World English Bible · Babylon and the exile
Ezekiel 39
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"You, , against , and say, ' says: "Behold, I am against you, , prince of , , and . I will turn you around, will lead you on, and will cause you to come up from the uttermost parts of the north; and I will bring you onto the mountains of Israel. I will strike your bow out of your left hand, and will cause your arrows to fall out of your . You will fall on the mountains of Israel, you, and all your hordes, and the peoples who are with you. I will give you to the ravenous birds of every sort and to the animals of the field to be devoured. You will fall on the open field, for I have spoken it," . "I will send a on and on those who securely in the islands. Then they will know that I am . "'"I will make my name known among my people Israel. I won't allow my name to be profaned any more. Then the nations will know that I am , the One in Israel. Behold, it comes, and it will be done," . "This is the day about which I have spoken. "'"Those who in the cities of Israel will go out and will make fires of the weapons and burn them, both the shields and the bucklers, the bows and the arrows, and the war clubs and the spears, and they will make fires with them for seven years; so that they will take no wood out of the field, and not cut down any out of the forests; for they will make fires with the weapons. They will plunder those who plundered them, and rob those who robbed them," . "'"It will happen in that day, that I will give to a place for burial in Israel, the valley of those who pass through on the east of the sea; and it will stop those who pass through. They will bury and all his multitude there, and they will call it 'The valley of Hamon '. "'"The will be burying them for seven months, that they may cleanse the land. Yes, all the people of the land will bury them; and they will become famous in the day that I will be glorified," . "'"They will men of continual employment who will pass through the land. Those who pass through will go with those who bury on the surface of the land, to cleanse it. After the end of seven months they will search. Those who search through the land will pass through; and when anyone sees a man's bone, then he will set up a sign by it, until the undertakers have buried it in the valley of Hamon . 16Hamonah will also be the name of a city. Thus they will cleanse the land."' "You, , says: 'Speak to the birds of every sort, and to every animal of the field, "Assemble yourselves, and come; gather yourselves on every side to my that I for you, even a great on the mountains of Israel, that you may eat meat and drink . You shall eat of the mighty, and drink of the princes of the earth, of rams, of lambs, and of goats, of bulls, all of them fatlings of . 19You shall eat fat until you are full, and drink until you are drunk, of my which I have for you. You shall be filled at my table with horses and charioteers, with , and with all men of war," .' "I will set my among the nations. Then all the nations will see my that I have executed, and my hand that I have laid on them. So the will know that I am their , from that day and forward. will know that the went into for their , because they trespassed against me, and I hid from them; so I gave them into the hand of their , and they all fell . I did to them according to their uncleanness and according to their . I hid from them. "Therefore says: 'Now I will reverse of and have mercy on the whole . I will be my name. They will forget their and all their trespasses by which they have trespassed against me, when they securely in their land. No one will make them afraid when I have brought them back from the peoples, gathered them out of their ' lands, and am shown among them in the sight of many nations. They will know that I am their , in that I caused them to go into among the nations, and have gathered them to their own land. Then I will leave none of them any more. I won't hide from them any more, for I have poured out on the ,' ."
A public domain modern English translation, free to read and share. 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