Ezekiel 13:1-23
13 And Jehovah’s word came to me
2 * “Man, prophesy against Israel’s prophesying prophets and say to the prophesiers out of their own heads ‘Hear Jehovah’s word.
3 * Says the Lord Jehovah, Ha, the rascally prophets that follow their own spirits so that they are not afraid!
4 Like foxes among ruins your prophets, Israel, are.
5 You have not gone up into the breaches and built a fence for the house of Israel for standing fast in battle on Jehovah’s day.
6 * They vision unmeaning things and soothsay falsehoods, they who say “quoth Jehovah” and Jehovah has not sent them, and they expect to make good a word.
7 Have you not been seeing unmeaning visions and uttering false soothsayings?’
8 Therefore say ‘Says the Lord Jehovah, Owing to your talking unmeaningness and visioning falsehood, therefore have at you, quoth the Lord Jehovah!
9 my hand shall be against the prophets that vision unmeaning things and soothsay falsehoods; they shall not be in the council of my people nor be inscribed in the register of the house of Israel nor come to Israelite soil; and you shall know that I am the Lord Jehovah.
10 * Forasmuch as they have misled my people, saying “All right” when nothing was all right, and the people is building without mortar and they are plastering it flat,
11 * say to those who are plastering it flat “When there is a flooding rain, and I send hailstones falling and a tempest of wind breaking loose,
12 and the wall falls, will they not say to you ‘Where is the plaster you plastered on?’
13 So the Lord Jehovah says, I will break loose a tempest of wind in my ire, and there shall be a flooding rain in my anger, and hailstones in ire to finish all,
14 * and I will break down the wall you plastered flat and lay it on the ground, and its foundation shall be uncovered,
15 * and I will wreak my ire on the wall and on those who are plastering it flat, and you will have it said to you ‘Where is the wall and where are those who plastered it,
16 the prophets of Israel who prophesied to Jerusalem and visioned for it a vision of everything all right when nothing was all right?’ quoth the Lord Jehovah.”’
17 “And for your part, man, face toward the daughters of your people who prophesy out of their own heads; prophesy against them
18 ** and say ‘Says the Lord Jehovah, Oho the women that pin tapes to all elbows and make cowls to go over the heads of all sizes of people to hunt lives! will you hunt lives for my people and preserve lives for yourselves?
19 And you have profaned me to my people for handfuls of barley and morsels of bread, destroying lives that should not die and preserving lives that should not live, by your lying to my people that listen to lies.
20 ** “‘So the Lord Jehovah says, Have at your tapes where you hunt the souls for fowl! I will tear them off your arms and let the souls you are hunting go free;
21 and I will tear your cowls and deliver my people out of your hands, and they shall no longer be a bag of game in your hands; and you shall know I am Jehovah.
22 * Since you have pained honest men’s hearts with falsehood when I had not pained them, and been encouraging wicked men not to turn back from their wicked courses to have their lives spared,
23 therefore you shall no longer vision unmeaning things nor carry on soothsaying; and I will deliver my people out of your hands, and you shall know I am Jehovah’”
Footnotes
^ 13:2 Var. against the prophets of Israel: you are to prophesy and say
^ 13:3 Codd. that they have not seen
^ 13:6 Conj. You vision . . . you who say . . . sent you, and you
^ 13:10 Lit. and it is building
^ 13:11 Codd. flat, and it will fall, “There will be a
^ 13:14 Codd. add and it shall fall, and you shall come to your finish within it, and you shall know that I am Jehovah (the word it in this added part referring to the city, not to the wall)
^ 13:15 Or The wall is missing and so are those who
^ 13:18 (pin) Unc.
^ 13:18, 20 (tapes) Or bags
^ 13:20 (far fowl) Unc.
^ 13:20 Codd. and let the souls go, that you are hunting souls for fowl
^ 13:22 (first part) Susp.
