Day 186 of 365

¹He said to me, "Son of man, eat that which you find. Eat this scroll, and go, speak to the house of Israel."

²So I opened my mouth, and he caused me to eat the scroll.

³He said to me, "Son of man, cause your belly to eat, and fill your bowels with this scroll that I give you." Then I ate it; and it was as sweet as honey in my mouth.

⁴He said to me, "Son of man, go to the house of Israel, and speak my words to them.

⁵For you are not sent to a people of a strange speech and of a hard language, but to the house of Israel;

⁶not to many peoples of a strange speech and of a hard language, whose words you can not understand. Surely, if I sent you to them, they would listen to you.

⁷But the house of Israel will not listen to you; for they will not listen to me: for all the house of Israel are obstinate and hard-hearted.

⁸Behold, I have made your face hard against their faces, and your forehead hard against their foreheads.

⁹As an adamant harder than flint have I made your forehead: do not be afraid of them, neither be dismayed at their looks, though they are a rebellious house."

¹⁰Moreover he said to me, "Son of man, all my words that I shall speak to you receive in your heart, and hear with your ears.

¹¹Go to them of the captivity, to the children of your people, and speak to them, and tell them, 'Thus says the Lord God'; whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear.

¹²Then the Spirit lifted me up, and I heard behind me the voice of a great rushing, saying, "Blessed be the glory of the Lord from his place."

¹³I heard the noise of the wings of the living creatures as they touched one another, and the noise of the wheels beside them, even the noise of a great rushing.

¹⁴So the Spirit lifted me up, and took me away; and I went in bitterness, in the anger of my spirit; and the hand of the Lord was strong on me.

¹⁵Then I came to them of the exiles at Tel Aviv, that lived by the river Chebar, and to where they lived; and I sat there overwhelmed among them seven days.

¹⁶It happened at the end of seven days, that the word of the Lord came to me, saying,

¹⁷"Son of man, I have made you a watchman to the house of Israel: therefore hear the word from my mouth, and give them warning from me.

¹⁸When I tell the wicked, 'You shall surely die'; and you give him no warning, nor speak to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life; that wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at your hand.

¹⁹Yet if you warn the wicked, and he doesn't turn from his wickedness, nor from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity; but you have delivered your soul.

²⁰"Again, when a righteous man does turn from his righteousness, and commit iniquity, and I lay a stumbling block before him, he shall die: because you have not given him warning, he shall die in his sin, and his righteous deeds which he has done shall not be remembered; but his blood will I require at your hand.

²¹Nevertheless if you warn the righteous man, that the righteous not sin, and he does not sin, he shall surely live, because he took warning; and you have delivered your soul."

²²The hand of the Lord was there on me; and he said to me, "Arise, go forth into the plain, and I will there talk with you."

²³Then I arose, and went forth into the plain: and behold, the glory of the Lord stood there, as the glory which I saw by the river Chebar; and I fell on my face.

²⁴Then the Spirit entered into me, and set me on my feet; and he spoke with me, and said to me, "Go, shut yourself inside your house.

²⁵But you, son of man, behold, they shall lay bands on you, and shall bind you with them, and you shall not go out among them:

²⁶and I will make your tongue stick to the roof of your mouth, that you shall be mute, and shall not be to them a reprover; for they are a rebellious house.

²⁷But when I speak with you, I will open your mouth, and you shall tell them, 'Thus says the Lord God': He who hears, let him hear; and he who forbears, let him forbear: for they are a rebellious house.

¹"You also, son of man, take a tile, and lay it before yourself, and portray on it a city, even Jerusalem:

²and lay siege against it, and build forts against it, and cast up a mound against it; set camps also against it, and plant battering rams against it all around.

³Take for yourself an iron pan, and set it for a wall of iron between you and the city: and set your face toward it, and it shall be besieged, and you shall lay siege against it. This shall be a sign to the house of Israel.

⁴"Moreover lie on your left side, and lay the iniquity of the house of Israel on it; according to the number of the days that you shall lie on it, you shall bear their iniquity.

⁵For I have appointed the years of their iniquity to be to you a number of days, even three hundred ninety days: so you shall bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.

⁶"Again, when you have accomplished these, you shall lie on your right side, and shall bear the iniquity of the house of Judah: forty days, each day for a year, have I appointed it to you.

⁷You shall set your face toward the siege of Jerusalem, with your arm uncovered; and you shall prophesy against it.

⁸Behold, I lay bands on you, and you shall not turn you from one side to the other, until you have accomplished the days of your siege.

⁹"Take for yourself also wheat, and barley, and beans, and lentils, and millet, and spelt, and put them in one vessel, and make bread of it; according to the number of the days that you shall lie on your side, even three hundred ninety days, you shall eat of it.

¹⁰Your food which you shall eat shall be by weight, twenty shekels a day: from time to time you shall eat it.

¹¹You shall drink water by measure, the sixth part of a hin: from time to time you shall drink.

¹²You shall eat it as barley cakes, and you shall bake it in their sight with dung that comes out of man."

¹³The Lord said, "Even thus shall the children of Israel eat their bread unclean, among the nations where I will drive them."

