would only save their own souls.
21.For thus says the Lord God: How awful it will be when I send upon Jerusalem my four deadly judgments: sword, and famine, and wild beast, and pestilence, to cut off from her man and beast!
22.Yet, behold, a remnant will be left in her, sons and daughters who will be brought out. Behold, they will come forth to you, and you will see their ways and their doings, and you will be comforted concerning the evil that I have brought upon Jerusalem, all that I have brought upon her.
23.Yea, they will comfort you when you see their way and their doings, and you will know that it is not for nothing that I have done all that I have done in it, says the Lord God.”
Ezekiel 15
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“How is the wood of a vine better than any wood of a branch that is in trees of the forest?
3.Is wood taken from it to make anything? Or do men even take from it a peg to hang any vessel on it?
4.Behold, it is given to the fire for fuel, both ends of it; the fire consumes both ends of it; its center is also burned. Is it good for any work?
5.Behold, when it is whole, it is not used for anything. So, how much less, when fire has devoured it, and it is burned, is it used for work.
6.Therefore, says the Lord God, just as the wood of the vine among the trees of the forest, which I have given to the fire as fuel, so will I give up the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
7.And I will set my face against them. They may come out of the fire, but the fire will devour them. And you will know that I am the Lord when I set my face against them!
8.Moreover, I will make the land a desolation because they have behaved treacherously, says the Lord God.”
Ezekiel 16
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, make Jerusalem to know her abominations,
3.and say, ‘Thus says the Lord God to Jerusalem: Your origin and your birth are of the land of the Canaanites. Your father was an Amorite and your mother was a Hittite.
4.As for your relatives, on the day you were born, your cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to clean you up, nor were you rubbed at all with salt, nor were you even swaddled.
5.No eye took pity on you to do any of these things for you out of compassion for you, but you were tossed out into an open field because you were abhorred on the day you were born.
6.And when I passed by you and saw you squirming in your blood, I said to you – still in your blood – “Live!” Yea, I said to you in your blood, “Live!”
7.I made you flourish like a plant of the field, and you grew and became great, and you came into full adornment. Your breasts were formed, and your hair was long, and yet, you were naked and bare.
8. I passed by you again and looked at you, and behold, it was your time of love. And I spread my garment over you and covered your nakedness, and I swore to you and entered into covenant with you, says the Lord God, and you became mine.
9.And I bathed you in water and washed your blood off you, and I anointed you with oil.
10.And I clothed you with embroidered work, and shod you with fine leather, and wrapped you in fine linen and covered you with silk.[6]
11.I adorned you with ornaments, and put bracelets on your wrists and a chain about your neck.
12.And I put a ring in your nose and earrings in your ears and a beautiful crown on your head.
13.So, you were adorned with gold and silver, and your clothes were fine linen, and silk, and embroidered work. You ate flour, oil, and honey. And you were exceptionally beautiful and attained to queenship.
14. And your fame went out among the Gentiles because of your beauty, for it was perfect through my splendor which I had bestowed upon you, says the Lord God.
15. But you trusted in your beauty, and you played the whore because of your fame, and you poured out your fornication on anyone passing by; his it was.
16. And you took some of your garments and made for yourself colorful high places, and you committed whoredom on them – which things have not been, nor shall be.
17. And you took your beautiful objects made from my gold and from my silver which I had given you, and you made for yourself male images, and you committed whoredom with them.
18. And you took your colorfully woven garments and clothed them, and you offered my oil and my incense before them,
19.and my bread which I gave you – fine flour, and oil, and honey with which I fed you – and offered it before them for a placating aroma; and so it is, says the Lord God.
20. Moreover, you took your sons and your daughters, whom you had borne to me, and these you sacrificed to them, to be eaten! Was your fornication a small thing,
21.that you slaughtered my children and gave them up, making them to pass over the fire for them?
22.And in all your abominations and whoredoms, you did not remember the days of your youth when you were naked and bare, squirming in your blood.
23.And it came to pass, after all your wickedness (Woe! Woe to you, says the Lord God!)
24.that you built for yourself an arched place and you made for yourself a high place in every open square;
25.at the head of every street, you built your high place, and you abhorred your beauty, and you spread your feet for anyone passing by, and multiplied your whoredoms.
26.And you played the harlot with the children of Egypt, your neighbors, great of flesh, and multiplied your whoredoms to provoke me to anger.
27.So then, behold! I stretched out my hand against you, and I diminished your portion, and I gave you over to the desire of those who hate you, the daughters of the Philistines who are ashamed of your lewd way.
28.And not yet satisfied, you played the whore with the children of Assyria, and even when you played the whore with them, you were not satisfied,
29.and so, you multiplied your whoredom to the land of merchants, Chaldea, and even with this, you were not satisfied!
30. How weakened is your heart, says the Lord God, seeing you do all these things, the work of a brazen whore,
31.building your arched place at the head of every street, and making your high place in every open square. Yet, you were unlike a prostitute in that you scoffed at payment.
32.You adulterous woman! who takes strangers instead of her Husband!
33.Men give a gift to all harlots. But you! You have given gifts to all your lovers, and have bribed them with your whoredoms to come to you from every direction!
34.So, with you in your whoredoms, it is different from other women. No one caused you to play the harlot, but you give payment, and no payment is given you. Therefore, you are different.
35.Therefore, O harlot, hear the word of the Lord!’
36. “Thus says the Lord God: Because your lust was poured out and your nakedness uncovered in your whorish acts with your lovers and with all your abominable idols, and because of the blood of your children that you gave to them,
37.therefore, behold, I will assemble all of your lovers with whom you have taken pleasure, all whom you have loved with all whom you have hated. I will gather them against you from every side, and I will expose your nakedness to them, and they will see all your nakedness.
38.And I will judge you with the judgments of women who commit adultery and murder; and I will bring on you the blood of fury and jealousy.
39.And I will give you into their hand, and they will tear down your eminent place, and they will pull down your high place, and they will strip you of your clothes, and take away your lovely things, and they will cast you aside, naked and bare.
40.And they will bring up a company against you, and stone you with stones, and cut you down with their swords.
41.And they will burn your houses with fire and execute judgments against you in the sight of many women. And I will make you cease from whoredom, and you will also make no more payments.
42.So, I will lay to rest my wrath against you, and my jealousy will turn away from you, and I will be at peace and be angry no longer.
43.Because you did not remember the days of your youth and vexed me with all these things. Yea, behold, I will also return your way down on your head, says the Lord God, and you will not do wickedness on top of all your other abominations.[?]
44.Behold, everyone who uses a proverb against you will use this proverb: ‘As the mother is, so is her daughter.’
45.You are the daughter of your mother, who loathed her husband and her children, and you are the sister of your sisters, who loath their husbands and their children. Your mother was a Hittite, and your father, an Amorite.
46.And your elder sister was Samaria. She and her daughters lived to the north of you. And your younger sister who lives to the south of you was Sodom and her daughters.
47.And you not only walked in their ways and practiced their abominations; in a very little time, you surpassed them in corruption, in all your ways.
48.As I live, says the Lord God, your sister Sodom, she and her daughters, did not do the way you have done, you and your daughters.
49.Behold, this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: pride, excess food, and undisturbed ease were hers and her daughters, but she did not help the poor and the needy man.
50.They were haughty and committed abomination before me, and I removed them as I saw fit.
51.Samaria did not commit half your sins, but you multiplied your abominations above them, and with all your abominations which you have committed, you have made your sisters appear righteous!
52.Bear your disgrace! Yes, you, for you intervened for your sisters. Since your sins which you have committed are more abominable than theirs, they are more righteous than you are. Therefore, be ashamed, you also, and bear your disgrace, since you have made your sisters appear righteous.
53.Yet, I will restore their captivity, the captivity of Sodom and her daughters and the captivity of Samaria and her daughters – with the captivity of your captives in the midst of them,
54.so that you might bear your disgrace and be ashamed for all that you did, in being a consolation to them.
55.And your sisters, Sodom and her daughters, will return to their former state, and Samaria and her daughters will return to their former states, and you and your daughters will return to your former state.
56.But Sodom your sister was not a topic in your mouth in the day of your pride,
57.before your wickedness was exposed, as at the time of the reproach of Edom and of all those around her, the Philistines, who despise you on every side.
58.You must bear your wickedness and your abominations, says the Lord.
59.For thus says the Lord God: I will certainly do to you as you have done who have despised the oath and broken the covenant.
60.Yet, I will remember my covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I will establish with you an everlasting covenant.
61.Then, you will call to mind your ways and be ashamed when I take away your sisters, both the older and the younger, and give them to you for daughters, but not by your covenant,
62.and I will establish my covenant with you. And you will know that I am the Lord,
63.so that you will remember and be ashamed, and never open your mouth again because of your disgrace, when I am pacified concerning you for all that you have done, says the Lord God.’”
Ezekiel 17
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, propound a riddle, yea, put forth a parable to the house of Israel
3.and say ‘Thus says the Lord God: a large eagle that had large wings, long pinions, full of multi-colored feathers, came to Lebanon and took away the top of a cedar.
4.He plucked off the topmost of its twigs and carried it to the land of Canaan, and put it in a city of merchants.
5.Then he took some of the seed of the land and planted it in a fertile field. He placed[?] it beside plenteous waters; he set it out like a willow.
6.And it spouted and it became a spreading vine, low in height, its branches turning toward him, but its roots remained beneath it. So, it became a vine, and produced shoots, and sent out runners.
7.And there was another large eagle with large wings and many feathers. And behold, this vine bent its roots toward him and sent out its branches to him from its planting bed, that he might water it.
8.It had been planted in a good field beside abundant waters so that it might produce branches and bear fruit and become a magnificent vine.’
9.Say, ‘Thus says the Lord God: It should thrive. Will he not pull up its roots, and strip off its fruit so that it shrivels? All its sprouting leaves will wither, and it will take no strong arm or many people to pull it up by its roots.
10.Now, behold, it is planted. Will it thrive? Will it not utterly wither when the east wind strike it? It will wither on the beds where it sprouted.’
¶11. Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
12.“Say now to the house of rebels, ‘Do you not know what these things mean?’ Say, ‘Behold, the king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and took away her king and her princes, and he brought them to him to Babylon.
13.And he took one of the royal seed and made a covenant with him, and he put him under an oath. And he took away rulers of the land
14.so that the kingdom would be lowly, unable to lift itself up, but would keep his covenant so that it might stand.
15.But he rebelled against him, sending his messengers to Egypt, that he might give him horses and many people. Will he thrive? Will he escape who does such things? Will he break the covenant and escape?
16.As I live, says the Lord God, I will damn myself if he does not die in the midst of Babylon, in the land of the king who enthroned him, whose oath he treated with contempt and whose covenant he broke!
17.Pharaoh will not help him in the battle with a great army and a great assembly when mounds are cast up and siege-walls are built, to destroy many lives.
18.Yea, he despised the oath in breaking the covenant, when, behold, he had given his hand, and yet, did all these things. He shall not escape.
19.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: As I live, I will damn myself if I do not return on his own head my oath which he despised and my covenant which he has broken!
20.Yea, I will spread my net over him, and he will be caught in my snare, and I will bring him into Babylon and execute judgment upon him there for his treachery which he has committed against me.
21.And all his fugitives with all his forces shall fall by the sword, and the survivors will be scattered to all the winds. And you will know that I, Jehovah, have spoken!
22.Thus says the Lord God: I myself will take a sprig from the lofty top of a cedar and set it. From its topmost twigs will I pluck a tender one, and I myself will plant it on a high and lofty mountain.
23.On the mountain height of Israel will I plant it, and it will bear a branch and yield fruit, and it will become a majestic cedar, and under it, birds of every kind will dwell; they will dwell in the shade of its branches.
24.And all the trees of the field will know that I am the Lord! I bring the exalted tree low, and I exalt the low tree. I wither the green tree, and I cause the withered tree to flourish. I the Lord have spoken, and I will do it.’”
Ezekiel 18
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Why are you using this parable concerning the land of Israel, saying, ‘Fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge’?
3.As I live, says the Lord God, I will damn myself if you will any longer use this parable in Israel.
4.Behold, all souls are mine, the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son; they are mine. The soul that sins, it shall die!
¶5. “Now, if a man is righteous and does what is just and right,
6.if he does not eat on the mountains, and does not lift up his eyes to the idols of Israel, and does not defile his neighbors wife or approach a woman during her menstrual impurity,
7.does not mistreat anyone, returns the debtor’s pledge, has committed no robbery, gives his bread to a hungry man, and covers the naked man with a garment,
8.does not lend at interest or take interest, withdraws his hand from iniquity, executes true justice between man and man,
9.walks in my statutes and keeps my judgments, doing truth, that righteous man shall live says the Lord God.
10.But if he fathers a son who is a violent shedder of blood, or does anything akin to any one of those evil things
11.and does none of those good things, but also who eats on the mountains, or defiles his neighbor’s wife,
12.oppresses the poor and needy man, has committed robbery, does not return a pledge, or lifts up his eyes to idols, commits abomination,
13.lends at interest or takes interest while he is alive, he shall not live. He has done all of these abominations. He shall surely die, His blood will be on himself.
14.Then, behold, if he begets a son, and he sees all the sins that his father has committed, and he sees and does not do likewise,
15.he does not eat on the mountains, his eyes he does not lift up to the idols of the house of Israel, he does not defile his neighbor’s wife,
16.and does not oppress anyone, exacts no pledge, commits no robbery, gives his food to the hungry man and covers with a garment the naked man,
17.withdraws his hand from iniquity, does not take interest or usury, executes my judgments, walks in my statutes, he shall not die because of the iniquity of his father. He shall surely live.
18.His father, because he practiced oppression, robbed a brother, and did what is not good in the midst of his people, then, behold, he shall die in his iniquity.
19.But you say, ‘Why should the son not bear the iniquity of his father?’ When the son does what is just and right, keeping all my statutes, and doing them, he shall surely live!
20.The soul that sins, it shall die. A son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, and a father shall not bear the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.
21.Moreover, the wicked who turns from all his sin that he has done, and keeps all my statutes, and does what is just and right shall surely live; he shall not die.
22.None of his transgressions which he committed will be remembered against him. He shall live because of his righteousness which he has done.
23.Do I take any pleasure in the death of a wicked man, says the Lord God, and not rather in his repentance from his ways, so that he may live?
24.Furthermore, when a righteous man turns from his righteousness and does wrong, doing according to any of the abominations that a wicked man does, and lives so, none of his righteousness that he has done will be remembered. Because of his treachery which he has committed and because of his sin which he has sinned, he shall die.
25.But you say, ‘The way of the Lord is unjust.’ Hear, now, O house of Israel! My way is unjust‽ Are not your ways unjust?
26.When a righteous man turns from his righteousness and does wrong, he will die because of those deeds; for his wrong which he has done, he will die.
27.And when an evil man turns from his wickedness which he has been doing, and he does what is just and right, he shall keep his soul alive.
28.Inasmuch as he considered and repented of all his transgressions which he committed, he shall surely live; he shall not die.
29.Yet, the house of Israel says, ‘The way of the Lord is unjust.’ My ways are unjust, O house of Israel‽ Are not your ways unjust?
30.Thus will I judge each man among you according to his ways, O house of Israel, says the Lord God. Repent! Yea, turn from all your transgressions, that iniquity be no stumbling-block for you!
31.Cast away from yourselves all your transgressions which you have committed, and get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit, for why will you die, O house of Israel?
32.For I take no pleasure in the death of him who dies, says the Lord God. So, repent and live!
Ezekiel 19
¶1. “And as for you, lift up a dirge for the princes of Israel,
2.and say, “What was your mother? A lioness! Among lions she crouched; in the midst of young lions, she reared her cubs.
