And it will be clear to all the trees of the field that I the Lord have made low the high tree and made high the low tree, drying up the green tree and making the dry tree full of growth; I the Lord have said it and have done it.

Why do you make use of this saying about the land of Israel, The fathers have been tasting bitter grapes and the children's teeth are on edge?

By my life, says the Lord, you will no longer have this saying in Israel.

Not one of the sins which he has done will be kept in memory against him: in the righteousness which he has done he will have life.

Have I any pleasure in the death of the evil-doer? says the Lord: am I not pleased if he is turned from his way so that he may have life?

But when the upright man, turning away from his righteousness, does evil, like all the disgusting things which the evil man does, will he have life? Not one of his upright acts will be kept in memory: in the wrong which he has done and in his sin death will overtake him.

Again, when the evil-doer, turning away from the evil he has done, does what is ordered and right, he will have life for his soul.

Put away all your evil-doing in which you have done sin; and make for yourselves a new heart and a new spirit: why are you desiring death, O children of Israel?

For I have no pleasure in the death of him on whom death comes, says the Lord: be turned back then, and have life.

Son of man, say to the responsible men of Israel, This is what the Lord has said: Have you come to get directions from me? By my life, says the Lord, you will get no directions from me.

For this cause, son of man, say to the children of Israel, This is what the Lord has said: In this your fathers have further put shame on my name by doing wrong against me.

I will take pleasure in you as in a sweet smell, when I take you out from the peoples and get you together from the countries where you have been sent in flight; and I will make myself holy in you before the eyes of the nations.

And there, at the memory of your ways and of all the things you did to make yourselves unclean, you will have bitter hate for yourselves because of all the evil things you have done.

And say to the woodland of the South, Give ear to the words of the Lord: this is what the Lord has said: See, I will have a fire lighted in you, for the destruction of every green tree in you and every dry tree: the flaming flame will not be put out, and all faces from the south to the north will be burned by it.

And all flesh will see that I the Lord have had it lighted: it will not be put out.

Because I am going to have the upright and the evil cut off from you, for this cause my sword will go out from its cover against all flesh from the south to the north:

And all flesh will see that I the Lord have taken my sword out of its cover: and it will never go back.

And I have given it to the polisher so that it may be taken in the hand: he has made the sword sharp, he has had it polished, to put it into the hand of him who gives death.

In order that hearts may become soft, and the number of those who are falling may be increased, I have sent death by the sword against all their doors: you are made like a flame, you are polished for death.

And I will put my hands together with a loud sound, and I will let my wrath have rest: I the Lord have said it.

And you, son of man, have two ways marked out, so that the sword of the king of Babylon may come; let the two of them come out of one land: and let there be a pillar at the top of the road:

And this answer given by secret arts will seem false to those who have given their oaths and have let them be broken: but he will keep the memory of evil-doing so that they may be taken.

For this cause the Lord has said: Because you have made your evil-doing come to mind by the uncovering of your wrongdoing, causing your sins to be seen in all your evil-doings; because you have come to mind, you will be taken in them.

You will be food for the fire; your blood will be drained out in the land; there will be no more memory of you: for I the Lord have said it.

You are responsible for the blood drained out by you, and you are unclean through the images which you have made; and you have made your day come near, and the time of your judging has come; for this cause I have made you a name of shame to the nations and a cause of laughing to all countries.

See, the rulers of Israel, every one in his family, have been causing death in you.

In you they have had no respect for father and mother; in you they have been cruel to the man from a strange land; in you they have done wrong to the child without a father and to the widow.

You have made little of my holy things, and have made my Sabbaths unclean.

In you there are men who say evil of others, causing death; in you they have taken the flesh with the blood for food; in your streets they have put evil designs into effect.

In you they have let the shame of their fathers be seen; in you they have done wrong to a woman at the time when she was unclean.

In you they have taken rewards as the price of blood; you have taken interest and great profits, and you have taken away your neighbours' goods by force, and have not kept me in mind, says the Lord.

See, then, I have made my hands come together in wrath against your taking of goods by force and against the blood which has been flowing in you.

Will your heart be high or your hands strong in the days when I take you in hand? I the Lord have said it and will do it.

Son of man, the children of Israel have become like the poorest sort of waste metal to me: they are all silver and brass and tin and iron and lead mixed with waste.

For this cause the Lord has said: Because you have all become waste metal, see, I will get you together inside Jerusalem.

As silver becomes soft in the oven, so you will become soft in it; and you will be certain that I the Lord have let loose my passion on you.

