CHAPTER 22
1 And the word of the Lord was made to me, and he said,
2 And thou, son of man, whether thou deemest not the city of bloods? And thou shalt show to it all his abominations,
3 and thou shalt say, The Lord God saith these things, This is a city shedding out blood in the midst of itself, that the time thereof come; and which made idols against itself, that it should be defouled.
4 In thy blood which is shed out of thee, thou trespassedest, and thou art defouled in thine idols which thou madest; and thou madest thy days to nigh, and thou broughtest the time of thy years. Therefore I gave thee to be a shame to heathen men, and a scorning to all lands
5 that be nigh thee, and that be far from thee; thou foul city, noble, great in perishing, they shall have victory of thee.
6 Lo! [the] princes of Israel, all in their arm, were in thee, to shed out blood.
7 They punished with wrongs [the] father and mother in thee, they challenged falsely a comeling in the midst of thee, they made sorry a fatherless child, and a widow at thee.
8 Ye despised my saintuaries, and ye defouled my sabbaths.
9 Men backbiters were in thee, to shed out blood, and eat on hills [or mountains] in thee; they wrought great trespass in the midst of thee.
10 They uncovered the shamefuller things of the father[s] in thee, they made low in thee the uncleanness of a woman in unclean blood.
11 And each man wrought abomin-ation against the wife of his neigh-bour, and the father of the husband defouled his son’s wife unleavefully; a brother oppressed in thee his sister, the daughter of his father.
12 They took gifts of thee, to shed out blood; thou tookest usury and over-abundance, and thou challengedest greedily thy neighbours, and thou hast forgotten me, saith the Lord God.
13 Lo! I have smitten together mine hands on thine avarice, [or greediness], which thou didest, and on the blood which is shed out in the midst of thee.
14 Whether thine heart shall sustain, either thine hands shall have power, in the days which I shall make to thee? For I the Lord spake, and I shall do.
15 And I shall scatter thee into nations, and I shall winnow, [or blow], thee into other lands; and I shall make thine uncleanness to fail from thee,
16 and I shall wield thee in the sight of heathen men; and thou shalt know, that I am the Lord.
17 And the word of the Lord was made to me, and he said,
18 Thou, son of man, the house of Israel is turned to me into dross, either filth of iron; all these be brass, and tin, and iron, and lead, in the midst of a furnace; they be made the dross of silver.
19 Therefore the Lord God saith these things, For that all ye be turned into dross, lo! I shall gather you together in the midst of Jerusalem,
20 by the gathering together of silver, and of latten, and of iron, and of tin, and of lead, in the midst of a furnace; and I shall kindle therein a fire, to well together; so I shall gather you together in my strong vengeance, and in my wrath, and I shall rest. And I shall well you together,
21 and I shall gather you together, and I shall set you afire in the fire of my strong vengeance, and ye shall be welled together in the midst thereof.
22 As silver is welled together in the midst of a furnace, so ye shall be in the midst thereof; and ye shall know, that I am the Lord, when I have shed out mine indignation [up] on you.
23 And the word of the Lord was made to me, and he said,
24 Son of man, say thou to it, Thou art a land unclean, and not berained in the day of strong vengeance.
25 Swearing together, either conspiring, of prophets is in the midst thereof; as a lion roaring and taking prey, they devoured men, they took riches, and price; they multiplied widows thereof in the midst thereof.
26 [The] Priests thereof despised my law, and defouled my saintuaries; they had not difference betwixt holy thing and unholy, they understood not betwixt defouled thing and clean thing; and they turned away their eyes from my sabbaths, and I was defouled in the midst of them.
27 The princes thereof in the midst thereof were as wolves ravishing prey, to shed out blood, and to lose men, and in following lucres greedily.
28 Forsooth the prophets thereof pargeted them without tempering, and saw vain things, and divined leasings to them, and said, The Lord God saith these things, when the Lord spake not.
29 The peoples of the land challenged false challenge, and ravished by violence; they tormented a needy man and poor, and oppressed a comeling by false challenge, without doom.
30 And I sought of them a man, that should set [or put] an hedge betwixt, and stand set [even] against me for the land, that I should not destroy it, and I found not.
31 And I shed out on them mine indignation, and I wasted them in the fire of my wrath; and I yielded the way of them on the head of them, saith the Lord God.