3.And she brought up one of her cubs, and he became a lion, and he learned to catch prey; he devoured men.
4.And nations heard of him. He was caught in their pit, and they brought him with hooks to the land of Egypt.
5.When she saw that she had hoped, but her hope had perished, then she took another of her cubs and made him a young lion.
6.And he went about in the midst of lions. He became a lion and learned to catch prey. He devoured men
7.and knew their widows. And he laid waste their cities, and the earth and all that filled it were awestruck at the sound of his roaring.
8.Then nations came against him from the provinces on every side, and they spread their net over him. He was taken in their pit.
9.Then with hooks, they put him into a cage and brought him to the king of Babylon. The brought him to the stronghold, and so, his voice was no longer heard on the mountains of Israel.”
¶10. “Your mother was like a vine in your blood, planted by the water; it was fruitful with branches because of abundant water.
11.And it had strong branches, used for the scepters of rulers. Moreover, it rose high among the leafy trees and could be seen because of its height with its many branches.
12.But it was uprooted in wrath; it was cast down to the ground; and the east wind dried up its fruit. Its strong branches were broken off, and they withered. Fire consumed them.
13.And now, it is planted in the wilderness, in a dry and thirsty land.
14.But a fire will come forth from a branch of its shoots; it will consume its fruit, and there will be no strong branch in it fit to be the scepter of a ruler. This is the dirge, and it will be used as a dirge.”
Ezekiel 20
¶1. And it came to pass on the seventh year, in the fifth month, on the tenth day of the month, some men, elders of Israel, came in to inquire of the Lord, and they sat before me.
2. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
3.“Son of man, speak to the elders of Israel and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Have you come to inquire of me? As I live, I will damn myself if I will be inquired of by you, says the Lord God!’
4.Will you judge them? Will you judge them, son of man? Cause them to know the abominations of their fathers!
5.And say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: On the day I chose Israel, I lifted my hand to the seed of the house of Jacob, and I made myself known to them in the land of Israel. Yea, I lifted up my hand to them, saying, “I am Jehovah your God!” ’
6.On that day, I lifted up my hand to them, to bring them out of the land of Egypt to a land that I had selected for them, flowing with milk and honey, the glory of all lands.
7.And I said to them, ‘Let each one cast away detestable things that are before his eyes! Do not defile yourselves with the idols of Egypt! I, Jehovah, am your God.’
8.But they rebelled against me and would not listen to me. None of them cast away detestable things from before their eyes, nor did they forsake the idols of Egypt. Then I considered pouring out my wrath upon them and fully satisfying my anger against them in the midst of the land of Egypt.
9.However, I acted for the sake of my name, so that it might not be profaned in the eyes of the Gentiles, in the midst of whom they were, in whose sight I had revealed myself to them when I brought them out of the land of Egypt.
10.That is the reason I brought them out of the land of Egypt and led them into the wilderness.
11.And I gave them my statutes and made known to them my judgments, which if a man does, he shall live by them.
12.And I also gave them my sabbaths as a sign between me and their sons, that they might know that I, Jehovah, am the One who consecrates them.
13.But the house of Israel rebelled against me in the wilderness. They did not observe my statutes and they refused my judgments, which if a man does, he shall have life by them. And they greatly polluted my sabbaths, and I considered pouring out my wrath on them in the wilderness to make an end of them.
14.But I acted for the sake of my name, so that it might not be profaned in the eyes of the Gentiles in whose sight I brought them out.
15.But I also lifted my hand to them in the wilderness that I would not bring them into the land that I had given them, a land flowing with milk and honey, the glory of all lands,
16.because they refused my judgments, and did not walk in my statutes, and profaned my sabbaths, for their heart went after their idols.
17.Yet, my eyes looked on them with pity, and I did not destroy them, neither did I make a full end of them in the wilderness.
18.And I said to their children in the wilderness, ‘Do not walked in the statutes of your fathers, nor keep their judgments, nor defile yourselves with their idols.
19.I, Jehovah, am your God. Walk in my statutes, and keep my judgments and do them,
20.and keep my sabbaths holy, for they are a sign between me and you, that you might know that I, Jehovah, am your God.’
21.But their children rebelled against me. They did not walk in my statutes, nor keep my judgments to do them, which if a man does them, that man will also live because of them. They profaned my sabbaths, and I considered pouring out my wrath on them and spending my anger on them in the wilderness.
22.But I withheld my hand and acted for the sake of my name, so that it might not be profaned in the eyes of the Gentiles, in whose sight I had brought them out of Egypt.
23.Moreover, I swore to them in the wilderness that I would scatter them among the Gentiles and disperse them among the nations
24.because they did not execute my judgments, but rejected my statutes and polluted my sabbaths, and their eyes followed after their fathers’ idols.
25.So, I also gave them statutes that were not good and judgments by which they could not have life.
26.And I defiled them with their own gifts because they made all the firstborn pass through the fire, to make them desolate, so that they might know that I am Jehovah.
27.Therefore, speak to the house of Israel O son of man, and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: In this, too, your fathers blasphemed me, by their dealing treacherously with me.
28.For when I brought them to the land which I swore I would give them and they saw all the high hills and leafy trees, they made their sacrifices there; and there, they presented the provocation of their offerings; and there, they set their placating aromas; and there, they poured out their libations.’
29.(Then I said to them, “What is the high place to which you are going?” So, it is called a “high place”[7] to this day.)
30.Therefore, say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Are you defiling yourselves the way your fathers did‽ Are you playing the harlot, going after their detestable things‽
31.For when you offer your gifts and when you make you children pass through the fire, you are defiling yourselves with all your idols to this day! And shall I be inquired of by you, O house of Israel? As I live, says the Lord God, I will not be inquired of by you!
32.Moreover, what has come up in your mind will never happen! For you think, “We will be like the Gentiles, like the families of the nations, to be ministers of wood and stone.”
33.As I live, says the Lord God, I swear that I will damn myself if I will not be King over you with a strong hand, and outstretched arm, and poured-out wrath![8]
34.And I will bring you out from the nations and gather you out of the countries where you have been scattered, with a strong hand and outstretched arm and poured-out wrath!
35.And I will bring you to the wilderness of the nations, and there will I enter into judgment with you, face to face.
36.As I judged your fathers in the wilderness of the land of Egypt, so will I judge you, says the Lord God.
37.And I will cause you to pass under the rod, and then bring you into the bond of the covenant.
38.I also will purge from among you the rebels and those who transgress against me. And I will cause them to come out of the country where they are strangers. But it will not enter into the land of Israel. And you will know that I am the Lord.
39.And as for you, O house of Israel, thus says the Lord God: Go on, every one of you, and serve his idols, but later on, as I live, you will listen to me and no longer defile my holy name with your gifts and your idols.
40.For on my holy mountain, on the mountain height of Israel, says the Lord God, there, the house of Israel will serve me, all who are in the land. There, I will accept them, and there, I will require your offerings and your gifts of firstfruits, with all your holy things.
41.As a placating aroma will I accept you when I bring you forth you from the peoples and gather you from the lands among whom you were scattered, and I will be sanctified among you in the sight of the nations.
42.And you will know that I am Jehovah, when I have brought you into the land of Israel, to the land that I swore I would give to your fathers.
43.And there you will remember your ways and all your deeds by which you defiled yourselves, and you will loathe yourselves because of all your evils that you did.
44.And you will know that I am Jehovah when I have dealt with you for my name’s sake and not according to your evil ways and your corrupt deeds, O house of Israel, says the Lord God.’”
¶45. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
46.“Son of man! Set your face toward the road to Teman, and drop a word toward the south, and prophesy toward the forested field of the Negev.
47.And say to the forest of the Negev, ‘Thus says the Lord God, Watch me! I am going to kindle a fire in you, and it will consume every green tree and every dry tree that is in you. The raging flame shall not be quenched, and all people from south to north will be scorched by it.’
48.And all flesh will understand that I, Jehovah, kindled it. It shall not be quenched!”
49.Then I said, “Ah, Lord God! They keep saying of me, ‘Is he not the one who tells parables?’”
Ezekiel 21
1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, set your face toward Jerusalem and prophesy against the holy places; yea, prophesy against the land of Israel
3.and say to the land of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord: Behold, I am against you, and I will draw my sword from its sheath and will cut off from you both the righteous and the wicked man.
4.Seeing that I will cut off from you both the righteous and the wicked man, my sword will go forth from its sheath against all flesh, from south to north.
5.And all flesh will know that I, Jehovah, have drawn my sword out of its sheath. It will not return to it again.
6.And as for you, son of man, groan with a broken heart! Groan bitterly before their eyes!
7.And it shall come to pass when they say to you, ‘Why are you groaning?’ that you will say, ‘Because of the news that has come! And every heart will melt, and all hands will grow feeble, and every spirit will faint, and all knees will grow weak as water.’ Behold! It is coming, and it will come to pass, says the Lord God.”
¶8. Again the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,
9.“Son of man, prophesy, and say, ‘Thus says the Lord!’ Say, ‘A sword! A sword is sharpened and it has also been polished!
10.It is sharpened to make a great slaughter. It is polished so that it will flash like lightning. Should we rejoice? The sword despises every tree, the tribe of my son,
11.though he ordained it to be polished, to be held in the hand. This sword is sharpened, and it is polished to be put into the hand of the slayer.’
12.Cry out and howl, O son of man, for it is upon my people! It is upon all the princes of Israel; they are thrown to the sword. They are my people! Therefore beat on your thigh!
13.It is for testing, but what if it also despises the tribe? It shall be no more, says the Lord God.”
¶14. As for you, son of man, prophesy, and strike your hands together! And let the sword strike twice! Three times! It is a sword for the polluted people, the sword of a mortally wounded mighty man, that surrounds them.
15.I have set the point[9] of a sword against all their gates, that their heart may melt and their ruins be multiplied. Ah! It is being made to glitter – it is grasped for slaughter.
16.Be ready, O sword! Set up, right or left, wherever you are assigned.
17.And I also will strike my hands together, and I will satisfy my anger. I, Jehovah have spoken!
¶18. Again the word of the Lord came to me saying,
19.As for you, son of man, you appoint two ways for the sword of the king of Babylon to come; both will start out from the same location. And you erect a sign; erect it at the head of the way to the city.
20. You will appoint a way for the sword to come to Rabba, the sons of Ammon, and to Judah, to fortified Jerusalem.
21. For the King of Babylon stood at the fork in the road, at the head of the two ways, to use divination. He shook the arrows; he consulted the teraphim; he looked in the liver.
22. In his right hand was the divination of Jerusalem, to set up battering rams to make an opening for slaughter, to lift up the voice with a shout, to set up battering rams against the gates, to cast up mounds to build a ramp.
23. But to them, in their eyes, it will be like false divination, the oaths sworn against them. But He will be bringing their iniquity to remembrance, that they may be taken.
24. Therefore thus says the Lord God: Because you made your iniquity to be remembered, your transgressions to be uncovered, with all your sins and your deeds to be seen – therefore, you have made yourself to be remembered, to be taken by force.
¶25. And as for you, O mortally wounded, wicked prince of Israel, whose day will come during the iniquity of the end time,
26.thus says the Lord God: Take away the turban; take off the crown! Let this be instead: exalt him who is lowly, and bring him low who is exalted!
27. A ruin! A ruin! A ruin will I make it (such has never happened!) until he comes whose right it is, and to him will I give it.
¶28. And you, son of man, you prophesy and say, “Thus says the Lord God concerning the sons of Ammon and concerning their reproach!” And say, “A sword! A sword is drawn for slaughter, polished to consume like lightning,
29.while they see vain visions for you, divining a lie for you, to appoint you against the necks of the polluted, wicked people, those whose day will come at the time of iniquity of the end!
30.Return it to its sheath! In the place where you were created, in the land of your origin, will I judge you.
31.And I will pour out my indignation upon you; with the fire of my wrath will I breathe on you. And I will give you into the hands of brutal men, men skillful in destruction.
32.You will be fuel for the fire, your blood will be in the midst of the land. You will not be remembered – for I, Jehovah, have spoken.”
Ezekiel 22
¶1. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“As for you, son of man, will you judge? Will you judge the bloody city? Then make her to know all her abominations.
3.And say, ‘Thus says the Lord God: O city that sheds blood in her midst, that her time may come, and makes idols for herself, that she may be defiled!
4.You are guilty because of the blood you have shed, and you are defiled because of the idols that you have made, and you have caused your days to draw near, and you have reached the extent of your years. Therefore, I have made you a reproach to the nations, yea, a derision to all countries.
5.Those who are near and those far from you will mock at you. Your name is defiled; you are full of confusion.
6.Behold, princes of Israel, each according to his power, are in you for the purpose of shedding blood.
7.In you, they treat father and mother with contempt; in your midst, they oppress the foreigner; in you, they do wrong to the orphan and widow.
8.You have despised my holy things and profaned my sabbaths.
9.In you have been slanderous men bent on bloodshed; in you are those who eat on the mountains; in your midst, they carry out wickedness.
10.In you, men uncover their father’s nakedness; in you, they violates her who is unclean during her menstrual impurity.
11.One commits an abomination with his neighbor’s wife, another lewdly defiles his daughter-in-law; and in you, another violates his sister, the daughter of his own father.
12.In you, they take bribes to shed blood; you take interest and profit, and make unjust gain of your neighbor by extortion. Yea, you have forgotten me, says the Lord.
13.But behold, I have struck my hand at your unjust gain which you made and at your blood that has been in your midst.
14.Will your courage last or your hands remain strong in the days when I will deal with you? I am Jehovah! I have spoken it, and I will do it!
15.And I will scatter you among the Gentiles and disperse you among the countries, and I will purge your uncleanness from you.
16.And because of yourself, you will be dishonored in the eyes of the Gentiles. And you will know that I am the Lord!’”
¶17. Again, the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
18.“Son of man, the house of Israel have become like dross to me. All of them are bronze, and iron, and tin, and iron, and lead within a furnace; they are dross of silver.
19.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: Because all of you have become like dross, therefore, behold, I will gather you into the midst of Jerusalem.
20.Like the gathering of silver, or bronze, or iron, or lead, or tin into the midst of a furnace to blow fire on it to melt it, so will I gather you in my anger and in my wrath, and leave, and make you melt.
21.Yea, I will gather you, and blow on you with the fire of my fury, and you will be melted in the midst of Jerusalem.
22.As silver is melted in the midst of a furnace, so shall you be melted in the midst of it. And you will know that I, Jehovah, have poured out my wrath on you!”
¶23. Again, the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
24.“Son of man, say to her, ‘You are a land that is not cleansed or rained upon in the day of indignation.’
25.The conspiracy of the prophets on her midst is like a roaring lion tearing apart the prey; they have devoured lives and taken away wealth and treasures. They multiply widows in her midst.
26.Her priests have done violence to my law and profaned my holy things. They have made no distinction between the holy and the common, nor have they taught the difference between the unclean and the clean, and they have disregarded my sabbaths, so that I am profaned among them.
27.Her princes in her midst are like wolves tearing the prey, shedding blood and destroying lives so that they might get unjust gain.
28.And for them, her prophets have coated wickedness with whitewash, seeing false visions and divining a lie for them, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord God’ when Jehovah has not spoken.
29.The people of the land have practiced extortion, and committed robbery, and maltreated the poor and needy man, and oppressed the foreigner without justice.
30.And I searched among them for a man who would build a wall and stand in the breach before me for the land, that I should not destroy it, but I found none.
31.Therefore will I pour out on them my indignation. In the fire of my fury will I make an end of them. I will return their way upon their own heads, says the Lord God.”
Ezekiel 23
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, there were two women, the daughters of one mother.