Her rulers in her are like a loud-voiced lion violently taking his food; they have made a meal of souls; they have taken wealth and valued property; they have made great the number of widows in her.

Her priests have been acting violently against my law; they have made my holy things unclean: they have made no division between what is holy and what is common, and they have not made it clear that the unclean is different from the clean, and their eyes have been shut to my Sabbaths, and I am not honoured among them.

And her prophets have been using whitewash, seeing foolish visions and making false use of secret arts, saying, This is what the Lord has said, when the Lord has said nothing.

The people of the land have been acting cruelly, taking men's goods by force; they have been hard on the poor and those in need, and have done wrong to the man from a strange land.

And I let loose my passion on them, and have put an end to them in the fire of my wrath: I have made the punishment of their ways come on their heads, says the Lord.

So I will put an end to your evil ways and your loose behaviour which came from the land of Egypt: and your eyes will never be lifted up to them again, and you will have no more memory of Egypt.

They will do these things to you because you have been untrue to me, and have gone after the nations, and have become unclean with their images.

You have gone in the way of your sister; and I will give her cup into your hand.

And after drinking it and draining it out, you will take the last drops of it to the end, pulling off your breasts: for I have said it, says the Lord.

So this is what the Lord has said: Because you have not kept me in your memory, and because your back has been turned to me, you will even undergo the punishment of your evil designs and your loose ways.

And the meeting, after stoning her with stones, will put an end to her with their swords; they will put her sons and daughters to death and have her house burned up with fire.

And I will put an end to evil in all the land, teaching all women not to do as you have done.

I have made myself tired to no purpose: still all the waste which is in her has not come out, it has an evil smell.

As for your unclean purpose: because I have been attempting to make you clean, but you have not been made clean from it, you will not be made clean till I have let loose my passion on you in full measure.

I the Lord have said the word and I will do it; I will not go back or have mercy, and my purpose will not be changed; in the measure of your ways and of your evil doings you will be judged, says the Lord.

And you will do as I have done, not covering your lips or taking the food of those in grief.

For the Lord has said, Because you have made sounds of joy with your hands, stamping your feet, and have been glad, putting shame with all your soul on the land of Israel;

For this cause my hand has been stretched out against you, and I will give up your goods to be taken by the nations; I will have you cut off from the peoples and will put an end to you among the countries: I will give you up to destruction; and you will be certain that I am the Lord.

To the children of the east I have given her for a heritage, as well as the children of Ammon, so that there may be no memory of her among the nations:

I will take payment from Edom because of my people Israel; and I will take Edom in hand in my wrath and in my passion: and they will have experience of my reward, says the Lord.

This is what the Lord has said: Because the Philistines have taken payment, with the purpose of causing shame and destruction with unending hate;

And they will give the walls of Tyre to destruction and have its towers broken: and I will take even her dust away from her, and make her an uncovered rock

She will be a place for the stretching out of nets in the middle of the sea; for I have said it, says the Lord: and her goods will be given over to the nations.

They will take by force all your wealth and go off with the goods with which you do trade: they will have your walls broken down and all the houses of your desire given up to destruction: they will put your stones and your wood and your dust deep in the water.

I will make you an uncovered rock: you will be a place for the stretching out of nets; there will be no building you up again: for I the Lord have said it, says the Lord.

Then I will make you go down with those who go down into the underworld, to the people of the past, causing your living-place to be in the deepest parts of the earth, in places long unpeopled, with those who go down into the deep, so that there will be no one living in you; and you will have no glory in the land of the living.

And say to Tyre, O you who are seated at the doorway of the sea, trading for the peoples with the great sea-lands, these are the words of the Lord: You, O Tyre, have said, I am a ship completely beautiful.

Your builders have made your outlines in the heart of the seas, they have made you completely beautiful.

They have made all your boards of fir-trees from Senir: they have taken cedars from Lebanon to make the supports for your sails.

Of oak-trees from Bashan they have made your driving blades; they have made your floors of ivory and boxwood from the sea-lands of Kittim.

Your boatmen have taken you into great waters: you have been broken by the east wind in the heart of the seas.

Your wealth and your goods, the things in which you do trade, your seamen and those guiding your ships, those who make your boards watertight, and those who do business with your goods, and all your men of war who are in you, with all who have come together in you, will go down into the heart of the seas in the day of your downfall.

And they will have the hair of their heads cut off because of you, and will put haircloth on their bodies, weeping for you with bitter grief in their souls, even with bitter sorrow.

