Ezekiel 4

Ezekiel 4:1

Take thee a tile, and lay it before thee, and pourtray upon it the city, even Jerusalem.

Make thee upon a tile, a model or draught of the city Jerusalem.

Ezekiel 4:2

And lay siege against it, and build a fort against it, and cast a mount against it; set the camp also against it, and set battering rams against it round about.

And then make the model of a siege laid against that so pour-trayed city; in all the representations of those hostile actions, that are wont to be done against a city that is beleaguered.

Ezekiel 4:3

Moreover take thou unto thee an iron pan, and set it for a wall of iron between thee and the city; and set thy face against it, and it shall be besieged, and thou shalt lay siege against it. This shall be a sign to the house of Israel.

And, to signify the strength and invincibleness of that siege, set a pot of iron between thee and that city; and then do thou set thy face against it, as if thou wert the besieger of it: and this shall be a sign to all the people of Israel, what they shall really expect to be performed against them.

Ezekiel 4:4

Lie thou also upon thy left side, and lay the iniquity of the house of Israel upon it; according to the number of the days that thou shalt lie upon it thou shalt bear their iniquity.

Lie thou also upon thy left side, and, by thy quiet and still lying thereon, represent unto the house of Israel, the Ten Tribes, how long I have lain patiently under the many provocations, which I have had from those rebellious Israelites: according to the number of the days, wherein thou shalt, in vision, lie upon that side, thou shalt represent my patience under the iniquity of the house of Israel.

Ezekiel 4:5

For I have laid upon thee the years of their iniquity, according to the number of the days, three hundred and ninety days: so shalt thou bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.

So many days as thou shalt, in the appointment of this vision, lie upon that left side, for this purpose; so many have been the years, that I have quietly forborne to revenge the iniquities of Israel, that is, three hundred and ninety years, answerable to so many days, since their defection under Jeroboam.

Ezekiel 4:6

And when thou hast accomplished them, lie again on thy right side, and thou shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days: I have appointed thee each day for a year.

And when thou hast done this, in a figure of what I have done for Israel, then lie another while, upon thy right side, to represent my bearing with the iniquity of the house of Judah: forty days are, in thy vision, appointed for this posture, in figure of forty years, that I have been provoked by the sins of Judah.

Ezekiel 4:7

Thine arm shall be uncovered.

Thine arm shall be uncovered; to signify the vehemence and readiness of execution, which shall be in the besiegers of Jerusalem.

Ezekiel 4:8

And, behold, I will lay bands upon thee, and thou shalt not turn thee from one side to another, till thou hast ended the days of thy siege.

And, to shew the immutable certainty of that my decree for the besieging of Jerusalem, I will lay bands upon thee, in this vision, that thou mayest not change sides, till the days of that fore-appointed siege be fulfilled.

Ezekiel 4:9

Take thou also unto thee wheat, and barley, and beans, and lentiles, and millet, and fitches, and put them in one vessel, and make thee bread thereof, according to the number of the days that thou shalt lie upon thy side, three hundred and ninety days shalt thou eat thereof.

And, as thou shalt thus represent the siege, so also, in the sequel, thou shalt represent the famine, which shall fall upon Jerusalem; take thee, therefore, all kinds of grain, wheat and barley and beans, and lentiles, and fitches, and put them all together and make bread of this mesline, and eat thereof for the space of three hundred and ninety days; to signify, that, in that strait siege, there shall be such scarcity, as that they shall be glad of the coarsest sustenance.

Ezekiel 4:10

And thy meat which thou shalt eat shall be by weight, twenty shekels a day: from time to time shalt thou eat it.

And thy meat, which thou shalt eat, shall be stinted unto thee, according to five ounces, the day.

Ezekiel 4:11

Thou shalt drink also water by measure, the sixth part of an hin: from time to time shalt thou drink.

Neither shalt thou have full scope to drink how much water thou pleasest, but shall have it allowed thee by measure, about a pint a day; and so shall continue.

Ezekiel 4:12

13. And thou shalt eat it as barley cakes, and thou shalt bake it with the dung that cometh out of man, in their sight, &c.

And thou shalt make it up in the form of barley cakes, and shalt bake it, instead of coals, with man’s dung, in the sight of the people; to signify that extreme pollution, whereto God will give over his people, among the Gentiles.

Ezekiel 4:14

Then said I, Ah Lord God! behold, my soul hath not been polluted: for from my youth up even till now have I not eaten of that which dieth of itself, or is torn in pieces; neither came there abominable flesh into my mouth.

Then said I, Ah Lord God, behold, as I have been consecrated to thy service in the priesthood, so I have carefully kept myself from all legal pollutions from my youth: I have not eaten ought, that is forbidden by thy law, but have avoided all those offensive meats, of what kind soever; and now, thou knowest that this excrementitious fire, which thou enjoinest, is, beside the loathsome-ness, unclean by thy law.