3.And they played the harlot with Egypt. In their youth, they played the whore. There, their breasts were squeezed, and there, men handled their virgin teats.
4.Now, their names were Oholah, the elder, and Oholibah was her sister. And they became mine, and they bore son and daughters. And as for their names, Samaria is Oholah, and Jerusalem is Oholibah.
5.And Oholah played the harlot though she was mine and lusted after her lovers, the Assyrians, our neighbors,
6.who were clothed in purple, governors and prefects, all of them desirable young men, horsemen riding horses.
7.And she bestowed her whoredom on them, the choice sons of Assyria all of them, and with all for whom she lusted, with all their idols, she defiled herself.
8.And she did not forsake her fornication brought from Egypt, for men lay with her in her youth, and they handled her virgin teats and poured their fornication upon her.
9.Therefore, I gave her over into the hand of her lovers, into the hand of the Assyrians, for whom she lusted.
10.They uncovered her nakedness; they took away her sons and daughters; and her they slew with the sword. And she became a byword among women when they executed against her.
11.Her sister Oholibah saw it, yet she was more corrupt in her lustfulness than she, and in her whoredoms worse than the whoredoms of her sister.
12.She lusted after the Assyrians, governors and prefects, her immaculately dressed neighbors, horsemen riding horses, desirable young men, all of them.
13.And I saw that she was defiled. They both had taken the same path.
14.But she added to her whoredoms when she saw men portrayed on the wall, images of the Chaldeans portrayed in vermilion,
15.sporting belts around their waists, flowing turbans on their heads, all of them having the appearance of officers in the manner of Babylonians in Chaldea, the land of their birth.
16.Yea, when the sight caught her eyes, she lusted after them and sent messengers to them in Chaldea.
17.And the Babylonians came in to her, to the bed of love, and they defiled her with their whorish lusts. But when they had defiled her, her soul turned from them in disgust.
18.But she had flaunted her whoredoms and flaunted her nakedness, and my soul was alienated from her, as my soul had been estranged from her sister.
19.Yet, she multiplied her whoredoms, recalling the days of her youth when she played the harlot in the land of Egypt
20.and lusted after their paramours, whose member is like the member of donkeys and whose issue is like the issue of horses.
21.So, you revisited the wickedness of your youth when your teats were handled by the Egyptians because of your youthful breasts.
22.Therefore, O Oholibah, thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am stirring up your paramours against you, those from whom your soul turned in disgust, and I will bring them against you from every side:
23.the Babylonians and all the Chaldeans; Pekod, and Shoa, and Koa, all the Assyrians with their young, desirable men, governors and prefects all of them, and men of renown, all of them riding on horses.
24.And they will come against you with weapons,[10] chariots, and wagons, and with an assembly of people; with shield and buckler and helmet will they set themselves against you all around. And I will give the judgment to them, and they will judge you according to their own standards.
25.And I will give vent to my jealousy over you, that they may deal with you in fury. Your nose and ears, they will take off, and your remnant will fall by the sword. They will take your sons and your daughters, and your remnant will be consumed with fire.
26.They will also strip you of your garments and seize all your beautiful jewelry.
27.So, I will make your wickedness to cease from you, even your harlotry brought from the land of Egypt, so that you do not lift up your eyes to them or remember Egypt any longer.
28.For thus says the Lord God: I will give you into the hand of those whom you hate, into the hand of those from whom you turned away in disgust.
29.And they will deal with you hatefully, and seize all that you have worked for, and leave you naked and exposed; yea, the nakedness of your whoredom will be uncovered. Yea, your wickedness and your whoredoms.
30.These things will be done to you because you have gone whoring after the nations and because you have defiled yourself with their idols.
31.You have gone the way of your sister, and I will place her cup into your hand.
32.Thus says the Lord God: You shall drink of your sister’s cup, which is deep and large. It will bring ridicule and derision. It holds much.
33.You will be filled with drunkenness and grief. The cup of devastation and desolation is the cup of your sister, Samaria.
34.Yea, you shall drink it, and drain it, and break it and tear at your breasts, for I have said so, says the Lord God!
35. Therefore, thus says the Lord God: Because you have forgotten me and cast me behind your back, you also must bear your wickedness and your whoredoms.”
¶36. The Lord also said to me, “Son of man, will you judge Oholah and Oholibah, and declare to them their abominations?
37.For they have committed adultery, and blood is on their hands. Yea, they have committed adultery with their idols, and their children whom they bore to me, they have even offered to them to be consumed.
38.Moreover, this they have done to me: on the same day, they defiled my sanctuary and profaned my sabbaths.
39.For when they had slaughtered their children for their idols, then they entered into my sanctuary the same day to profane it. Yea, behold, they did thus within my house!
40.And the women even sent for men to come from far away, to whom a messenger was sent, and behold, they came. For them you bathed yourself, you painted your eyes, and decked yourself with ornaments.
41.Then you sat on a stately couch, with a table spread before it on which you placed my incense and my oil,
42.and the sound of a carefree multitude with it. Men of the common sort were brought in, Sabeans from the wilderness, and they put bracelets on their wrists and lovely crowns on their heads.
43.Then I said of the woman worn out by fornications, ‘Now they will fornicate and join her fornications, and she with them.’
44.And they went in her, as one goes in to a whorish woman. Thus they went in to Oholah and to Oholibah, the wicked women.
45.But righteous men will judge them with judgment due adulteresses, and the judgment due women who shed blood, because they are adulteresses with blood on their hands.
46.For thus says the Lord God: I am bringing up an assembly against them, and I will consign them to terror and to spoil.
47.And the assembly will cast stones upon them, and cut them down with their swords, they will slay their sons and their daughters and burn down their houses with fire.
48.And I will make wickedness to cease from the land, and all women may be warned, and so, not do wickedness, as you have done.
49.So, they will recompense you for your wickedness, and you will bear the sins of your idols. And you will know that I am the Lord God!”
Ezekiel 24
¶1. And the word of the Lord came to me in the ninth year, in the tenth month, on the tenth day of the month, saying,
2.“Son of man, write down for yourself the name of this day, this very day, that the king of Babylon has laid siege against Jerusalem this selfsame day.
3.Now, give the rebellious house a parable, and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Set on the pot! Set it on and also pour water into it.
4.Gather its pieces into it, every good piece – thigh and shoulder. Fill it with choice bones.
5.Take the choice of the flock and pile the logs beneath it. Boil it thoroughly, until its bones seethe in it.
6.Therefore thus says the Lord God: Woe to the bloody city, the pot whose filth is in her, and whose filthiness has not gone out of her! Take it out, piece after piece; one will not cast a lot for it.
7.For her blood-guilt is in her midst. She put it on an exposed, high rock! She did not pour it out on the ground to cover it with dust!
8.To cause wrath to come up to take vengeance, I have put her blood-guilt on an exposed, high rock, that it may not be covered!
9.Therefore thus says the Lord God: Woe to the bloody city! I also will make the pyre great.
10.Pile up the logs! Light the fire to consume the flesh and mix in the spices, and let the bones be burned up!
11.Set it empty on its coals so that it may become hot and its copper may burn, that its uncleanness may be melted within it, its filthiness consumed.
12.She has wearied herself with vain works,[11] and her abundant filthiness has not gone out of her – filthiness even in the fire.
13.Because I cleansed you from your uncleanness and lewdness, and you would not be clean from your uncleanness, therefore you will not be cleansed anymore until I have satisfied my wrath against you.
14. I, Jehovah, have said it is coming, and I will bring it about! I will not hold back! I will show no pity, and I will not relent! They will judge you as your ways and as your deeds deserve, says the Lord God.”
15. Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
16.“Son of man, Behold, I am taking from you the desire of your eyes with a blow, but you are not to lament or weep, and your tears may not come forth.
17.You may cry silently; make no lament for the dead. Bind your head-dress on you and put your shoes on your feet, and do not cover your lip nor eat the food of other men.”
18. And I spoke to the people in the morning, and my wife died in the evening. And in the morning, I did just as He had commanded me.
19. And the people said to me, “Will you not tell to us what these things that you are doing mean for us?”
20. Then I told them the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
21.“Say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I will profane my sanctuary, in which you are mighty proud, the desire of your eyes and the delight of your souls, and your sons and your daughters whom you have left will fall by the sword.
22.Then you will do just as I have done. You will not cover your lips, nor eat the bread of men.
23.Your head-dresses will be on your heads and your shoes on your feet. You will neither mourn nor weep, but you will rot away in your iniquities, and groan, one to another.
24.And Ezekiel has been a sign to you; you will do just as he has done when it happens. And you will know that I am the Lord God!’
25.And as for you, O son of man, shall it not be that on the day I take from them their refuge, the joy of their glory, the desire of their eyes, and that on which they set their heart – their sons and daughters –
26.that on that day, one who has escaped will come to you, causing your ears to hear?
27.On that day, your mouth will be opened to the fugitive, and you will speak and be bound no longer. And so, you shall be for them a sign, and they will know that I am the Lord.”
Ezekiel 25
[against Ammon, Moab, Edom, and Philitsia]
¶1. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, set your face against the face of the children of Ammon and prophecy against them,
3.and say to Ammon, ‘Hear the word of the Lord God! Thus says the Lord God: Because you said, “Aha!” over my sanctuary when it was profaned, and over the land of Israel when was made desolate, and over the house of Judah when they went into exile,
4.therefore, behold, I will give you to the children of the east for a possession, and they will set up their encampments in you, and they will make their dwellings in you. They will eat your fruit, and they will drink your milk.
5.And I will make Rabbah a habitation for camels and Ammon a fold for flocks. And you will know that I am the Lord!
6.For thus says the Lord God: Because you clapped hands, and stamped feet, and rejoiced with all the malice in your soul against the land of Israel,
7.therefore I have stretched out my hand against you, and I will give you as plunder to the nations, and I will cut you off from the peoples. Yea, I will destroy you from the countries; I will exterminate you! And you will know that I am the Lord!’”
¶8. “Thus says the Lord God: Because Moab and Seir say, ‘Behold, the house of Judah is like all the nations,’
9.therefore, behold, I will expose the flank of Moab, from the cities, his cities on his frontier, the glory of the country, Beth-Jeshimoth, Baal-Meon, and Kiriathaim,
10.to the children of the east along with Ammon. (I will certainly give it up as a possession so that Ammon might not be remembered among the nations.)
11.Also against Moab will I execute judgments. And they will know that I am the Lord!”
¶12. “Thus says the Lord God: Because Edom acted with great vengeance against the house of Judah, he has committed a grievous offense, and they avenged himself against them,
13.therefore, thus says the Lord God: I have certainly stretched out my hand against Edom, and I will cut off man and beast from it and make it a wasteland. From Teman to Dedan shall they fall by the sword.
14.And I will take my vengeance on Edom by the hand of my people Israel, and they will deal with Edom according to my anger and my wrath. And they will know my vengeance, says the Lord God.
¶15.Thus says the Lord God: Because the Philistines have taken revenge, and have taken great revenge with malice of soul, destroying with a never-ending enmity,
16.therefore, says the Lord God: Behold, I have stretched out my hand against the Philistines, and I will cut off the Cherethites, and I will cause the remnant of the seacoast people to perish.
17.And I will execute very great wrath upon them with furious rebukes. And they will know that I am the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon them.”
Ezekiel 26
[against Tyre]
¶1. And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, because Tyre has said concerning Jerusalem, ‘Aha! The Gentiles’ Gate is broken down; it has been swung open to me. I will be replenished, for she is laid waste.
3.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am against you, O Tyre, and I will bring up against you many nations, like the sea rises with its waves.
4.And they will destroy the wall of Tyre, and tear down her towers, and scrape her dirt off her, so that I make her a bare rock.
5.She will be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea, for I have spoken it, says the Lord God. Yea, she will be but plunder for the nations,
6.and her villages that are in the countryside will be put to death by the sword. And they will know that I am the Lord!
7.For this says the Lord God: Behold, I am bringing against Tyre from the north Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, a king of kings, with horse and chariot, and horsemen, and an assemblage of many people.
8.Your villages in the countryside will be put to the sword, and he will make a siege-wall against you, and throw up a mound against you, and raise up the shield against you.
9.And he will bring the blow of his battering-ram to your walls, and your towers will he pull down with his devices.
10.Because of the multitude of his horses, he will cover you with their dust; at the noise of his horsemen, and wheels, and chariots, your walls will shake when he comes into your gates, as the entrances to the city are breached.
11.With the hooves of his horses will he trample all your streets; he will slay your people with the sword, and your mighty pillars will fall to the earth.
12.They will also spoil your wealth and plunder your merchandise, and they will break down your walls and tear down your fine houses, and they will throw your stones, and your timbers – even your dirt that is within you – into the sea.
13.And I will cause to cease the noise of your songs, and the sound of your lyres will be heard no more.
14.And I will make you a bare rock. You shall be a place for the spreading of nets, never to be rebuilt, for I, Jehovah, have spoken, says the Lord God.
15.Thus says the Lord God concerning Tyre: At the sound of your fall, will not the coastlands quake at the groan of the wounded when the great slaughter is made in the midst of you?
16.Then all the princes of the sea will come down from their thrones, and remove their robes, and strip off their embroidered garments. Clothed with terror, they will sit upon the ground and tremble continually. Yea, they will be appalled at you.
17.And they will raise a lamentation over you, and say to you, ‘How you have perished, who was populated from the sea, O renowned city that was mighty on the sea, she and her inhabitants, who spread their terror to all who lived there.
18.Now the coastlands tremble on the day of your downfall; yea, the coastlands that are on the sea are disquieted at your departure.’
19.For thus says the Lord God: When I make you a city laid waste, like the cities that are not inhabited, when I bring up the deep over you, and the great waters will cover you.
20.then will I bring you down with those who go down into the Pit, to people of old, and I will make you dwell in the lower parts of the earth like the desolated cities of old who have gone down into the Pit, so that you be not inhabited. But I will give honor in the land of the living.
21.I will make you a terror, and you will be no more. You will be sought, but you will no longer be found, forever, says the Lord God.”
Ezekiel 27
[against Tyre]
¶1. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“You, O son of man! Lift up a lamentation for Tyre,
3.and speak to Tyre, she who dwells at the entrances of the sea, trafficker of the nations to many coastlands, thus says the Lord God: O Tyre! You say, ‘I am perfect in beauty.’
4.Your borders are in the heart of the seas; your builders did perfect your beauty.
5.They built all your planks with cypress trees from Senir; they took a cedar from Lebanon to make a mast for you.
6.With oaks from Bashan they made your oars; they inlaid your boards of boxwood from the coasts of Kittim with ivory.[12]
7.Your sail was of embroidered linen from Egypt; it was your ensign. Your awning was of violet and purple from the coasts of Elishah.
8.The inhabitants of Sidon and Arvad were your rowers. Your wise men, O Tyre, were with you; they were your pilots.
9.The elders of Gebal and her skilled men were with you, repairers of your seam. All the ships of the sea and their mariners were with you to exchange your wares.
10.Persia, and Lud, and Phut were with your army as men of war; they hung shield and helmet in you; they provided you with splendor.
11.Sons of Arvad and Helek were on your walls all around, and men of Gammad were in your towers. They hung their shields on your walls all around. They, too, perfected your beauty.
12.Tarshish was your merchant because of the abundance of all the riches; they gave silver, iron, tin, and lead for your merchandise.
13.Javan, Tubal, and Meshek, these were your traffickers in souls of men, and they gave bronze vessels for your wares.
14.They from Beth-Togarmah gave steeds and mules for your merchandise.
15.The sons of Dedan were your traffickers. Merchants under your control were on many coastlands. They exchanged ivory tusks and ebony for your payment.
