Eze 4 | ABEn | STEP | And you, O son of man, take unto yourself a brick! and you shall put it before your face,; and you shall diagram upon it the city of Jerusalem.

Ezekiel 4

CHAPTER 4 The Sign of the Brick and Frying Pan

1 And you, O son of man, take unto yourself a brick! and you shall put it before your face,; and you shall diagram upon it the city of Jerusalem. 2 And you shall put [²against ³it ¹an encompassment about]; and you shall build [²against ³it ¹battlements]; and you shall put around upon it a siege mound; and you shall put [²upon ³it ¹camps], and shall order the range of weapons round about. 3 And you, take to yourself a frying pan of iron! And you shall make it a wall of iron between you and between the city. And you shall prepare your face against it, and it will be for a siege, and you shall besiege it. [²is a sign ¹This] to the sons of Israel.

The Siege of Jerusalem Portrayed

4 And you shall go to sleep upon [³side ¹your ²left], and you shall put the iniquities of the house of Israel upon it, according to the number of the days which you shall sleep upon it. And you shall take their iniquities. 5 And I have appointed to you the two things for their iniquities for a number of days -- ninety and three hundred days; and you shall take the iniquities of the house of Israel. 6 And you shall complete these, and then go to sleep upon [³side ¹your ²right], and you shall take the iniquities of the house of Judah -- forty days; a day for a year is established to you. 7 And for the siege of Jerusalem you shall prepare your face, and [²your arm ¹you shall stiffen], and you shall prophesy against it. 8 And I, behold, I have appointed for you bonds, and you shall not be turned from your one side unto your other side, until of which time [⁴should be completed ¹the ²days ³of your siege].

The Famine Portrayed

9 And you, take to yourself wheat, and barley, and beans, and lentils, and millet, and wild oats! And put them into [³container ¹one ²earthenware], and make them [³for yourself ¹into ²bread loaves]! And according to the number of the days which you slept upon your side -- ninety and three hundred days -- you shall eat them. 10 And your food which you shall eat by weight is twenty shekels a day; from time to time you shall eat them. 11 And [²water ³by ⁴measure ¹you shall drink]; the sixth of the hin [²from ³time ⁴to ⁵time ¹you shall drink]. 12 And a cake baked in hot ashes of barley -- you shall eat them baked in dung, [³of the dung ⁴of a human ¹you shall hide ²them in the coals] before their eyes. 13 Thus says the lord God of Israel; So shall [⁴eat ¹the ²sons ³of Israel] unclean among the nations which I cast them. 14 And I said, By no means, O lord God of Israel, since my soul has not been defiled in uncleanness; and [³decaying flesh ⁴and ⁵that taken by wild beasts ¹I have not ²eaten] from my birth until the present; nor has [⁴entered ⁵into ⁶my mouth ¹any ³meat ²profane]. 15 And he said to me, Behold, I give to you dung of oxen instead of the dung of humans, and you shall make bread loaves upon them. 16 And he said to me, O son of man, behold, I shall break the reliance of bread in Jerusalem, and they shall eat bread by weight and in lack; and [²water ³by ⁴measure ⁵and ⁶unto ⁷extinction ¹they shall drink]; 17 so that [²lacking ¹they should be] of bread and water; and [⁴shall be obliterated ¹a man ²and ³his brother]; and they shall melt away in their iniquities.