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Hebrew / JewishChristianity
And say to the land of Israel, Thus saith the Lord, Beholde, I come against thee, and will drawe my sword out of his sheath, and cut off from thee both the righteous and the wicked.
Seeing then that I will cut off from thee both the righteous and wicked, therefore shall my sworde goe out of his sheath against all flesh from the South to the North,
That all flesh may knowe that I the Lord haue drawen my sworde out of his sheath, and it shall not returne any more.
Mourne therefore, thou sonne of man, as in the paine of thy reines, and mourne bitterly before them.
And if they say vnto thee, Wherefore mournest thou? then answere, Because of the bruite: for it commeth, and euery heart shall melt, and all handes shall be weake, and all mindes shall faint, and all knees shall fall away as water: beholde, it commeth, and shall be done, saith the Lord God.
Againe, the word of the Lord came vnto me, saying,
Sonne of man, prophecie, and say, Thus saith the Lord God, say, A sworde, a sworde both sharpe, and fourbished.
It is sharpened to make a sore slaughter, and it is fourbished that it may glitter: how shall we reioyce? for it contemneth the rod of my sonne, as all other trees.
And he hath giuen it to be fourbished, that he may handle it: this sword is sharpe, and is fourbished, that he may giue it into ye hand of the slayer.
Cry, and houle, sonne of man: for this shall come to my people, and it shall come vnto all the princes of Israel: the terrours of the sword shall be vpon my people: smite therefore vpon thy thigh.
For it is a triall, and what shall this be, if the sworde contemne euen the rodde? It shall be no more, saith the Lord God.
Thou therefore, sonne of man, prophecie, and smite hand to hand, and let the sworde be doubled: let the sworde that hath killed, returne the third time: it is the sword of the great slaughter entring into their priuie chambers.
I haue brought the feare of the sword into all their gates to make their heart to faint, and to multiplie their ruines. Ah it is made bright, and it is dressed for the slaughter.
Get thee alone: goe to the right hande, or get thy selfe to the left hande, whithersoeuer thy face turneth.
I wil also smite mine hands together, and wil cause my wrath to cease. I the Lord haue said it.
The worde of the Lord came vnto mee againe, saying,
Also thou sonne of man, appoint thee two wayes, that the sworde of the King of Babel may come: both twaine shall come out of one lande, and chuse a place, and chuse it in the corner of the way of the citie.
Appoint a way, that the sworde may come to Rabbath of the Ammonites, and to Iudah in Ierusalem the strong citie.
And the King of Babel stoode at the parting of the way, at the head of the two wayes, consulting by diuination, and made his arrowes bright: hee consulted with idoles, and looked in the liuer.
At his right hand was the diuination for Ierusalem to appoint captaines, to open their mouth in the slaughter, and to lift vp their voyce with shouting, to laye engines of warre against the gates, to cast a mount, and to builde a fortresse.
And it shalbe vnto them as a false diuination in their sight for the othes made vnto them: but hee will call to remembrance their iniquitie, to the intent they should be taken.
Therefore thus sayeth the Lord God, Because ye haue made your iniquitie to bee remembred, in discouering your rebellion, that in al your workes your sinnes might appeare: because, I say, that ye are come to remembrance, ye shall be taken with the hand.
And thou prince of Israel polluted, and wicked, whose day is come, when iniquitie shall haue an ende,
Thus saith the Lord God, I will take away the diademe, and take off the crowne: this shalbe no more the same: I wil exalt the humble, and will abase him that is hie.
I wil ouerturne, ouerturne, ouerturne it, and it shall be no more vntill he come, whose right it is, and I will giue it him.
And thou, sonne of man, prophecie, and say, Thus saith the Lord God to the children of Ammon, and to their blasphemie: say thou, I say, The sword, the sword is drawen foorth, and fourbished to the slaughter, to consume, because of the glittering:
Whiles they see vanitie vnto thee, and prophecied a lie vnto thee to bring thee vpon the neckes of the wicked that are slaine, whose day is come when their iniquitie shall haue an ende.
Shall I cause it to returne into his sheath? I will iudge thee in the place where thou wast created, euen in the land of thine habitation.
And I wil powre out mine indignation vpon thee, and will blowe against thee in the fire of my wrath, and deliuer thee into the hand of beastly men, and skilfull to destroy.
Thou shalt bee in the fire to be deuoured: thy blood shall be in the middes of the lande, and thou shalt be no more remembred: for I the Lord haue spoken it.
Moreover, the worde of the Lord came vnto me, saying,
Now thou sonne of man, wilt thou iudge, wilt thou iudge this bloody citie? wilt thou shew her all her abominations?
