Ezekiel 31

²⁰In the eleventh year, on the seventh day of the first month, the word of the Lord came to me, saying,

⁵And the city was kept under siege until King Zedekiah’s eleventh year.

⁶By the ninth day of the fourth month, the famine in the city was so severe that the people of the land had no food.

²On the fifth day of the month—it was the fifth year of the exile of King Jehoiachin—

¹⁹Therefore this is what the Lord God says: I will give the land of Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, who will carry off its wealth, seize its spoil, and remove its plunder. This will be the wages for his army.

¹⁰This is what the Lord God says: I will put an end to the hordes of Egypt by the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon.

¹⁸Who then is like you in glory and greatness among the trees of Eden? You also will be brought down to the depths of the earth to be with the trees of Eden. You will lie among the uncircumcised, with those slain by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, declares the Lord God.’”

¹³You said in your heart: “I will ascend to the heavens; I will raise my throne above the stars of God. I will sit on the mount of assembly, in the far reaches of the north.

¹⁴I will ascend above the tops of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.”

¹⁷Get yourself ready. Stand up and tell them everything that I command you. Do not be intimidated by them, or I will terrify you before them.

⁸Are you better than Thebes, stationed by the Nile with water around her, whose rampart was the sea, whose wall was the water?

⁹Cush and Egypt were her boundless strength; Put and Libya were her allies.

³³Behold, the Lord God of Hosts will lop off the branches with terrifying power. The tall trees will be cut down, the lofty ones will be felled.

³⁴He will clear the forest thickets with an axe, and Lebanon will fall before the Mighty One.

²⁰The tree you saw that grew large and strong, whose top reached the sky and was visible to all the earth,

²¹whose foliage was beautiful and whose fruit was abundant, providing food for all, under which the beasts of the field lived, and in whose branches the birds of the air nested—

¹⁰In these visions of my mind as I was lying in bed, I saw this come to pass: There was a tree in the midst of the land, and its height was great.

³and tell them that this is what the Lord God says: ‘A great eagle with great wings and long pinions, full of feathers of many colors, came to Lebanon and took away the top of the cedar.

⁴He plucked off its topmost shoot, carried it to the land of merchants, and planted it in a city of traders.

¹⁵But the thornbush replied, ‘If you really are anointing me as king over you, come and find refuge in my shade. But if not, may fire come out of the thornbush and consume the cedars of Lebanon.’

²²This is what the Lord God says: ‘I will take a shoot from the lofty top of the cedar, and I will set it out. I will pluck a tender sprig from its topmost shoots, and I will plant it on a high and lofty mountain.

¹⁵Then the angel said to me, “The waters you saw, where the prostitute was seated, are peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues.

²⁸A large population is a king’s splendor, but a lack of subjects is a prince’s ruin.

⁸It had been planted in good soil by abundant waters in order to yield branches and bear fruit and become a splendid vine.’

⁵He took some of the seed of the land and planted it in fertile soil; he placed it by abundant waters and set it out like a willow.

¹Then one of the seven angels with the seven bowls came and said to me, “Come, I will show you the punishment of the great prostitute, who sits on many waters.

³⁶Therefore this is what the Lord says: “Behold, I will plead your case and take vengeance on your behalf; I will dry up her sea and make her springs run dry.

¹¹The tree grew large and strong; its top reached the sky, and it was visible to the ends of the earth.

⁵He took some of the seed of the land and planted it in fertile soil; he placed it by abundant waters and set it out like a willow.

¹¹Surely you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the other countries, devoting them to destruction. Will you then be spared?

¹²Did the gods of the nations destroyed by my fathers rescue those nations—the gods of Gozan, Haran, and Rezeph, and of the people of Eden in Telassar?

⁴The Rabshakeh said to them, “Tell Hezekiah that this is what the great king, the king of Assyria, says: What is the basis of this confidence of yours?

³He is like a tree planted by streams of water, yielding its fruit in season, whose leaf does not wither, and who prospers in all he does.

³⁵I have seen a wicked, ruthless man flourishing like a well-rooted native tree,

³⁶yet he passed away and was no more; though I searched, he could not be found.

³²Although it is the smallest of all seeds, yet it grows into the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches.”

²³I will plant it on the mountain heights of Israel so that it will bear branches; it will yield fruit and become a majestic cedar. Birds of every kind will nest under it, taking shelter in the shade of its branches.

²¹whose foliage was beautiful and whose fruit was abundant, providing food for all, under which the beasts of the field lived, and in whose branches the birds of the air nested—

¹²Its leaves were beautiful, its fruit was abundant, and upon it was food for all. Under it the beasts of the field found shelter, in its branches the birds of the air nested, and from it every creature was fed.

