"And you, son of man, take a brick and set it in front of you. Inscribe a city on it -- Jerusalem.

You must turn your face toward the siege of Jerusalem with your arm bared and prophesy against it.

Then he said to me, "Son of man, I am about to remove the bread supply in Jerusalem. They will eat their bread ration anxiously, and they will drink their water ration in terror

"This is what the sovereign Lord says: This is Jerusalem; I placed her in the center of the nations with countries all around her.

Therefore fathers will eat their sons within you, Jerusalem, and sons will eat their fathers. I will execute judgments on you, and I will scatter any survivors to the winds.

He stretched out the form of a hand and grabbed me by a lock of hair on my head. Then a wind lifted me up between the earth and sky and brought me to Jerusalem by means of divine visions, to the door of the inner gate which faces north where the statue which provokes to jealousy was located.

The Lord said to him, "Go through the city of Jerusalem and put a mark on the foreheads of the people who moan and groan over all the abominations practiced in it."

While they were striking them down, I was left alone, and I threw myself face down and cried out, "Ah, sovereign Lord! Will you destroy the entire remnant of Israel when you pour out your fury on Jerusalem?"

"Son of man, your brothers, your relatives, and the whole house of Israel, all of them are those to whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, 'They have gone far away from the Lord; to us this land has been given as a possession.'

Say to them, 'This is what the sovereign Lord says: The prince will raise this burden in Jerusalem, and all the house of Israel within it.'

Then say to the people of the land, 'This is what the sovereign Lord says about the inhabitants of Jerusalem and of the land of Israel: They will eat their bread with anxiety and drink their water in fright, for their land will be stripped bare of all it contains because of the violence of all who live in it.

those prophets of Israel who would prophesy about Jerusalem and would see visions of peace for it, when there was no peace," declares the sovereign Lord.'

"For this is what the sovereign Lord says: How much worse will it be when I send my four terrible judgments -- sword, famine, wild animals, and plague -- to Jerusalem to kill both people and animals!

Yet some survivors will be left in it, sons and daughters who will be brought out. They will come out to you, and when you see their behavior and their deeds, you will be consoled about the catastrophe I have brought on Jerusalem -- for everything I brought on it.

"Therefore, this is what the sovereign Lord says: Like the wood of the vine is among the trees of the forest which I have provided as fuel for the fire -- so I will provide the residents of Jerusalem as fuel.

"Son of man, confront Jerusalem with her abominable practices

and say, 'This is what the sovereign Lord says to Jerusalem: Your origin and your birth were in the land of the Canaanites; your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite.

"Say to the rebellious house of Israel: 'Don't you know what these things mean?' Say: 'See here, the king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and took her king and her officials prisoner and brought them to himself in Babylon.

"Son of man, turn toward Jerusalem and speak out against the sanctuaries. Prophesy against the land of Israel

Mark out the routes for the sword to take: "Rabbah of the Ammonites" and "Judah with Jerusalem in it."

Into his right hand comes the portent for Jerusalem -- to set up battering rams, to give the signal for slaughter, to shout out the battle cry, to set up battering rams against the gates, to erect a siege ramp, to build a siege wall.

But those in Jerusalem will view it as a false omen. They have sworn solemn oaths, but the king of Babylon will accuse them of violations in order to seize them.

Therefore this is what the sovereign Lord says: 'Because all of you have become slag, look out! -- I am about to gather you in the middle of Jerusalem.

Oholah was the name of the older and Oholibah the name of her younger sister. They became mine, and gave birth to sons and daughters. Oholah is Samaria and Oholibah is Jerusalem.

"Son of man, write down the name of this day, this very day. The king of Babylon has laid siege to Jerusalem this very day.

"Son of man, because Tyre has said about Jerusalem, 'Aha, the gateway of the peoples is broken; it has swung open to me. I will become rich, now that she has been destroyed,'

In the twelfth year of our exile, in the tenth month, on the fifth of the month, a refugee came to me from Jerusalem saying, "The city has been defeated!"

Like the sheep for offerings, like the sheep of Jerusalem during her appointed feasts, so will the ruined cities be filled with flocks of people. Then they will know that I am the Lord."