When I shower you with the deadly arrows of famine and destruction that I will send to destroy you, I will intensify the famine against you and cut off your supply of food.
Parallel translations
- WEB when I send on them the evil arrows of famine that are for destruction, which I will send to destroy you. I will increase the famine on you, and will break your staff of bread.
- KJV When I shall send upon them the evil arrows of famine, which shall be for their destruction, and which I will send to destroy you: and I will increase the famine upon you, and will break your staff of bread:
- NKJV When I send against them the terrible arrows of famine which shall be for destruction, which I will send to destroy you, I will increase the famine upon you and cut off your supply of bread.
- NASB When I send against them the deadly arrows of famine which were for the destruction of those whom I will send to destroy you, then I will also intensify the famine upon you and break off your provision of bread.
- NLT “I will shower you with the deadly arrows of famine to destroy you. The famine will become more and more severe until every crumb of food is gone.
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 will send the deadly arrows of famine to destroy and break the staff of bread. Hunger is depicted as God's aimed weapon of judgment.
Overview
The Lord describes famine as arrows He fires deliberately, intensifying it until the support of bread is shattered. The military image shows that even natural disasters serve God's just purposes. This sobering picture of God's sovereignty over scarcity calls people to seek the One who alone can supply true and lasting bread.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 9
- Ezek 4:16Then He told me, “Son of man, I am going to cut off the supply of food in Jerusalem. They will anxiously eat bread rationed by weight, and in despair they will drink water by measure.
- Deut 32:23–24I will heap disasters upon them; I will spend My arrows against them.
- 2 Kgs 6:25So there was a great famine in Samaria. Indeed, they besieged the city so long that a donkey’s head sold for eighty shekels of silver, and a quarter cab of dove’s dung sold for five shekels of silver.
- Lev 26:26When I cut off your supply of bread, ten women will bake your bread in a single oven and dole out your bread by weight, so that you will eat but not be satisfied.
- Ps 91:5–7You will not fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day,
- Lam 3:12He bent His bow and set me as the target for His arrow.
- Isa 3:1For behold, the Lord GOD of Hosts is about to remove from Jerusalem and Judah both supply and support: the whole supply of food and water,
- Ps 7:13He has prepared His deadly weapons; He ordains His arrows with fire.
- Ezek 14:13“Son of man, if a land sins against Me by acting unfaithfully, and I stretch out My hand against it to cut off its supply of food, to send famine upon it, and to cut off from it both man and beast,
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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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 5:16 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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