Ezekiel 5

¹And you , O son of man , take a sharp sword . Use it as a barber’s razor and pass it over your head and your beard . Then take balances for weighing and divide the hair.

²A third part you shall burn in the fire in the midst of the city , when the days of the siege are completed . And a third part you shall take and strike with the sword all around the city. And a third part you shall scatter to the wind , and I will unsheathe the sword after them.

³And you shall take from these a small number and bind them in the skirts of your robe.

⁴And of these again you shall take some and cast them into the midst of the fire and burn them in the fire . From there a fire will come out into all the house of Israel .

⁵Thus says the Lord God: This is Jerusalem . I have set her in the center of the nations , with countries all around her.

⁶And she has rebelled against my rules by doing wickedness more than the nations , and against my statutes more than the countries all around her; for they have rejected my rules and have not walked in my statutes .

⁷Therefore thus says the Lord God: Because you are more turbulent than the nations that are all around you, and have not walked in my statutes or obeyed my rules , and have not even acted according to the rules of the nations that are all around you,

⁸therefore thus says the Lord God: Behold , I, even I , am against you. And I will execute judgments in your midst in the sight of the nations .

⁹And because of all your abominations I will do with you what I have never yet done , and the like of which I will never do again .

¹⁰Therefore fathers shall eat their sons in your midst , and sons shall eat their fathers . And I will execute judgments on you, and any of you who survive I will scatter to all the winds .

¹¹Therefore , as I live , declares the Lord God, surely , because you have defiled my sanctuary with all your detestable things and with all your abominations , therefore I will withdraw . My eye will not spare , and I will have no pity .

¹²A third part of you shall die of pestilence and be consumed with famine in your midst ; a third part shall fall by the sword all around you; and a third part I will scatter to all the winds and will unsheathe the sword after them.

¹³Thus shall my anger spend itself , and I will vent my fury upon them and satisfy myself. And they shall know that I am the Lord —that I have spoken in my jealousy — when I spend my fury upon them.

¹⁴Moreover, I will make you a desolation and an object of reproach the nations all around you and in the sight of all who pass by .

¹⁵You shall be a reproach and a taunt , a warning and a horror , to the nations all around you, when I execute judgments on you in anger and fury , and with furious rebukes — I am the Lord; I have spoken —

¹⁶when I send against you the deadly arrows of famine , arrows for destruction , which I will send to destroy you, and when I bring more and more famine upon you and break your supply of bread .

¹⁷I will send famine and wild beasts against you, and they will rob you of your children . Pestilence and blood shall pass through you, and I will bring the sword upon you. I am the Lord; I have spoken .