Then say, Thus sayth the Lord God, The citie sheddeth blood in the middes of it, that her time may come, and maketh idols against her selfe to pollute her selfe.
Thou hast offended in thy blood, that thou hast shed, and hast polluted thy selfe in thine idols, which thou hast made, and thou hast caused thy dayes to draw neere, and art come vnto thy terme: therefore haue I made thee a reproch to the heathen, and a mocking to all countreys.
Those that be neere, and those that be farre from thee, shall mocke thee, which art vile in name and sore in affliction.
Beholde, the princes of Israel euery one in thee was ready to his power, to shed blood.
In thee haue they despised father and mother: in the middes of thee haue they oppressed the stranger: in thee haue they vexed the fatherlesse and the widowe.
Thou hast despised mine holy things, and hast polluted my Sabbaths.
In thee are men that cary tales to shed blood: in thee are they that eate vpon the mountaines: in ye mids of thee they comit abomination.
In thee haue they discouered their fathers shame: in thee haue they vexed her that was polluted in her floures.
And euery one hath committed abomination with his neighbours wife, and euery one hath wickedly defiled his daughter in lawe, and in thee hath euery man forced his owne sister, euen his fathers daughter.
In thee haue they taken giftes to shed blood: thou hast taken vsurie and the encrease, and thou hast defrauded thy neighbours by extortion, and hast forgotten me, saith the Lord God.
Beholde, therefore I haue smitten mine hands vpon thy couetousnesse, that thou hast vsed, and vpon the blood, which hath bene in the middes of thee.
Can thine heart endure, or can thine hands be strong, in the dayes that I shall haue to doe with thee? I the Lord haue spoken it, and will doe it.
And I wil scatter thee among the heathen, and disperse thee in the countreys, and will cause thy filthines to cease from thee.
And thou shalt take thine inheritance in thy selfe in the sight of the heathen, and thou shalt knowe that I am the Lord.
And the worde of the Lord came vnto me, saying,
Sonne of man, the house of Israel is vnto me as drosse: all they are brasse, and tinne, and yron, and leade in the mids of the fornace: they are euen the drosse of siluer.
Therefore, thus sayth the Lord God, Because ye are all as drosse, beholde, therefore I will gather you in the middes of Ierusalem.
As they gather siluer and brasse, and yron, and leade, and tinne into the middes of the fornace, to blowe the fire vpon it to melt it, so wil I gather you in mine anger and in my wrath, and wil put you there and melt you.
I wil gather you, I say, and blowe the fire of my wrath vpon you, and you shalbe melted in the mids thereof.
As siluer is melted in the mids of the fornace, so shall ye be melted in the mids thereof, and ye shall knowe, that I the Lord haue powred out my wrath vpon you.
And the worde of the Lord came vnto me, saying,
Sonne of man, say vnto her; Thou art the land, that is vncleane, and not rained vpon in the day of wrath.
There is a conspiracie of her prophets in the mids thereof like a roaring lyon, rauening the praye: they haue deuoured soules: they haue taken the riches and precious things: they haue made her many widowes in the mids thereof.
Her Priests haue broken my Lawe, and haue defiled mine holy things: they haue put no difference betweene the holy and prophane, neither discerned betweene the vncleane, and the cleane, and haue hid their eyes from my Sabbaths, and I am prophaned among them.
Her princes in the mids thereof are like wolues, rauening the praye to shed blood, and to destroy soules for their owne couetous lucre.
And her prophets haue dawbed them with vntempered morter, seeing vanities, and diuining lies vnto them, saying, Thus sayth the Lord God, when the Lord had not spoken.
The people of the land haue violently oppressed by spoyling and robbing, and haue vexed the poore and the needy: yea, they haue oppressed the stranger against right.
And I sought for a man among them, that should make vp the hedge, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it, but I found none.
Therefore haue I powred out mine indignation vpon them, and consumed them with the fire of my wrath: their owne wayes haue I rendred vpon their heads, sayth the Lord God.
The worde of the Lord came againe vnto me, saying,
Sonne of man, there were two women, the daughters of one mother.
And they committed fornication in Egypt, they committed fornication in their youth: there were their breasts pressed, and there they bruised the teates of their virginitie.
And the names of them were Aholah the elder, and Aholibah her sister: and they were mine, and they bare sonnes and daughters: thus were their names. Samaria is Aholah, and Ierusalem Aholibah.
And Aholah played the harlot when she was mine, and she was set on fire with her louers, to wit, with the Assyrians her neighbours,
Which were clothed with blewe silke, both captaines and princes: they were all pleasant yong men, and horsemen riding vpon horses.
