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“Then the people in the towns of Israel will go out and pick up your small and large shields, bows and arrows, javelins and spears, and they will use them for fuel. There will be enough to last them seven years! 10 They won’t need to cut wood from the fields or forests, for these weapons will give them all the fuel they need. They will plunder those who planned to plunder them, and they will rob those who planned to rob them, says the Sovereign Lord.

11 “And I will make a vast graveyard for Gog and his hordes in the Valley of the Travelers, east of the Dead Sea.[a] It will block the way of those who travel there, and they will change the name of the place to the Valley of Gog’s Hordes. 12 It will take seven months for the people of Israel to bury the bodies and cleanse the land. 13 Everyone in Israel will help, for it will be a glorious victory for Israel when I demonstrate my glory on that day, says the Sovereign Lord.

14 “After seven months, teams of men will be appointed to search the land for skeletons to bury, so the land will be made clean again. 15 Whenever bones are found, a marker will be set up so the burial crews will take them to be buried in the Valley of Gog’s Hordes. 16 (There will be a town there named Hamonah, which means ‘horde.’) And so the land will finally be cleansed.

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Footnotes

  1. 39:11 Hebrew the sea.

The Aftermath of the Battle

“After all this happens, the people who live in the cities of Israel will be kindling fires for seven years, using small shields, large shields, bows, arrows, clubs, personal weapons, and spears to do so. 10 They won’t need to cut down trees from the fields nor gather firewood from the forests, because they will light fires with the weapons as they plunder the plunderers and loot the looters!” declares the Lord God. 11 “When all of this happens, I’m going to set aside a grave site for Gog in Israel’s Traveler’s Valley,[a] near the approach[b] to the Dead Sea. She[c] will block off everyone who tries to bypass it. There they will bury Gog, and rename the area ‘Valley of Gog’s Gang’.[d] 12 The house of Israel will be burying them for seven months in order to purify the land. 13 Everyone in the land will be involved in the burials, and this will serve as a reminder for them that I have glorified myself,” declares the Lord God. 14 “Men will be assigned to travel continuously throughout the land, exploring for seven full months as they go about burying the bodies that remain from the battle[e] on the surface of the ground, so that the land may be sterilized. 15 As scouts go searching throughout the land, whenever they see someone’s bones, they will place a sign beside the remains until the remains have been buried in the Valley of Gog’s Gang. 16 They’ll also name the city that is there ‘Hamonah,’[f] as they purify the land.”

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Footnotes

  1. Ezekiel 39:11 Lit. in the Crossover Valley; or Israel, the valley where people cross
  2. Ezekiel 39:11 I.e. to the north, as one travels from Jerusalem
  3. Ezekiel 39:11 MT does not identify the woman
  4. Ezekiel 39:11 Lit. Gog’s Crowd’ and so in v. 15
  5. Ezekiel 39:14 The Heb. lacks from the battle
  6. Ezekiel 39:16 The Heb. name means The Crowds