1A wind lifted me up and brought me to the east gate of the Lord's temple that faces the east. There, at the entrance of the gate, I noticed twenty-five men. Among them I saw Jaazaniah son of Azzur and Pelatiah son of Benaiah, officials of the people.
5Then the Spirit of the LORD came upon me and said to me, "Say: This is what the LORD says: 'This is what you are thinking, O house of Israel; I know what goes through your minds.
7Therefore, this is what the sovereign LORD says: 'The corpses you have dumped in the midst of the city are the meat, and this city is the cooking pot, but I will take you out of it.
12Then you will know that I am the LORD, whose statutes you have not followed and whose regulations you have not carried out. Instead you have behaved according to the regulations of the nations around you!'"
13Now, while I was prophesying, Pelatiah son of Benaiah died. Then I threw myself face down and cried out with a loud voice, "Alas, sovereign LORD! You are completely wiping out the remnant of Israel!"
15"Son of man, your brothers, your relatives, and the whole house of Israel, all of them are those to whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, 'They have gone far away from the LORD; to us this land has been given as a possession.'
16"Therefore say: 'This is what the sovereign LORD says: Although I have removed them far away among the nations and have dispersed them among the countries, I have been a little sanctuary for them among the lands where they have gone.'
17"Therefore say: 'This is what the sovereign LORD says: When I regather you from the peoples and assemble you from the lands where you have been dispersed, I will give you back the country of Israel.'
19I will give them one heart and I will put a new spirit within them; I will remove the hearts of stone from their bodies and I will give them tender hearts,
24Then a wind lifted me up and carried me to the exiles in Babylonia, in the vision given to me by the Spirit of God. Then the vision I had seen went up from me.
