Ezekiel 43-44

Ezekiel 43

¹And he took me to the doorway looking to the east:

²And there was the glory of the God of Israel coming from the way of the east: and his voice was like the sound of great waters, and the earth was shining with his glory.

³And the vision which I saw was like the vision I had seen when he came for the destruction of the town: and like the vision which I saw by the river Chebar; and I went down on my face.

⁴And the glory of the Lord came into the house by the way of the doorway looking to the east.

⁵And the spirit, lifting me up, took me into the inner square; and I saw that the house was full of the glory of the Lord.

⁶And the voice of one talking to me came to my ears from inside the house; and the man was by my side.

⁷And he said to me, Son of man, this is the place where the seat of my power is and the resting-place of my feet, where I will be among the children of Israel for ever: and no longer will the people of Israel make my holy name unclean, they or their kings, by their loose ways and by the dead bodies of their kings;

⁸By putting their doorstep by my doorstep, and the pillar of their door by the pillar of my door, with only a wall between me and them; and they have made my holy name unclean by the disgusting things which they have done: so in my wrath I sent destruction on them.

⁹Now let them put their loose ways and the dead bodies of their kings far from me, and I will be among them for ever.

¹⁰You, son of man, give the children of Israel an account of this house, so that they may be shamed because of their evil-doing: and let them see the vision of it and its image.

¹¹And they will be shamed by what they have done; so give them the knowledge of the form of the house and its structure, and the ways out of it and into it, and all its laws and its rules, writing it down for them: so that they may keep all its laws and do them.

¹²This is the law of the house: On the top of the mountain all the space round it on every side will be most holy. See, this is the law of the house.

¹³And these are the measures of the altar in cubits: (the cubit being a cubit and a hand's measure;) its hollow base is a cubit high and a cubit wide, and it has an overhanging edge as wide as a hand-stretch all round it:

¹⁴And from the base on the earth level to the lower shelf, the altar is two cubits high and a cubit wide; and from the smaller shelf to the greater shelf it is four cubits high and a cubit wide.

¹⁵And the fireplace is four cubits high: and coming up from the fireplace are the horns, a cubit high.

¹⁶And the fireplace is twelve cubits long and twelve cubits wide, square on its four sides.

¹⁷And the shelf is fourteen cubits long and fourteen cubits wide, on its four sides; the edge round it is half a cubit; the base of it is a cubit all round, and its steps are facing the east.

¹⁸And he said to me, Son of man, the Lord God has said, These are the rules for the altar, when they make it, for the offering of burned offerings on it and the draining out of the blood.

¹⁹You are to give to the priests, the Levites of the seed of Zadok, who come near to me, says the Lord God, to do my work, a young ox for a sin-offering.

²⁰You are to take some of its blood and put it on the four horns and on the four angles of the shelf and on the edge all round: and you are to make it clean and free from sin.

²¹And you are to take the ox of the sin-offering, and have it burned in the special place ordered for it in the house, outside the holy place.

²²And on the second day you are to have a he-goat without any mark on it offered for a sin-offering; and they are to make the altar clean as they did with the young ox.

²³And after you have made it clean, let a young ox without a mark be offered, and a male sheep from the flock without a mark.

²⁴And you are to take them before the Lord, and the priests will put salt on them, offering them up for a burned offering to the Lord.

²⁵Every day for seven days you are to give a goat for a sin-offering: and let them give in addition a young ox and a male sheep from the flock without any mark on them.

²⁶For seven days they are to make offerings to take away sin from the altar and to make it clean; so they are to make it holy.

²⁷And when these days have come to an end, then on the eighth day and after, the priests will make your burned offerings on the altar and your peace-offerings; and I will take pleasure in you, says the Lord.

Ezekiel 44

¹And he took me back to the outer doorway of the holy place, looking to the east; and it was shut.

²And the Lord said to me, This doorway is to be shut, it is not to be open, and no man is to go in by it, because the Lord, the God of Israel, has gone in by it; and it is to be shut.

