Ezekiel 7–9

Chapter 7

¹And the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying, ²And thou, son of man, thus saith the Lord Jehovah unto the land of Israel: An end, the end is come upon the four corners of the land. ³Now is the end upon thee; and I will send mine anger upon thee, and will judge thee according to thy ways, and will bring upon thee all thine abominations. ⁴And mine eye shall not spare thee, neither will I have pity; but I will bring thy ways upon thee, and thine abominations shall be in the midst of thee; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah. ⁵Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: An evil, an only evil! behold, it is come. ⁶The end is come, the end is come; it awaketh against thee: behold, it cometh. ⁷The doom is come unto thee, inhabitant of the land; the time is come, the day is near, —tumult, and not the joyous cry from the mountains. ⁸Now will I soon pour out my fury upon thee, and accomplish mine anger against thee; and I will judge thee according to thy ways, and will bring upon thee all thine abominations. ⁹And mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity: I will render unto thee according to thy ways, and thine abominations shall be in the midst of thee; and ye shall know that it is I, Jehovah, that smite. ¹⁰Behold the day, behold, it is come: the doom is gone forth; the rod hath blossomed, pride is full blown. ¹¹Violence is risen up into a rod of wickedness: nothing of them shall remain, nor of their multitude, nor of their wealth, nor of the magnificence in the midst of them. ¹²The time is come, the day draweth near: let not the buyer rejoice, nor the seller mourn; for fierce anger is upon all the multitude thereof. ¹³For the seller shall not return to that which is sold, even though he were yet alive amongst the living: for the vision is touching the whole multitude thereof; it shall not be revoked; and none shall through his iniquity assure his life. ¹⁴They have blown the trumpet and made all ready, but none goeth to the battle; for my fierce anger is upon all the multitude thereof. ¹⁵The sword is without, and the pestilence and the famine within: he that is in the field shall die by the sword; and he that is in the city, famine and pestilence shall devour him.

¹⁶And they that escape of them shall escape, and shall be on the mountains like doves of the valleys, all of them moaning, every one for his iniquity. ¹⁷All hands shall be feeble, and all knees shall melt into water. ¹⁸And they shall gird on sackcloth, and horror shall cover them; and shame shall be upon all faces, and baldness upon all their heads. ¹⁹They shall cast their silver in the streets, and their gold shall be as an impurity: their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of Jehovah’s wrath; they shall not satisfy their souls, neither fill their belly; for it hath been the stumbling-block of their iniquity. ²⁰And he set in majesty his beautiful ornament; but they made therein the images of their abominations and of their detestable things: therefore have I made it an impurity unto them. ²¹And I will give it into the hands of strangers for a prey, and to the wicked of the earth for a spoil; and they shall profane it. ²²And I will turn my face from them; and they shall profane my secret place; and the violent shall enter into it, and profane it.

²³Make the chain; for the land is full of bloody crimes, and the city is full of violence. ²⁴Therefore will I bring the worst of the nations, and they shall possess their houses; and I will make the pride of the strong to cease; and their sanctuaries shall be profaned. ²⁵Destruction cometh; and they shall seek peace, but there shall be none. ²⁶Mischief shall come upon mischief, and rumour shall be upon rumour; and they shall seek a vision from a prophet; but the law shall perish from the priest, and counsel from the elders. ²⁷The king shall mourn, and the prince shall be clothed with dismay, and the hands of the people of the land shall tremble: I will do unto them according to their way, and with their judgments will I judge them; and they shall know that I am Jehovah.

