The Sins of Jerusalem
And the word of the LORD came to me, saying:
And you, son of man, will you judge? Will you judge the city of blood? Then make her know all her abominations.
And say: Thus says the Lord GOD: A city shedding blood in her midst, so that her time may come, and making idols for herself to be defiled.
By your blood that you shed you have become guilty, and by your idols that you made you have been defiled. And you have brought your days near and have come to your years; therefore I have made you a reproach to the nations and a mockery to all the lands.
Those near and those far from you will mock you, unclean of name, great of tumult.
See, the leaders of Israel, each by his own arm, have been in you to shed blood.
Father and mother they have treated lightly in you; to the sojourner they have acted with oppression in your midst; orphan and widow they have wronged in you.
My holy things you have despised, and my sabbaths you have profaned.
Men of slander have been in you to shed blood; and on the mountains they have eaten in you; depravity they have done in your midst.
A father nakedness has been uncovered in you; the unclean woman in her impurity they have violated in you.
And one has done abomination with his neighbor wife, and another has defiled his daughter-in-law in depravity, and another in you has violated his sister, his father daughter.
A bribe they have taken in you to shed blood. Interest and increase you have taken, and you have gained from your neighbors by oppression; and me you have forgotten, the utterance of the Lord GOD.
And see, I have struck my palm at your unjust gain that you made, and at your blood that has been in your midst.
Will your heart stand, will your hands be firm, in the days when I deal with you? I the LORD have spoken, and I have done it.
And I will scatter you among the nations and disperse you through the lands, and I will consume your uncleanness out of you.
And you will be profaned in yourself before the eyes of the nations, and you will know that I am the LORD.
The Refining Furnace
And the word of the LORD came to me, saying:
Son of man, the house of Israel has become dross to me. All of them are bronze and tin and iron and lead in the midst of a furnace; dross of silver they have become.
Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: Because all of you have become dross, therefore see, I am gathering you into the midst of Jerusalem.
As silver and bronze and iron and lead and tin are gathered into the midst of a furnace, to blow fire on it to melt it, so I will gather you in my anger and in my wrath, and I will lay you down and melt you.
And I will collect you and blow on you with the fire of my fury, and you will be melted in her midst.
As silver is melted in the midst of a furnace, so you will be melted in her midst; and you will know that I the LORD have poured out my wrath on you.
Israel’s Wicked Leaders
And the word of the LORD came to me, saying:
Son of man, say to her: You are a land not cleansed, not rained on in the day of indignation.
A conspiracy of her prophets is in her midst, like a roaring lion tearing prey. They have devoured souls; treasure and precious things they take; her widows they have multiplied in her midst.
Her priests have done violence to my instruction and have profaned my holy things. Between holy and common they have not divided, and between the unclean and the clean they have not made known; and from my sabbaths they have hidden their eyes, and I am profaned among them.
Her officials in her midst are like wolves tearing prey, to shed blood, to destroy souls, to gain unjust gain.
And her prophets have plastered for them with whitewash, seeing emptiness and divining a lie for them, saying: Thus says the Lord GOD — and the LORD has not spoken.
The people of the land have practiced oppression and seized by robbery, and the poor and the needy they have wronged, and the sojourner they have oppressed without judgment.
And I sought from them a man to wall up a wall and stand in the breach before me for the land, so that I would not destroy her; and I found none.
And I poured out my indignation on them; with the fire of my fury I finished them. Their way I set on their head, the utterance of the Lord GOD.