EzekielChapter 22

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¹Then the LORD gave me this message. He said, ²"Son of man, will you judge her? Will you judge the city that is full of killing? Then show her all the disgusting things she has done. ³Tell her that this is what the Lord GOD says: 'You are a city that brings ruin on herself. You kill people inside your walls. You make idols that make you unclean. ⁴You are guilty because of the blood you have spilled. You are unclean because of the idols you have made. You have brought your days to a close. You have come to the end of your years. So I have made you something the nations laugh at. All the lands make fun of you. ⁵People near and far will make fun of you. You are a city with a bad name, full of chaos. ⁶Look at how every prince of Israel in you has used his power to kill people. ⁷In you, people treat their father and mother with scorn. Inside your walls, they take advantage of foreigners. They mistreat orphans and widows. ⁸You have looked down on my holy things. You have dishonored my Sabbaths. ⁹Among you are men who tell lies about others so that people will be killed. In you are people who eat at the shrines on the mountains. They do shameful sexual things. ¹⁰In you men sleep with their father's wife. In you they force women to have sex during their monthly time of being unclean. ¹¹One man does a disgusting thing with his neighbor's wife. Another man wickedly sleeps with his daughter-in-law. Yet another forces himself on his sister, his own father's daughter. ¹²In you people take bribes to kill others. You charge interest on loans and make huge profits. You cheat your neighbors to get their money. And you have forgotten me, declares the Lord GOD. ¹³Now look! I clap my hands together in anger at the money you got unfairly. I am angry at the blood you have spilled among you. ¹⁴Will you still be brave on the day I deal with you? Will your hands still be strong? I, the LORD, have spoken, and I will do it. ¹⁵I will scatter you among the nations. I will spread you out through many lands. I will clean out your filth. ¹⁶You will have made yourself unclean in front of the nations. Then you will know that I am the LORD.'" ¹⁷Then the LORD gave me this message. He said, ¹⁸"Son of man, the people of Israel have become like dross to me. All of them are like copper, tin, iron, and lead inside the furnace. They are only the waste left over from silver.a ¹⁹So this is what the Lord GOD says: 'All of you have become waste. So I will gather you into Jerusalem. ²⁰People gather silver, copper, iron, lead, and tin into a furnace. They blow fire on it to melt it. In the same way, I will gather you in my anger and fury. I will put you there and melt you. ²¹Yes, I will gather you together. I will blow on you with the fire of my fury. And you will be melted inside the city. ²²Silver is melted in a furnace. In the same way, you will be melted inside the city. Then you will know that I, the LORD, have poured out my fury on you.'" ²³The LORD gave me this message. He said, ²⁴"Son of man, say to her, 'You are a land that has not been made clean. No rain has fallen on you in the day of my anger.' ²⁵Her princes plot together inside her. They are like a roaring lion tearing apart what it has caught. They eat up the people. They grab treasures and valuable things. They make many women into widows inside her. ²⁶Her priests do violence to my law. They dishonor my holy things. They do not show the difference between what is holy and what is common. They do not teach the difference between what is clean and what is unclean. They close their eyes to my Sabbaths. So I am dishonored among them. ²⁷Her officials inside her are like wolves tearing apart what they have caught. They spill blood. They destroy people's lives to get money by cheating. ²⁸Her prophets cover up these deeds, like painting a wall with whitewash. They do it with false visions and fortune-telling that is full of lies. They say, 'This is what the Lord GOD says.' But the LORD has not spoken. ²⁹The people of the land cheat others and rob them. They mistreat the poor and needy. They take advantage of foreigners and treat them unfairly. ³⁰I looked for a man among them who would fix the wall. I looked for someone to stand in the gap in front of me for the land. Then I would not have to destroy it. But I found no one. ³¹So I have poured out my anger on them. I have burned them up with the fire of my fury. I have brought on their own heads what they have done, declares the Lord GOD."