Ezekiel 4
Lexham English Bible
Siege of Jerusalem Illustrated on a Brick
4 “Now,[a] son of man,[b] take for yourself a brick, and you must put it before you,[c] and you must portray on it a city, Jerusalem. 2 And you must build against it siege works, and you must build against it a bulwark, and you must heap against it a siege ramp, and you must set up against it camps and put against it a battering ram all around. 3 And take for yourself a plate of iron, and you must place it as a wall of iron between you and the city, and you must set your face against it, and it must be under siege,[d] and you must lay the siege against it; it is a sign for the house of Israel. 4 And you, lie down on your left side, and you must put[e] the guilt of the house of Israel on it. You will carry their guilt the number of days that you will lie on it. 5 And I will give to you the years of their guilt according to the number of the days, three hundred and ninety days, and you must bear the guilt[f] of the house of Israel. 6 When you have completed these, then you must lie a second time on your right side; and you must bear the guilt[g] of the house of Judah forty days, a day for each year, a day for each year I give it to you. 7 And toward the siege of Jerusalem you must set your face and your bared arm; then you must prophesy against it. 8 Now[h] look! I will put on you cords, and you may not turn yourself from one side to your other side until you complete the days of your siege.
Ezekiel’s Strange Defiled Meal
9 “And you, take for yourself[i] wheat and barley and beans and lentils and millet[j] and spelt, and you must put them in one vessel, and you must make them for yourself[k] into a food during the number of days that you are lying on your side; three hundred and ninety days you shall eat it. 10 And your food that you will eat[l] will be according to weight; twenty shekels for each day at fixed times[m] you shall eat it. 11 And an amount of water[n] you shall drink, a sixth of a hin; at fixed times[o] you shall drink it. 12 And as a bread-cake of barley you shall eat it, and with human excrement[p] you shall bake it before their eyes.” 13 And Yahweh said, “Thus shall the Israelites[q] eat their unclean food among the nations where I will scatter them.”[r] 14 And I said, “Ah, Lord Yahweh! Look! I have not been defiling myself, and a dead body and mangled carcass I have not eaten from my childhood until now, and unclean meat[s] has not come into my mouth!” 15 And he said to me, “See I will give you cattle manure[t] in the place of the feces of a human, and you may prepare your food on it.” 16 And he said to me, “Son of man,[u] look, I am going to break the supply[v] of bread in Jerusalem, and they will eat bread by weight, anxiously,[w] and rationed water,[x] and they will drink with horror, 17 so that they will lack food and water, and they will be appalled with one another,[y] and they will waste away because of their guilt.[z]
Footnotes
- Ezekiel 4:1 Or “And”
- Ezekiel 4:1 Or “mortal,” or “son of humankind”
- Ezekiel 4:1 Literally “to the face of you”
- Ezekiel 4:3 Literally “in the siege”
- Ezekiel 4:4 Or “you will put”
- Ezekiel 4:5 Or “punishment”
- Ezekiel 4:6 Or “punishment”
- Ezekiel 4:8 Or “and”
- Ezekiel 4:9 Hebrew “you”
- Ezekiel 4:9 Or “sorghum”
- Ezekiel 4:9 Hebrew “you”
- Ezekiel 4:10 Hebrew “will eat it”
- Ezekiel 4:10 Literally “from time to time”
- Ezekiel 4:11 Literally “water by amount”
- Ezekiel 4:11 Literally “from time to time”
- Ezekiel 4:12 Literally “with human dung of the excrement of the human”
- Ezekiel 4:13 Literally “sons/children of Israel”
- Ezekiel 4:13 Literally “which I will scatter them there”
- Ezekiel 4:14 Literally “flesh of unclean meat”
- Ezekiel 4:15 Literally “the manure of cattle”
- Ezekiel 4:16 Or “mortal,” or “son of humankind”
- Ezekiel 4:16 Literally “staff”
- Ezekiel 4:16 Literally “and with worry”
- Ezekiel 4:16 Literally “and water by amount”
- Ezekiel 4:17 Literally “a man and his brother”
- Ezekiel 4:17 Or “punishment”
Ezekiel 4
World English Bible
4 “You also, son of man, take a tile, and lay it before yourself, and portray on it a city, even Jerusalem. 2 Lay siege against it, build forts against it, and cast up a mound against it. Also set camps against it and plant battering rams against it all around. 3 Take for yourself an iron pan, and set it for a wall of iron between you and the city. Then set your face toward it. It will 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. 5 For 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. I have appointed forty days, each day for a year, to you. 7 You shall set your face toward the siege of Jerusalem, with your arm uncovered; and you shall prophesy against it. 8 Behold, I put ropes on you, and you shall not turn yourself from one side to the other, until you have accomplished the days of your siege.
9 “Take for yourself also wheat, barley, beans, lentils, millet, and spelt, and put them in one vessel. Make bread of it. According to the number of the days that you will lie on your side, even three hundred ninety days, you shall eat of it. 10 Your food which you shall eat shall be by weight, twenty shekels[a] a day. From time to time you shall eat it. 11 You shall drink water by measure, the sixth part of a hin.[b] From time to time you shall drink. 12 You shall eat it as barley cakes, and you shall bake it in their sight with dung that comes out of man.” 13 Yahweh said, “Even thus will the children of Israel eat their bread unclean, among the nations where I will drive them.”
14 Then I said, “Ah Lord Yahweh! Behold, my soul has not been polluted; for from my youth up even until now I have not eaten of that which dies of itself, or is torn of animals. No abominable meat has come into my mouth!”
15 Then he said to me, “Behold, I have given you cow’s dung for man’s dung, and you shall prepare your bread on it.”
16 Moreover he said to me, “Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread in Jerusalem. They will eat bread by weight, and with fearfulness. They will drink water by measure, and in dismay; 17 that they may lack bread and water, be dismayed one with another, and pine away in their iniquity.
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