International Standard Version | NET Bible |
1"Now as for you, Son of Man, you are to go find a sharp sword and use it like a barber's razor. You are to cut your hair and beard. Then you are to take a weighing scale and divide your shaved hair into three parts. | 1"As for you, son of man, take a sharp sword and use it as a barber's razor. Shave off some of the hair from your head and your beard. Then take scales and divide up the hair you cut off. |
2You are to burn a third of it in the middle of the city when you've finished your siege. Next, you are to take another third of it and beat it with your sword. Last, you are to scatter the remaining third to the wind, after which I'll unsheathe my sword and pursue them. | 2Burn a third of it in the fire inside the city when the days of your siege are completed. Take a third and slash it with a sword all around the city. Scatter a third to the wind, and I will unleash a sword behind them. |
3You are to preserve a few strands of hair and hide them in the folds of your garment. | 3But take a few strands of hair from those and tie them in the ends of your garment. |
4Then you are to take a few strands, throw them in the fire, and incinerate them. A fire will proceed to the house of Israel from there." | 4Again, take more of them and throw them into the fire, and burn them up. From there a fire will spread to all the house of Israel. |
5"This is what the Lord GOD says, 'This is Jerusalem. I placed her in the center of nations, with many nations surrounding her. | 5"This is what the sovereign LORD says: This is Jerusalem; I placed her in the center of the nations with countries all around her. |
6But she rebelled against my ordinances and my statutes. She practiced more evil than all the nations and territories around her. They rejected my ordinances and didn't live by my statutes.' | 6Then she defied my regulations and my statutes, becoming more wicked than the nations and the countries around her. Indeed, they have rejected my regulations, and they do not follow my statutes. |
7"Therefore this is what the Lord GOD says: 'Because you're more disrespectful than the nations that surround you, you didn't follow my statutes or follow my ordinances. You didn't even follow the ordinances of the surrounding nations!' | 7"Therefore this is what the sovereign LORD says: Because you are more arrogant than the nations around you, you have not followed my statutes and have not carried out my regulations. You have not even carried out the regulations of the nations around you! |
8"Therefore this is what the Lord GOD says: 'Watch out! I—that's right, even I—am against you. I'll carry out my sentence among you right in front of the nations. | 8"Therefore this is what the sovereign LORD says: I--even I--am against you, and I will execute judgment among you while the nations watch. |
9In fact, I'm going to do what I've never done before and what I'll never again do, because of all of your loathsome behavior: | 9I will do to you what I have never done before and will never do again because of all your abominable practices. |
10Fathers will eat their children in your midst. After this, your sons will eat their fathers as I carry out my sentence against you and scatter your survivors to the winds!' | 10Therefore fathers will eat their sons within you, Jerusalem, and sons will eat their fathers. I will execute judgments on you, and I will scatter any survivors to the winds. |
11"Therefore, as sure as I live," declares the Lord GOD, "because you've defiled my sanctuary with every loathsome thing and every abomination, I'll restrain myself, and I'll show neither pity nor compassion. | 11"Therefore, as surely as I live, says the sovereign LORD, because you defiled my sanctuary with all your detestable idols and with all your abominable practices, I will withdraw; my eye will not pity you, nor will I spare you. |
12A third of you will die by pestilence, starving because of the famine in your midst. Another third will die violently by the violence of war around you. The final third I'll scatter to the wind as I unsheathe my sword to pursue them. | 12A third of your people will die of plague or be overcome by the famine within you. A third of your people will fall by the sword surrounding you, and a third I will scatter to the winds. I will unleash a sword behind them. |
13"Only then will I stop being angry—my burning in anger. Then they'll know that I've spoken out in my arduous anger. Only then will my burning anger against them be exhausted. | 13Then my anger will be fully vented; I will exhaust my rage on them, and I will be appeased. Then they will know that I, the LORD, have spoken in my jealousy when I have fully vented my rage against them. |
14I'm also going to turn you into a waste and an object of insult among the nations that surround you and in front of every person who passes by. | 14"I will make you desolate and an object of scorn among the nations around you, in the sight of everyone who passes by. |
15As a result, Jerusalem will become an insult, an object of taunt, an example of chastisement, and a useless waste to all the nations that surround you when I carry out my sentence against you in my anger, my burning rage, and my burning rebukes. I, the LORD, have spoken it. | 15You will be an object of scorn and taunting, a prime example of destruction among the nations around you when I execute judgments against you in anger and raging fury. I, the LORD, have spoken! |
16I'll send arrows of severe famine in their direction, meant for destruction, which I'll shoot, intending to destroy them. I'll make you have more and more famines that will attack you, and I'll disrupt your source of food. | 16I will shoot against them deadly, destructive arrows of famine, which I will shoot to destroy you. I will prolong a famine on you and will remove the bread supply. |
17"I'll send famine and wild beasts against you that will rob you of your children. Pestilence and bloodshed will devastate you when I'll declare war on you. I, the LORD, have spoken." | 17I will send famine and wild beasts against you and they will take your children from you. Plague and bloodshed will overwhelm you, and I will bring a sword against you. I, the LORD, have spoken!" |
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