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¹“As for you, son of man, take a sharp sword; take and use it as a barber’s razor on your head and beard. Then take scales for weighing and divide the hair.

²A third you shall burn in the fire at the center of the city, when the days of the siege are completed. Then you shall take a third and strike it with the sword all around the city, and a third you shall scatter to the wind; for I will unsheathe a sword behind them.

³Take also a few hairs in number from them and bind them in the hems of your robes.

⁴Take again some of them and throw them into the fire and burn them in the fire; from it a fire will spread to all the house of Israel.

⁵“This is what the Lord GOD says: ‘This is Jerusalem; I have placed her at the center of the nations, with lands around her.

⁶But she has rebelled against My ordinances more wickedly than the nations, and against My statutes more than the lands which surround her; for they have rejected My ordinances and have not walked in My statutes.’

⁷Therefore, this is what the Lord GOD says: ‘Because you have more turmoil than the nations that surround you and have not walked in My statutes, nor executed My ordinances, nor acted in accordance with the ordinances of the nations around you,’

⁸therefore, this is what the Lord GOD says: ‘Behold, I, even I, am against you, and I will execute judgments among you in the sight of the nations.

⁹And because of all your abominations I will do among you what I have not done, and the like of which I will never do again.

¹⁰Therefore, fathers will eat their sons among you, and sons will eat their fathers; for I will execute judgments on you and scatter all your remnant to every wind.

¹¹Therefore as I live,’ declares the Lord GOD, ‘Because you have defiled My sanctuary with all your detestable idols and with all your abominations, I definitely will also withdraw and My eye will have no pity, and I also will not spare.

¹²A third of you will die by plague or perish by famine among you, a third will fall by the sword around you, and a third I will scatter to every wind, and I will unsheathe a sword behind them.

¹³‘Then My anger will be spent and I will satisfy My wrath on them, and I will be appeased; then they will know that I, the LORD, have spoken in My zeal, when I have spent My wrath upon them.

¹⁴Moreover, I will make you a site of ruins and a disgrace among the nations that surround you, in the sight of everyone who passes by.

¹⁵So it will be a disgrace, an object of abuse, a warning, and an object of horror to the nations that surround you when I execute judgments against you in anger, wrath, and raging reprimands. I, the LORD, have spoken.

¹⁶When I send against them the deadly arrows of famine which were for the destruction of those whom I will send to destroy you, then I will also intensify the famine upon you and break off your provision of bread.

¹⁷I will send on you famine and vicious animals, and they will bereave you of children; plague and bloodshed also will pass through you, and I will bring the sword on you. I, the LORD, have spoken.’ ”

¹Now 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

³and say, ‘Mountains of Israel, listen to the word of the Lord GOD! This is what the Lord GOD says to the mountains, the hills, the ravines, and the valleys: “Behold, I Myself am going to bring a sword against you, and I will destroy your high places.

⁴So your altars will become deserted and your incense altars will be smashed; and I will make your slain fall in front of your idols.

⁵I will also lay the dead bodies of the sons of Israel in front of their idols; and I will scatter your bones around your altars.

⁶Everywhere you live, cities will be in ruins and the high places will be deserted, so that your altars will be in ruins and deserted, your idols will be broken and brought to an end, your incense altars will be cut down, and your works wiped out.

⁷The slain will fall among you, and you will know that I am the LORD.

⁸“However, I will leave a remnant, in that you will have those who escaped the sword among the nations when you are scattered among the countries.

⁹Then those of you who escape will remember Me among the nations to which they will be taken captive, how I have been hurt by their adulterous hearts which turned away from Me, and by their eyes which committed infidelity with their idols; and they will loathe themselves in their own sight for the evils which they have committed, for all their abominations.

¹⁰Then they will know that I am the LORD; I have not said in vain that I would inflict this disaster on them.” ’

¹¹“This is what the Lord GOD says: ‘Clap your hands, stamp your foot and say, “Woe, because of all the evil abominations of the house of Israel, which will fall by the sword, famine, and plague!

¹²Anyone who is far away will die by the plague, anyone who is near will fall by the sword, and anyone who remains and is spared from these will die by the famine. So I will expend My wrath on them.

¹³Then you will know that I am the LORD, when their dead are among their idols around their altars, on every high hill, on all the tops of the mountains, under every leafy tree and under every massive oak with thick branches—the places where they offered a soothing aroma to all their idols.

¹⁴So through all their dwelling places I will stretch out My hand against them and make the land more desolate and waste than the wilderness toward Diblah; so they will know that I am the LORD.” ’ ”

¹Moreover, the word of the LORD came to me, saying,

²“And you, son of man, this is what the Lord GOD says to the land of Israel: ‘An end! The end is coming on the four corners of the land.

³Now the end is upon you, for I will send My anger against you; I will judge you according to your ways and bring all your abominations upon you.

⁴And My eye will have no pity on you, nor will I spare you, but I will bring your ways upon you, and your abominations will be among you; then you will know that I am the LORD!’

⁵“This is what the Lord GOD says: ‘A disaster, a unique disaster, behold, it is coming!

⁶An end is coming; the end has come! It has awakened against you; behold, it has come!

⁷Your doom has come to you, you inhabitant of the land. The time has come, the day is near—panic rather than joyful shouting on the mountains.

⁸Now I will shortly pour out My wrath on you and expend My anger against you; I will judge you according to your ways and bring on you all your abominations.

