Aharei Mot

Aharei Mot Posted On Jan 1, 1980 | Haftarah Reading

This translation was taken from the JPS Tanakh

Ezekiel 22:1-19

Some congregations read Ezekiel 20:1-20

Chapter 22
1 The word of the Lord came to me: 2 Further, O mortal, arraign, arraign the city of bloodshed; declare to her all her abhorrent deeds! 3 Say: Thus said the Lord God: O city in whose midst blood is shed, so that your hour is approaching; within which fetishes are made, so that you have become unclean! 4 You stand guilty of the blood you have shed, defiled by the fetishes you have made. You have brought on your day; you have reached your year. Therefore I will make you the mockery of the nations and the scorn of all the lands. 5 Both the near and the far shall scorn you, O besmirched of name, O laden with iniquity!

6 Every one of the princes of Israel in your midst used his strength for the shedding of blood. 7 Fathers and mothers have been humiliated within you; strangers have been cheated in your midst; orphans and widows have been wronged within you. 8 You have despised My holy things and profaned My sabbaths.

9 Base men in your midst were intent on shedding blood; in you they have eaten upon the mountains; and they have practiced depravity in your midst. 10 In you they have uncovered their fathers’ nakedness; in you they have ravished women during their impurity. 11 They have committed abhorrent acts with other men’s wives; in their depravity they have defiled their own daughters-in-law; in you they have ravished their own sisters, daughters of their fathers. 12 They have taken bribes within you to shed blood. You have taken advance and accrued interest; you have defrauded your countrymen to your profit. You have forgotten Me — declares the Lord God.

13 Lo, I will strike My hands over the ill-gotten gains that you have amassed, and over the bloodshed that has been committed in your midst. 14 Will your courage endure, will your hands remain firm in the days when I deal with you? I the Lord have spoken and I will act.15 I will scatter you among the nations and disperse you through the lands; I will consume the uncleanness out of you. 16 You shall be dishonored in the sight of nations, and you shall know that I am the Lord.

17 The word of the Lord came to me: 18 O mortal, the House of Israel has become dross to Me; they are all copper, tin, iron, and lead. But in a crucible, the dross shall turn into silver. 19 Assuredly, thus said the Lord God: Because you have all become dross, I will gather you into Jerusalem.


Taken from Tanakh, The Holy Scriptures, (Philadelphia, Jerusalem: Jewish Publication Society) 1985.
Used by permission of The Jewish Publication Society. Copyright © 1962, 1992
Third Edition by the Jewish Publication Society.
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