Though these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job lived in that land, they would only save their own lives on account of their righteousness," declares the Lord GOD.

“If I were to cause predatory beasts to pass through the land and they ravaged it and depopulated it of children, and it became desolate so that no one would pass through because of the predators,

"Or suppose I were to bring a sword against that land and say, 'Let a sword pass through the land,' and I were to kill both people and animals.

"Or suppose I were to send a plague into that land, and pour out my rage on it with bloodshed, killing both people and animals.

Yet, behold, survivors will be left in it [escaping the judgments], both sons and daughters. Listen carefully, they are going to come out to you [in Babylon] and you will see their [wicked] conduct and [despicable] actions; then you will be at peace in regard to the disaster which I have brought against Jerusalem for everything which I have brought on it [has been deserved].

They will console you when you see their behavior and their deeds, because you will know that it was not without reason that I have done everything which I have done in it, declares the sovereign Lord."

“Son of man, how is the wood of the grapevine (Israel) better than any wood of a branch which is among the trees of the forest?

Seeing then, that it was mete for no work, being whole: much less may there anything be made of it, when the fire hath consumed and burnt it.

And therefore thus sayeth the LORD God: Like as I cast the vine into the fire for to be burnt, as other trees of the wood: Even so will I do with them that dwell in Jerusalem,

I will set my face against them -- although they have escaped from the fire, the fire will still consume them! Then you will know that I am the Lord, when I set my face against them.

“Son of man, make Jerusalem understand [the heinous and vile nature of] her repulsive (idolatrous) acts

You are to declare, "This is what the Lord GOD says to Jerusalem: "Your birth place was the territory that belonged to the Canaanites. Your father was an Ammonite and your mother was a Hittite.

Now as to your birth, on the day you were born your umbilical cord wasn't cut. You weren't washed with water to clean you, and nobody rubbed you with salt. And it's certain that you weren't wrapped in strips of cloth.

No eye looked with pity on you to do any of these things for you, to have compassion on you; but you were thrown out in the open field, for you were loathed on the day that you were born.

"""When I passed by you, I saw you kicking around, covered in your own blood. That's when I told you, "Live!' while you were wallowing in your blood. I commanded you to live, even as you lay there in your own blood.

I made you plentiful like sprouts in a field; you grew tall and came of age so that you could wear jewelry. Your breasts had formed and your hair had grown, but you were still naked and bare.

"'Then I passed by you and watched you, noticing that you had reached the age for love. I spread my cloak over you and covered your nakedness. I swore a solemn oath to you and entered into a marriage covenant with you, declares the sovereign Lord, and you became mine.

You were so beautiful that the story of you went out into all nations; you were completely beautiful because of my glory which I had put on you, says the Lord.

"'But you trusted in your beauty and capitalized on your fame by becoming a prostitute. You offered your sexual favors to every man who passed by so that your beauty became his.

You took some of your clothes and made for yourself [decorated] high places and shrines of various colors and prostituted yourself on them—things which should never have come about and taken place.

You also took your beautiful jewels made of My gold and of My silver, which I had given you, and made for yourself male images that you might play the harlot with them.

As for my food that I gave you -- the fine flour, olive oil, and honey I fed you -- you placed it before them as a soothing aroma. That is exactly what happened, declares the sovereign Lord.

You slaughtered My children and offered them up to [worthless] idols, forcing them to pass through the [hideousness of the] fire.

And yet in all thy abominations and whoredom, thou hast not remembered the days of thy youth:, how naked and bare thou wast at that time, and trodden down in thine own blood.

That you made for yourself an arched room in every open place.

Thou hast built thy lofty place at the head of every way, and hast made thy beauty an abomination, and hast opened thy feet to every one that passed by, and multiplied thy whoredom.

Behold therefore, I have stretched out my hand over thee, and have diminished thine ordinary food , and delivered thee unto the will of them that hate thee, the daughters of the Philistines, that are ashamed of thy lewd way.

You committed even more immorality with that land of the merchants, the Chaldeans. But you weren't satisfied even with these!

How feeble is your heart, says the Lord, seeing that you do all these things, the work of a loose and overruling woman;

When you built your shrine altar for prostitution at the beginning of every street and made your high place in every public square, you were not like a prostitute because you refused payment.

A wife that committeth adultery! that taketh strangers instead of her husband!

Men give gifts to all prostitutes, but you give your gifts to all your lovers, bribing the pagan nations to come to you [as allies] from every direction for your obscene immoralities.

And you are different from other [unfaithful] women in your promiscuity, in that no one follows you to lure you into prostitution, and because you give money and no money is given you; in this way you are different.”

