“How can you say, ‘I have not made myself unclean. I have not paid allegiance to ¹  the gods called Baal.’ Just look at the way you have behaved in the Valley of Hinnom! ²  Think about the things you have done there! You are like a flighty, young female camel that rushes here and there, crisscrossing its path. ³ 

ב (Bet) She weeps bitterly at night; tears stream down her cheeks. ¹  She has no one to comfort her among all her lovers. ²  All her friends have betrayed her; they have become her enemies.

“Son of man, these men have erected their idols in their hearts and placed the obstacle leading to their iniquity ¹  right before their faces. Should I really allow them to seek ²  me?

“And you, son of man, prophesy, and clap your hands together. Let the sword strike twice, even three times! It is a sword for slaughter, a sword for the great slaughter surrounding them.

Groan in silence for the dead, ¹  but do not perform mourning rites. ²  Bind on your turban ³  and put your sandals on your feet. Do not cover your lip ⁴  and do not eat food brought by others.” ⁵ 

Will you still say, “I am a god,” before the one who kills you – though you are a man and not a god – when you are in the power of those who wound you?

When he brought me there, I saw ¹  a man whose appearance was like bronze, with a linen cord and a measuring stick in his hand. He was standing in the gateway.

Then he went to the gate facing east. He climbed its steps and measured the threshold of the gate as 10½ feet deep. ¹ 

On the doors of the outer sanctuary were carved cherubim and palm trees, like those carved on the walls, and there was a canopy ¹  of wood on the front of the outside porch.

Then he brought me through the entrance, which was at the side of the gate, into the holy chambers for the priests which faced north. There I saw ¹  a place at the extreme western end.

You have issued an edict, O king, that everyone must bow down and pay homage to the golden statue when they hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, trigon, harp, pipes, and all kinds of music.

Just as it is written in the law of Moses, so all this calamity has come on us. Still we have not tried to pacify ¹  the LORD our God by turning back from our sin and by seeking wisdom ²  from your reliable moral standards. ³ 

The inhabitants of one will go to another and say, “Let’s go up at once to ask the favor of the Lord, to seek the Lord who rules over all. Indeed, I’ll go with you.”’

But now plead for God’s favor ¹  that he might be gracious to us. ²  “With this kind of offering in your hands, how can he be pleased with you?” asks the Lord who rules over all.

“When ¹  you fast, do not look sullen like the hypocrites, for they make their faces unattractive ²  so that people will see them fasting. I tell you the truth, ³  they have their reward.

It would be better for him to have a millstone ¹  tied around his neck and be thrown into the sea ²  than for him to cause one of these little ones to sin. ³ 

I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace. In the world you have trouble and suffering, ¹  but take courage ²  – I have conquered the world.” ³ 

We are not trying to commend ¹  ourselves to you again, but are giving you an opportunity to be proud of us, ²  so that you may be able to answer those who take pride ³  in outward appearance ⁴  and not in what is in the heart.

For Christ did not enter a sanctuary made with hands – the representation ¹  of the true sanctuary ²  – but into heaven itself, and he appears now in God’s presence for us.

and if he turned to ashes the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah when he condemned them to destruction, ¹  having appointed ²  them to serve as an example ³  to future generations of the ungodly, ⁴