“‘Then I passed by you and watched you, noticing ¹  that you had reached the age for love. ²  I spread my cloak ³  over you and covered your nakedness. I swore a solemn oath to you and entered into a marriage covenant with you, declares the sovereign Lord, and you became mine.

therefore this is what the sovereign Lord says: Surely I have spoken in the fire of my zeal against the rest of the nations, and against all Edom, who with great joy and utter contempt have made my land their property and prey, because of its pasture.’

When the Lord ¹  commanded the man dressed in linen, “Take fire from within the wheelwork, from among the cherubim,” the man ²  went in and stood by one of the wheels. ³ 

You took some of your clothing and made for yourself decorated high places; you engaged in prostitution on them. You went to him to become his. ¹ 

You also took your beautiful jewelry, made of my gold and my silver I had given to you, and made for yourself male images and engaged in prostitution ¹  with them.

“‘See here – this was the iniquity ¹  of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters had majesty, abundance of food, and enjoyed carefree ease, but they did not help ²  the poor and needy.

When she lustfully exposed her nakedness, ¹  I ²  was disgusted with her, just as I ³  had been disgusted with her sister.

Fine linen from Egypt, woven with patterns, was used for your sail to serve as your banner; blue and purple from the coastlands of Elishah ¹  was used for your deck’s awning.

The Dedanites ¹  were your clients. Many coastlands were your customers; they paid ²  you with ivory tusks and ebony.

The merchants of Sheba and Raamah engaged in trade with you; they traded the best kinds of spices along with precious stones and gold for your products.

I placed you there with an anointed ¹  guardian ²  cherub; ³  you were on the holy mountain of God; you walked about amidst fiery stones.

I made it beautiful with its many branches; all the trees of Eden, in the garden of God, envied it.

So I prophesied as I was commanded. There was a sound when I prophesied – I heard ¹  a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to bone.

So I prophesied as I was commanded, and the breath came into them; they lived and stood on their feet, an extremely great army.

You have not kept charge of my holy things, but you have assigned foreigners ¹  to keep charge of my sanctuary for you.

You must divide it equally just as I vowed to give it to your forefathers; ¹  this land will be assigned as your inheritance. ² 

the word of the Lord came to the priest Ezekiel ¹  the son of Buzi, ²  at the Kebar River in the land of the Babylonians. ³  The hand ⁴  of the Lord came on him there).

Then she defied my regulations and my statutes, becoming more wicked than the nations ¹  and the countries around her. ²  Indeed, they ³  have rejected my regulations, and they do not follow my statutes.

“‘But you trusted in your beauty and capitalized on your fame by becoming a prostitute. You offered your sexual favors to every man who passed by so that your beauty ¹  became his.

On that day I swore ¹  to bring them out of the land of Egypt to a land which I had picked out ²  for them, a land flowing with milk and honey, ³  the most beautiful of all lands.