Ezekiel

36 “And do you, man, prophesy about the highlands of Israel and say ‘Highlands of Israel, hear Jehovah’s word! 2 Since the enemy has said “ah there!” over you, and “the historic heights have become ours to take possession of,” 3* therefore prophesy and say “Says the Lord Jehovah, Forasmuch as on all sides there is gasping and panting for you, to have you become a possession for the remnant of the nations, and you are a topic for tongue-racing and popular gossip, 4 therefore, highlands of Israel, hear Jehovah’s word! Says the Lord Jehovah to the mountains and the hills, the gorges and the valleys, the desolate wastes and the abandoned cities, that have become an object of plunder and derision to the remnant of the nations around them, 5* therefore the Lord Jehovah says: I have in the fire of my jealousy spoken against the remnant of the nations and all Edom, who gave my country to themselves for a possession with wholehearted glee and passionate spite, in order to sweep it bare for plunder. 6 So prophesy about the soil of Israel and say to the mountains and the hills, the gorges and the valleys, ‘Says the Lord Jehovah, In my jealousy and resentment I declare, since you have borne humiliation from nations, 7 therefore the Lord Jehovah says, I pledge myself that it shall be the nations around you that bear their humiliation, 8 and you, highlands of Israel, shall put out your shoots and bear your fruits for my people Israel, because they are coming in right away; 9 for here I come and will face toward you, and you shall be worked and sown, 10 and I will make men numerous over you, all the whole house of Israel, and the cities shall be inhabited and the deserted sites rebuilt. 11* And I will make man and beast numerous over you, and they shall multiply and breed; and I will have you inhabited as of old, and do better by you than at first; and you shall know that I am Jehovah. 12 And I will set men walking over you, my own people Israel, and they shall take possession of you and have you for their estate, and no more shall you kill their children. 13 Says the Lord Jehovah, Whereas they say of you “You are a man-eating country and have kept killing off the children of your nation,” 14 therefore you shall not again eat men nor again kill your nation’s children, quoth the Lord Jehovah. 15* And I will not again let the insults the nations address to you be heard, nor shall you again be a butt for the taunting of peoples, nor shall you again kill the children of your nation, quoth the Lord Jehovah.’”’”

16 And Jehovah’s word came to me 17 “Man, the house of Israel, while they lived on their soil, defiled it by their courses and practices; their course came to be like the uncleanness of menstruation before me; 18 and I poured out my ire upon them for the blood they had shed over the country and the way they had defiled it with their fetishes, 19 and I scattered them among the nations and sprinkled them through the countries; I executed justice on them in accordance with their courses and practices. 20 And when they came to the nations to which they did come, they desecrated my hallowed name by its being said of them ‘These are Jehovah’s people, and come out of his country.’

21 “But I had consideration for my hallowed name, which the house of Israel had desecrated among the nations where they came. 22 So say to the house of Israel ‘Says the Lord Jehovah, it is not on account of you I am acting, house of Israel, but for my hallowed name, which you have desecrated among the nations where you came; 23 and I will vindicate the sanctity of my internationally desecrated great name, which you have desecrated in the midst of the nations, and the nations shall know that I am Jehovah, quoth the Lord Jehovah, when I vindicate my sanctity by you before their eyes. 24 And I will take you out of the nations and gather you out of all the countries and bring you to your own soil; 25 and I will dash clean water over you so that you shall be clean; from all your defilements and all your fetishes I will cleanse you; 26 and I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit into you, and remove from your flesh the stone heart and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my own spirit in you, and cause you to go by my usages and observe my laws and live up to them; 28 and you shall live in the country I gave to your fathers, and I will have you for my people and you shall have me for your God. 29 And I will save you out of all your defilements, and will call up the grain and make it plentiful and not inflict famine on you; 30 and I will make the fruit of the trees and the products of the range plentiful, in order that you may not again take a taunt for hungriness among the nations. 31 And you shall remember your bad courses and good-for-nothing practices, and feel a loathing for your own faces because of all your guilts and abominations. 32 It is not on account of you that I am acting, quoth the Lord Jehovah, realize that; be ashamed and humiliated at your courses, house of Israel.

33 “‘Says the Lord Jehovah, On the day that I cleanse you from all your guilts I will people the cities, and the sites that were lying waste shall be rebuilt, 34 and the desolated land shall be worked instead of being a desolation for the eyes of every passerby; 35 and they shall say “Yonder desolate country has become like the garden of Eden, and the wasted and desolated and demolished cities are inhabited with fortifications,” 36 and the nations that still remain around you shall know that it was I, Jehovah, who rebuilt the demolished and replanted the desolated; I, Jehovah, promised it and did it.

37 “‘Says the Lord Jehovah, To do this also for the house of Israel I will receive their petitions: I will make them numerous, men like sheep. 38 Like sheep for sacred occasions, like the sheep of Jerusalem at her anniversaries, so the cities that lay waste shall be full of human sheep, and they shall know that I am Jehovah.’”