¹³You were in Eden, the garden of God. Every kind of precious stone adorned you: ruby, topaz, and diamond, beryl, onyx, and jasper, sapphire, turquoise, and emerald. Your mountings and settings were crafted in gold, prepared on the day of your creation.

¹⁰The mountains were covered by its shade, and the mighty cedars with its branches.

¹⁰And Lot looked out and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan, all the way to Zoar, was well watered like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt. (This was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.)

³For the Lord will comfort Zion and will look with compassion on all her ruins; He will make her wilderness like Eden and her desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and melodious song.

⁸And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, where He placed the man He had formed.

⁹Out of the ground the Lord God gave growth to every tree that is pleasing to the eye and good for food. And in the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

¹⁸Who then is like you in glory and greatness among the trees of Eden? You also will be brought down to the depths of the earth to be with the trees of Eden. You will lie among the uncircumcised, with those slain by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, declares the Lord God.’”

⁶For exaltation comes neither from east nor west, nor out of the desert,

⁷but it is God who judges; He brings down one and exalts another.

¹⁰And Lot looked out and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan, all the way to Zoar, was well watered like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt. (This was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.)

¹³You were in Eden, the garden of God. Every kind of precious stone adorned you: ruby, topaz, and diamond, beryl, onyx, and jasper, sapphire, turquoise, and emerald. Your mountings and settings were crafted in gold, prepared on the day of your creation.

³⁷You, O king, are the king of kings, to whom the God of heaven has given sovereignty, power, strength, and glory.

³⁸Wherever the sons of men or beasts of the field or birds of the air dwell, He has given them into your hand and has made you ruler over them all. You are that head of gold.

³For the Lord will comfort Zion and will look with compassion on all her ruins; He will make her wilderness like Eden and her desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and melodious song.

¹²Let the fields exult, and all that is in them. Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy

¹³before the Lord, for He is coming—He is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples in His faithfulness.

¹⁷Your heart grew proud of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom because of your splendor; so I cast you to the earth; I made you a spectacle before kings.

²⁰But when his heart became arrogant and his spirit was hardened with pride, he was deposed from his royal throne, and his glory was taken from him.

²⁵But because his heart was proud, Hezekiah did not repay the favor shown to him. Therefore wrath came upon him and upon Judah and Jerusalem.

¹²Before his downfall a man’s heart is proud, but humility comes before honor.

¹⁴This happened so that no other trees by the waters would become great in height and set their tops among the clouds, and no other well-watered trees would reach them in height. For they have all been consigned to death, to the depths of the earth, among the mortals who descend to the Pit.’

³⁰the king exclaimed, “Is this not Babylon the Great, which I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?”

¹¹For this is what the Lord God says: ‘The sword of the king of Babylon will come against you!

¹²I will make your hordes fall by the swords of the mighty, the most ruthless of all nations. They will ravage the pride of Egypt and all her multitudes will be destroyed.

¹⁸As for you, O king, the Most High God gave your father Nebuchadnezzar sovereignty and greatness, glory and honor.

¹⁹Because of the greatness that He bestowed on him, the people of every nation and language trembled in fear before him. He killed whom he wished and kept alive whom he wished; he exalted whom he wished and humbled whom he wished.

¹⁸O king of Assyria, your shepherds slumber; your officers sleep. Your people are scattered on the mountains with no one to gather them.

¹²For whoever does these things is detestable to the Lord. And because of these detestable things, the Lord your God is driving out the nations before you.

¹³For judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment.

⁹I will bring you out of the city and deliver you into the hands of foreigners, and I will execute judgments against you.

⁷behold, I will bring foreigners against you, the most ruthless of nations. They will draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom and will defile your splendor.

⁸I will fill its mountains with the slain; those killed by the sword will fall on your hills, in your valleys, and in all your ravines.

¹¹He and his people with him, the most ruthless of the nations, will be brought in to destroy the land. They will draw their swords against Egypt and fill the land with the slain.

¹⁷Your guards are like the swarming locust, and your scribes like clouds of locusts that settle on the walls on a cold day. When the sun rises, they fly away, and no one knows where.

¹⁸O king of Assyria, your shepherds slumber; your officers sleep. Your people are scattered on the mountains with no one to gather them.

⁶For behold, I am raising up the Chaldeans—that ruthless and impetuous nation which marches through the breadth of the earth to seize dwellings not their own.

⁵When My sword has drunk its fill in the heavens, then it will come down upon Edom, upon the people I have devoted to destruction.

⁶The sword of the Lord is bathed in blood. It drips with fat—with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams. For the Lord has a sacrifice in Bozrah, a great slaughter in the land of Edom.

⁴I will abandon you on the land and hurl you into the open field. I will cause all the birds of the air to settle upon you, and all the beasts of the earth to eat their fill of you.