³But the ruler will be seated there to take his food before the Lord; he will go in by the covered way to the door, and will come out by the same way.

⁴And he took me to the north doorway in front of the house; and, looking, I saw that the house of the Lord was full of the glory of the Lord; and I went down on my face.

⁵And the Lord said to me, Son of man, take to heart, and let your eyes see and your ears be open to everything I say to you about all the rules of the house of the Lord and all its laws; and take note of the ways into the house and all the ways out of the holy place.

⁶And say to the uncontrolled children of Israel, This is what the Lord has said: O you children of Israel, let it be enough for you, among the disgusting things which you have done,

⁷To have let men from strange lands, without circumcision of heart or flesh, come into my holy place, making my house unclean; and to have made the offering of my food, even the fat and the blood; and in addition to all your disgusting ways, you have let my agreement be broken.

⁸And you have not taken care of my holy things; but you have put them as keepers to take care of my work in my holy place.

⁹For this cause the Lord has said, No man from a strange land, without circumcision of heart and flesh, of all those who are living among the children of Israel, is to come into my holy place.

¹⁰But as for the Levites, who went far from me, when Israel went out of the right way, turning away from me to go after their images; their punishment will come on them.

¹¹But they may be caretakers in my holy place, and overseers at the doors of the house, doing the work of the house: they will put to death the burned offering and the beasts offered for the people, and they will take their place before them as their servants.

¹²Because they did this work for them before their images, and became a cause of sin to the children of Israel; for this cause my hand has been lifted up against them, says the Lord, and their punishment will be on them.

¹³And they will not come near me to do the work of priests to me, or come near any of my holy things, or the things which are most holy: but their shame will be on them, and the punishment for the disgusting things which they have done.

¹⁴But I will make them responsible for the care of the house and all its work and everything which is done in it.

¹⁵But as for the priests, the sons of Zadok, who took care of my holy place when the children of Israel were turned away from me, they are to come near me to do my work, they will take their places before me, offering to me the fat and the blood, says the Lord;

¹⁶They are to come into my holy place and they are to come near to my table, to do my work and have the care of my house.

¹⁷And when they come in by the doorways of the inner square, they are to be clothed in linen robes; there is to be no wool on them while they are doing my work in the doorway of the inner square and inside the house.

¹⁸They are to have linen head-dresses on their heads and linen trousers on their legs, and they are to have nothing round them to make their skin wet with heat.

¹⁹And when they go out into the outer square to the people, they are to take off the robes in which they do the work of priests, and put them away in the holy rooms, and put on other clothing, so that the people may not be made holy by their robes.

²⁰They are not to have all the hair cut off their heads, and they are not to let their hair get long, but they are to have the ends of their hair cut.

²¹The priests are not to take wine when they go into the inner square.

²²And they are not to take as wives any widow or woman whose husband has put her away: but they may take virgins of the seed of Israel, or a widow who is the widow of a priest.

²³And they are to make clear to my people the division between what is holy and what is common, and to give them the knowledge of what is clean and what is unclean.

²⁴In any cause, they are to be in the position of judges, judging in harmony with my decisions: they are to keep my laws and my rules in all my fixed feasts; and they are to keep my Sabbaths holy.

²⁵They are not to come near any dead person so as to become unclean: but for a father or mother or son or daughter or brother or for a sister who has no husband, they may make themselves unclean.

²⁶And after he has been made clean, seven days are to be numbered for him.

²⁷And on the day when he goes into the inner square, to do the work of the holy place, he is to make his sin-offering, says the Lord.

²⁸And they are to have no heritage; I am their heritage: you are to give them no property in Israel; I am their property.

²⁹Their food is to be the meal offering and the sin-offering and the offering for error; and everything given specially to the Lord in Israel will be theirs.

³⁰And the best of all the first-fruits of everything, and every offering which is lifted up of all your offerings, will be for the priests: and you are to give the priest the first of your bread-making, so causing a blessing to come on your house.

³¹The priests may not take for food any bird or beast which has come to a natural death or whose death has been caused by another animal.