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Judgment On Evil Rulers

¹ And the Spirit lifted me up, and it brought me to the eastern gate, the one facing east, of the temple^[a] of Yahweh. And look, there were twenty-five men in the doorway of the gate, and I saw Jaazaniah the son of Azzur in the midst of them, and Pelatiah the son of Benaiah, the commanders of the people. ² And he said to me, "Son of man,^[b] these are the men who devise mischief,^[c] and who are offering bad counsel in this city, ³ who are saying, "The building of houses is not near; the city is the pot, and we are the flesh. ⁴ Therefore prophesy against them! Prophesy, son of man!"^[d]

⁵ And the Spirit of Yahweh fell on me, and he said to me, "Say, ‘thus says Yahweh: "This is what you think, house of Israel, and I myself know them,^[e] the thoughts of your spirit. ⁶ You made your slain ones numerous in this city, and you have filled its streets with slain ones."'^{[f] 7} Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: "Your slain ones whom you put in its midst, they are the flesh, and it is the pot, and I^[g] will bring you out from its midst. ⁸ The sword you have feared, and the sword I will bring against you!" declares^[h] the Lord Yahweh. ⁹ "And I will bring you out from its midst, and I will give you into the hand of strangers, and I will execute judgments against you. ¹⁰ By the sword you will fall at the border of Israel; I will judge you, and you will know that I am Yahweh. ¹¹ It will not be as a pot to you, and so you would be^[i] in the midst of it as flesh, for at the border of Israel I will judge you. ¹² And you will know that I am Yahweh, whose^[j] rules you did not follow, and whose^[k] regulations you did not do, but according to the regulations of the nations that are around you, you acted."'^[l]

¹³ And it happened that as I was prophesying,^[m] Pelatiahu the son of Benaiahu died! And I fell on my face, and I cried with a loud voice, and I said, "Ah, Lord Yahweh, you are making a complete destruction of the remnant of Israel!" ¹⁴ And the word of Yahweh came^[n] to me, saying,^{[o] 15} "Son of man,^[p] your brothers, your brothers, the men of your redemption, and all of the house of Israel, all of it, who said concerning the inhabitants of Jerusalem,^[q] ‘They are far from Yahweh, therefore to us this land was given as a possession.' ¹⁶ Therefore say, ‘Thus says the Lord Yahweh: "Though I have removed them far away among the nations and though I have scattered them among the countries, yet I was a sanctuary to them for a little while in the countries to which they have gone.'"^{[r] 17} Therefore say, ‘Thus says the Lord Yahweh: "And I will assemble you from the peoples, and I will gather you from the countries to which you were scattered among them, and I will give the land of Israel to you. ¹⁸ And when they come there, then they will remove all of its vile idols and all of its detestable things from it. ¹⁹ And I will give to them one heart, and a new spirit I will give^[s] in their inner parts. And I will remove their^[t] heart of stone from their body, and I will give to them a heart of flesh, ²⁰ so that they may walk in my statutes, and they will keep my regulations, and they will do them, and they will be to me a people, and I myself will be to them as God. ²¹ But to^[u] the heart of their abominations and the detestable things their heart is going. I will bring their way on their head," declares^[v] the Lord Yahweh.'"

²² Then^[w] the cherubim lifted up their wings, and their^[x] wheels were beside them, and the glory of the God of Israel was over them.^{[y] 23} And the glory of Yahweh went up from the midst of the city, and it stood still on the mountain that is to the east of the city. ²⁴ And the Spirit lifted me up, and it brought me to Chaldea, to the exiles,^[z] in the vision by the spirit of God; and the vision that I had seen left me.^{[aa] 25} And I spoke to the exiles^[ab] all of the words of Yahweh that he had shown me.