Moff EZE Chapter 16

◄ EZE 16 ► ║ ═ ©

16 This word from the Eternal also came to me: 2 “Son of man, put the loathsomeness of Jerusalem before her, 3 and proclaim this word of the Lord the Eternal to Jerusalem:

Your origin and birth are from the land of Canaanites; your father was an Amorite, your mother a Hittite. 4 As for your birth, on the day you were born no one cut your navel- string, no one washed you clean with water, no one rubbed salt on you or swaddled you, 5 none looked with pity on you to do any such service to you; you were thrown out on the open field, a loathed object, on the day that you were born. 6 But as I passed and saw you weltering in your own blood, I said to you, as you lay thus weltering in your blood, ‘Live!’ 7 I brought you up, till you throve like a plant, growing tall and strong; you came to womanhood, your breasts were formed, your hair grew long. But you were bare and naked. 8 Then, as I passed, I saw you were ripe for love; so I spread my robe over you, to cover your nakedness, and pledged myself to you in marriage, making a compact with you--says the Lord the Eternal. Thus did you become my own. 9 I bathed you in water, I washed all the blood off you, and anointed you with oil; 10 I decked you with embroidered robes, I shod you with Egyptian leather, I swathed you in fine linen, I clothed you in silk; 11 I adorned you with finery, bracelets on your arms, a necklace round your throat, 12 a ring on your nose, ear-rings in your ears, and a lovely crown upon your head.

13 You were adorned with silver and gold, robed in fine linen and silk and embroidered robes; your food was fine flour, honey, and oil. You blossomed into a great beauty, 14 and the fame of your beauty went over the world; your beauty was perfect, through the splendour of my endowment--says the Lord the Eternal.

15 But, trusting to your beauty, in the fame of it you played the harlot; you lavished your favours upon any passer-by. 16 You took your robes to make gay tents of love, where you played the harlot’s trade. 17 You took the fine jewels of gold and silver that I had given to you, and made yourself human figures, with which you played the harlot; 18 you covered these idols with my embroidered robes, you offered them my oil and incense: 19 the food I gave you, my fine flour and oil and honey, that I fed you with, you burned for them as fragrant smoke--says the Lord the Eternal. 20 The sons and daughters that you bore me, these you took and burned to them in sacrifice. Was your harlotry not enough, 21 that you must murder my children and burn them alive for these idols of yours? 22 And amid all your loathsomeness and harlotry you never remembered your own early days, when you lay bare and naked, when you were weltering in your blood. 23 And now, to crown your vice (woe betide you! woe betide you! says the Lord the Eternal), 24 you have raised a shrine for yourself, a resort in every street; 25 you have raised your shrines at every street comer, prostituting your beauty, offering your body to any passer-by, in many an act of harlotry. 26 You have played the harlot with your neighbours, the sensual Egyptians; over and over again have you done it, to provoke my anger. 27 [[So I struck at you, I cut down your rations and handed you over to the will of your foes, the Philistine towns, themselves ashamed of your lascivious life.]] 28 You have played the harlot with the Assyrians, so insatiable was your lust; and even then you were not satisfied. 29 You repeated your harlotry over and again with Chaldea, the traders’ land; but even that left you unsatisfied. 30 What a passion consumes you, says the Lord the Eternal, to act like this!--to live like an abandoned harlot, 31 raising your shrine at every street corner, with a resort in every street. True, you were no harlot! You scorned to be paid for your favours! 32 [[O adulterous wife, taking strangers instead of your husband!]] 33 No, harlots receive presents, but you gave presents to all your lovers; you bribed them to come from all quarters to your embraces! 34 You were the opposite of other harlots; no man had to solicit you, and no man had to pay you; this made you the opposite of other harlots!

35 You harlot, listen to what the Eternal has to say. 36 The Lord the Eternal declares: For the lavishing of your favours, for the unbaring of your body in your harlot’s play with your lovers, for all your detestable idols, and for the murder of your children whom you gave up to them, 37 I will gather all the lovers with whom you have lain, all you loved and all you did not love, I will gather them all round you and expose you to their gaze, baring your nakedness to them; 38 I will punish you as women are punished for unfaithfulness and for child-murder, I will let my fury and jealousy work on you their bloody doom; 39 I will leave you to your lovers, and they shall pull down your shrines and break down your resorts, stripping you of your clothes, robbing you of your fine jewels, and leaving you bare and naked; 40 they shall collect a crowd, to stone you and cut you to pieces with their swords; 41 they shall let many a woman witness your punishment by burning your houses. So will I put a stop to your harlotry; no more bribes from you! 42 It will appease my fury, I will cease being jealous of you, I will be quiet, and angry no more. 43 It is because you never remembered your early days, but roused me to rage with all your doings, that I will make you suffer for your conduct, says the Lord the Eternal. Oh that you had not been foully unfaithful!

44 Everyone who quotes proverbs will quote this proverb against you, ‘Like mother, like daughter!’ 45 You are the daughter of a mother who scorned her husband and her children. And you are the sister of women who scorned their husbands and their children. Your mother was a Hittite, your father was an Amorite. 46 Your elder sister is Samaria, with her daughters, to the north; your younger sister is Sodom, with her daughters, to the south. 47 You did not live as they lived, you did not follow their detestable ways? No, that would not have been enough! You lived a life still more depraved than theirs. 48 By my life! says the Lord Eternal, your sister Sodom and her daughters have not been so bad as you and your daughters. 49 This was your sister Sodom’s crime: she and her daughters lived in pride, in plenty, and in careless ease; she never lent a hand to the weak and wretched. 50 Haughty they grew, and they committed detestable impieties before my face. So I swept them off, when I noticed it. 51 Nor has Samaria committed half your sins. No, you have committed more detestable impieties than they have; yours serve to palliate your sisters’ crimes, and that is some consolation to them; 52 you must endure the shame of lessening your sisters’ guilt by your far more abominable life; you make them out better than yourself--take the shame and the disgrace of that to yourself!

53 I will restore their fortunes, the fortunes of Sodom and her daughters and the fortunes of Samaria and her daughters, and your fortunes along with theirs 54 --to make you feel the shame and the disgrace of having been some consolation to them. 55 When Sodom and Samaria, your sisters, and their daughters, regain their former state, you and your daughters also shall regain your former state. 56 Yet was not Sodom a byword in your mouth, during your days of pride, before your nakedness was exposed? 57 And now you are, like her, the scorn of the daughters of Edom and the malignant daughters of the Philistines around. 58 You bear the penalty of your lasciviousness and your abominable life, says the Lord the Eternal. 59 For this is the Lord the Eternal’s decision: I will repay you for your conduct, for scorning the marriage-oath by breaking our compact. 60 Yet I will remember my compact with you in the days of your youth; I will ratify a lasting compact with you; 61 then you will remember how you have lived and be ashamed as you receive your sisters, the elder and the younger, when I give them to you as daughters. 62 It shall not be through your compact with me; no, I will ratify my own compact with you, that you may learn that I am the Eternal, 63 that you may remember and be ashamed and be silent under your disgrace, when I forgive you for all you have done. The Lord the Eternal has spoken.”

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