Ezekiel 22:12-16

22:12 They take bribes within you to shed blood. You engage in usury and charge interest; ¹  you extort money from your neighbors. You have forgotten me, ²  declares the sovereign Lord. ³ 

22:13 “‘See, I strike my hands together ⁴  at the dishonest profit you have made, and at the bloodshed ⁵  they have done among you. 22:14 Can your heart endure, ⁶  or can your hands be strong when I deal with you? ⁷  I, the Lord, have spoken, and I will do it! 22:15 I will scatter you among the nations and disperse you among various countries; I will remove your impurity from you. ⁸  22:16 You will be profaned within yourself ⁹  in the sight of the nations; then you will know that I am the Lord.’”

[22:12]  ¹ tn Heb “usury and interest you take.” See 18:13, 17. This kind of economic exploitation violated the law given in Lev 25:36.

[22:12]  ² sn Forgetting the Lord is also addressed in Deut 6:12; 8:11, 14; Jer 3:21; 13:25; Ezek 23:35; Hos 2:15; 8:14; 13:6.

[22:12]  ³ tn The second person verb forms are feminine singular in Hebrew, indicating that the personified city is addressed here as representing its citizens.

[22:13]  ⁴ sn This gesture apparently expresses mourning and/or anger (see 6:11; 21:14, 17).

[22:13]  ⁵ tn Heb “the blood which was in you.”

[22:14]  ⁷ tn Heb “stand.” The heart here stands for the emotions; Jerusalem would panic in the face of God’s judgment.

[22:14]  ⁸ tn Heb “in the days when I act against you.”

[22:15]  ¹⁰ sn The ultimate purpose of divine judgment is to purify the covenant community of its sins.

[22:16]  ¹³ tc Several ancient versions read the verb as first person, in which case the Lord refers to how his people’s sin brings disgrace upon him. For a defense of the Hebrew text, see D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 1:712, n. 68, and M. Greenberg, Ezekiel (AB), 2:457-58.