16.Aram was your merchant because of the abundance of your goods; they exchanged [b/c of the addition of two “with’s”] emeralds, purple, and embroidered work, and byssus, and coral, and rubies for your merchandise.
17.Judah and the land of Israel were your traffickers. They gave wheat of Minnith, and pannag,[13] and honey, and oil, and balsam for your wares.
18.Damascus was your merchant in an abundance of your goods, because of the abundance of all the riches, with wine from Helbon and wool from Zahar.
19.And Dan and Javan went to and fro from Uzal for your merchandise; they exchanged wrought iron, cassia, and calamus for your wares.
20.Dedan was your trafficker in saddlecloth for riding.
21.Arabia and all the princes of Kedar, they were your dealers in lambs, and rams, and goats. With them, they were your dealers.
22.Traffickers of Sheba and Raamah, they were your traffickers. The exchanged the choicest of spice, and all precious stones, and gold for your merchandise.
23.Haran and Calneh, and Eden traded with you, and traffickers of Sheba, Assyria, Chilmad.
24.They were your traffickers in choice items, with garments of blue, and embroidered work, and in multicolored carpets, bound and secured with cords, among your merchandise.
25.Ships of Tarshish made journeys for you with your wares. So, you were filled and heavily laden in the heart of the sea.
26.Your oarsmen took you onto the high seas, but an east wind will break you in the heart of the sea.
27.Your wealth and your merchandise, your wares, your mariners and your pilots, those who repair a seam, and exchangers of your wares, and all your men of war in you, and in all your assembly that is in your midst shall fall in the heart of the sea in the day of your fall.
28.The sound of your pilots’ cry will shake the countryside.
29.All those who handle the oar, the mariners, will come down from their ships. The sea captains will stand upon the shore.
30.And they will make their voices heard for you and cry out bitterly. They will also throw dust up on their heads; they will roll about in ashes.
31.Moreover, they will make themselves bald for you, and gird on sackcloth and weep over you in bitterness of soul, mourning bitterly.
32.And in their wailing, they will lift up for you a dirge, and they will lament for you, ‘Who is like Tyre, like the one silenced in the midst of the sea?
33.When your merchandise went out by the seas, you satisfied many nations with your great wealth, and your wares enriched the kings of earth.’
34.At the time you are broken by the seas, in the depths of the waters, your wares and all your assembly will have gone down in your midst!
35.All the inhabitants of the coastlands and their kings are appalled at you; they bristle with great horror; their faces are contorted.
36.Dealers of the nations will hiss at you; you have come to a dreadful end, and you will be no more, forever.
Ezekiel 28
[against the prince and the king of Tyre]
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, Say to the prince of Tyre, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Because your heart is lifted up, you have said “I am a god; I have lived in the dwelling-place of God, in the heart of the seas.” But you are a man, and not a god (though you make your heart like the heart of God).
3.Behold, you are wiser than Daniel; they can keep no secret from you.
4.By your wisdom and your understanding have you made wealth for yourself, and you have amassed gold and silver in your treasuries.
5.By the greatness of your wisdom, with your traffic, you increased your wealth, and because of your wealth, your heart is puffed up.
6.Therefore, says the Lord God, because you have made your heart like the heart of a god,
7.behold, I am bringing foreigners against you, the most ruthless of the nations, and they will draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom, and they will defile your splendor.
8.They shall send you down into the Pit, and you shall die the death of those slain in the heart of the sea.
9.Will you still say, ‘I am God’ before him who kills you? You will just be a man and not a god in the hand of those who slay you.
10.At the hand of foreigners will you die the deaths of the uncircumcised, for I have spoken, says the Lord God.”
¶11. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
12. “Son of man, take up a lamentation for the king of Tyre, and say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord God: You are the epitome of symmetry, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.
13.You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was your covering: sardius, topaz, and diamond; beryl, onyx, and jasper; sapphire, emerald, and carbuncle. Moreover, your timbrels and your pipes, gold workmanship, were set in you the day you were created.
14.You are an anointed cherub that covers, and I put you on the holy mountain of God. You have walked freely in the midst of the stones of fire.
15.You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created until unrighteousness was found in you.
16.By the abundance of your merchandise, they filled your midst with violence, and you have sinned. Therefore, I will cast you out as profane from the mountain of God; yea, I will banish you, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.
17.Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty; you have corrupted your wisdom because of your brightness.
18.By the multitude of your iniquities, by your unrighteous trade, you profaned your sanctuaries, and I will send forth a fire out of your midst which shall consume you, and I will turn you into ashes on the ground for the eyes of all who see you.
19.All who know you among the nations are made desolate; a dreadful terror shall come upon you, and you shall be no more, forever.’ ”
¶20. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
21.“Son of man, set your face against Sidon and prophesy against it!
22.And say, thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am against you, O Sidon! And I will be glorified in your midst, and they will know that I am the Lord when I shall have executed judgments in her. And I will be sanctified in her.
23.For I will send a plague against her and blood into her streets, and the slain will fall in her midst by the sword that is against her all around. And they will know that I am the Lord.
24.There will no longer be a pricking brier or thorn causing pain to the house of Israel among those around them that treated them with contempt, and they will know that I am the Lord God.
¶25. “Thus says the Lord God: When I have gathered the house of Israel out of the nations where they were scattered, I will sanctify them in the sight of the Gentiles, and they will dwell in their own land, which I gave to my servant Jacob.
26.Yea, they will safely dwell in it and build houses and plant vineyards, and they will dwell safely while I execute judgments upon all those around them who despise them, and they will know that I am Jehovah their God.”
Ezekiel 29
[against Pharaoh and for Egypt. Against Tyre]
¶1. In the tenth year, in the tenth month, on the twelfth day of the month, the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, set your face against Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and prophesy against him and against all Egypt.
3.Speak, and say, Thus says the Lord God: Behold I am against you, O Pharaoh, king of Egypt, the great dragon who makes his abode in the midst of his canals, who has said to me, ‘It is my canal; I, myself, made it for myself.’
4.But I will put hooks in your jaws, and I will cause the fish of your streams to stick to your scales. And I will bring you up out of the midst of your streams, and all the fish of your streams will cling to your scales.
5.Then I will leave you in the wilderness, you and all the fish of your streams. You will fall upon the face of the field. You will not be brought together or gathered. I have given you for food for the beasts of the earth and birds of heaven.
6.And all the inhabitants of Egypt will know that I am the Lord, for they have been a staff of reed to the house of Israel.[14]
7.When they took you by your hand, you splintered and tore open all their shoulders; yea, when they leaned upon you, you broke and made all their loins to be at a stand.
8.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: Behold, I will bring upon you a sword, and I will cut off from you man and beast.
9.And the land of Egypt will be a desolation and a waste. And they will know that I am the Lord, since he said, ‘The Nile is mine, and I made it.’
10.Therefore, behold, I am against you and your streams, and I will make the land of Egypt an utter waste, a desolation from Migdol to Syene, as far as the border of Cush.
11.The foot of man will not pass over her, and the foot of beast will not pass over her, but it will be uninhabited forty years.
12.And I will make the land of Egypt a desolation in the midst of desolated countries, and her cities will be a desolation in the midst of desolated cities forty years, and I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations; yea, I will disperse them throughout the lands.
13.For thus says the Lord God: At the end of forty years, I will gather Egypt from the peoples among whom they were scattered.
14.And I will bring back the captivity of Egypt, and I will cause them to return to the land of Pathros, to the land of their origin, and there they will be a lowly kingdom.
15.It will be the lowliest of kingdoms; neither will it exalt itself any more over the nations. Yea, I will make them small, that they do not rule over the nations.
16.And it will no more be the confidence of the house of Israel; they will remember iniquity, when they turned after them. And they will know that I am the Lord God!”
¶17. And it came to pass in the twenty-seventh year, in the first month, on the first day of the month, that the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
18.“Son of man, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, caused his army to perform a great service at Tyre. Every head was made bald and every shoulder was made bare, but he received no wages from Tyre, nor did his army, for the service which he rendered against it.
19.Therefore, thus says the Lord God, Behold, I am giving Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, the land of Egypt, and he will carry off its abundance, and seize its spoil, and take its plunder, and that will be his army’s wages.
20.I have given him the land of Egypt as his payment, for which he labored, because they worked for me, says the Lord God.
21.On that day, I will cause a horn to spring forth for the house of Israel, and to you will I give an opened mouth in their midst. And they will know that I am the Lord!”
Ezekiel 30
[against Egypt]
¶1. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, prophesy and say, Thus says the Lord: ‘Give out a howl: “Alas for the day!”’
3.For the day is near. Yea, the day of the Lord is near, a day of gloom! It will be the Gentiles’ time.
4.A sword will come against Egypt, and there will be anguish in Cush when he falls, slain in Egypt. And they will take away its wealth, and its foundations will be overthrown.
5.Cush, and Phut, and Lud, and all the mixed company, and Chub, and children of the land of the covenant, will fall by the sword with them.
6.Thus says the Lord: Those who support Egypt will also fall, and her proud might will collapse. From Migdol to Syene will they fall by the edge of the sword, says the Lord God.
7.Yea, they will be desolate among desolated countries, and its cities will be among wasted cities.
8.And they will know that I am the Lord when I have set a fire in Egypt and all their helpers are broken!
9.In that day shall messengers go out from me in ships to cause unsuspecting Cush to tremble, and will be anguish among them in the day of Egypt. Yea, behold, it is coming.
10.Thus says the Lord God: By the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, will I also put an end to the wealth of Egypt.
11.He and his multitude with him, the most ruthless of the Gentiles, will be brought in to destroy the land, and they will draw their swords against Egypt and fill the land with the slain.
12.Moreover, I will make the Nile dry, and I will sell the land into the hand of wicked men, and by the hand of foreigners will I make desolate the land and its fullness. I, Jehovah, have spoken.
13.Thus says the Lord God: I will also destroy the images and cause the idols of Noph to cease, and no longer will there be an exalted prince from Egypt. Yea, I will put fear upon the land of Egypt.
14.I will also make Pathros a desolation, and will light a fire in Zoan, and will execute judgments upon No.
15.And I will pour out my wrath upon Sin, the Egyptian stronghold, and I will cut off the multitude of No.
16.Yea, I will light a fire in Egypt; Sin will be in great agony; No will be breached; and Noph will face enemies by day.
17.The young men of On and Pi-Beseth will fall by the sword, and the women will go into captivity.
18.And at Tehaphpenehes, the day will be dark when I break there the yokes of Egypt and her proud strength within her is ended. A cloud will cover her, and her daughters will go into captivity.
19.Yea, I will execute judgments in Egypt, and they will know that I am the Lord!”
¶20. And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the first month, on the seventh day of the month, that the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
21.“Son of man, I have broken the arm of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and, behold, it has not been bound up for healing or wrapped with a bandage to make it strong enough to wield the sword.
22.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am against Pharaoh king of Egypt! And I will break his arms, the strong one and the one that is broken, and I will cause the sword to fall from his hand.
23.And I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations; yea, I will disperse them throughout the lands.
24.But I have strengthened the arms of the king of Babylon, and I have placed my sword in his hand, and I have broken the arms of Pharaoh, and he will groan before him with the groanings of a mortally wounded man.
25.Yea, I have strengthened the arms of the king of Babylon, and the arms of Pharaoh will fall down. And they will know that I am the Lord when I have put my sword into the hand of the king of Babylon and stretch it out against the land of Egypt.
26.And I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations; yea, I will disperse them throughout the lands. And they will know that I am the Lord!
Ezekiel 31
[against Pharaoh and Egypt]
¶1. Now, it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month, on the first day of the month, that the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.Son of man, say to Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and to his people, to whim are you like in your greatness?
3.Behold, Assyria was a cedar in Lebanon with beautiful branches and a forest providing shade and towering height with his top being thick with foliage.
4.Waters made him great; the deep made him tall, with streams flowing all around his planting-place, and he sent forth his water-courses to all the trees of the field.
5.Therefore, his height towered above all the trees of the field, and his boughs were large, and when he shot them forth, his branches were long because of the abundance of water.
6.In his branches nested all the birds of heaven, and under his boughs, all the beasts of the field gave birth, and many nations all lived in his shade.
7.He was beautiful in his greatness, in the length of his branches, for his roots extended to abundant water.
8.The cedars in the garden of God did not outdo his; the cypresses did not equal his boughs; nor were the planes trees comparable to his branches. None of the trees in the garden of God compared with him in his beauty.
9.I made him beautiful with his many branches, and all the trees of Eden, who were in the garden of God, envied him.
10.Therefore says the Lord God: Because he rose up into the heights and his top thick with foliage, his heart became proud because of his height.
11.And so, I will give him over into the hand of a leader of nations who will assuredly deal with him. I have cast him out, in accordance with his wickedness,~
12.and foreigners, the most ruthless of the Gentiles, have cut him down and left him. Upon the mountains and in all the valleys, his branches have fallen, and his boughs are broken; they have come down into all the ravines of earth. All the nations of earth have escaped from under his shade.
13.All the birds of heaven will remain on his carcass and all the creatures of the field will be upon his branches,
14. so that none of the trees by the water will be lofty in their height or have their top thick with foliage, nor will their great ones stand firm in their height, all that drink up water, because all of them are given over to death, to the lower part of the earth among the children of men who go down to the Pit. [Compare Hebrew of verse 3b with 14a]
15.Thus says the Lord God: In the day he went down to Sheol, I caused mourning. I closed the Abyss over him and held back his rivers; yea, his abundant waters were withheld. I also made Lebanon grieve over him, and all the trees of the field fainted because of him.
16.At the sound of his fall, I made the nations to shake when I sent him down to Sheol with those who go down into the Pit, and all the trees of Eden will be comforted in the lower part of the earth, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink up water.
17.They also went down to Sheol with him, to those slain with the sword, yea, those who were his arm. They lived in his shade in the midst of the nations.
18.To whom among the trees of Eden are you like in such glory and greatness? Yet, you shall be brought down with the trees of Eden to the lower parts of the earth, among the uncircumcised you will lie down, with those slain by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, says the Lord God.”
Ezekiel 32
[against Pharaoh and Egypt]
¶1. And it came to pass in the twelfth year, in the twelfth month, on the first day of the month, that the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, take up a lamentation for Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and say to him, ‘You are like a young lion among the nations, and you are like a sea serpent. Yea, you burst forth with your rivers, and trouble the waters with your feet, and muddy their rivers.
3.Thus says the Lord God: I will spread my net over you with an assembly of many nations, and they will haul you up in my net.
4.I will forsake you in the land; I will cast you to the open field and will cause every bird of the sky to light upon you, and with you will I fill all the beasts of earth.
5.And I will lay your flesh to the mountains and fill the valleys with your bodies.
6.And I will cause the land to drink your blood that flows from you, to the mountains, and the ravines will be full of you.
7.And when I wipe you out, I will cover over the heavens and darken the stars. The sun will I cover, and the moon will not put forth its light.
8.All the bright lights of heaven will I make dark over you, and I will put darkness over your land, says the Lord God.
9.And I will vex the heart of many peoples when I bring about your destruction among the nations, upon countries about which you do not know.
10.And I will make many peoples to be appalled at you, and the hair of their kings will bristle because of you when I brandish my sword before them. And each one will tremble for his life, every moment, in the day of your downfall.
11.For thus says the Lord God: The sword of the king of Babylon shall come upon you!
12.By the swords of mighty men will I cause your people to fall, ruthless nations all of them, and they will bring to ruin the majesty of Egypt, and all her army will be annihilated.
13.I will also destroy all her beasts from beside the abundant waters, and the foot of man will muddy them no more, nor will the hooves of beasts muddy them.
