1 ARST Yahweh said to Ezekiel,“Son of man, give a message to the hill country and mountains in Israel just as if they were people. Tell them to listen to my message for them. BSB BSB: “And you, son of man, prophesy to the mountains of Israel and say: O mountains of Israel, hear the word of the LORD.
2 ARST This is it: The enemies of Israel, those people groups who live nearby, are now very happy, because they are saying that Jerusalem has been destroyed, so the ancient mountains of Israel will now belong to them. BSB BSB: This is what the Lord GOD says: Because the enemy has said of you, ‘Aha! The ancient heights have become our possession,’
3 ARST So you, Ezekiel, must tell the mountains of Israel what I, the Lord Yahweh, am saying to them:‘Armies of other nations attacked you from every direction, and everyone has left you. Those foreign armies are now in your land. They have spoken very maliciously about your people, the Israelites, and have told all kinds of lies about them. BSB BSB: therefore prophesy and declare that this is what the Lord GOD says: Because they have made you desolate and have trampled you on every side, so that you became a possession of the rest of the nations and were taken up in slander by the lips of their talkers,
4 ARST Therefore, you mountains of Israel, listen to this message from me. I, Yahweh the Lord, have something to say to you, the hills and mountains, and to you, the ravines and valleys, and to you, the towns and cities which the enemy burned down, where no one is living any longer, from where the enemy has taken everything valuable, and whose people the people groups all around are mocking. “This is what I, Yahweh the Lord, declare: I am very angry with the people of Edom and the other people groups; they have insulted your Israelite people and happily taken all their land as pastures. So Ezekiel must speak for me to you, the land of Israel, mountains and hills, valleys and ravines: I, Yahweh the Lord, am very angry because the enemy has insulted you. BSB BSB: therefore, O mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord GOD. This is what the Lord GOD says to the mountains and hills, to the ravines and valleys, to the desolate ruins and abandoned cities, which have become a spoil and a mockery to the rest of the nations around you.
7 ARST Therefore, this is what I, Yahweh the Lord, say: I solemnly declare I will shame the people of the nations that are around you. BSB BSB: Therefore this is what the Lord GOD says: I have sworn with an uplifted hand that surely the nations around you will endure reproach of their own.
8 ARST But I say to you mountains of Israel that huge crops of fruit will grow on your trees for my Israelite people, because they will soon return home from Babylonia. BSB BSB: But you, O mountains of Israel, will produce branches and bear fruit for My people Israel, for they will soon come home.
9 ARST I will work to help you, and I will be kind to you. I will enable farmers to plow the ground and plant seed in you. BSB BSB: For behold, I am on your side; I will turn toward you, and you will be tilled and sown.
10 ARST I will cause the number of people who live there on you mountains and everywhere else in Israel to greatly increase. People will live in the cities and rebuild houses where there are now only ruins. BSB BSB: I will multiply the people upon you—the house of Israel in its entirety. The cities will be inhabited and the ruins rebuilt.
11 ARST I will cause the number of people and domestic animals to increase. People will have many children. I will enable people to live there as they did previously, and I will enable them to prosper as they did before. Then you will know that it is I, Yahweh, who have the power to do what I say that I will do. BSB BSB: I will fill you with people and animals, and they will multiply and be fruitful. I will make you as inhabited as you once were, and I will make you prosper more than before. Then you will know that I am the LORD.
12 ARST I will enable my Israelite people to walk through your mountains. They will own the land on you; you will belong to them forever. You will always grow enough food for them to eat, so they will never again go hungry and die. BSB BSB: Yes, I will cause My people Israel to walk upon you; they will possess you, and you will be their inheritance, and you will no longer deprive them of their children.
13 ARST I, Yahweh the Lord, am telling you mountains this: It is true that people have said they could not grow many crops on you, and so they died from hunger. BSB BSB: For this is what the Lord GOD says: Because people say to you, ‘You devour men and deprive your nation of its children,’
14 ARST But that will no longer happen. BSB BSB: therefore you will no longer devour men or deprive your nation of its children, declares the Lord GOD.
15 ARST No longer will the other people groups ridicule you mountains. No longer will they laugh at you; no longer will you mountains make your nation suffer defeat. I, the Lord Yahweh, am telling you this myself.’” BSB BSB: I will no longer allow the taunts of the nations to be heard against you, and you will no longer endure the reproach of the peoples or cause your nation to stumble, declares the Lord GOD.”
16 ARST Yahweh gave me another message. He said, BSB BSB: Again the word of the LORD came to me, saying,
17 ARST “Son of man, when the Israelite people were living in their own land, they defiled it by the things that they did. They made it unacceptable to me. I considered that their behavior was as disgusting as the rags that women use during their monthly menstrual periods. BSB BSB: “Son of man, when the people of Israel lived in their land, they defiled it by their own ways and deeds. Their behavior before Me was like the uncleanness of a woman’s impurity.
18 ARST So I severely punished them, because they had murdered many people and because they had worshiped idols there. They made their entire land unacceptable to me. BSB BSB: So I poured out My wrath upon them because of the blood they had shed on the land, and because they had defiled it with their idols.
19 ARST So I made their enemies scatter them into other lands. I punished them as they deserved to be punished because they had done so many evil things. BSB BSB: I dispersed them among the nations, and they were scattered throughout the lands. I judged them according to their ways and deeds.