Chapter 8

¹And it came to pass in the sixth year, in the sixth month, on the fifth of the month, that as I sat in my house, and the elders of Judah sat before me, the hand of the Lord Jehovah fell there upon me. ²And I looked, and behold, a likeness as the appearance of fire; from the appearance of his loins and downward, fire; and from his loins and upward, as the appearance of brightness, as the look of glowing brass. ³And he stretched forth the form of a hand, and took me by a lock of my head; and the Spirit lifted me up between the earth and the heavens, and brought me in the visions of God to Jerusalem, to the entry of the inner gate that looketh toward the north, where was the seat of the image of jealousy, which provoketh to jealousy. ⁴And behold, the glory of the God of Israel was there, according to the appearance that I saw in the valley. ⁵And he said unto me, Son of man, lift up now thine eyes toward the north. And I lifted up mine eyes toward the north, and behold, northward of the gate of the altar, this image of jealousy in the entry. ⁶And he said unto me, Son of man, seest thou what they do? the great abominations that the house of Israel commit here, to cause me to go far off from my sanctuary? And yet again thou shalt see great abominations.

⁷And he brought me to the entry of the court, and I looked, and behold, a hole in the wall. ⁸And he said unto me, Son of man, dig now through the wall; and I digged through the wall, and behold, a door. ⁹And he said unto me, Go in, and behold the wicked abominations that they do here. ¹⁰And I went in and looked, and behold, every form of creeping thing and abominable beast, and all the idols of the house of Israel, portrayed upon the wall round about. ¹¹And there stood before them seventy men of the elders of the house of Israel, and in the midst of them stood Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan, with every man his censer in his hand; and a thick cloud of incense went up. ¹²And he said unto me, Hast thou seen, son of man, what the elders of the house of Israel do in the dark, every one in his chambers of imagery? for they say, Jehovah seeth us not; Jehovah hath forsaken the land.

¹³And he said unto me, Yet again thou shalt see great abominations which they do. ¹⁴And he brought me to the entry of the gate of Jehovah’s house that was toward the north; and behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz. ¹⁵And he said unto me, Seest thou, son of man? Thou shalt yet again see greater abominations than these. ¹⁶And he brought me into the inner court of Jehovah’s house, and behold, at the entry of the temple of Jehovah, between the porch and the altar, were about five and twenty men, with their backs toward the temple of Jehovah and their faces toward the east; and they worshipped the sun toward the east. ¹⁷And he said unto me, Seest thou, son of man? Is it a light thing to the house of Judah to commit the abominations which they commit here, that they yet fill the land with violence, and keep provoking me afresh to anger? And behold, they put the branch to their nose. ¹⁸And I also will deal in fury: mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity; and though they cry in mine ears with a loud voice, I will not hear them.

Chapter 9

¹And he cried in mine ears with a loud voice, saying, Draw near, ye that have charge of the city, and every man with his destroying weapon in his hand. ²And behold, six men came from the way of the upper gate, which is turned toward the north, and every man with his slaughter weapon in his hand; and in the midst of them, one man clothed with linen, with a writer’s ink-horn by his side; and they went in, and stood beside the brazen altar. ³And the glory of the God of Israel was gone up from the cherub, whereupon it was, to the threshold of the house; and he called to the man clothed with linen, who had the writer’s ink-horn by his side; ⁴and Jehovah said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that are done in the midst thereof.

⁵And to the others he said in my hearing, Go after him through the city, and smite: let not your eye spare, neither have pity. ⁶Slay utterly the old man, the young man, and the maiden, and little children, and women; but come not near any man upon whom is the mark; and begin at my sanctuary. Then they began at the elders who were before the house. ⁷And he said unto them, Defile the house, and fill the courts with the slain: go forth. And they went forth, and smote in the city. ⁸And it came to pass, while they were smiting, and I was left, that I fell upon my face, and cried, and said, Ah, Lord Jehovah! wilt thou destroy all the remnant of Israel in thy pouring out of thy fury upon Jerusalem? ⁹And he said unto me, The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceeding great, and the land is full of blood, and the city full of perverseness; for they say, Jehovah hath forsaken the earth, and Jehovah seeth not. ¹⁰And as for me also, mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity: I will recompense their way upon their head. ¹¹And behold, the man clothed with linen, who had the ink-horn by his side, reported the matter, saying, I have done as thou hast commanded me.