¹⁴Then I said, "Ah Lord God! Behold, my soul has not been polluted; for from my youth up even until now have I not eaten of that which dies of itself, or is torn of animals; neither came there abominable flesh into my mouth."

¹⁵Then he said to me, "Behold, I have given you cow's dung for man's dung, and you shall prepare your bread thereon."

¹⁶Moreover he said to me, "Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread in Jerusalem: and they shall eat bread by weight, and with fearfulness; and they shall drink water by measure, and in dismay:

¹⁷that they may want bread and water, and be dismayed one with another, and pine away in their iniquity.

¹"You, son of man, take a sharp sword; You shall take it as a barber's razor to you, and shall cause it to pass on your head and on your beard: then take balances to weigh, and divide the hair.

²A third part you shall burn in the fire in the midst of the city, when the days of the siege are fulfilled; and you shall take a third part, and strike with the sword around it; and a third part you shall scatter to the wind, and I will draw out a sword after them.

³You shall take of it a few in number, and bind them in your skirts.

⁴Of these again you shall take, and cast them into the midst of the fire, and burn them in the fire; from it shall a fire come forth into all the house of Israel."

⁵"Thus says the Lord God: 'This is Jerusalem; I have set her in the midst of the nations, and countries are around her.

⁶She has rebelled against my ordinances in doing wickedness more than the nations, and against my statutes more than the countries that are around her; for they have rejected my ordinances, and as for my statutes, they have not walked in them.'

⁷"Therefore thus says the Lord God: 'Because you are turbulent more than the nations that are around you, and have not walked in my statutes, neither have kept my ordinances, neither have done after the ordinances of the nations that are around you';

⁸therefore thus says the Lord God: 'Behold, I, even I, am against you; and I will execute judgments in the midst of you in the sight of the nations.

⁹I will do in you that which I have not done, and whereunto I will not do any more the like, because of all your abominations.

¹⁰Therefore the fathers shall eat the sons in the midst of you, and the sons shall eat their fathers; and I will execute judgments on you; and the whole remnant of you will I scatter to all the winds.'

¹¹"'Therefore as I live,' says the Lord God, 'surely, because you have defiled my sanctuary with all your detestable things, and with all your abominations, therefore will I also diminish you; neither shall my eye spare, and I also will have no pity.

¹²A third part of you shall die with the pestilence, and with famine shall they be consumed in the midst of you; and a third part shall fall by the sword around you; and a third part I will scatter to all the winds, and will draw out a sword after them.

¹³Thus shall my anger be accomplished, and I will cause my wrath toward them to rest, and I shall be comforted; and they shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken in my zeal, when I have accomplished my wrath on them.

¹⁴Moreover I will make you a desolation and a reproach among the nations that are around you, in the sight of all that pass by.

¹⁵So it shall be a reproach and a taunt, an instruction and an astonishment, to the nations that are around you, when I shall execute judgments on you in anger and in wrath, and in wrathful rebukes; (I, the Lord, have spoken it;)

¹⁶when I shall send on them the evil arrows of famine, that are for destruction, which I will send to destroy you: and I will increase the famine on you, and will break your staff of bread;

¹⁷and I will send on you famine and evil animals, and they shall bereave you; and pestilence and blood shall pass through you; and I will bring the sword on you: I, the Lord, have spoken it.'"

¹The word of the Lord came to me, saying,

²"Son of man, set your face toward the mountains of Israel, and prophesy to them,

³and say, 'You mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord God: Thus says the Lord God to the mountains and to the hills, to the watercourses and to the valleys: "Behold, I, even I, will bring a sword on you, and I will destroy your high places.

⁴Your altars shall become desolate, and your incense altars shall be broken; and I will cast down your slain men before your idols.

⁵I will lay the dead bodies of the children of Israel before their idols; and I will scatter your bones around your altars.

⁶In all your dwelling places the cities shall be laid waste, and the high places shall be desolate; that your altars may be laid waste and made desolate, and your idols may be broken and cease, and your incense altars may be cut down, and your works may be abolished.

⁷The slain shall fall in the midst of you, and you shall know that I am the Lord.

⁸"'"Yet will I leave a remnant, in that you shall have some that escape the sword among the nations, when you shall be scattered through the countries.

⁹Those of you that escape shall remember me among the nations where they shall be carried captive, how that I have been broken with their lewd heart, which has departed from me, and with their eyes, which play the prostitute after their idols: and they shall loathe themselves in their own sight for the evils which they have committed in all their abominations.

¹⁰They shall know that I am the Lord: I have not said in vain that I would bring this disaster on them."'"

¹¹"Thus says the Lord God: 'Strike with your hand, and stamp with your foot, and say, "Alas!" because of all the evil abominations of the house of Israel; for they shall fall by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence.

¹²He who is far off shall die of the pestilence; and he who is near shall fall by the sword; and he who remains and is besieged shall die by the famine: thus will I accomplish my wrath on them.

¹³You shall know that I am the Lord, when their slain men shall be among their idols around their altars, on every high hill, on all the tops of the mountains, and under every green tree, and under every thick oak, the places where they offered pleasant aroma to all their idols.

¹⁴I will stretch out my hand on them, and make the land desolate and waste, from the wilderness toward Diblah, throughout all their habitations: and they shall know that I am the Lord."'"