20 ARST Wherever they went among those lands, they caused other people to mock me, when they should have honored me. Those people have been saying,‘The Israelites belong to Yahweh, but he was not strong enough to protect them. They had to leave the land that he had given to them.’ BSB BSB: And wherever they went among the nations, they profaned My holy name, because it was said of them, ‘These are the people of the LORD, yet they had to leave His land.’
21 ARST The people of Israel had disgraced me among the people groups to which they had to go, but I deserve that those people groups worship me instead. BSB BSB: But I had concern for My holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the nations to which they had gone.
22 ARST So you, Ezekiel, say to the Israelite people that I, the Lord Yahweh, am telling them this:‘You Israelite people, it is not for your sake that I am going to rescue you from your enemies. Instead, I will do this so that the people in these other lands will worship me as God. You have done your best to disgrace me wherever you have gone. BSB BSB: Therefore tell the house of Israel that this is what the Lord GOD says: It is not for your sake that I will act, O house of Israel, but for My holy name, which you profaned among the nations to which you went.
23 ARST I will show that these other people groups should worship me as God, even though they would never know it by watching how you act. When I prove to them that I am powerful and can do anything, then they will know that I will carry out everything that I say I will do. And they will see you honor me as the God who is holy. BSB BSB: I will show the holiness of My great name, which has been profaned among the nations—the name you have profaned among them. Then the nations will know that I am the LORD, declares the Lord GOD, when I show My holiness in you before their eyes.
24 ARST I will take you out of those distant lands. I will gather you from all those places where you had to go, and I will bring you back to your own land. BSB BSB: For I will take you from among the nations and gather you out of all the countries, and I will bring you back into your own land.
25 ARST It will be as though I will sprinkle clean water on you, and then you will be clean. I will make you clean from everything that has made me reject you, and I will cause you to stop worshiping idols. BSB BSB: I will also sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean. I will cleanse you from all your impurities and all your idols.
26 ARST I will give you a completely new way of thinking. I will enable you to stop being stubborn, and I will enable you to obey me from your inner beings. BSB BSB: I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will remove your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.
27 ARST I will put my Spirit within you and enable you to carefully obey all my laws. BSB BSB: And I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes and to carefully observe My ordinances.
28 ARST You will again live in the land that I gave to your ancestors. You will be my people, and I will be your God. BSB BSB: Then you will live in the land that I gave your forefathers; you will be My people, and I will be your God.
29 ARST I will free you from everything that made me reject you. I will cause your grain to be plentiful, and I will not send a famine to you again. BSB BSB: I will save you from all your uncleanness. I will summon the grain and make it plentiful, and I will not bring famine upon you.
30 ARST I will cause your fruit trees to produce plenty of fruit and your ground to produce plenty of good crops, with the result that the people of other lands will not mock you because you do not have enough food. BSB BSB: I will also make the fruit of the trees and the crops of the field plentiful, so that you will no longer bear reproach among the nations on account of famine.
31 ARST When that happens, you will think about your previous evil behavior and wicked deeds, and you will be very displeased with yourselves for your sins and the detestable things that you did. BSB BSB: Then you will remember your evil ways and wicked deeds, and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and abominations.
32 ARST But I, the Lord Yahweh, tell you this: It is not for your sake that I will do those things. You Israelite people ought to be ashamed of your behavior. BSB BSB: It is not for your sake that I will act, declares the Lord GOD—let it be known to you. Be ashamed and disgraced for your ways, O house of Israel!
33 ARST I, the Lord Yahweh, also tell you this: At the time that I cleanse you from all the sins that you have committed, I will enable you to live in your cities again and to build houses where there are now only ruins. BSB BSB: This is what the Lord GOD says: On the day I cleanse you from all your iniquities, I will cause the cities to be resettled and the ruins to be rebuilt.
34 ARST People who walk through your country will see that you are once again cultivating your land, and that your people are living in it again. BSB BSB: The desolate land will be cultivated instead of lying desolate in the sight of all who pass through.
35 ARST Then they will say,“This land that was ruined has become very fertile, like the garden of Eden. The cities that were piles of ruins, empty and destroyed, now have houses around them, and people are living in those cities.” BSB BSB: Then they will say, ‘This land that was desolate has become like the garden of Eden. The cities that were once ruined, desolate, and destroyed are now fortified and inhabited.’
36 ARST When that happens, the people who are still left in the lands that are around you will know that it is I, Yahweh, who have enabled you to rebuild what was destroyed, and to again plant crops in the fields that had nothing growing in them. I, Yahweh, have said that it will happen, and I will cause it to happen. BSB BSB: Then the nations around you that remain will know that I, the LORD, have rebuilt what was destroyed, and I have replanted what was desolate. I, the LORD, have spoken, and I will do it.
37 ARST This is also what I, Yahweh the Lord, say: Again I will answer your pleas for me to make your people become as numerous as sheep. BSB BSB: This is what the Lord GOD says: Once again I will hear the plea of the house of Israel and do for them this: I will multiply their people like a flock.
38 ARST I will make them as numerous as the flocks of sheep that will be needed for offerings in Jerusalem during your regular festivals. The cities that are now ruined will be filled with people, and then you will know that I, Yahweh, have done this.’” BSB BSB: Like the numerous flocks for sacrifices at Jerusalem during her appointed feasts, so the ruined cities will be filled with flocks of people. Then they will know that I am the LORD.”
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