Those who do business among the peoples make sounds of surprise at you; you have become a thing of fear, you have come to an end for ever.

Son of man, say to the ruler of Tyre, This is what the Lord has said: Because your heart has been lifted up, and you have said, I am a god, I am seated on the seat of God in the heart of the seas; but you are man and not God, though you have made your heart as the heart of God:

By your wisdom and deep knowledge you have got power for yourself, and put silver and gold in your store-houses:

For this cause the Lord has said: Because you have made your heart as the heart of God,

Your death will be the death of those who are without circumcision, by the hands of men from strange lands: for I have said it, says the Lord.

Through all your trading you have become full of violent ways, and have done evil: so I sent you out shamed from the mountain of God; the winged one put an end to you from among the stones of fire.

Your heart was lifted up because you were beautiful, you made your wisdom evil through your sin: I have sent you down, even to the earth; I have made you low before kings, so that they may see you.

By all your sin, even by your evil trading, you have made your holy places unclean; so I will make a fire come out from you, it will make a meal of you, and I will make you as dust on the earth before the eyes of all who see you.

All who have knowledge of you among the peoples will be overcome with wonder at you: you have become a thing of fear, and you will never be seen again.

This is what the Lord has said: When I have got together the children of Israel from the peoples among whom they are wandering, and have been made holy among them before the eyes of the nations, then they will have rest in the land which is theirs, which I gave to my servant Jacob

And they will be safe there, building houses and planting vine-gardens and living without fear; when I have sent my punishments on all those who put shame on them round about them; and they will be certain that I am the Lord their God.

Say to them, These are the words of the Lord: See, I am against you, Pharaoh, king of Egypt, the great river-beast stretched out among his Nile streams, who has said, The Nile is mine, and I have made it for myself.

And I will let you be in the waste land, you and all the fish of your streams: you will go down on the face of the land; you will not be taken up or put to rest in the earth; I have given you for food to the beasts of the field and the birds of the heaven.

And it will be clear to all the people of Egypt that I am the Lord, because you have been a false support to the children of Israel.

I will make the land of Egypt a waste among the countries which are made waste, and her towns will be unpeopled among the towns which have been made waste, for forty years: and I will send the Egyptians in flight among the nations and wandering through the countries.

For this is what the Lord has said: At the end of forty years I will get the Egyptians together from the peoples where they have gone in flight:

It will be the lowest of the kingdoms, and never again will it be lifted up over the nations: I will make them small, so that they may not have rule over the nations.

I have given him the land of Egypt as the reward for his hard work, because they were working for me, says the Lord.

This is what the Lord has said: The supporters of Egypt will have a fall, and the pride of her power will come down: from Migdol to Syene they will be put to the sword in it, says the Lord.

And she will be made waste among the countries which have been made waste, and her towns will be among the towns which are unpeopled.

And they will be certain that I am the Lord, when I have put a fire in Egypt and all her helpers are broken.

And I will make the Nile streams dry, and will give the land into the hands of evil men, causing the land and everything in it to be wasted by the hands of men from a strange country: I the Lord have said it.

I have given him up into the hands of a strong one of the nations; he will certainly give him the reward of his sin, driving him out.

And men from strange lands, who are to be feared among the nations, after cutting him off, have let him be: on the mountains and in all the valleys his branches have come down; his arms are broken by all the waterways of the land; all the peoples of the earth have gone from his shade, and have let him be.

All the birds of heaven have come to rest on his broken stem where it is stretched on the earth, and all the beasts of the field will be on his branches:

And they will go down with him to the underworld, to those who have been put to the sword; even those who were his helpers, living under his shade among the nations

Among those who have been put to the sword: they will give a resting-place with them to all their people.

The strong among the great ones will say to him from the underworld, Are you more beautiful than any? go down, you and your helpers, and take your rest among those without circumcision, and those who have been put to the sword.

There is Elam and all her people, round about her last resting-place: all of them put to death by the sword, who have gone down without circumcision into the lowest parts of the earth, who were a cause of fear in the land of the living, and are put to shame with those who go down to the underworld:

They have made a bed for her among the dead, and all her people are round about her resting-place: all of them without circumcision, put to death with the sword; for they were a cause of fear in the land of the living, and are put to shame with those who go down to the underworld: they have been given a place among those who have been put to the sword.

And they have been put to rest with the fighting men who came to their end in days long past, who went down to the underworld with their instruments of war, placing their swords under their heads, and their body-covers are over their bones; for their strength was a cause of fear in the land of the living.