Thy Strong Word – Ezekiel 19: A Lament for the Princes of Israel

What was your mother? A lioness!
    Among lions she crouched;
in the midst of young lions
    she reared her cubs.
³ And she brought up one of her cubs;
    he became a young lion,
and he learned to catch prey;
    he devoured men.
⁴ The nations heard about him;
    he was caught in their pit,
and they brought him with hooks
    to the land of Egypt.
⁵ When she saw that she waited in vain,
    that her hope was lost,
she took another of her cubs
    and made him a young lion.
⁶ He prowled among the lions;
    he became a young lion,
and he learned to catch prey;
    he devoured men,
⁷ and seized^[a] their widows.
    He laid waste their cities,
and the land was appalled and all who were in it
    at the sound of his roaring.
⁸ Then the nations set against him
    from provinces on every side;
they spread their net over him;
    he was taken in their pit.
⁹ With hooks they put him in a cage^[b]
    and brought him to the king of Babylon;
    they brought him into custody,
that his voice should no more be heard
    on the mountains of Israel.

¹⁰ Your mother was like a vine in a vineyard^[c]
    planted by the water,
fruitful and full of branches
    by reason of abundant water.
¹¹ Its strong stems became
    rulers’ scepters;
it towered aloft
    among the thick boughs;^[d]
it was seen in its height
    with the mass of its branches.
¹² But the vine was plucked up in fury,
    cast down to the ground;
the east wind dried up its fruit;
    they were stripped off and withered.
As for its strong stem,
    fire consumed it.
¹³ Now it is planted in the wilderness,
    in a dry and thirsty land.
¹⁴ And fire has gone out from the stem of its shoots,
    has consumed its fruit,
so that there remains in it no strong stem,
    no scepter for ruling.