Thus says the Lord God, “Because your lewdness was poured out and your nakedness uncovered through your obscene immoralities with your lovers (pagan allies), and with all your [repulsive] idols, and because of the blood of your sons that you gave to them,

therefore, listen, I will gather all your lovers (pagan allies) with whom you took pleasure, and all those whom you loved with all those whom you hated; I will even gather them against you from every direction and will expose your nakedness to them that they may see all your nakedness [making you, Israel, an object of loathing and of mockery, a spectacle among the nations].

And I will judge thee, as women that break wedlock and shed blood are judged; and I will bring upon thee the blood of wrath and jealousy.

I will give thee over into their power, that shall break down thy stews, and destroy thy brothel houses: they shall strip thee out of thy clothes, all thy fair and beautiful Jewels shall they take from thee, and so let thee sit naked and bare.

They shall burn up thy houses, and punish thee in the sight of many women. Thus will I make thy whoredom to cease, so that thou shalt give out no more rewards.

"That's how I'll make you stop your prostitution so you won't pay any prostitute's fees anymore. I'll stop being angry with you, and I'll cease being jealous. I'll be calm and not be indignant anymore.

Because you have not remembered the days of your youth but have enraged Me by all these things, behold, I in turn will bring your conduct down on your own head,” declares the Lord God, “so that you will not commit this lewdness on top of all your other abominations.

Behold, every one that useth proverbs shall use this proverb against thee, saying, As is the mother, so is her daughter.

Thou art the daughter of thy mother, that loatheth her husband and her children; and thou art the sister of thy sisters, who loathed their husbands and their children: your mother was a Hittite, and your father an Amorite.

And thine elder sister is Samaria, that dwelleth at thy left hand, she and her daughters; and thy younger sister, that dwelleth at thy right hand, is Sodom and her daughters.

Have you not copied their behavior and practiced their abominable deeds? In a short time you became even more depraved in all your conduct than they were!

Behold, the sins of thy sister Sodom, were these: Pride, fullness of meat, abundance and Idleness: these things had she and her daughters. Besides that, they reached not their hand to the poor and needy,

Samaria has not committed half the sins you have; you have done more abominable deeds than they did. You have made your sisters appear righteous with all the abominable things you have done.

So now, bear your disgrace, because you have given your sisters reason to justify their behavior. Because the sins you have committed were more abominable than those of your sisters; they have become more righteous than you. So now, be ashamed and bear the disgrace of making your sisters appear righteous.

"I'll bring them back from their captivity that is, from the captivity of Sodom and her daughters, along with the captivity of Samaria and her daughters and the captivity of your captives among them.

so that you may bear your disgrace and be ashamed of all you have done in consoling them.

before thy wickedness was uncovered, as at the time of the reproach of the daughters of Syria, and of all that are round about her, the daughters of the Philistines, that do despite unto thee round about.

that thou mightest bear thine own filthiness and abomination, sayeth the LORD.

For Thus, saith My Lord, Yahweh, Therefore will I deal with thee just as thou hast dealt,- In that thou didst despise an oath by breaking a covenant.

"'Nevertheless, I will remember the covenant that I made with thee in thy youth, insomuch that it shall be an everlasting covenant:

So that thou also remember thy ways, and be ashamed of them. Then shalt thou receive of me thy elder and younger sisters, whom I will make thy daughters: and that beside thy covenant.

I will establish my covenant with you, and then you will know that I am the Lord.

so that you may remember [in detail] and be ashamed and never open your mouth again because of your humiliation, when I have forgiven you for all that you have done,” says the Lord God.

and thou hast said: Thus said the Lord Jehovah: The great eagle, great-winged, long-pinioned, Full of feathers, that hath diverse colours, Hath come in unto Lebanon, And it taketh the foliage of the cedar,

And it grew, and became a spreading vine of low stature, so that its branches should turn toward him, and the roots thereof be under him; and it became a vine, and brought forth branches, and shot forth sprigs.

And there was another eagle with great wings and thick feathers: and now this vine, pushing out its roots to him, sent out its branches in his direction from the bed where it was planted, so that he might give it water.

It was planted in good soil where water was plentiful for it to produce leaves and branches and to bear fruit, so that it might become a splendid vine.”’

Thus says the Lord God, ‘Ask, “Will it thrive? Will he (Nebuchadnezzar) not uproot it and strip off its fruit so that all its sprouting leaves will wither? It will not take a strong arm or many people to uproot it [ending Israel’s national existence].

"Speak to that froward household, 'Know ye not, what these things do signify?' Tell them, 'Behold, the king of Babylon came to Jerusalem, and took the king and his princes, and led them to Babylon.

so that the kingdom would be in subjection, unable to restore itself and rise again, but that by keeping his covenant it might continue.

But Zedekiah rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar by sending his ambassadors to Egypt so that they might give him horses and many troops. Will he succeed? Will he who does such things escape? Can he indeed break the covenant [with Babylon] and [still] escape?

