Study Desk

"Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, every one according to his ways," says the Lord GOD. "Repent, and turn from all your transgressions, so that iniquity will not be your ruin.

He knew their desolate places, [fn] And laid waste their cities;The land with its fullness was desolatedBy the noise of his roaring.

They put him in a cage with chains, And brought him to the king of Babylon; They brought him in nets, That his voice should no longer be heard on the mountains of Israel.

Then I said to them, "Each of you, throw away the abominations which are before his eyes, and do not defile yourselves with the idols of Egypt. I am the LORD your God.'

"As for you, O house of Israel," thus says the Lord GOD: "Go, serve every one of you his idols--and hereafter--if you will not obey Me; but profane My holy name no more with your gifts and your idols.

In his right hand is the divination for Jerusalem: to set up battering rams, to call for a slaughter, to lift the voice with shouting, to set battering rams against the gates, to heap up a siege mound, and to build a wall.

"Look, the princes of Israel: each one has used his power to shed blood in you.

One commits abomination with his neighbor's wife; another lewdly defiles his daughter-in-law; and another in you violates his sister, his father's daughter.

"Son of man, write down the name of the day, this very day--the king of Babylon started his siege against Jerusalem this very day.

He will direct his battering rams against your walls, and with his axes he will break down your towers.

Because of the abundance of his horses, their dust will cover you; your walls will shake at the noise of the horsemen, the wagons, and the chariots, when he enters your gates, as men enter a city that has been breached.

With the hooves of his horses he will trample all your streets; he will slay your people by the sword, and your strong pillars will fall to the ground.

Speak, and say, 'Thus says the Lord God: "Behold, I am against you,O Pharaoh king of Egypt,O great monster who lies in the midst of his rivers,Who has said, 'My River [fn] is my own;I have made it for myself.'

"Son of man, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon caused his army to labor strenuously against Tyre; every head was made bald, and every shoulder rubbed raw; yet neither he nor his army received wages from Tyre, for the labor which they expended on it.

Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: "Surely I will give the land of Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon; he shall take away her wealth, carry off her spoil, and remove her pillage; and that will be the wages for his army.

I have given him the land of Egypt for his labor, because they worked for Me,' says the Lord GOD.

He and his people with him, the most terrible of the nations, Shall be brought to destroy the land; They shall draw their swords against Egypt, And fill the land with the slain.

Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: "Surely I am against Pharaoh king of Egypt, and will break his arms, both the strong one and the one that was broken; and I will make the sword fall out of his hand.

I will strengthen the arms of the king of Babylon and put My sword in his hand; but I will break Pharaoh's arms, and he will groan before him with the groanings of a mortally wounded man.

"Son of man, say to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to his multitude: "Whom are you like in your greatness?