“Say to the rebellious house of Israel: ‘Don’t you know what these things mean?’ Say: ‘See here, the king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and took her king and her officials prisoner and brought them to himself in Babylon.

Into his right hand comes the portent for Jerusalem – to set up battering rams, to give the signal for slaughter, to shout out the battle cry, to set up battering rams against the gates, to erect a siege ramp, to build a siege wall.

“Son of man, your brothers, your relatives, and the whole house of Israel, all of them are those to whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, ‘They have gone far away from the Lord; to us this land has been given as a possession.’

Then say to the people of the land, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says about the inhabitants of Jerusalem and of the land of Israel: They will eat their bread with anxiety and drink their water in fright, for their land will be stripped bare of all it contains because of the violence of all who live in it.

Yet some survivors will be left in it, sons and daughters who will be brought out. They will come out to you, and when you see their behavior and their deeds, you will be consoled about the catastrophe I have brought on Jerusalem – for everything I brought on it.

But those in Jerusalem will view it as a false omen. They have sworn solemn oaths, but the king of Babylon will accuse them of violations in order to seize them.

He stretched out the form of a hand and grabbed me by a lock of hair on my head. Then a wind lifted me up between the earth and sky and brought me to Jerusalem by means of divine visions, to the door of the inner gate which faces north where the statue which provokes to jealousy was located.

Therefore fathers will eat their sons within you, Jerusalem, and sons will eat their fathers. I will execute judgments on you, and I will scatter any survivors to the winds.

On that day a fugitive will come to you to report the news.

(Make the chain, because the land is full of murder and the city is full of violence.)

‘But I will take you out of the city. And I will hand you over to foreigners. I will execute judgments on you.

and say: “‘What a lioness was your mother among the lions! She lay among young lions; she reared her cubs.

“‘Therefore this is what the sovereign Lord says: Woe to the city of bloodshed! I will also make the pile high.

“Therefore this is what the sovereign Lord says: I – even I – am against you, and I will execute judgment among you while the nations watch.

Pharaoh with his great army and mighty horde will not help him in battle, when siege ramps are erected and siege-walls are built to kill many people.

“‘Your mother was like a vine in your vineyard, planted by water. It was fruitful and full of branches because it was well-watered.

“As for you, son of man, are you willing to pronounce judgment, are you willing to pronounce judgment on the bloody city? Then confront her with all her abominable deeds!

The Babylonians crawled into bed with her. They defiled her with their lust; after she was defiled by them, she became disgusted with them.

Set the empty pot on the coals, until it becomes hot and its copper glows, until its uncleanness melts within it and its rot is consumed.

Then a wind lifted me up and carried me to the exiles in Babylonia, in the vision given to me by the Spirit of God. Then the vision I had seen went up from me.