¹⁹ “And son of man, appoint for yourself two ways for the sword of the king of Babylon to go; both of them shall go from the same land. Make a sign; put it at the head of the road to the city.

The Siege of Jerusalem Portrayed

4 “You also, son of man, take a clay tablet and lay it before you, and portray on it a city, Jerusalem. ^2 (A)Lay siege against it, build a ^(B)siege wall against it, and heap up a mound against it; set camps against it also, and place battering rams against it all around. ³ Moreover take for yourself an iron plate, and set it as an iron wall between you and the city. Set your face against it, and it shall be ^(C)besieged, and you shall lay siege against it. ^(D)This will be a sign to the house of Israel.

A Sword Against Jerusalem

5 “And you, son of man, take a sharp sword, take it as a barber’s razor, ^(A)and pass it over your head and your beard; then take scales to weigh and divide the hair. ^2 (B)You shall burn with fire one-third in the midst of ^(C)the city, when ^(D)the days of the siege are finished; then you shall take one-third and strike around it with the sword, and one-third you shall scatter in the wind: I will draw out a sword after ^(E)them. ^3 (F)You shall also take a small number of them and bind them in the edge of your garment. ⁴ Then take some of them again and ^(G)throw them into the midst of the fire, and burn them in the fire. From there a fire will go out 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 the countries all around her. ⁶ She has rebelled against My judgments by doing wickedness more than the nations, and against My statutes more than the countries that are all around her; for they have refused My judgments, and they have not walked in My statutes.’ ⁷ Therefore thus says the Lord God: ‘Because you have ^[a]multiplied disobedience more than the nations that are all around you, have not walked in My statutes ^(H)nor kept My judgments, ^[b]nor even done according to the judgments of the nations that are all around you’— ⁸ therefore thus says the Lord God: ‘Indeed I, even I, am against you and will execute judgments in your midst in the sight of the nations. ^9 (I)And I will do among you what I have never done, and the like of which I will never do again, because of all your abominations. ¹⁰ Therefore fathers ^(J)shall eat their sons in your midst, and sons shall eat their fathers; and I will execute judgments among you, and all of you who remain I will ^(K)scatter to all the winds.

¹¹ ‘Therefore, as I live,’ says the Lord God, ‘surely, because you have ^(L)defiled My sanctuary with all your ^(M)detestable things and with all your abominations, therefore I will also diminish you; ^(N)My eye will not spare, nor will I have any pity. ^12 (O)One-third of you shall die of the pestilence, and be consumed with famine in your midst; and one-third shall fall by the sword all around you; and ^(P)I will scatter another third to all the winds, and I will draw out a sword after ^(Q)them.

¹³ ‘Thus shall My anger ^(R)be spent, and I will ^(S)cause My fury to rest upon them, ^(T)and I will be avenged; ^(U)and they shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken it in My zeal, when I have spent My fury upon them. ¹⁴ Moreover ^(V)I will make you a waste and a reproach among the nations that are all around you, in the sight of all who pass by.

¹⁵ ‘So ^[c]it shall be a ^(W)reproach, a taunt, a ^(X)lesson, and an astonishment to the nations that are all around you, when I execute judgments among you in anger and in fury and in ^(Y)furious rebukes. I, the Lord, have spoken. ¹⁶ When I ^(Z)send against them the terrible arrows of famine which shall be for destruction, which I will send to destroy you, I will increase the famine upon you and cut off your ^(AA)supply of bread. ¹⁷ So I will send against you famine and ^(AB)wild beasts, and they will bereave you. ^(AC)Pestilence and blood shall pass through you, and I will bring the sword against you. I, the Lord, have spoken.’ ”