As I live, saith the Lord Jehovah, surely in the place where the king dwelleth that made him king, whose oath he despised, and whose covenant he brake, even with him in the midst of Babylon he shall die.

Therefore, thus says the Lord God, “As I live, I will bring down on his own head My oath [made on My behalf by Nebuchadnezzar] which Zedekiah dishonored and My covenant which he broke.

I will spread My net over him, and he will be caught in My snare; and I will bring him to Babylon and will enter into judgment with him there for his treason which he has committed against Me.

All the choice men among his troops will die by the sword and the survivors will be scattered to every wind. Then you will know that I, the Lord, have spoken!

"'Thus sayeth the LORD God: I will also take a branch from a high Cedar tree, and will set it, and take the uppermost twig, that yet is but tender, and plant it upon a high hill:

I will plant it on the mountain heights of Israel, that it may grow boughs and bear fruit and be a noble and stately cedar. And birds of every kind will live under it; they will nest [securely] in the shade of its branches.

All the trees of the field will know that I am the Lord. I make the high tree low; I raise up the low tree. I make the green tree wither, and I make the dry tree sprout. I, the Lord, have spoken, and I will do it!'"

What mean ye, that ye use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge?

Behold (pay close attention), all souls are Mine; the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is Mine. The soul who sins will die.

But if a man be just, and do that which is lawful and right,

if he doesn't eat at mountain shrines, and doesn't look to the idols that have been erected in Israel's house, if he doesn't defile his neighbor's wife or approach a woman during her time of menstrual separation,

he that hath not given forth upon interest, neither hath taken any increase, that hath withdrawn his hand from iniquity, hath executed true justice between man and man,

and follows my statutes and observes my regulations by carrying them out. That man is righteous; he will certainly live, declares the sovereign Lord.

If he beget a son that is a robber, a shedder of blood, and that doeth any one of these things,

(though he himself did not do any of these things), that is, he even eats at the mountain shrines, and defiles his neighbor’s wife,

Now, lo, if he beget a son, that seeth all his father's sins, which he hath done, and feareth, and doeth not such like;

that hath not eaten upon the mountains, neither hath lifted up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, hath not defiled his neighbor's wife,

that hath withdrawn his hand from the poor, that hath not received interest nor increase, hath executed mine ordinances, hath walked in my statutes; he shall not die for the iniquity of his father, he shall surely live.

As for his father, because he practiced extortion, robbed his brother, and did that which is not good among his people, behold, he shall die for his sin.

“Yet do you say, ‘Why should the son not bear the punishment for the father’s sin?’ When the son has practiced justice and righteousness and has kept all My statutes and has done them, he shall certainly live.

The person who sins [is the one that] will die. The son will not bear the punishment for the sin of the father, nor will the father bear the punishment for the sin of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be on himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be on himself.

“But if the wicked man turns [away] from all his sins which he has committed and keeps all My statutes and practices justice and righteousness, he shall certainly live; he shall not die.

None of his transgressions that he hath committed shall be remembered against him: in his righteousness that he hath done he shall live.

Do I actually delight in the death of the wicked, declares the sovereign Lord? Do I not prefer that he turn from his wicked conduct and live?

“But when the righteous man turns away from his righteousness and commits sin and acts in accordance with all the repulsive things that the wicked man does, will he live? All of his righteous deeds which he has done will not be remembered because of the treachery that he has committed and for his sin which he has committed; for them he shall die.

"Yet you say, 'The Lord's conduct is unjust!' Hear, O house of Israel: Is my conduct unjust? Is it not your conduct that is unjust?

When a righteous man turns away from his righteousness, and commits sin and dies because of it, it is for his sin which he has committed that he dies.

Again, when a wicked man turns away from his wickedness which he has committed and practices justice and righteousness, he will save his life.

Because he considereth, and turneth away from all his transgressions that he hath committed, he shall surely live, he shall not die.

Yet the house of Israel says, 'The Lord's conduct is unjust!' Is my conduct unjust, O house of Israel? Is it not your conduct that is unjust?

“Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, each according to his conduct,” declares the Lord God. “Repent and turn away from all your transgressions, so that iniquity may not become a stumbling block to you.

Cast away from you all your ungodliness that ye have done: make you new hearts and a new spirit. Wherefore will ye die, O ye house of Israel?

For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord Jehovah: wherefore turn yourselves, and live.

and say, "Wherefore lay thy mother, that lioness, among the lions, and nourished her young ones among the lion's whelps?

She raised one cub in particular, teaching that fierce lion to become a hunter-prowler to eat human beings.

"'When she realized that she waited in vain, her hope was lost. She took another of her cubs and made him a young lion.