Then you will remember your conduct, and be ashamed when you receive your older and younger sisters. I will give them to you as daughters, but not on account of my covenant with you.

“‘How sick is your heart, declares the sovereign Lord, when you perform all of these acts, the deeds of a bold prostitute.

“When you have completed these days, then lie down a second time, but on your right side, and bear the iniquity of the house of Judah 40 days ¹  – I have assigned one day for each year.

When the prescribed period is over, ¹  on the eighth day and thereafter the priests will offer up on the altar your burnt offerings and your peace offerings; ²  I will accept you, declares the sovereign Lord.”

“They even sent for men from far away; when the messenger arrived, those men set out. ¹  For them you bathed, ²  painted your eyes, and decorated yourself with jewelry.

“‘For testing will come, and what will happen when the scepter, which the sword despises, is no more? ¹  declares the sovereign Lord.’

“Yet you say, ‘Why should the son not suffer ¹  for his father’s iniquity?’ When the son does what is just and right, and observes all my statutes and carries them out, he will surely live.

But when I speak with you, I will loosen your tongue ¹  and you must say to them, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says.’ Those who listen will listen, but the indifferent will refuse, ²  for they are a rebellious house.

I will shock many peoples with you, and their kings will shiver with horror because of you. When I brandish my sword before them, every moment each one will tremble for his life, on the day of your fall.

You were different from other prostitutes ¹  because no one solicited you. When you gave payment and no payment was given to you, you became the opposite!

As a shepherd seeks out his flock when he is among his scattered sheep, so I will seek out my flock. I will rescue them from all the places where they have been scattered on a cloudy, dark day. ¹ 

He said to me, “These waters go out toward the eastern region and flow down into the Arabah; when they enter the Dead Sea, ¹  where the sea is stagnant, ²  the waters become fresh. ³ 

When the scouts survey ¹  the land and see a human bone, they will place a sign by it, until those assigned to burial duty have buried it ²  in the valley of Hamon-Gog.

When the man went out toward the east with a measuring line in his hand, he measured 1,750 feet, ¹  and then he led me through water, which was ankle deep.

At the head of every street you erected your pavilion and you disgraced ¹  your beauty when you spread ²  your legs to every passerby and multiplied your promiscuity.

“‘For this is what the sovereign Lord says: I will deal with you according to what you have done when you despised your oath by breaking your covenant.

A total ruin I will make it! ¹  It will come to an end when the one arrives to whom I have assigned judgment.’ ² 

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.

I will break down the wall you coated with whitewash and knock it to the ground so that its foundation is exposed. When it falls you will be destroyed beneath it, ¹  and you will know that I am the Lord.

When I say to the wicked, ‘O wicked man, you must certainly die,’ ¹  and you do not warn ²  the wicked about his behavior, ³  the wicked man will die for his iniquity, but I will hold you accountable for his death. ⁴