< Ezekiel 19 >
1 And thou, take thou up a lamentation for the princes of Israel,
[Yahweh said to me, “Ezekiel], sing a sad funeral [a which will be a parable] [two of the] kings of Israel.
2 and say, What was thy mother? A lioness: she lay down among lions, she nourished her whelps in the midst of the young lions.
Say [to the Israeli people], ‘[It is as though] [MET] your mother was a brave female lion who raised her cubs among [other] lions.
3 And she brought up one of her whelps; it became a young lion, and he learned to catch the prey; he devoured men.
She taught one of them to [for other animals to kill], and he [even] learned [kill and] eat people.
4 And the nations heard of him; he was taken in their pit, and they brought him with nose-rings into the land of Egypt.
[When people from other] nations heard about him, they trapped him in a pit. Then they used hooks to drag him to Egypt.
5 And when she saw that she had waited [and] her hope was lost, she took another of her whelps, [and] made him a young lion.
His mother waited for him [to return], but [soon] she stopped hoping/expecting [that he would return]. So she raised another cub who [also] became very fierce.
6 And he went up and down among the lions; he became a young lion, and learned to catch the prey; he devoured men.
He hunted along with [other] [for animals to kill], and he even learned [kill and] eat people.
7 And he knew their [desolate] palaces, and he laid waste their cities, so that the land was desolate, and all it contained, by the noise of his roaring.
He destroyed forts, and he ruined cities. When he roared [loudly], everyone was terrified.
8 Then the nations set against him on every side from the provinces, and spread their net over him; he was taken in their pit.
So [people of other] nations planned to kill him, and men came from many places to spread out a net for him, and they caught him in a trap.
9 And they put him in a cage with nose-rings, and brought him to the king of Babylon; they brought him into strongholds, that his voice should no more be heard upon the mountains of Israel.
They tied him with chains and took him to Babylonia. And [there] he was locked in a prison, with the result that [no one on] the hills of Israel ever heard him roar again.’ [Also, say to the Israeli people, ]
10 Thy mother was as a vine, in thy rest, planted by the waters: it was fruitful and full of branches by reason of many waters.
‘[It is as though] [SIM] your mother was a grapevine that was planted along a stream. There was plenty of water, so it had lots of branches and produced [a lot of] grapes.
11 And it had strong rods for sceptres of them that bear rule, and its stature was exalted between the thick boughs; and it was conspicuous by its height with the multitude of its branches.
That grapevine grew and became taller than all the nearby trees; [everyone could] see that it was very strong and healthy. And those branches were good for making scepters that symbolize the power/ [of a king].
12 But it was plucked up in fury, it was cast down to the ground, and the east wind dried up its fruit; its strong rods were broken and withered; the fire consumed them.
[Yahweh] became very angry, so he pulled up the vine by its roots and threw it on the ground, where the [very hot] winds from the desert dried up all its fruit. The strong branches wilted and were burned in a fire.
13 And now it is planted in the wilderness, in a dry and thirsty ground:
Now that vine has been planted in a hot, dry desert.
14 and a fire is gone out of a rod of its branches, [which] hath devoured its fruit; so that it hath no strong rod to be a sceptre for ruling. This is a lamentation, and shall be for a lamentation.
A fire started to burn its stem, and then started to burn the branches and burned all the grapes. [Now] not [even] one strong branch remains; they will never become scepters for a king.’ That funeral song must be sung very sadly.”