14.Then will I let their waters settle and make their rivers run like oil, says the Lord God.
15.When I make the land of Egypt a desolation, when the land is desolate of all that filled it, when I have struck down all the inhabitants in it, then they will know that I am the Lord!
16.This is the lamentation with which they shall lament her; the daughters of the nations shall lament for her, for Egypt and all her people, says the Lord God.”
¶17. And it came to pass in the twelfth year, on the fifteenth of the month, that the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
18.“Son of man, wail for the multitude of Egypt and cast it down, her and the daughters of the grand nations, to the lower parts of the earth with those who go down to the Pit.
19.Whom do you surpass in beauty? Descend, and be laid down with the uncircumcised!
20.They shall fall in the midst of those slain by the sword. She is given over to the sword. They will drag her down, with all her multitudes.
21.The leaders of the mighty ones will say to him from the midst of Sheol, with his helpers, ‘They are gone down. They lie with the uncircumcised, slain by the sword.’
22.Assyria is there, and all her assembly. Round about it are its graves, all of them slain, felled by the sword,
23.whose graves were appointed to be in the sides of the Pit, and her assembly is round about her grave, all of them slain, felled by the sword, who had spread terror in the land of the living.
24.Elam is there, and all her multitude round about her grave, all of them slain, felled by the sword, who went down uncircumcised to the lower parts who had spread their terror in the land of the living, and they bear their infamy with those who go down to the Pit.
25.In the midst of the slain have they made her a bed, with all her multitude, round about it are her graves, all of them uncircumcised, slain by the sword, though their terror was spread in the land of the living, and they bear their infamy with those who go down to the Pit. It is placed in the midst of those who are slain.
26. Meshech-Tubal is there, and all her multitude. Round about it are her graves, all of them uncircumcised, having been slain with the sword, though they spread their terror in the land of the living.
27.They do not lie with the fallen mighty men from among the uncircumcised who have gone down to Sheol, though men placed their weapons of war and their swords under their heads. Yet, their iniquities will be upon their bones, though the terror of mighty men was in the land of the living.
28.(But you, you will be broken in the midst of the uncircumcised, and you will lie with those slain by the sword.)
29.Edom is headed there, her kings and all her princes who, in spite of their might, are appointed to be with those slain by the sword. They will lie with the uncircumcised and with those who go down to the Pit.
30.The princes of the north are headed there, all of them, and all the Zidonians, who go down with the slain, put to shame with their terror and their might. Yea, the uncircumcised will lie with those slain by the sword. And they will bear their infamy with those who go down to the Pit.
31.Pharaoh will see them and be comforted because of all his multitude slain by the sword, even Pharaoh and his army, says the Lord God.
32.Though I spread his terror in the land of the living, yet he will be laid in the midst of the uncircumcised with those slain by the sword, even Pharaoh and all his people, says the Lord God.”
Ezekiel 33
¶1. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, speak to the children of your people and say to them, ‘If I bring a sword against a country, and the people of that country take a man from their territory and make him their watchman,
3.and he sees the sword coming upon the land, and he blows the shofar and warns the people,
4.then whoever hears the sound of the shofar, yet does not heed the warning, and the sword comes and takes him away, his blood shall be on his own head.
5.He heard the sound of the shofar, but did not take warning. His blood shall be upon himself, for he was warned, that he might save his life.
6.But the watchman, when he sees the sword coming and does not blow the shofar, and the people are not warned, and the sword comes and takes someone from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity, but his blood will I require of the watchman’s hand.’
7.Now, I have appointed you, O son of man, to be a watchman for the house of Israel, and you have heard the word from my mouth. So, you give them the warning from me!
8.When I say of the wicked man, ‘A wicked man shall surely die,’ and you do not speak to warn the wicked man, because of that, the wicked man will die in his iniquity, but his blood will I require at your hand.
9.But as for you, if you have warned the wicked man of his way, to turn from it, and he does not turn from his way, he shall die in his iniquity, but you will have delivered your soul.’
10.And as for you, O son of man, you say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus you speak, saying, “If our transgressions and our sins be upon us, and we are rotting away because of them, then how shall we live?”
11.You say to them, ‘I swear on my life, says the Lord God, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! For why will you die, O house of Israel?’
12.So then, you, O son of man, say to the sons of your people, ‘The righteousness of a righteous man shall not deliver him in the day of his transgression. And as for the wickedness of the wicked man, he shall not be condemned because of it in the day he repents from his wickedness. Nor shall the righteous man be able to live because of his righteous deeds in the day of his sin.’
13.When I say to the righteous that he shall surely live, but then he trusts in his own righteousness and does wrong, none of his righteousness will be remembered, but because of his wrong that he has done, he will die in it.
14.Or when I say to the wicked man, ‘You shall surely die!’ and then he turns from his sin and does what is just and right,
15.if the wicked restores the pledge, repays what he stole, walks in the statutes of life, not doing wrong, he will surely live and not die.
16.None of his sin which he committed will be remembered against him. He has done what is just and right. He shall live.’
17.Yet the children of my people say, ‘The way of the Lord is not equal.’ But theirs is the way that is not equal!
18.When a righteous man turns from his righteousness and does wrong, then he shall die because of it.
19.And if a wicked man turns from his wickedness and does what is just and right, he shall live on account of that.
20.Yet, you say, ‘The way of the Lord is not equal.’ I will judge you, O house of Israel, each man according to his ways.”
¶21. And it came to pass in the twelfth year, on the tenth day of the fifth month of our captivity that a captive from Jerusalem came in to me, saying, ‘The city has been taken.’
22. And the hand of the Lord had been on me the evening before the captive came in, and He had opened my mouth ere he came in to me in the morning; He opened my mouth, and I was no longer dumb.
¶23. Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
24.“Son of man, the inhabitants of these waste places in the land of Israel keep saying, ‘Abraham was one, and he inherited the land, and we are many, and to us is the land given for an inheritance.’
25.Therefore, say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: You eat with the blood, and lift up your eyes to your idols, and you shed blood, and shall you possess the land?
26.Your men rely upon your sword, and your women commit an abomination, and each of you defiles his neighbor’s wife, and shall you possess the land?’
27.Thus shall you say to them: ‘Thus says the Lord God: I swear by my life that I will damn myself if those who are in the waste places do not fall by the sword, and I do not give those in the field to the beasts for food, and those in strongholds and caves do not die by the plague!
28.Yea, I have made the land a desolation and a waste; the mountains of Israel shall be desolate, so that no one will pass through.
29.And they will know that I am the Lord when I have made the land a desolation and a waste because of all their abominations which they have done.
¶30. As for you, O son of man, the children of your people are talking about you by the walls and at the doors of houses, and they speak one to another, each to his brother, saying, “Come, I pray, and let’s hear what the word will be that comes from Jehovah!”
31. And they come to you as people come, and they sit before you as my people, and they hear your words, but they will not do them! Though with their mouth, they show much love, their heart goes after their unjust gain.
32.Behold, you are to them like one who sings love songs with a beautiful voice while playing skillfully on an instrument, for they hear your words, but they do not do them.
33.But when it comes – behold, it is coming! – then they will know that a prophet has been in their midst.
Ezekiel 34
[against the shepherds of God’s flock]
¶1. And the word of the Lord came to me saying,
2.“Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel! Prophesy and say to them, to the shepherds, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Woe to the shepherds of Israel because they are feeding themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the flock?
3.You eat the fat, and clothe yourselves with the wool, and slaughter the fattened sheep for sacrifice, but you do not feed the flock!
4.You have not strengthened those who are weak, nor have you healed the sick one, nor have you bound up the injured one, nor have you brought back the one driven off, nor have you sought for the one who is dying. Instead, with force and harshness, you rule over them.
5.So, they are scattered because there is no shepherd, and when they were scattered, they became food for every beast of the field.
6.My sheep are wandering on all the mountains and on every high hill. My sheep are scattered over the whole face of the earth, and there is no one looking for them; yea, no one is searching.
7.Therefore, O shepherds, hear the word of the Lord!
8.I swear on my life, says the Lord God, that I will damn myself if I do not – because my flock is a spoil and my sheep have become food for every beats of the field because the is no shepherd, nor did my shepherds search for my sheep, but the shepherds fed themselves and did not feed the flock –
9.Therefore, O shepherds, hear the word of the Lord!
10.Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am against the shepherds, and I will demand my sheep from their hand and remove them from tending the flock so that the shepherds may no longer feed themselves, and I will deliver my flock from their mouths, that it may not be food for them.
11.For thus says the Lord God: I myself will search for my sheep and seek them out.
12.As a shepherd seeks his own flock on a day when he is in the midst of his sheep that are scattered, so will I seek out my sheep and rescue them out of all the places where they were scattered in a day of clouds and thick darkness.
13.I will bring them out from the nations and gather them from the lands, and will bring them to their own land, and I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, by the streams and in all the dwelling places of the country.
14.I will feed them in a good pasture, and their fold will be on the high mountains of Israel; there will they lie down in a good fold, and they will feed in rich pastures upon the mountains of Israel.
15.I myself will feed my sheep, and I will cause them to lie down, says the Lord God.
16.I will seek that which is lost, and bring back that which is cast out, and I will bind up that which is injured, and I will make the weak strong, but that which is fat and strong will I destroy; I will feed that one with judgment.
17.And as for you, my flock, thus says the Lord God: Behold, I judge between one sheep and another, between the rams and the he-goats.
18.Is it a small thing to you, that you eat up the good pasture and trample with your feet what is left of your pastures, and that you drink clear water but foul the rest with your feet?
19.As for my flock, they must eat what is trodden with your feet and drink what is fouled by your feet.
20.Therefore, thus says the Lord God to them: Behold, I, even I, will judge between fat sheep and lean sheep.
21.Because you have thrust with side and shoulder, and because you have gored all the weak with your horns until you scattered them abroad,
22.therefore will I rescue my flock, and they will no longer be a prey. Moreover, I will judge between one sheep and another.
23.I have raised up one shepherd to be over them, and he will feed them, even David my servant; he will feed them and be their shepherd.
24.And I, Jehovah, will be their God, and my servant David will be a Prince in their midst. I, Jehovah, have spoken!
25.And I will make for them a covenant of peace so that I rid the land of dangerous beasts, and men will live in the wilderness in safety, and sleep in the woods.
26.And I will make them, and the areas around my hill, a blessing, and I will send down the rain in its season. There will be showers of blessing,
27.and the tree of the field will yield its fruit, and the land will yield its increase. And they will be safe on their own land, and they will know that I am the Lord when I break the bars of their yoke and snatch them out of the hand of those who enslaved them.
28.And they will no longer be a prey for the Gentiles, neither will the beast of the land devour them, but they will live in security, and nothing will make them afraid.
29.And I will cause acclaimed crops to come up for them so that they no longer waste away with famine in the land and never again bear the reproach of the Gentiles.
30.And they will know that I, Jehovah their God, am with them, and that they, the house of Israel, are my people, says the Lord God.
31.And you, my flock, the flock of my pasture, you are men. I am your God, says the Lord God.”
Ezekiel 35
[against Edom]
¶1. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2.“Son of man, set your face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it!
3.And you say to it, ‘thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am against you, O Mount Seir, and I will stretch out my hand against you and appoint you to desolation and devastation.
4.I will lay your cities waste, and you will be a desolation. And you will know that I am the Lord!
5.Because you had perpetual enmity and delivered the children of Israel over to the power of the sword in the time of their calamity, in the time of final punishment.
6.Therefore, by my life, says the Lord God, I will prepare you for bloodshed, and bloodshed will pursue you! Inasmuch as you did not hate bloodshed, bloodshed will pursue you!
7.And I will make Mount Seir a desolation and devastation, and I will cut off from it the one who passes through and the one who returns.
8.And I will fill his mountains with his slain; those slain by the sword will fall on your hills, and your valleys, and in all your ravines.
9.I will make you a perpetual desolation, and your cities will not be inhabited. And you will know that I am the Lord!
10.Because you have said, “These two nations and two lands are mine,” although Jehovah was there,
11.I swear by my life, says the Lord God, I will certainly do according to your wrath and according to your envy which you have showed because of your hatred of them, and I will make myself known among them when I shall have judged you,
12.and you will know that I am the Lord. I have heard all your blasphemies which you have spoken against the mountains of Israel, saying, “They are desolate. They are given to us for food!”
13.And you have exalted yourselves against me with your mouth; yea, you have multiplied your words against me. I heard it!
14.Thus says the Lord God: When the whole earth rejoices, I will make you a desolation.
15.As you rejoiced over the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was desolate, so will I do to you. You shall be desolate, O Mount Seir, and all Edom – all of it! And you will know that I am the Lord!’
Ezekiel 36
¶1. “And so, you, O son of man, you prophesy to the mountains of Israel and say, ‘O mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord!
2.Thus says the Lord God: Because the enemy has said of you, “Aha!” and “The ancient heights have become our possession,”
3.therefore, prophesy and say, Thus says the Lord God: Because they brought desolation and trampled you on every side, so that you have become a possession for the rest of the nations, and are taken up on their lips and tongue, and have an evil report of people,
4.therefore, O mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord God! Thus says the Lord God to the mountains and to the hills, to the ravines and to the valleys, and to the desolate waste places, and to the deserted cities which were a spoil and ridicule to the remnant of the surrounding Gentiles:
5.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: I swear that I will damn myself if I have not spoken in the fire of my jealousy against the remnant of the Gentiles, and against all Edom, who appropriated my land for themselves as a possession with wholehearted joy and scornful soul, so that its pastureland was spoil.
6.Therefore, prophesy concerning the land of Israel and say to the mountains and to the hills, to the ravines and to the valleys, thus says the Lord God: Behold, I have said in my jealousy and in my wrath, because you have borne the reproach of the heathen,
7.therefore, thus says the Lord God: I have lifted up my hand. I swear that I will damn myself if the heathen that are around you do not bear their own reproach!
8.But you, O mountains of Israel, you will put forth your branches and yield your fruit for my people Israel when they are about to come.
9.For, behold, I am for you, and I will turn to you, and you will be tilled and sown.
10.And I will multiply men upon you, all the house of Israel – all of it! – and the cities will be inhabited, and the desolate places will be built.
11.I will certainly multiply man and beast upon you, and they will multiply and bear fruit. And I will settle you as in your former times, and I will do you more good than at the first. And you will know that I am the Lord!
12.I will cause men to walk over you, even my people Israel, and they will possess you, and you will be their inheritance, and you will never again be bereaved of them.
13.Thus says the Lord God: Because they say to you, ‘You, O land are a devourer of men and a bereaver of your own nation.’
14.Therefore, you will no longer devour men or again bereave your own nation, says the Lord God.
15.Neither will I cause the invective of the heathen against you to be heard any longer, nor will you bear the reproach of the nations, nor will you bring ruin to your nation again, says the Lord God.”
¶16. And the word of the Lord came to me saying,
17.“Son of man, the house of Israel dwelt in their own land, but they defiled it with their ways and their doings. Their way before me was like the uncleanness of woman’s menstruation.
18.Then I poured out my wrath upon them because of the blood which they had shed on the land. They also defiled it with their idols.
19.And I scattered them among the Gentiles, and they were dispersed among the nations; I judged them as their ways and as their deeds deserve.
20. And when they came to the Gentiles, wherever they came, they profaned my holy name so that men said of them, “These are the people of the Lord, yet they had to leave His land.”
21. But I was concerned about my holy name which the house of Israel had profaned among the Gentiles where they had gone.
¶22. Therefore, say to the house of Israel, “Thus says the Lord God: I will not do this for your sake, O house of Israel, but for my holy name, which you have dishonored among the nations where you have gone.
23.And I will sanctify my great name which was profaned among the Gentiles, which you profaned in their midst, says the Lord God. And the Gentiles will know that I am the Lord when I am sanctified in you before their eyes!
24.Yet, I will take you from among the Gentiles and gather you out of all countries, and I will bring you to your land
25.and sprinkle clean water upon you, and you will be clean. And I will cleanse you from all your uncleanness and from all your idols.
26.I will also give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh.
27.And I will put my Spirit within you, and I will enable you to walk according to my statutes and my judgments, and you will diligently keep them.
28.Then you will live in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you will be my people, and I will be your God.
29.And I will deliver you from all your uncleanness, and I will summon the grain and multiply it, and I will not give you famine.
30.And I will make the fruit of the tree and the produce of the field abundant, so that you no longer bear the reproach of famine before the Gentiles.
31.And you will remember your evil ways and your deeds that were not good, and you will be loathsome in your own sight because of your sins and because of your abominations.
32.I will not do this for your sake, says the Lord God. Be it known to you! Be ashamed and confounded because of your ways, O house of Israel!
¶33. Thus says the Lord God: On the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities, I will also cause all the cities to be inhabited, and the waste places will be built.
34. And the land that was made desolate will be worked instead of being the desolation that it was in the sight of all who passed by.
35. And they will say, “This land that was made desolate has become like the garden of Eden! And the cities that were laid waste, and made desolate, and left in ruins are unassailable and inhabited!”
36. And the nations around you that are left will know that I, Jehovah, have rebuilt the places that were thrown down, and I have planted the desolated place. I, Jehovah, have spoken, and I will do it!
¶37. Thus says the Lord God: I will be asked this for the house of Israel, to do for them; I will multiply them like a flock of men,
38.like a flock of holy men, like the flock of Jerusalem during her appointed feasts. Thus will desolate cities be filled with a flock of men, and they will know that I am the Lord.”
Ezekiel 37
¶1. The hand of the Lord was upon me, and He took me out, by the spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the middle of the valley, and it was full of bones.
2. And he made me pass by them, all around, and behold, there were very many on the valley floor, and behold, they were very dry.
3. And He said to me, “Son of man, will these bones come back to life?” And I said, “O Lord God, you alone know.”
4. Then He said to me, “Prophesy over these bones, and say to them, ‘O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord!
5.Thus says the Lord God to these bones: Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and you shall live.
6.And I will lay sinews upon you, and I will make flesh grow on you, and I will spread skin over you, and I will put breath into you, and you will live. And you will know that I am the Lord! ’”
7. So I prophesied as I was commanded, and there was a sound as I was prophesying, and there was a shaking, and bones joined together, bone to its bone!
8. Then I looked, and there were sinews upon them, and then, flesh grew, and skin spread over them above that, but there was no breath in them.
9. Then He said to me, “Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, son of man, and say to the breath, thus says the Lord God: From the four winds come, breath, and breathe into these slain men, that they may live.”
10. So I prophesied as He commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they came to life, and they stood on their feet, an extraordinarily great army.
11. And He said to me, “Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Behold, they say, ‘Our bones have dried up, and our hope has perished. We are utterly cut off.’
12.Therefore, prophesy and say to them, thus says the Lord God: Behold, I will open your graves and bring you up out of your graves, O my people, and I will bring you to the land of Israel.
13.And you will know that I am the Lord when I open your graves and bring you up out of your graves, O my people,
14.and put my spirit in you and you come to life, and I give you rest upon the land. Then you will know that I the Lord spoke, and I brought it to pass, says the Lord.”
¶15. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
16.“Now, you son of man, take one stick and write on it, ‘For Judah and for the children of Israel united with him’. And take another stick and write on it, ‘For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and all the house of Israel united with him.’
17.Then bring them together to you, one against the other, as one stick, and they will become one in your hand.
18.And when the children of your people speak to you, saying, ‘Will you not tell us what these are to you?’,
19.say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am taking the stick of Joseph that is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel united with him, and I will put them with him, with the stick of Judah, and I will make them into one stick, and they will be one in my hand.”
20.And the sticks that you wrote on will be in your hand in their sight.
21. Then say to them, “Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I will take the children of Israel from among the nations where they have gone, and I will gather them from every direction and bring them into their own land.
22. And I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel. And there will be one King over them all, and they will no longer be two nations, and no longer be divided into two kingdoms.
23. And they will no longer defile themselves with their idols, or with their abominations, or with any of their transgressions, but I will rescue them from all the places they have lived and where they have sinned, and I will purify them. And they will be my people, and I will be their God.
24. And David my servant will be king over them, and there will be one shepherd for all of them, and they will walk in my judgments and keep my statutes, and they will do them.
25. And they will dwell in the land that I gave to my servant Jacob, where your fathers dwelt; they will dwell in it, they, and their sons, and their son’s sons forever, and David my servant will be their prince forever.
26. And I will make a covenant of peace with them. It will be an everlasting covenant with them, and I will establish them and multiply them, and I will put my sanctuary in their midst forever.
27. Then my tabernacle will be with them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.
28. And the nations will know that I, Jehovah, sanctify Israel, when my sanctuary is in their midst forever.
Ezekiel 38
¶1. Again the word of the Lord came to me saying,
2.“Son of man, set your face toward God, the land of Magog, chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him.
3.And you shall say, Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am against you, O Gog, chief prince of Meshech and Tubal.
4.And I will turn you back, and I will put hooks in your jaws and lead you forth, with all your army: horses, horsemen in full armor attired, all of them – a great assembly – shield and buckler, all of them wielding swords.
5.Persia, Cush, and Phut are with them, all of them with shield and helmet,
6.Gomer and all her hordes, the house of Togarmah, from distant northern parts, and all his hordes. Yea, many peoples are with you.
7.Get ready! Ready yourself, you and your whole Assembly who are assembled about you. Yea, you are their keeper.
8.After many days, you will be visited. In the latter times, you will come to the land brought back from the sword and gathered out of many nations, against the mountains of Israel which have been perpetually wasted, even she who was brought forth out of the nations, and all of them dwelling securely.
9.And you will come up like a devastating storm; you will come like a cloud to cover the land, you and all your hordes, and many nations with you.
¶10. “Thus says the Lord God: It shall come to pass on the very day they come up that thoughts will come into your mind, and you will devise an evil plan.
11.And you will say, ‘I will go up against the land of unprotected villages; I will come against the quiet people, all of them living securely, dwelling without a wall, and no gates and bars for themselves,’
12.to take spoil and carry off plunder, to turn your hand against the waste places now inhabited, even against the people gathered out of the nations, who have livestock and goods, who dwell on the pre-eminent part of the earth.
13.Sheba and Dedan, and merchants of Tarshish, and all her young lions, will say to you, ‘Have you come to take spoil and to carry off plunder? Have you gathered your assembly in order to carry away silver and gold, to take livestock and goods, to seize great spoil?’
14.Therefore, prophesy, son of man, and say to Gog, “Thus says the Lord God: On the day when my people Israel dwell securely, will you not take note of it?
15.And you shall come out of your place, from places far to the north, you and many nations with you, all of them riding horses, a great assembly and a large army.
16.And you will come up against my people Israel like a cloud to cover the land; in the last days shall it come to pass that I will bring you against my land so that the nations may know me, when I sanctify myself in you before their eyes, O Gog!
¶17. “Thus says the Lord God: Are you the one of whom I spoke in former days by the hand of my servants, the prophets of Israel, who prophesied in those days that I would bring you up against them?
18.But it shall come to pass on that day, the day that Gog comes against the land of Israel, says the Lord God, that my hot anger will come up in me,
19.and in my jealousy, in my fiery wrath – I have spoken! – I swear that I will damn myself if there is not on that day a great quaking in the land of Israel.
20.And fish of the sea, and bird of the sky, and beast of the field, and every creeping thing that creeps on the ground, and every human who is on the face of the earth shall quake, and the mountains shall be cast down, and the cliffs shall collapse, and every wall shall fall to the ground.
21.And for all my mountains, I will call for a sword against him, says the Lord God. Every man’s sword will be against his brother.
22.And I will judge him with a plague, and with blood, and an overwhelming downpour, and I will make stones of hail, fire, and sulfur to rain upon him, and upon all his hordes, and upon the many nations that are with him.
23.And I will magnify myself, and sanctify myself, and make myself known in the sight of many nations. And they will know that I am the Lord!
Ezekiel 39
¶1. “And you, son of man, prophesy against Gog, and say, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am against you, Gog, chief prince of Meshech and Tubal!
2.And I will deceive you, and lead you on,[15] and I will bring you up from the remote north, and I will cause you to come against the mountains of Israel,
3.and then I will strike your bow out of your left hand, and make your arrows drop from your right hand.
4.Upon the mountains of Israel will you fall, you and all your hordes, and the peoples who are with you. I will give you as food to predatory birds of all kinds and to the beast of the field.
5.You will fall in the open field, for I have spoken, says the Lord God.”
6.I will send a fire upon Gog, and upon those who inhabit the isles, for a sacrifice, and they will know that I am the Lord!
7.And I will make my holy Name known in the midst of my people Israel, and I will not cause my holy name to be polluted any longer. And the nations will know that I, Jehovah, the Holy One, am with Israel.
8.Behold, it is coming, and it shall be done, says the Lord God, this day of which I have spoken.
9.And those who live in the cities of Israel will go out and make fires with the weaponry and will burn it: bucklers and shields, bows and arrows, clubs and spears. And they will make fires with them seven years.
10.And they will not pick up wood from the fields nor cut wood out of the forests, for they will make fires with the weaponry. And they will spoil those who were spoiling them, and they will plunder those who were plundering them, says the Lord God.
¶11. “And it shall come to pass on that day that I will give to Gog a place for burial there in Israel, the valley of those who pass by, east of the sea, and it will stop those who pass by. And they will bury Gog and all his multitude there, and they will call it “The Valley of Hamon-Gog”.[16]
12.And for seven months, the house of Israel will be burying them to purify the land,
13.and all the people of the land will do the burying. And the day I glorify myself will be a memorable day for them, says the Lord God.
14.And they will designate men who will pass through the land on a regular basis, burying the trespassers that remain on the face of the land, to purify it. At the end of the seven months, they will begin to search.
15.And when those who pass through the land go over it and see a human bone, one will put up a marker beside it until the buriers bury it in the Valley of Hamon-Gog.
16.(The name of the city is also Hamonah.) Thus will they cleanse the land.
17. As for you, son of man, thus says the Lord God: Tell every sort of bird and every wild beast, “Assemble and come! Gather from all around to my sacrifice that I am making for you, a great sacrifice on the mountains of Israel! And you will eat flesh and drink blood.
18.You will eat the flesh of mighty men, and you will drink the blood of princes of the earth; rams, he-lambs, and he-goats, bulls – fatlings of Bashan, all of them.
19.And at my sacrifice which I am making for you, you will eat fat until you are full, and you will drink blood until you are drunk.
20.And at my table, you will be filled with horse and charioteer, mighty men, and all men of war”, says the Lord God.
21. And I will establish my glory among the nations when all the nations see my judgment that I have executed and my hand that I have laid upon them.
22. And from that day forward shall the house of Israel know that I, Jehovah, am their God.
23.And the nations will know that the house of Israel went into exile because of their iniquity, for they were treacherous against me, and I hid my face from them. And I gave them into the hand of their adversaries and they fell by the sword, all of them.
24.I dealt with them according to their uncleanness and according to their transgressions, and I hid my face from them.
25.Therefore, thus says the Lord God: I will now return the captivity of Jacob; yea, I will have compassion on the whole house of Israel, for I am jealous for my holy name.
26.And they will bear[?] their shame and all their treachery which they committed against me, when they dwell safely upon the land and there is no one causing them to tremble.
27.When I have brought them back from the nations and gathered them out of the lands of the enemies, then will I sanctify myself in them before the eyes of many nations.
28.And they will know that I am Jehovah their God, because I exiled them into the nations, but I gathered them together upon their own land. Yea, I will not leave one of them there any longer.
29.And I will no longer hide my face from them when I have poured out my Spirit upon the house of Israel, says the Lord God.”
Ezekiel 40
1. In the twenty-fifth year of our exile, at the beginning of the year, on the tenth day of the month, in the fourteenth year after the city was destroyed, on that selfsame day, the hand of the Lord was upon me, and He brought me there
2.in visions. God brought me to the land of Israel, and He let me down on a very high mountain, and above it was something like a structure of a city toward the south.
3. And He brought me there, and behold, a man whose appearance was like the appearance of bronze. In his hand was a flax cord and a measuring reed. And he was standing in the gate.
4. And the man said to me, “Son of man, see with your eyes, and hear with your ears, and pay close attention to everything that I show you because you have been brought here that you might see it. Declare all that you see to the house of Israel.”
5. And behold, a wall was outside the temple, all around. And in the man’s hand was a measuring reed of six cubits (each was a cubit and a handbreadth), and he measured the width of the construction as one reed, and the height was one reed.
6. Then he went to the gate that faced the road toward the east, and he went up by its steps and measured the threshold of the gate as one reed wide and the other threshold one reed wide.
7. And each chamber was one reed long and one reed wide, and between the chambers was five cubits, and the threshold of the gate next to the portico of the inner gate was one reed.
8. And he measured the portico of the inner gate, one reed.
9. Then he measured the portico of the gate, eight cubits, and its pillars, two cubits, and the portico of the gate was inward.
10. The chambers of the eastern gate were three on both sides, the three of them of one measurement. And there was one measurement for the pillars on both sides of it.
11. And he measured the width of the gate opening, ten cubits. The length of the gateway was thirteen cubits.
12.And the border before the chambers: a border of one cubit by one cubit, and the chamber was six cubits on this side and six cubits on that side.
13. And he measured the gate from the roof of one chamber to the roof of the opposite one: twenty-five cubits wide, from doorway to doorway.
14. So did he the pillars, sixty cubits, even to the pillar of the courtyard gate, all around.
15. And from the front of the gate entrance before the portico of the inner gate, fifty cubits.
16. And the gate had narrowed windows by the chambers and their pillars inside, all around, and likewise the porticos had windows all around inside and on the pillars were palm trees.
17. Then he brought me to the outer courtyard, and, behold, rooms and pavement were made all around. Thirty rooms faced the pavement,
18.with the pavement to the side of the gates, corresponding to the length of the gates. This was the lower pavement.
19. Then he measured the distance in front of the lower gate to the outside of the inner courtyard: one hundred cubits on the east and the north.
20. As for the gate that faced the way north, belonging to the lower courtyard, he measured its length and its width.
21. And its chambers were three on this side and three on that side, and its pillars and its portico were of the measure of the first gate, fifty cubits was its length, and the length was twenty-five by the cubit.
22. And its windows, and its portico, and its palm trees were of the measure of the gate that faced the way east, and by seven steps they shall go into it. And its portico faced them.
23. As for the gate to the inner courtyard opposite the north gate, as on the east, he then measured. From gate to gate was one hundred cubits.
24. Then he led me toward the south, and there was a gate on the south. And he measured its pillar and its portico. These measurements were the same as the others.
25. And there were windows in it and in its porticos all around, like the other windows, fifty cubits long and twenty-five cubits wide.
26. And seven steps led up to it, and the porticos were opposite them, it had palm trees on it pillars, one on this side and one on the other.
27. The inner courtyard also had gate on the south. And he measured from gate to gate, southward, one hundred cubits.
28. Then he brought me into the inner courtyard by the south gate, and he measured the south gate. These measurements were the same as the others.
29. These measurements of the chambers and pillars and porticos were the same as the others, and its windows and its porticos all around were fifty cubits long and twenty-five cubits wide.