⁹My eye will have no pity nor will I spare you. I will repay you according to your ways, while your abominations are in your midst; then you will know that I, the LORD, am striking.

¹⁰‘Behold, the day! Behold, it is coming! Your doom has gone forth; the rod has budded, arrogance has blossomed.

¹¹Violence has grown into a rod of wickedness. None of them shall remain, none of their people, none of their wealth, nor anything eminent among them.

¹²The time has come, the day has arrived. Let neither the buyer rejoice nor the seller mourn; for wrath is against all their multitude.

¹³Indeed, the seller will not regain what he sold as long as they both live; for the vision regarding all their multitude will not be averted, nor will any of them maintain his life by his wrongdoing.

¹⁴‘They have blown the trumpet and made everything ready, but no one is going to the battle, for My wrath is against all their multitude.

¹⁵The sword is outside the city and the plague and the famine are within. Anyone who is in the field will die by the sword, while famine and the plague will consume those in the city.

¹⁶Even when their survivors escape, they will be on the mountains like doves of the valleys, all of them moaning, each over his own wrongdoing.

¹⁷All hands will hang limp, and all knees will drip with water.

¹⁸They will put on sackcloth and shuddering will overwhelm them; and shame will be on all faces, and a bald patch on all their heads.

¹⁹They will fling their silver into the streets, and their gold will become an abhorrent thing; their silver and their gold will not be able to save them on the day of the wrath of the LORD. They cannot satisfy their appetite, nor can they fill their stomachs, because their wrongdoing has become a cause of stumbling.

²⁰Moreover, they transformed the splendor of His jewels into pride, and they made the images of their abominations and their detestable things with it; therefore I will make it an abhorrent thing to them.

²¹And I will hand it over to the foreigners as plunder, and to the wicked of the earth as spoils; and they will profane it.

²²I will also turn My face away from them, and they will profane My treasure; then robbers will enter and profane it.

²³‘Make the chain, for the land is full of bloody crimes, and the city is full of violence.

²⁴Therefore, I will bring the worst of the nations, and they will take possession of their houses. I will also put an end to the pride of the strong ones, and their holy places will be profaned.

²⁵When anguish comes, they will seek peace, but there will be none.

²⁶Disaster will come upon disaster and rumor will be added to rumor; then they will seek a vision from a prophet, but the Law will be lost from the priest, and counsel from the elders.

²⁷The king will mourn, the prince will be clothed in horror, and the hands of the people of the land will tremble. I will deal with them because of their conduct, and by their judgments I will judge them. And they will know that I am the LORD.’ ”

¹Now it came about in the sixth year, on the fifth day of the sixth month, as I was sitting in my house with the elders of Judah sitting before me, that the hand of the Lord GOD fell upon me there.

²Then I looked, and behold, something like the appearance of a man; from His waist and downward there was the appearance of fire, and from His waist and upward like the appearance of a glow, like gleaming metal.

³And He extended the form of a hand and took me by the hair of my head; and the Spirit lifted me up between earth and heaven and brought me in the visions of God to Jerusalem, to the entrance of the north gate of the inner courtyard, where the seat of the idol of jealousy, which provokes to jealousy, was located.

⁴And behold, the glory of the God of Israel was there, like the appearance which I saw in the plain.

⁵Then He said to me, “Son of man, raise your eyes now toward the north.” So I raised my eyes toward the north, and behold, to the north of the altar gate was this idol of jealousy at the entrance.

⁶And He said to me, “Son of man, do you see what they are doing, the great abominations which the house of Israel are committing here, so that I would be far from My sanctuary? But yet you will see still greater abominations!”

⁷Then He brought me to the entrance of the courtyard, and when I looked, behold, a hole in the wall.

⁸And He said to me, “Son of man, now dig through the wall.” So I dug through the wall, and behold, an entrance.

⁹Then He said to me, “Go in and see the wicked abominations that they are committing here.”

¹⁰So I entered and looked, and behold, every form of crawling things and animals and detestable things, with all the idols of the house of Israel, were carved on the wall all around.

¹¹And standing in front of them were seventy elders of the house of Israel, with Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan standing among them, each man with his censer in his hand; and the fragrance of the cloud of incense was rising.

¹²Then He said to me, “Do you see, son of man, what the elders of the house of Israel are doing in the dark, each man in the rooms of his carved images? For they say, ‘The LORD does not see us; the LORD has abandoned the land.’ ”

¹³And He said to me, “Yet you will see still greater abominations which they are committing!”

¹⁴Then He brought me to the entrance of the gate of the LORD’S house which was toward the north; and behold, women were sitting there weeping for Tammuz.

¹⁵And He said to me, “Do you see this, son of man? Yet you will see still greater abominations than these!”

¹⁶Then He brought me into the inner courtyard of the LORD’S house. And behold, at the entrance to the temple of the LORD, between the porch and the altar, were about twenty-five men with their backs to the temple of the LORD while their faces were toward the east; and they were prostrating themselves eastward toward the sun.

¹⁷And He said to me, “Do you see this, son of man? Is it a trivial thing for the house of Judah to commit the abominations which they have committed here, that they have filled the land with violence and provoked Me to anger repeatedly? Yet behold, they are putting the twig to their nose!

¹⁸Therefore, I indeed will deal in wrath. My eye will have no pity nor will I spare; and though they cry out in My ears with a loud voice, yet I will not listen to them.”