King James Version · Babylon and the exile
Ezekiel 33
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1Again unto me, saying, , speak to the children of thy people, and say unto them, When I bring upon a land, if the people of the land take a man of their coasts, and set him for their watchman: If when he seeth come upon the land, he blow the , and warn the people; Then whosoever heareth the sound of the , and taketh not warning; if come, and take him away, his shall be upon his own head. He heard the sound of the , and took not warning; his shall be upon him. But he that taketh warning shall his . But if the watchman see come, and blow not the , and the people be not warned; if come, and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his ; but his will I require at the watchman’s hand. So thou, O , I have set thee a watchman unto the ; therefore thou shalt hear the word at my , and warn them from me. When I say unto , O man, thou shalt surely ; if thou dost not speak to warn from his way, that man shall in his ; but his will I require at thine hand. Nevertheless, if thou warn of his way to turn from it; if he do not turn from his way, he shall in his ; but thou hast thy . Therefore, O thou , speak unto the ; Thus ye speak, saying, If our and our be upon us, and we pine away in them, how should we then live? Say unto them, As I live, saith , I have no pleasure in the of ; but that turn from his way and live: turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye , O ? Therefore, thou , say unto the children of thy people, The of shall not him in the day of his : as for the wickedness of , he shall not fall thereby in the day that he turneth from his wickedness; neither shall be able to live for his in the day that he sinneth. When I shall say to , that he shall surely live; if he to his own , and commit , all his righteousnesses shall not be remembered; but for his that he hath committed, he shall for it. Again, when I say unto , Thou shalt surely ; if he turn from his , and do that which is lawful and right; If restore the pledge, give again that he had robbed, walk in the of life, without committing ; he shall surely live, he shall not . None of his that he hath committed shall be mentioned unto him: he hath done that which is lawful and right; he shall surely live. Yet the children of thy people say, of is not equal: but as for them, their way is not equal. When turneth from his , and committeth , he shall even thereby. But if turn from his wickedness, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall live thereby. Yet ye say, of is not equal. O ye , I will judge you every one after his ways. And it came to pass in the twelfth year of our , in the tenth month, in the fifth day of the month, that one that had escaped out of came unto me, saying, The city is smitten. Now the hand of was upon me in the evening, afore he that was escaped came; and had opened my , until he came to me in the morning; and my was opened, and I was no more dumb. 23Then unto me, saying, , they that inhabit those wastes of the land of Israel speak, saying, was one, and he the land: but we are many; the land is given us for . Wherefore say unto them, Thus saith ; Ye eat with , and lift up your eyes toward your idols, and shed : and shall ye possess the land? Ye stand upon your , ye work , and ye defile every one his neighbour’s wife: and shall ye possess the land? Say thou thus unto them, Thus saith ; As I live, surely they that are in the wastes shall fall , and him that is in the open field will I give to the to be devoured, and they that be in the forts and in the caves shall of the pestilence. For I will lay the land most desolate, and the pomp of her strength shall cease; and the mountains of Israel shall be desolate, that none shall pass through. Then shall they know that I am , when I have laid the land most desolate because of all their which they have committed. Also, thou , the children of thy people still are talking against thee by the walls and in the doors of the houses, and speak one to another, every one to his brother, saying, Come, I you, and hear what is the word that cometh forth from . And they come unto thee as the people cometh, and they sit before thee as my people, and they hear thy words, but they will not do them: for with their they shew much love, but their goeth after their covetousness. And, lo, thou art unto them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice, and can play well on an instrument: for they hear thy words, but they do them not. And when this cometh to pass, (lo, it will come,) then shall they know that a hath been among them.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Babylon and the exile, 612 BC to 539 BC ›
Babylon replaces Assyria, Jerusalem and its temple are destroyed in 586 BC, and the leadership of Judah lives in Mesopotamia without a king, a temple, or a country.
- Babylon
- Nebuchadnezzar II rebuilds the city on a scale meant to be seen from a distance: the Ishtar Gate in glazed blue brick, the processional way, the ziggurat, and gardens later counted among the wonders of the world. Babylonian tablets record rations issued to the captive king Jehoiachin of Judah by name, which is one of the tidier points of contact between the Bible and the archives.
- Egypt
- Briefly resurgent. Pharaoh Neco marches north, kills King Josiah at Megiddo, and installs and deposes kings in Jerusalem, until Babylon beats him decisively at Carchemish in 605 BC. Jeremiah spends his career saying that betting on Egypt is suicide, and is proved right.
- Judah
- Deported in stages, then destroyed. The temple is burned, the walls broken, and the leadership marched to Mesopotamia. What happens next is one of the strangest survivals in history: a people keeps its identity without land, king, or sanctuary, and comes out of it with its scriptures more central than before.
- Further afield
- An extraordinary century for ideas everywhere at once. Thales and the first Greek philosophers, Solon's reforms at Athens, the Buddha in India, Confucius and Lao Tzu in China, and Zoroaster in Persia all fall within a few generations of the exile.
All of Ezekiel