30. And the porticos all around were twenty-five cubits long, and five cubits wide,
31.and its portico faced the outer courtyard. And palm tress were on its pillars, with eight steps for its ascent.
32. Then he took me to the inner court on the east, and he measured the gate. These measurements were the same as the others.
33. These measurements of the chambers and pillars and porticos were the same as the others, and its windows and its porticos all around were fifty cubits long and twenty-five cubits wide.
34. And its pillars faced the outer courtyard, and palm trees were on the pillars, on either side, with eight steps for its ascent.
35. Then he brought me to the north gate, and he took measurements. These measurements were the same as the others,
36.its chambers, its pillars, its porticos, and its porticos and its windows all round were fifty cubits long and twenty-five cubits wide.
37. And its pillars faced the outer courtyard, and palm trees were on the pillars, on either side, with eight steps for its ascent.
38. And a room with its entrance was by the pillars of the gate. There they wash the burnt offering.
39. And in the portico of the gate were two tables on this side and that side, on which the burnt offering, and the sin offering, and the trespass offering are butchered.
40. And to the side, outside of it, as one goes up to the entrance of the north gate, were two tables, and on the other side, which was the portico of the gate, were two tables.
41. Four table were on this side and four tables were on that side, beside of the gate, eight tables on which they butcher sacrifices.
42. And the four tables for burnt offering were of hewn stone, one and a half cubits long, one cubit and a half wide, and the height was one cubit high. On them, they will place the utensils with which they slaughter the burnt offering and the sacrifices.
43. And hooks, one handbreadth wide, were fastened all around to the temple, and on the tables was the flesh of the offering.
44. And outside the inner gate are rooms form the singers in the inner courtyard, one of which was beside the north gate facing south, the other beside the east gate facing north.
45. And he said to me, “This room facing the south is for the priests who keep the charge over the temple,
46.and the room that faces north is for the priests who have charge over the altar. They are sons of Zadok, who from the sons of Levi approach Jehovah to minister to Him.”
47. And he measured the courtyard, a hundred cubits long and a hundred cubits wide, made square, and the altar was in front of the temple.
48. Then he brought me to the portico of the temple, and he measured the pillar of the portico, five cubits on this side and five cubits on that side, and the breadth of the gate was three cubits on this side and three cubits on that side.
49. The length of the portico was twenty cubits, and the breadth, eleven cubits, and those who went up to it did so by steps. And there were pillars at the doorposts, one on this side and one on that side.
Ezekiel 41
¶1. Then he brought me to the temple, and he measured the pillars, six cubits wide on this side and six cubits wide on that side, a width of the tabernacle (? cp. Ex. 36:20–21).
2. And the width of the entrance was ten cubits, and the sides of the entrance were five cubits on this side and five cubits on that side. And he measured the length, forty cubits, and the width, twenty cubits.
3. Then he went inside and measured the pillar of the entrance, two cubits, and the doorway, six cubits, with the width of the doorway being seven cubits.
4. And he measured the length of it, twenty cubits, and the width, twenty cubits, before the temple. And he said to me, “This is the Most Holy Place.”
5. And he measured the wall of the temple building [?], six cubits, and the width of each side chamber was four cubits all around, all around the temple building [?]
6. And the chambers were chamber upon chamber, three levels, with thirty on a level. And chambers[?] were fastened into the wall of the temple all around to act as supports, that they might not be supported by the wall of the temple.
7. And it became wider as it wound up to each level of chambers because surrounding the house, level upon level, it went all around the house, so that the house increased in width as it went upward, and thus the lowest chambers went up the highest ones by way of the middle ones.
8. And I saw the height of the temple foundation for the chambers was laid all around, a full reed, that is, six joined cubits in height.
9. The width of the outside wall of each chamber was five cubits, and the space between the chambers for the temple
10.and the rooms was twenty cubits wide, all around the temple.
11. And the chamber had entryway into the free space, one entrance toward the north and one entrance toward the south, and the width of the place of the free space was five cubits all around.
12. Now, the building that was before the separate place at the western entrance was seventy cubits wide, and the wall of the building was five cubits wide all around, and its length was ninety cubits.
13. And he measured the length of the temple, one hundred cubits, and the length of the separate place and the building and its wall were one hundred cubits.
14. And the width of the front of the temple and the separate area to the east was a hundred cubits.
15. And he measured the length of the building in front of the separate area which is at its rear and the galleries, from this side to that side, a hundred cubits, as well as the inner sanctuary and the portico of the courtyard,
16.the sills, and the narrowed windows. And the galleries around their three levels, opposite the threshold, were paneled wood all around, even from the floor to the windows. And the windows were covered.
17. Up above the entrance, and toward the inner house even to the outside, and the whole wall all around, by a measure,
18.was also carved cherubim and palm trees. And a palm tree was between cherub and cherub, and each cherub had two faces.
19.The face of a man was toward the palm tree on one side and the face of a young lion was toward the palm tree on one side. They were carved on the whole house all around.
20. From the floor to above the entrance were carved cherubim and palm trees, as well as the wall of the temple.
21. The door posts of the temple were squared, as was the front of the sanctuary; the appearance of the one was as the appearance of the other.
22. The wooden altar was three cubits high, and its length was two cubits, with its corners, and its length and its walls were wooden. And he said to me, “This is the table that is before Jehovah.”
23. The temple and the Holy Place had two doors.
24. And the two doors had two swinging leaves, two leaves on one door, and two leaves on the other.
25. And there were made on them, on the doors of the temple, cherubim and palm trees, as were made for the walls, and a covering of wood for the surface of the porch outside.
26. And there were narrowed windows and palms on one side and the other, on the sides of the porch, and the side chambers of the house, and the coverings.
Ezekiel 42
¶1. Then he led me out to the outer courtyard, the way toward the north, and he brought me to the room opposite the separate area, which was also opposite the building to the north.
2. Along the length, which was one hundred cubits, was the door facing north, and the width was fifty cubits.
3. Opposite the inner court’s twenty cubits, and opposite the pavement of the outer court was gallery against gallery on three levels.
4. And opposite the rooms was a walkway ten cubits wide leading to the inside, a way of one cubit, and their doors were to the north.
5. Now, the upper rooms were shorter because the galleries took more from them than from the lower and middle rooms of the building.
6. For they were on three levels, and they did not have pillars like the pillars of the courtyards. Therefore, they were set back more than the lower and middle levels from the ground up.
7. And there was a wall that was outside by the rooms, toward the outer court in front of the rooms. Its length was fifty cubits,
8.for the length of the rooms that were in the outer court was fifty cubits, but behold, facing the temple, it was one hundred cubits.
9. And beneath these rooms was the east entrance, by which one enters them from the outer court.
10. In the thickness of the outer wall facing east, in front of the separate area and in front of the building, were rooms,
11.with a passageway before them. These mirrored the rooms that were to the north, similar in their length, in their width, and all their exits, and their arrangements, and their entrances.
12.And like the entrances to the rooms that were on the south, an entrance was at the head of the path, before the surrounding [?? root: ganan] wall to the east, as one enters them.
13. And he said to me, “The north rooms and the south rooms which are before the separate area are holy rooms in which the priests who approach Jehovah may eat the holiest things. There shall they place the holiest things, even the grain offering, and the sin offering, and the guilt offering, for it is a holy place.
14. When the priests have entered, they may not go out of the holy place into the outer court, but there they shall lay their garments in which they minister, for they are holy. After that, they shall put on clothes and go near that which is for the people.
15. When he finished the measurement of the inner temple, he brought me out by way of the eastern gate and measured it all round.
16. He measured the east side with the measuring reed, five hundred reeds, with the measuring reed all around.
17. He measured the north side with the measuring reed all around, five hundred reeds.
18. The south side he measured five hundred reeds, with the measuring reed all around.
19. Around to the west side, he measured five hundred reeds, with the measuring reed all around.
20. He measured it on four sides. It had a wall all around. Its length was five hundred and its breadth, five hundred, to make a separation between the holy from the common.
Ezekiel 43
¶1. Then he led me to the gate, the gate that faces toward the east.
2. And behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the east, and His voice was like the sound of many waters, and the earth shone with His glory.
3. And this vision was like a vision that I had seen, like the vision that I saw when I came to destroy the city, and visions like the vision that I saw at the river Chebar. And I fell on my face.
4. And the glory of the Lord came to the house by way of the gate that faces toward the east.
5. And the Spirit took me up and brought me to the inner courtyard, and behold, the glory of the Lord filled the house.
6. And I heard one speaking to me from the house (and a man was standing beside me),
7.and He said to me, “Son of man, this is the place of my throne, and the place for the soles of my feet where I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel forever, and the house of Israel, neither they nor their kings, will again defile my holy name with their whoredoms and with the carcasses of their kings in their high places.
8.In setting their threshold by my threshold, and their doorpost beside my doorpost, and the wall between me and them, they defiled my holy name with their abominations that they practiced, so that I consumed them in my anger.
9.Let them now put away their whoredom and the carcasses of their kings far from me, and then, I will dwell with them forever.
10.You, son of man, describe the house to the house of Israel, that they may be ashamed of their iniquities, and let them measure the pattern.
11.And if they are ashamed of all that they have done, show them the design of the house, and its arrangement, and its exits, and its entrances, and all its design and all its statutes. And all my designs and all its laws make known to them, and write it out for their eyes, and let them follow all its designs and all its statutes, and carry them out.
12.This is the law of the house: on the top of the mountain, all its boundary round about shall be most holy. Behold, this is the law of the house.
13. And these are the measurements of the altar by cubits (a cubit being a cubit and a handbreadth): the base shall be a cubit, and a cubit wide, and its surrounding border on its lip, a span. And this shall be the height of the altar:
14.from the base on the ground to the lower ledge, two cubits; with a width of one cubit, and from the small ledge to the larger ledge, four cubits, with a width of a cubit.
15. And the hearth was four cubits, and from the hearth four horns projected upwards.
16. And the hearth was twelve long, by twelve wide, squared.
17. The ledge shall also be fourteen long by fourteen wide on its four sides, with the larger ledge around it, half a cubit, and the surrounding base for it a cubit, with its steps facing east.
18. And he said to me, “Son of man, thus says the Lord God: These are the ordinances for the altar on the day that it is made, for burnt offerings to be made on it, and for blood to be sprinkled on it.
19.And you shall give to the priests, the Levites who are of the seed of Zadok, who approach me to minister to me, says the Lord God, a bullock from the herd for a sin offering.
20.And you shall take some of its blood and put it on its four horns, and on the four corners of the ledge, and on the border round about; thus shall you purify it and make atonement for it.
21.And you shall take the bullock of the sin offering, and he shall burn it at the appointed place of the house, outside the sanctuary.
22.And on the second day, you shall offer an unblemished male from the goats for a sin offering, and they shall purify the altar just as they purified it with the bullock.
23.And when you finish purifying it, you shall offer an unblemished bullock from the herd and an unblemished ram from the flock.
24.And you shall offer them before the Lord, and the priests shall cast salt on them and offer them for a burnt offering to the Lord.
25.Seven days shall you prepare a goat for a daily sin offering; they shall also prepare a bullock from the herd and an unblemished ram from the flock.
26.Seven days shall they make atonement for the altar and purify it; and they shall be ordained.
27.And when they have completed these days, then it shall be that on the eighth day and onward, the priests shall make your burnt offerings on the altar, and your peace offerings, and I will accept you, says the Lord God.”
Ezekiel 44
¶1. Then he brought me back by way of the theater gate of the sanctuary that faced east, and it was shut.
2. And Jehovah said to me, “This gate is to remain shut. It shall not be opened, and no man shall enter through it, because Jehovah, the God of Israel, has entered through it. Therefore, it is to remain shut.
3.Only the Prince himself may sit within it to eat bread before the Lord. By way of the portico shall he enter, and by that way shall he go out.”
4. And then he brought me by way of the north gate to the front of the temple, and I looked, and behold, the glory of the Lord filled the temple of the Lord, and I fell on my face.
5. And Jehovah said to me, “Son of man! Pay close attention, and see with your eyes and hear with your ears all that I am saying to you concerning all the ordinances of the temple of the Lord and all its laws. Yea, take careful note to the entrance of the temple and all the exits of the sanctuary.
6.And you tell the rebellious house of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord God: You have a multitude because of all your abominations, O house of Israel,
7.in that you bring in sons of a stranger, uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh, to be in my sanctuary to pollute it – my house! – when you offer my bread, the fat and the blood. Yea, they violate my covenant through all your abominations.
8.And you have not kept the charge of my holy things, but you have appointed others instead of yourselves to be keepers of my charge in my sanctuary.
9.Thus says the Lord God: No foreigner, uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh, may enter into my sanctuary, including any foreigner who is among the children of Israel.
10.And the Levites who went far from me when Israel went astray, who went astray from me after their idols, will surely bear their iniquity.
11.Yet, they were ministers in my sanctuary, having charge of the gates of the temple and guarding the temple. They slaughtered the burnt offering and the sacrifice for the people, and they stood before them to minister to them.
12.Because they ministered to them before their idols, they became an iniquitous stumbling-block to the house of Israel. Therefore, I have sworn concerning them, says the Lord God, that they shall bear their iniquity.
13.And they will never come near me, to act as a priests to me, nor come near any of my holy things at the Most Holy Place, but they will bear their shame, and the abomination which they have committed.
14.Yet, I appointed them keepers of the charge of the temple, and all its service, and all that is done in it.
15.However, the priests, the Levites, the sons of Zadok who kept the charge of my sanctuary when the children of Israel went astray from me, they shall approach me to minister to me and to stand before me to offer me the fat and the blood, says the Lord God.
16.They shall enter my sanctuary, and they shall approach my table to minister to me, and they shall keep my charge.
17.And it shall come to pass that when they enter the gates of my inner court, they shall wear linen garments, and they shall not have wool upon them while they minister within the gates of my inner court or at the temple.
18.And linen turbans shall be on their heads, and linen undergarments shall be on their loins. They shall not gird on anything that makes them sweat.
19.And when they go out to the outer court, to the outer court to the people, they shall take off their garments in which they minister, and leave them in the holy rooms, and put on other garments so that they do not sanctify the people with their garments.
20.And they shall not shave their head, nor grow their locks long. They shall only trim their heads.
21.And no priest shall drink wine when he comes the inner court.
22.And they shall not take as a wife either a widow or a divorcee, but only a virgin of the seed of the house of Israel. However, the widow who is a widow of a priest, they may take.
23.And they shall teach my people the difference between the holy and the common, and make them to distinguish between the unclean and the clean.
24.And in a dispute, they shall stand to judge. They shall render judgment of it in keeping with my ordinances. And they shall keep my laws and my statutes, with all my appointed times, and they shall keep my sabbaths holy.
25.Moreover, they shall not defile themselves by coming in to a dead man; however, they may defile themselves for a father, or mother, or son, or daughter, or for brother, or for a sister who has not had a husband.
26.But after his purification, they shall count for him seven days.
27.And on the day he goes in to the holy place, to the inner court, to minister in the holy place, he shall bring his sin offering, says the Lord God,
28.and it shall be for them an inheritance; I am their inheritance. And you shall give them no possession in Israel; I am their possession.
29.And they may eat the grain offering, the sin offering, and the guilt offering, and every devoted thing in Israel shall be theirs.
30.And all the firstfruits of everything, of all the excise offerings, everything from all your excise offerings, shall be the priests’. And you shall give the firstfruits of your dough to the priest, so that a blessing may rest upon your house.
31.The priests shall not eat of anything that dies of itself or is torn, whether of fowl or of beast.
Ezekiel 45
¶1. “And when you divide the land by lot as an inheritance, you shall offer up an excise offering to Jehovah, a holy portion of the land twenty-five thousand long, ten thousand wide. It shall be holy in all its border around.
