Ezekiel 29

Chapter 29

Judgment of Egypt

¹In the ^atenth year, in the tenth month, on the twelfth of the month, the word of the Lord came to me saying,

²“Son of man, set your face against ^aPharaoh king of Egypt and prophesy against him and against all ^bEgypt.

³“Speak and say, ‘Thus says the Lord ¹God,

“Behold, I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt,

The great ^2amonster that lies in the midst of his ³rivers,

That ^bhas said, ‘My Nile is mine, and I myself have made it.’

⁴“I will put ^ahooks in your jaws

And make the fish of your ¹rivers cling to your scales.

And I will bring you up out of the midst of your rivers,

And all the fish of your rivers will cling to your scales.

⁵“I will ^aabandon you to the wilderness, you and all the fish of your ¹rivers;

You will fall on the ²open field; you will not be brought together or ^3bgathered.

I have given you for ^cfood to the beasts of the earth and to the birds of the sky.

⁶“Then all the inhabitants of Egypt will know that I am the Lord,

Because they have been only a ^astaff made of reed to the house of Israel.

⁷“When they took hold of you with the hand,

You ^abroke and tore all their ¹hands;

And when they leaned on you,

You broke and made all their loins ²quake.”

⁸‘Therefore thus says the Lord God, “Behold, I will ^abring upon you a sword and I will cut off from you man and beast.

⁹“The ^aland of Egypt will become a desolation and waste. Then they will know that I am the Lord.

Because ¹you ^bsaid, ‘The Nile is mine, and I have made it,’

¹⁰therefore, behold, I am ^aagainst you and against your ¹rivers, and I will make the land of Egypt an utter waste and desolation, from Migdol to Syene and even to the border of ²Ethiopia.

¹¹“A man’s foot will ^anot pass through it, and the foot of a beast will not pass through it, and it will not be inhabited for forty years.

¹²“So I will make the land of Egypt a desolation in the ^amidst of desolated lands. And her cities, in the midst of cities that are laid waste, will be desolate forty years; and I will ^bscatter the Egyptians among the nations and disperse them among the lands.”

¹³‘For thus says the Lord God, “At the end of forty years I will ^agather the Egyptians from the peoples ¹among whom they were scattered.

¹⁴“I will turn the fortunes of Egypt and make them return to the land of ^aPathros, to the land of their origin, and there they will be a lowly kingdom.

¹⁵“It will be the ^alowest of the kingdoms, and it will never again lift itself up above the nations. And I will make them so small that they will not ^brule over the nations.

¹⁶“And it will never again be the ^aconfidence of the house of Israel, ^1bbringing to mind the iniquity of their having turned ²to Egypt. Then they will know that I am the Lord God.” ’ ”

¹⁷Now in the ^atwenty-seventh year, in the first month, on the first of the month, the word of the Lord came to me saying,

¹⁸“Son of man, ^aNebuchadnezzar king of Babylon made his army labor ¹hard against Tyre; every head was made ^bbald and every shoulder was rubbed bare. But he and his army had no wages from Tyre for the labor that he had ²performed against it.”

¹⁹Therefore thus says the Lord God, “Behold, I ^awill give the land of Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon. And he will carry off her ^1bwealth and capture her spoil and seize her plunder; and it will be wages for his army.

²⁰“I have given him the land of Egypt for his labor which he ^1aperformed, because they acted for Me,” declares the Lord God.

²¹“On that day I will make a ^ahorn sprout for the house of Israel, and I will ^1bopen your mouth in their midst. Then they will know that I am the Lord.”