Ezekiel 4 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.
Time Period
593 to 592 BC, roughly five years before Babylon destroyed Jerusalem
Location
Ezekiel's house in the exile settlement by the Kebar canal in Babylonia
Audience
Judean exiles who still expected Jerusalem to survive and to bring them home quickly
Situation
Ezekiel is told to act out the coming siege of Jerusalem using a clay brick as a model city, an iron plate as a wall between himself and it, and long periods lying on one side then the other to represent years of guilt. He is also to eat rationed bread and measured water cooked over dung fuel, showing the starvation conditions of a besieged city.
Key Background
Prophets in this culture regularly performed their messages as street theatre, and to the audience these acted signs were not illustrations but the first stage of the event itself being set in motion. Sun dried clay bricks were the standard building and writing material of Babylonia, and siege scenes were commonly scratched or stamped onto them, so the prop was familiar to anyone watching. Dried animal dung was ordinary cooking fuel in a treeless region, but human waste as fuel crosses a purity line, which is why Ezekiel objects as a priest and is allowed a substitution.
"Now you, of — take a set it down in front of you, and carve into it the image of a city:
"Then lay against it — build a wall around it, pile up an assault ramp, set up military camps, and position on every side."
"Then take an and set it up as an wall between you and the city. Turn your face toward it — it will be under siege, and you will press the siege against it. This is a for the of
"Then lie on your left side and place the of the house of Israel upon yourself. For as many days as you lie on that side, you will carry their
"I have assigned you the same number of as the years of their guilt — three and This is how you will carry the guilt of the house of Israel."
"When you have finished those lie down again — this time on your right side — and carry the guilt of the of for I have assigned you one day for each year."
"Set your face toward the siege of Jerusalem, with your and against her."
"And look — I will you with so you cannot turn from one side to the other until you have completed the days of your siege."
"Now take and — put them all in one container and make bread from them. You will eat this for the three hundred and ninety days you lie on your side."
"The food you eat will be rationed — twenty weight per day. You will eat it at set times."
"And the water you drink will be rationed — one-sixth of a per day. You will drink it at set times."
"And you will eat it like a barley cake — baking it over as they watch."
And said, "This is how the people of Israel will eat their bread — made — among the nations where I will drive them."
Then I said, "Please, — no! I have never made myself unclean. From my youth until now, I have never eaten anything that on its own or was by No foul meat has ever entered my mouth."
He said to me, "Very well — I will let you use instead of human excrement. You may bake your bread over that."
Then he said to me, "Son of man, I am about to the of in Jerusalem. They will eat by weight, in They will drink water by measure, in
"They will run short of bread and water. They will look at each other in horror and under the weight of their