2.Some of this will be for the sanctuary, a square, five hundred by five hundred in circumference, with fifty cubits of open land around it.
3.And from this measured portion, you shall measure a length of twenty-five thousand and a width of ten thousand, in which will be the sanctuary for the Holy of Holies.
4.It will be a holy portion of the land. It is for the priests who minister in the sanctuary, who approach to minister to Jehovah, and it is for them a place for houses as well as a place for the sanctuary.
5.Moreover, twenty-five thousand long and ten thousand wide shall be for the Levites who serve the temple, for their inheritance, twenty dwelling-places.
6.And you shall give in possession to the city five thousand wide and in length twenty-five thousand, alongside the holy excised portion. It shall belong to all the house of Israel.
7.And the Prince shall have both sides of the holy excised portion with the city’s possession, alongside the holy excised portion and the city’s possession from the west side, westward, and from the east side, eastward. And the length shall be alongside one of the portions, from the west border toward the east border.
8.For that land shall be his for a possession in Israel. And princes shall no longer oppress my people, but you shall give the land to the house of Israel for their tribes.”
9.Thus says the Lord God: Enough, you princes of Israel! Turn from violence and havoc! Do justice and righteousness! Cease from your evictions of my people, says the Lord God!
10.Let there be with you just balances, and a just ephah, and a just bath!
11.Let there be one measure for the ephah and the bath. The bath shall contain a tenth of a homer, and the ephah a tenth of a homer; the homer shall be the standard measurement.
12.The shekel shall be twenty gerahs. Twenty shekels and twenty-five shekels and fifteen shekels shall be your mina.
13.This is the excise offering which you shall make: a sixth of an ephah of each homer of wheat. You shall also bring a sixth of an ephah of each homer of barley.
14.And the due from a bath of oil is a tenth of the bath from the cor. Ten baths are a homer; yea, ten baths are a homer.
15.And one sheep from each flock of two hundred from the well-watered places of Israel for a grain offering, and a burnt offering, and peace offerings, to make atonement for them, says the Lord God.
16.All the people of the land shall contribute to this excise offering for the Prince in Israel.
17.And at the feasts, the new moons, and the Sabbaths – at all the appointed times of the house of Israel – the Prince’s part shall be the burnt offerings, and the grain offering, and the libation. He himself shall make the sin offering, with the grain offering, and the burnt offering, and the peace offerings, to make atonement on behalf of the house of Israel.
18.Thus says the Lord God: At the beginning of the first month, at the new moon, you shall take a bull from the herd, without blemish, and purify the sanctuary with a sin offering.
19.And the priest shall take some of the blood of the sin offering and put it on the doorpost of the temple, and the four corners of the ledge of the altar, and the gatepost at the gate of the inner courtyard.
20.Thus shall you do on the seventh day of the month for the man who errs inadvertently or out of ignorance. Thus shall you make atonement for the temple.
21.In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month, you shall keep the Passover Feast. Unleavened bread shall be eaten seven days.
22.And on that day, the Prince shall prepare for himself and for all the people of the land a bull for a sin offering.
23.And he shall provide on the seven days of the feast as a burnt offering to Jehovah seven bullocks and seven rams without blemish, each of the seven days, and goats each day for a sin offering.
24.And he shall prepare an ephah of grain offering with each bull, and an ephah with each ram, and hin of oil with each ephah.
25.In the seventh month, on the fifteenth day of the month, during the feast shall he provide like these for the seven days a sin offering, a burnt offering, and a grain offering with the oil.
Ezekiel 46
¶1. “Thus says the Lord God: The gate of the inner courtyard that faces east shall be shut the six working days, but on the Sabbath day, it shall be opened, and on the day of the new moon it shall be opened.
2.And the prince shall enter from the outside by way of the portico of the gate, and he shall stand by the gate-post while the priests offer his burnt offering and his peace offerings, and he shall bow down upon the threshold of the gate. Then shall he leave. But the gate shall not be shut until the evening.
3.And on the Sabbaths and on the new moons, the people of the land shall worship before the Lord at the opening of the gate,
4.And the burnt offering which the Prince shall offer before the Lord is six lambs without blemish and one ram without blemish,
5.and an ephah of grain offering for the ram, and a grain offering for the lambs as he is able to give, with a hin of oil for each ephah.
6.And on the day of the new moon, a bull of the herd, unblemished, and six lambs and a ram. They shall be unblemished.
7.And he shall provide a grain offering, an ephah for the bull and an ephah for the ram, and for the lambs as he is able to give, and a hin of oil for each ephah.
8.And when the Prince enters, he shall enter by way of the portico of the gate, and he shall go out the same way.
9.And when the people of the land come in before the Lord at the appointed times, he who comes in by way of the north gate to worship shall go out by way of the south gate, and he who comes in by way of the south gate to worship shall go out by way of the north gate. He shall not return by way of the gate by which he entered, but he shall go out straight ahead.
10.And the Prince shall come in among them when they come in, and he shall go out when they go out.
11.At the feasts and the appointed times, the grain offering shall be an ephah for the bull, and an ephah for the ram, and for the lambs as one is able to give, and a hin of oil for each ephah.
12.And when the Prince makes a freewill offering, a burnt offering or peace offerings as a freewill offering to Jehovah, then one shall open for him the gate facing east, and he shall make his burnt offering or his peace offerings just as he did on the Sabbath day, and then he shall go out, and he shall shut the gate after he goes out.
13.And a one-year-old lamb, without blemish, shall you offer as a burnt offering daily to Jehovah; morning by morning shall you offer it.
14.And a grain offering shall you place upon it each morning, one sixth of an ephah and one third of a hin of oil to moisten the fine flour, as a grain offering to Jehovah. It shall be a statute forever, continually.
15.And they shall offer the lamb, and the grain offering, and the oil morning by morning forever, continually.
¶16. “Thus says the Lord God: if the Prince gives a gift to one of his sons, it is his inheritance, it shall be to his sons; it is their possession by inheritance.
17.But if he gives a gift from his inheritance to one of his servants, then it shall be his until the Year of Liberty. Then it shall revert to the Prince. His inheritance is only for his sons; it is theirs.
18.And the Prince shall not take any of the inheritance of the people, to rob them of their inheritance. From his own inheritance shall he cause his sons to inherit, so that my people are not scattered, each from his inheritance.”
¶19. Then he brought me into the entrance that was beside the gate, to the holy chambers for the priests, which faced north. And behold, there was a place at their far western end.
20. And He said to me, “This is the place where the priests shall boil the trespass offering and the sin offering and bake the grain offering, so that they do not bring it out to the outer courtyard and transmit holiness to the people.”
21. Then He brought me to the outer courtyard and caused me to go about the four corners of the courtyard, and behold, there was a courtyard in every corner of the courtyard.
22. In the four corners of the courtyard were four small courtyards, by measure, thirty in length and width, their four corners were of one measure.
23. And within them was a row all around, around the four of them, with cooking-places made at the base of the rows round about.
24. Then He said to me, “These are the cooking-places where they who minister at the temple will boil the sacrifices of the people.”
Ezekiel 47
¶1. Then He brought me back to the door of the house, and behold, from underneath the threshold of the house water was flowing out eastward (for the front of the house was eastward), and then the water went down from underneath the right side of the house, from the south side, toward the altar.
2. And he brought me out by way of the north gate, and he led me around the road outside to the outer gate, the road that faces east, and behold, water was trickling from the right side.
3. Then going on eastward, the man with the line in his hand measured one thousand cubits. And he had me to pass through the water; the waters were ankle-deep.
4. Then he measured another thousand, and he had me to pass through the water; the water was knee-deep. And he measured another thousand, and he had me to pass through waters waist-deep.
5. And he measured another thousand, and it was a river that I was not able to pass through, for the water had risen and become waters for swimming, a river that could not be crossed.
6. And he said to me, “Son of man, do you see?” Then he led me and brought me back to the bank of the river.
7. And when he had brought me back, then behold, on the bank of the river were very many trees, on this side and that.
8. And he said to me, “These waters are going out toward the eastern region, and they descend to the Arabah, and then they will enter the sea when they have been brought forth to the sea, and its waters will be healed.
9. And it shall come to pass that every creature that swarms will live; wherever the streams go, they will live. And there will be very many fish because these waters went there, and they were healed. Everything lives where the stream goes in.
10. And it shall come to pass that fishermen will stand on its shore; from En-gedi to En-eglaim will be a place for the spreading of nets. Their fish will be of very many kinds, like the fish of the Great Sea.
11. Its swamps and marshes will not be healed; they are given for salt.
12. And on the river, on this bank and that, will grow every tree for food, whose leaf will not wither, and whose fruit will not fail. Month by month, each tree will bear new fruit because of the water which flows out from the sanctuary, and its fruit will be for food, and its leaves, for healing.
¶13. Thus says the Lord God: “This is the boundary by which you will divide the land as an inheritance to the twelve tribes of Israel. Joseph shall have a double portion.
14.And you shall divide it, each as his brother, because I swore I would give it to your fathers. And so, this land has fallen to you as an inheritance.
15.And this shall be the border of the land on the north side: from the Great Sea to the Hethlon Road, to the entrance of Zedad.
16.Hamath, Berothah, Sibraim (which is between the border of Damascus and the border of Hamath), Hazor-Hatticon which is on the border of Hauron.
17.And the border from the sea shall be Hazor-Enan at the border of Damascus, and on the north, northward, and the border of Hamath. This is the north side.
18.And the east side: you shall measure from between Hauron and Damascus, and between Gilead and the land of Israel, the Jordan from the border of the eastern sea. This is the east side.
19.And the south side, southward: from Tamar to the Waters of Meribah-Kadesh, to the Brook of Egypt, on to the Great Sea. This is the southern side, southward.
20.And the west side: the Great Sea, from opposite to the entrance of Hamath. This is the west side.
21.You shall divide this land among yourselves according to the tribes of Israel.
22.And it shall be that you apportion it by lot as an inheritance for yourselves and for the foreigners who sojourn among you who have come and begotten children among you. And they shall be to you as native sons of Israel; they shall be apportioned an inheritance with you, among the tribes of Israel.
23.And it shall be that within the tribe in which the sojourner sojourns, there shall you assign his inheritance, says the Lord God.”
Ezekiel 48
¶1.Now, these are the memorials of the tribes. At the northern end, along the Hethlon Road, the entrance of Hamath, Hazar-Enan at the northern border of Damascus, beside Hamath, and those areas belonging to it, from the east side to the west: Dan, one portion.
2. And on the border of Dan, from the east side to the west side: Asher, one portion.
3. And on the border of Asher, from the east side to the west side: Naphtali, one portion.
4. And on the border of Naphtali, from the east side to the west side: Manasseh, one portion.
5. And on the border of Manasseh, from the east side to the west side: Ephraim, one portion.
6. And on the border of Ephraim, from the east side to the west side: Reuben, one portion.
7. And on the border of Reuben, from the east side to the west side: Judah, one portion.
8. And on the border of Judah, from the east side to the west side, shall an excise offering [terumah], which you shall offer up, even twenty-five thousand measures wide, and in length as one of the other portions, from the east side to the west side. And the sanctuary shall be in the middle of it.
9. The excise offering which you shall offer up to Jehovah shall be twenty-five thousand measures long and twenty thousand wide.
10. And for these shall be the holy excise offering: the priests shall have, northward, twenty-five thousand measures, and on the west, ten thousand wide, and to the east, ten thousand wide, and southward, twenty-five thousand long. And the sanctuary of the Lord shall be in the middle of it.
11. For the consecrated priests of the sons of Zadok who kept my charge, who did not go astray when the sons of Israel went astray, as the Levites went astray.
12. And so, they shall have an excise offering from the offering of the land, a most holy place, by the border of the Levites.
13. And alongside the border of the priests, the Levites shall have twenty-five thousand measures in length and ten thousand in breadth. The entire length shall be twenty-five thousand, and the width, ten thousand.
14. And they may neither sell nor trade any of it, nor may the firstfruits of the land be alienated, for it is holy to the Lord.
15. And the five thousand in width that is left beside the twenty-five thousand, that is for common use for the city, for dwellings, and for open land. And the city shall be in the middle of it.
16. And these are its measurements: on the north side, four thousand five hundred; and on the east side, four thousand five hundred; and on the south side, four thousand five hundred; and on the west side, four thousand five hundred.
17. And there shall be open land for the city: on the north, two hundred fifty; on the south, two hundred fifty; on the east, two hundred fifty; on the west, two hundred fifty.
18. And the remaining length of the holy excised portion: ten thousand on the east; ten thousand on the west; ten thousand on the east; ten thousand on the east. And it shall be alongside the holy excised portion. And its produce shall be for food for the city workers.
19. And the workers of the city working it may come from all the tribes of Israel.
20. The entire excised portion shall be twenty-five thousand by twenty-five thousand, foursquare. You shall offer up the holy excised offering to be the city’s possession.
21. What remains on the two sides of the holy excised portion and the possession of the city shall belong to the Prince, twenty-five thousand from the sides of the excised portion to the eastern border, and to the western border twenty-five thousand, alongside the portions, for the Prince. And the holy excised portion, and the sanctuary of the house shall be in the middle of it.
22. And from the possession of the Levites and the possession of the city in the midst of that which belongs to the Prince, the Prince shall have the area between the border of Judah and the border of Benjamin.
23. And as for the rest of the tribes, from the east side to the west side: Benjamin, one portion.
24. And on the border of Benjamin, from the east side to the west side: Simeon, one portion.
25. And on the border of Simeon, from the east side to the west side: Issachar, one portion.
26. And on the border of Issachar, from the east side to the west side: Zebulun, one portion.
27. And on the border of Zebulun, from the east side to the west side: Gad, one portion.
28. And as for the border of Gad, on the south side, the border shall be from Tamar, to the Waters of Meribah-Kadesh, to the Brook of Egypt, on to the Great Sea.
29. This is the land you shall allot for an inheritance to the tribes of Israel, and these are their divisions, says the Lord God.
30. And these are the goings out of the cities: to the north shall be a measure of four thousand five hundred
31.(and the gates of the city will be according to the names of the tribes of Israel), three gates to the north: one, the Reuben Gate, one, the Judah Gate, one, the Levi Gate.
32. And on the eastern side shall be a measure of four thousand five hundred, with three gates: the Joseph Gate, one, the Benjamin Gate, one, the Dan Gate, one.
33. And on the southern side shall be a measure of four thousand five hundred, with three gates: the Simeon gate, one, the Issachar Gate, one, the Zebulun Gate, one.
34. And on the western side shall be a measure of four thousand five hundred. Their three gates: the Gad Gate, one, the Asher gate, one, the Naphtali Gate, one.
35. The measure around it shall be eighteen thousand, and from that time, the name of the city shall be Jehovah Shamah.[17]
Footnotes
[1] Hebrew uncertain.
[2] Hebrew uncertain.
[3] Hebrew uncertain.
[4] Hebrew uncertain.
[5] Hebrew, “he stood”.
[6] Hebrew uncertain.
[7] Hebrew: Bamah.
[8] Literally, “ – if I will not be King…” The curse intended with this oath is so unthinkable – God’s death and damnation – that it is not even uttered. See also, 36:7; 38:19.
[9] Hebrew uncertain.
[10] Hebrew uncertain,
[11] Hebrew uncertain.
[12] Or, “The company of Ashurites made your benches of ivory from the coasts of Kittim.”
[13] The meaning of this word is unknown.
[14] That is, a useless ally. Cf. 2Kgs. 18:21; Isa. 36:6; Ezek. 29:16.
[15] Hebrew uncertain.
[16] Or, “Multitude of Gog”.
[17] That is, “Jehovah is there.”