And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month, in the first day of the month, that the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying,
Son of man, say unto Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to his multitude: Whom art thou like in thy greatness?
Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a forest-like shade, and of high stature; and its top was among the {Or, clouds}thick boughs.
The waters nourished it, the deep made it to grow: the rivers thereof ran round about its plantation; and it sent out its channels unto all the trees of the field.
Therefore its stature was exalted above all the trees of the field; and its boughs were multiplied, and its branches became long by reason of {Or, great}many waters, when it shot them forth.
All the birds of the heavens made their nests in its boughs; and under its branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young; and under its shadow dwelt all great nations.
Thus was it fair in its greatness, in the length of its branches; for its root was by {Or, great}many waters.
The cedars in the garden of God could not hide it; the fir-trees were not like its boughs, and the plane-trees were not as its branches; nor was any tree in the garden of God like unto it in its beauty.
I made it fair by the multitude of its branches, so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied it.
Therefore thus {Or, saith}said the Lord Jehovah: Because thou art exalted in stature, and he hath set his top among the {Or, clouds}thick boughs, and his heart is lifted up in his height;
I will even deliver him into the hand of the mighty one of the nations; he shall surely deal with him; I have driven him out for his wickedness.
And strangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off, and have left him: upon the mountains and in all the valleys his branches are fallen, and his boughs are broken by all the watercourses of the land; and all the peoples of the earth are gone down from his shadow, and have left him.
Upon his ruin all the birds of the heavens shall dwell, and all the beasts of the field shall be upon his branches;
to the end that none of all the trees by the waters exalt themselves in their stature, neither set their top among the thick boughs, nor that their mighty ones stand up on their height, even all that drink water: for they are all delivered unto death, to the nether parts of the earth, in the midst of the children of men, with them that go down to the pit.
Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: In the day when he went down to Sheol I caused a mourning: I covered the deep for him, and I restrained the rivers thereof; and the great waters were stayed; and I caused Lebanon {Hebrew: to be black.}to mourn for him, and all the trees of the field fainted for him.
I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to Sheol with them that descend into the pit; and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, were comforted in the nether parts of the earth.
They also went down into Sheol with him unto them that are slain by the sword; yea, they that were his arm, that dwelt under his shadow in the midst of the nations.
To whom art thou thus like in glory and in greatness among the trees of Eden? yet shalt thou be brought down with the trees of Eden unto the nether parts of the earth: thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised, with them that are slain by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, saith the Lord Jehovah.
Querverweise zu Hesekiel 31,12 Hes 31,12
therefore, behold, I will bring strangers upon thee, the terrible of the nations; and they shall draw their swords against the beauty of thy wisdom, and they shall {Or, profane}defile thy brightness.
And I will leave thee upon the land, I will cast thee forth upon the open field, and will cause all the birds of the heavens to settle upon thee, and I will satisfy the beasts of the whole earth with thee.
The leaves thereof were fair, and the fruit thereof much, and in it was food for all: the beasts of the field had shadow under it, and the birds of the heavens dwelt in the branches thereof, and all flesh was fed from it.
I saw in the visions of my head upon my bed, and, behold, a watcher and a holy one came down from heaven.
He cried aloud, and said thus, Hew down the tree, and cut off its branches, shake off its leaves, and scatter its fruit: let the beasts get away from under it, and the fowls from its branches.
He and his people with him, the terrible of the nations, shall be brought in to destroy the land; and they shall draw their swords against Egypt, and fill the land with the slain.
And I will lay thy flesh upon the mountains, and fill the valleys with thy {Or, as otherwise read, worms}height.
Thy princes are as the locusts, and thy {Or, scribes}marshals as the swarms of grasshoppers, which encamp in the {Or, walls}hedges in the cold day, but when the sun ariseth they flee away, and their place is not known where they are.
For, lo, I raise up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation, that march through the breadth of the earth, to possess dwelling-places that are not theirs.
Because thou hast had a perpetual enmity, and hast given over the children of Israel to the power of the sword in the time of their calamity, in the time of the {Or, punishment}iniquity of the end;
Thy shepherds slumber, O king of Assyria; thy nobles are at rest; thy people are scattered upon the mountains, and there is none to gather them.
{Or, Then shall the wind sweep by, and he shall pass away}Then shall he sweep by as a wind, and shall {Or, transgress}pass over, and be guilty, even he whose might is his god.
And I will fill its mountains with its slain: in thy hills and in thy valleys and in all thy watercourses shall they fall that are slain with the sword.
And the ten horns which thou sawest, and the beast, these shall hate the harlot, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and shall burn her utterly with fire.
Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and all thy hordes, and the peoples that are with thee: I will give thee unto the ravenous birds of every sort, and to the beasts of the field to be devoured.
For my sword hath drunk its fill in heaven: behold, it shall come down upon Edom, and upon the people of my {Hebrew: devoting, or, ban.}curse, to judgment.
The sword of Jehovah is filled with blood, it is made fat with fatness, with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams; for Jehovah hath a sacrifice in Bozrah, and a great slaughter in the land of Edom.
And the wild-oxen shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls: and their land shall be drunken with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness.