Therefore, this is what the Lord God says: “Woe to the bloody city! I also will make the wood pile great.
Parallel translations
- WEB Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: Woe to the bloody city! I also will make the pile great.
- KJV Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Woe to the bloody city! I will even make the pile for fire great.
- BSB Yes, this is what the Lord GOD says: ‘Woe to the city of bloodshed! I, too, will pile the kindling high.
- NKJV ‘Therefore thus says the Lord God: “Woe to the bloody city! I too will make the pyre great.
- NLT “This is what the Sovereign Lord says: What sorrow awaits Jerusalem, the city of murderers! I myself will pile up the fuel beneath her.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
God repeats the woe over the bloody city and promises to make the fire even greater. It reaffirms the certainty and intensity of the judgment.
Overview
The renewed 'Woe to the bloody city!' and the vow to 'make the pile great' heighten the sense of inescapable doom. The enlarged fire signals that the judgment will be more severe than the people imagine. Divine patience has limits, and persistent bloodshed and idolatry finally meet decisive wrath.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 15
- Ezek 24:6Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: Woe to the bloody city, to the cauldron whose rust is therein, and whose rust is not gone out of it! take out of it piece after piece; No lot is fallen on it.
- Hab 2:12Woe to him who builds a town with blood, and establishes a city by iniquity!
- 2 Th 1:8giving vengeance to those who don’t know God, and to those who don’t obey the Good News of our Lord Jesus,
- 2 Pet 3:7–12But the heavens that now are, and the earth, by the same word have been stored up for fire, being reserved against the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.
- Luke 13:34–35“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, that kills the prophets, and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, like a hen gathers her own brood under her wings, and you refused!
- Nah 3:1Woe to the bloody city! It is all full of lies and robbery. The prey doesn’t depart.
- Rev 14:20The wine press was trodden outside of the city, and blood came out of the wine press, even to the bridles of the horses, as far as one thousand six hundred stadia.
- Rev 21:8But for the cowardly, unbelieving, sinners, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their part is in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”
- Isa 31:9His rock will pass away by reason of terror, and his princes will be afraid of the banner,” says Yahweh, whose fire is in Zion, and his furnace in Jerusalem.
- Ezek 22:19–22Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: ‘Because you have all become dross, therefore, behold, I will gather you into the middle of Jerusalem.
- Isa 30:33For his burning place has long been ready. Yes, for the king it is prepared. He has made its pyre deep and large with fire and much wood. Yahweh’s breath, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it.
- Rev 16:19The great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell. Babylon the great was remembered in the sight of God, to give to her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.
- Rev 16:6For they poured out the blood of the saints and prophets, and you have given them blood to drink. They deserve this.”
- Ezek 22:31Therefore I have poured out my indignation on them. I have consumed them with the fire of my wrath. I have brought their own way on their heads,” says the Lord Yahweh.
- Jude 1:7Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them, having, in the same way as these, given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are shown as an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire.
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The promise of one Shepherd-King David, a new heart and new Spirit, and the river of life flowing from the temple all stream toward Christ, the good Shepherd who gives the Spirit.
How Ezekiel 24:9 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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