⁶They will all be left to the mountain birds of prey, and to the beasts of the land. The birds will feed on them in summer, and all the wild animals in winter.

⁵I will leave you in the desert, you and all the fish of your streams. You will fall on the open field and will not be taken away or gathered for burial. I have given you as food to the beasts of the earth and the birds of the air.

¹⁷Then I saw an angel standing in the sun, and he cried out in a loud voice to all the birds flying overhead, “Come, gather together for the great supper of God,

¹⁸so that you may eat the flesh of kings and commanders and mighty men, of horses and riders, of everyone slave and free, small and great.”

¹⁸Did not your forefathers do the same things, so that our God brought all this disaster on us and on this city? And now you are rekindling His wrath against Israel by profaning the Sabbath!”

⁹But those who seek my life to destroy it will go into the depths of the earth.

¹⁰They will fall to the power of the sword; they will become a portion for foxes.

⁷But like mortals you will die, and like rulers you will fall.”

⁶if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes as an example of what is coming on the ungodly;

²⁰then I will bring you down with those who descend to the Pit, to the people of antiquity. I will make you dwell in the earth below like the ancient ruins, with those who descend to the Pit, so that you will no longer be inhabited or set in splendor in the land of the living.

¹¹Now these things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the fulfillment of the ages has come.

⁸Nineveh has been like a pool of water throughout her days, but now it is draining away. “Stop! Stop!” they cry, but no one turns back.

⁹“Plunder the silver! Plunder the gold!” There is no end to the treasure, an abundance of every precious thing.

⁴Then the offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will please the Lord, as in days of old and years gone by.

⁹Then the kings of the earth who committed sexual immorality and lived in luxury with her will weep and wail at the sight of the smoke rising from the fire that consumes her.

¹⁰In fear of her torment, they will stand at a distance and cry out: “Woe, woe to the great city, the mighty city of Babylon! For in a single hour your judgment has come.”

¹⁸and cry out at the sight of the smoke rising from the fire that consumes her. “What city was ever like this great city?” they will exclaim.

¹⁹Then they will throw dust on their heads as they weep and mourn and cry out: “Woe, woe to the great city, where all who had ships on the sea were enriched by her wealth! For in a single hour she has been destroyed.”

¹⁵But you will be brought down to Sheol, to the lowest depths of the Pit.

¹⁵This is what the Lord God says to Tyre: ‘Will not the coastlands quake at the sound of your downfall, when the wounded groan at the slaughter in your midst?

⁸Even the cypresses and cedars of Lebanon exult over you: “Since you have been laid low, no woodcutter comes against us.”

⁹I made it beautiful with its many branches, the envy of all the trees of Eden, which were in the garden of God.’

²⁸The countryside will shake when your sailors cry out.

¹⁷For your violence against Lebanon will overwhelm you, and the destruction of animals will terrify you, because of your bloodshed against men and your violence against the land, the city, and all their dwellers.

⁶All the birds of the air nested in its branches, and all the beasts of the field gave birth beneath its boughs; all the great nations lived in its shade.

¹⁷The wicked will return to Sheol—all the nations who forget God.

³Look at Assyria, a cedar in Lebanon, with beautiful branches that shaded the forest. It towered on high; its top was among the clouds.

⁹Sheol beneath is eager to meet you upon your arrival. It stirs the spirits of the dead to greet you—all the rulers of the earth. It makes all the kings of the nations rise from their thrones.

³²But after it is planted, it grows to be the largest of all garden plants and puts forth great branches, so that the birds of the air nest in its shade.”

²¹“Son of man, I have broken the arm of Pharaoh king of Egypt. See, it has not been bound up for healing, or splinted for strength to hold the sword.

²²Therefore this is what the Lord God says: Behold, I am against Pharaoh king of Egypt. I will break his arms, both the strong one and the one already broken, and will make the sword fall from his hand.

¹⁹Whom do you surpass in beauty? Go down and be placed with the uncircumcised!

²¹Mighty chiefs will speak from the midst of Sheol about Egypt and her allies: ‘They have come down and lie with the uncircumcised, with those slain by the sword.’

¹⁰You will die the death of the uncircumcised at the hands of foreigners. For I have spoken, declares the Lord God.”

¹⁹When anyone hears the message of the kingdom but does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is the seed sown along the path.

²“Son of man, say to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to his multitude: ‘Who can be compared to your greatness?

²⁵“Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will punish all who are circumcised only in the flesh—

²⁶Egypt, Judah, Edom, Ammon, Moab, and all the inhabitants of the desert who clip the hair of their temples. For all these nations are uncircumcised, and the whole house of Israel is uncircumcised in heart.”