Ezekiel 3

¹And he said to me, “Son of man, eat what is offered to you; eat this scroll, and go, speak to the house of Israel.” ²So I opened my mouth, and he gave me the scroll to eat. ³And he said to me, “Son of man, eat this scroll that I give you and fill your stomach with it.” Then I ate it; and it was in my mouth as sweet as honey.

⁴And he said to me, “Son of man, go, get you to the house of Israel, and speak with my words to them. ⁵For you are not sent to a people of foreign speech and a hard language, but to the house of Israel—⁶not to many peoples of foreign speech and a hard language, whose words you cannot understand. Surely, if I sent you to such, they would listen to you. ⁷But the house of Israel will not listen to you; for they are not willing to listen to me; because all the house of Israel are of a hard forehead and of a stubborn heart. ⁸Behold, I have made your face hard against their faces, and your forehead hard against their foreheads. ⁹Like adamant harder than flint have I made your forehead; fear them not, nor be dismayed at their looks, for they are a rebellious house.” ¹⁰Moreover he said to me, “Son of man, all my words that I shall speak to you receive in your heart, and hear with your ears. ¹¹And go, get you to the exiles, to your people, and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God’; whether they hear or refuse to hear.”

¹²Then the Spirit lifted me up, and as the glory of the Lord arose from its place, I heard behind me the sound of a great earthquake; ¹³it was the sound of the wings of the living creatures as they touched one another, and the sound of the wheels beside them, that sounded like a great earthquake. ¹⁴The Spirit lifted me up and took me away, and I went in bitterness in the heat of my spirit, the hand of the Lord being strong upon me; ¹⁵and I came to the exiles at Tel-aʹbib, who dwelt by the river Chebar. And I sat there overwhelmed among them seven days.

¹⁶And at the end of seven days, the word of the Lord came to me: ¹⁷“Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel; whenever you hear a word from my mouth, you shall give them warning from me. ¹⁸If I say to the wicked, ‘You shall surely die,’ and you give him no warning, nor speak to warn the wicked from his wicked way, in order to save his life, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood I will require at your hand. ¹⁹But if you warn the wicked, and he does not turn from his wickedness, or from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity; but you will have saved your life. ²⁰Again, if a righteous man turns from his righteousness and commits iniquity, and I lay a stumbling block before him, he shall die; because you have not warned him, he shall die for his sin, and his righteous deeds which he has done shall not be remembered; but his blood I will require at your hand. ²¹Nevertheless if you warn the righteous man not to sin, and he does not sin, he shall surely live, because he took warning; and you will have saved your life.”

²²And the hand of the Lord was there upon me; and he said to me, “Arise, go forth into the plain, and there I will speak with you.” ²³So I arose and went forth into the plain; and lo, the glory of the Lord stood there, like the glory which I had seen by the river Chebar; and I fell on my face. ²⁴But the Spirit entered into me, and set me upon my feet; and he spoke with me and said to me, “Go, shut yourself within your house. ²⁵And you, O son of man, behold, cords will be placed upon you, and you shall be bound with them, so that you cannot go out among the people; ²⁶and I will make your tongue cleave to the roof of your mouth, so that you shall be dumb and unable to reprove them; for they are a rebellious house. ²⁷But when I speak with you, I will open your mouth, and you shall say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God’; he that will hear, let him hear; and he that will refuse to hear, let him refuse; for they are a rebellious house.