EzekielChapter 5

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¹"Now, son of man, take a sharp sword. Use it like a barber's razor to shave your head and your beard. Then take a set of scales and divide up the hair. ²When the days of the siege are over, burn a third of the hair inside the city. Take another third and cut it up with the sword all around the city. Scatter the last third to the wind. For I will chase after them with a drawn sword. ³But take a few strands of hair and tuck them into the folds of your robe. ⁴Again, take a few of these and throw them into the fire. Burn them up. From there a fire will spread to the whole house of Israel. ⁵This is what the Lord GOD says: 'This is Jerusalem. I put her in the center of the nations, with countries all around her. ⁶But she has rebelled against my laws. She has been more wicked than the nations. She has rebelled against my rules, worse than the countries around her. For her people have rejected my laws. They have not lived by my rules.' ⁷So this is what the Lord GOD says: 'You have been more disobedient than the nations around you. You have not lived by my rules or kept my laws. You have not even kept the laws of the nations around you.' ⁸So this is what the Lord GOD says: 'Look, I myself am against you, Jerusalem. I will punish you while the nations watch. ⁹Because of all your disgusting acts, I will do something to you that I have never done before. I will never do anything like it again. ¹⁰Because of this, fathers among you will eat their sons. And sons will eat their fathers. I will punish you. I will scatter all your survivors to every wind.' ¹¹So as surely as I live, says the Lord GOD, I myself will take away my favor. This is because you have made my holy place unclean with all your disgusting idols and evil acts. I will not look on you with pity. I will not spare you. ¹²A third of your people will die of disease or starve to death inside your walls. A third will be killed by the sword outside your walls. And a third I will scatter to every wind. I will chase after them with a drawn sword. ¹³Then my anger will be used up. I will have poured out my fury on them, and I will be satisfied. When I have used up my fury on them, they will know that I, the LORD, have spoken in my burning jealousy. ¹⁴I will make you a ruin. You will be a disgrace among the nations around you. Everyone who passes by will see it. ¹⁵You will be put to shame and mocked. You will be a warning and a horror to the nations around you. That is what will happen when I punish you in anger, fury, and raging wrath. I, the LORD, have spoken. ¹⁶I will shoot at you with the deadly arrows of famine and ruin. I will send them to destroy you. I will make the famine worse and worse. I will cut off your food supply. ¹⁷I will send famine and wild animals against you. They will leave you without children. Disease and killing will sweep through you. I will bring the sword against you. I, the LORD, have spoken."