Thus she committed her whoredome with them, euen with all them that were the chosen men of Asshur, and with all on whome she doted, and defiled her selfe with all their idoles.
Neither left she her fornications, learned of the Egyptians: for in her youth they lay with her, and they bruised the breasts of her virginitie, and powred their whoredome vpon her.
Wherefore I deliuered her into the hands of her louers, euen into the hands of the Assyrians, vpon whome she doted.
These discouered her shame: they tooke away her sonnes and her daughters, and slewe her with the sworde, and she had an euill name among women: for they had executed iudgement vpon her.
And when her sister Aholibah sawe this, she marred her selfe with inordinate loue, more then she, and with her fornications more then her sister with her fornications.
She doted vpon the Assyrians her neighbours, both captaines and princes clothed with diuers sutes, horsemen ryding vpon horses: they were all pleasant yong men.
Then I sawe that she was defiled, and that they were both after one sort,
And that she encreased her fornications: for when she sawe men painted vpon the wall, the images of the Caldeans painted with vermelon,
And girded with girdles vpon their loynes, and with dyed attyre vpon their heads (looking all like princes after the maner of the Babylonians in Caldea, the land of their natiuitie)
Assoone, I say, as she sawe them, she doted vpon them, and sent messengers vnto them into Caldea.
Nowe when the Babylonians came to her into the bed of loue, they defiled her with their fornication, and she was polluted with them, and her lust departed from them.
So she discouered her fornication, and disclosed her shame: then mine heart forsooke her, like as mine heart had forsaken her sister.
Yet she encreased her whoredome more, and called to remembrance ye dayes of her youth, wherein she had played the harlot in the land of Egypt.
For she doted vpon their seruants whose members are as the members of asses, and whose yssue is like the yssue of horses.
Thou calledst to remembrance the wickednes of thy youth, when thy teates were bruised by ye Egyptians: therefore ye paps of thy youth are thus.
Therefore, O Aholibah, thus sayeth the Lord God, Beholde, I will raise vp thy louers against thee, from whome thine heart is departed, and I will bring them against thee on euery side,
To wit, the Babylonians, and all the Caldeans, Peked, and Shoah, and Koa, and all the Assyrians with them: they were all pleasant yong men, captaines and princes: all they were valiant and renoumed, riding vpon horses.
Euen these shall come against thee with charets, waggons, and wheeles, and with a multitude of people, which shall set against thee, buckler and shield, and helmet round about: and I will leaue the punishment vnto them, and they shall iudge thee according to their iudgements.
And I wil lay mine indignation vpon thee, and they shall deale cruelly with thee: they shall cut off thy nose and thine eares, and thy remnant shall fall by the sword: they shall cary away thy sonnes and thy daughters, and thy residue shall be deuoured by the fire.
They shall also strip thee out of thy clothes, and take away thy fayre iewels.
Thus wil I make thy wickednes to cease from thee and thy fornication out of the land of Egypt: so that thou shalt not lift vp thine eyes vnto them, nor remember Egypt any more.
For thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I wil deliuer thee into the hand of them, whome thou hatest: euen into the hands of them from whome thine heart is departed.
And they shall handle thee despitefully, and shall take away all thy labour, and shall leaue thee naked and bare, and the shame of thy fornications shalbe discouered, both thy wickednes, and thy whoredome.
I wil doe these things vnto thee, because thou hast gone a whoring after the heathen, and because thou art polluted with their idoles.
Thou hast walked in the way of thy sister: therefore wil I giue her cup into thine hand.
Thus saith ye Lord God, Thou shalt drinke of thy sisters cup, deepe and large: thou shalt be laughed to scorne and had in derision, because it containeth much.
Thou shalt be filled with drunkennes and sorow, euen with the cup of destruction, and desolation, with the cup of thy sister Samaria.
Thou shalt euen drinke it, and wring it out to the dregges, and thou shalt breake the sheards thereof, and teare thine owne breasts: for I haue spoken it, sayth the Lord God.
Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Because thou hast forgotten me, and cast me behinde thy backe, therefore thou shalt also beare thy wickednes and thy whoredome.
The Lord sayd moreouer vnto me, Sonne of man, wilt thou iudge Aholah and Aholibah? and wilt thou declare to them their abominations?
For they haue played the whores, and blood is in their hands, and with their idoles haue they committed adulterie, and haue also caused their sonnes, whome they bare vnto me, to passe by the fire to be their meate.
Moreouer, thus haue they done vnto me: they haue defiled my Sanctuarie in the same day, and haue prophaned my Sabbaths.
For when they had slaine their children to their idoles, they came the same day into my Sanctuarie to defile it: and loe, thus haue they done in the middes of mine house.