He who is far away will die of the virulent disease, and he who is near will fall by the sword, and he who remains and is besieged will die by the famine. Thus I will spend My wrath on them.

Your doom has come to you, O inhabitant of the land; the time has come, the day is near—tumult rather than joyful shouting on the mountains.

The time has come, the day has arrived. Let not the buyer rejoice nor the seller mourn, for wrath is against all their multitude [of people].

Then [in my vision] I heard Him cry out with a thunderous voice, saying, “Approach now, executioners of the city, each with his weapon of destruction in his hand.”

Utterly slay old men, young men, maidens, little children, and women; but do not touch or go near anyone on whom is the mark. Begin at My sanctuary.” So they began with the old men who were in front of the temple [who did not have the Lord’s mark on their foreheads].

who say, ‘Is not the time near to build houses? This city is [secure just like] the pot and we are the meat [in it].’

and does not eat [at the pagan shrines] on the mountains or raise his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, or defile his neighbor’s wife or approach a woman during her [monthly] time of impurity—

You have become guilty by the blood which you have shed, and you are defiled by the idols which you have made. Thus you have caused your day [of judgment and punishment] to approach and have arrived at [the completion of] your years; therefore, I have made you an object of scorn to the [pagan] nations and a thing to be mocked by all countries.

Those who are near and those who are far from you will mock you, you [infamous one] of ill repute, full of turmoil.

Haran and Canneh and Eden [in Mesopotamia], the merchants of Sheba [on the Euphrates], Asshur and Chilmad traded with you.

“For the day is near,
Even the day of the Lord is near,
It will be a cloudy day;
A time of doom for the nations.

but the chamber which faces toward the north is for the priests who have the responsibility and take care of the altar. These are the sons of Zadok, who [alone] from the sons of Levi come near to the Lord to minister to Him.”

And it was like the appearance of the vision which I saw, like the vision I saw when He came to destroy the city. And the visions were like the vision I saw beside the River Chebar [near Babylon]; and I fell face downward.

You shall give to the priests, the Levites who are from the descendants of Zadok, who are close to Me to minister to Me,’ says the Lord God, ‘a young bull for a sin offering [as a memorial to Christ’s sacrifice].

You shall present them before the Lord, and the priests shall throw salt on them, and they shall offer them up as a burnt offering to the Lord.

And they shall not come near to Me to serve as priests to Me, nor come near to any of My holy things, to the things that are most holy; but they shall bear their shame and their disgrace and [the consequences of] their repulsive acts which they have committed.

“But the Levitical priests, the sons of Zadok, who performed the duty of My sanctuary when the children (descendants) of Israel went astray from Me, shall come near to Me to minister to Me; and they shall stand before Me to offer to Me the fat and the blood,” declares the Lord God.

“They shall enter into My sanctuary; and they shall come near to My table to minister to Me and they shall perform [the priestly] duty to me.

They shall not go to a dead person to defile themselves; except for father or for mother, for son or for daughter, for brother or for sister who has had no husband; they may defile themselves.

It shall be the holy portion of the land; it shall be for the priests, the ministers of the sanctuary, who come near to minister to the Lord, and it shall be a place for their houses and a holy place for the sanctuary.

“The south side, southward, from Tamar [near the Dead Sea] shall extend as far as the waters of Meribath-kadesh, to the Brook of Egypt and to the Great [Mediterranean] Sea. This is the south side toward the south.