1 AND YOU, son of man [Ezekiel], take a sharp sword and use it as a barber's razor and shave your head and your beard. Then take balances for weighing and divide the hair into three parts. 2 You shall burn one part with fire in the midst of the city, when the days of the siege are fulfilled; and you shall take a second part and strike with the sword round about it; and a third part you shall scatter to the wind, and I will draw out a sword after them. 3 You shall also take from these a small number of hairs and bind them in the skirts of your robe. 4 And of these again take some hairs and cast them into the midst of the fire and burn them in the fire; from there a fire shall come forth into all the house of Israel.
5 Thus says the Lord God: This is Jerusalem; in the center of the nations I have set her, and countries are round about her. 6 And she has changed and rebelled against My ordinances more wickedly than the [heathen] nations, and against My statutes more than the countries that are round about her; for [Israel] rejected My ordinances, and as for My statutes, they have not walked in them. 7 Therefore thus says the Lord God: Because you were more turbulent and raged [against Me] more than the nations that are round about you and have not walked in My statutes, neither have kept My ordinances, nor have done according to the ordinances [concerning] the nations that are round about you; 8 Therefore thus says the Lord God: Behold, I, even I, am against you, and I will execute judgments in the midst of you in the sight of the nations. 9 And because of all your abominations, I will do in you that which I have not done and the like of which I will never do again. 10 Therefore fathers shall eat their sons in your midst, and sons shall eat their fathers; and I will execute judgments on you and all who are left of you I will scatter to all the winds. 11 Therefore, as I live, says the Lord God, surely because you have defiled My sanctuary with all your detestable things and with all your abominations, therefore will I also diminish you and withdraw My eye that it shall not spare you. And I also will have no pity. 12 And a third of you shall die of pestilence and be consumed by famine in the midst of you; a third shall fall by the sword round about you; and I will scatter a third to all the winds and will draw out a sword after them.
13 Thus shall My anger be spent and I will cause My wrath toward them to rest and I will be eased and comforted. And they shall know, understand, and realize that I the Lord have spoken in My zeal, when I have accomplished My wrath upon them. 14 Moreover, I will make you a desolation and a reproach among the nations that are round about you and in the sight of all who pass by. 15 So it shall be a reproach and a taunt, a warning and a horror and an astonishment to the [heathen] nations around you when I shall execute judgments upon you in anger and in wrath and in furious chastisements and rebukes--I the Lord have spoken it. 16 When I shall loose against them the evil arrows of hunger that are for destruction, which I will send to destroy you, then I will increase the famine upon you and will break your staff of bread. 17 And I will send upon you hunger and wild beasts, and they shall bereave you [of your loved ones]; and pestilence and blood shall pass through you, and I will bring the sword upon you. I the Lord have spoken it.