The Poetry of the Prophets - Part III: Ezekiel, Prophet of Visions

(1) In the thirtieth year, on the fifth day of the fourth month, when I was in the community of exiles by the Kevar Canal, the heavens opened and I saw visions of God. (2) On the fifth day of the month—it was the fifth year of the exile of King Jehoiachin— (3) the word of the Lord came to the priest Ezekiel ben Buzi, by the Kevar Canal, in the land of the Chaldeans. And the hand of the Lord came upon him there:

(4) I looked, and lo, a stormy wind came sweeping out of the north—a huge cloud and flashing fire, surrounded by a radiance; and in the center of it, in the center of the fire, an electric glow. (5) In the center of it were also the figures of four creatures. And this was their appearance:

They had the figures of human beings. (6) However, each had four faces, and each of them had four wings; (7) the legs of each were fused into a single rigid leg, and the feet of each were like a single calf’s hoof; and their sparkle was like the luster of burnished bronze. (8) They had human hands below their wings. The four of them had their faces and their wings on their four sides. (9) Each one’s wings touched those of the other. They did not turn when they moved; each could move in the direction of any of its faces.

(10) Each of them had a human face and the face of a lion on the right; each of the four had the face of an ox on the left; and each of the four had the face of an eagle. (11) Such were their faces. As for their wings, they were separated: above, each had two touching those of the others, while the other two covered its body. (12) And each could move in the direction of any of its faces; they went wherever the spirit impelled them to go, without turning when they moved.

(13) Such then was the appearance of the creatures. With them was something that looked like burning coals of fire. This fire, suggestive of torches, kept moving about among the creatures; the fire had a radiance, and lightning issued from the fire. (14) Running back and forth among the creatures was something that looked like lighting.

(1) And you are to intone a dirge over the princes of Israel, (2) and say:

What a lioness was your mother,

Crouching among the lions!

Among the great beasts

She raised her cubs.

(3) She raised up one of her cubs,

And he became a great beast;

He learned to tear men apart

And eat them.

(4) Nations heard about him;

and he was caught in their snare.

They dragged him off with hooks

to the land of Egypt.

(5) When she saw she had been foiled,

Her hope was lost.

She took another of her cubs

And set him up as a beast.

(6) He stalked among the lions,

A great beast he was;

He learned to tear men apart —

And eat them.

(7) He ravished their widows,

Laid their cities to waste;

The land and all in it were appalled

At the sound of his roaring.

(8) Nations from countries all around Arrayed themselves against him.

They spread their net over him,

He was caught in their snare.

(9) With hooks he was put in a cage,

They carried him off to the king of Babylon

And confined him in a fortress,

So that never again should his roar be heard

On the hills of Israel.

A dirge this is, and a dirge it has become.

(1) In the tenth year, on the twelfth day of the tenth month, the word of the Lord came to me: (2) O mortal, turn your face against Pharaoh king of Egypt, and prophesy against him and against all Egypt. (3) Speak these words:

Thus said the Lord God:

Here I come upon you, O Pharaoh king of Egypt,

Mighty serpent, sprawling in your channels,

Who said, My Nile is my own;

I made it for myself.

(4) I will stick hooks through your cheeks,

And make the fish of your Nile cling to your scales;

I will haul you up from your Nile,

With all the fish of your Nile clinging to your scales.

(5) And I will fling you into the desert, With all the fish of your Nile.

You shall be left lying in the field, ungathered and unburied:

To the beasts of the earth and the birds of the sky I have given you as food.

(6) Then all the inhabitants of Egypt will know that I am the Lord.

Because you were a staff of reed to the House of Israel:

(7) When they grasped you with the hand, you would splinter

And crack against their shoulders,

And when they leaned on you, you would break,

And shoot up against their loins.