Ezekiel
Ezekiel 5
Big idea: The second sign-act uses a sword as a razor. The prophet shaves his head and beard, weighs the hair on scales, and divides it into thirds — burned, struck with the sword, scattered to the wind — with a few strands bound in his robe and some of those thrown into the fire.
The interpretation is given in full here, which sets the pattern: Ezekiel's acts are never left unexplained.
5:1–17 — This is Jerusalem
A priest shaving his head is already a scandal — priests were forbidden to do it — and using a sword as the razor makes the meaning unmistakable. The hair is weighed, which turns a haircut into an accounting, and divided into three fates that match what happened: plague and famine inside, the sword around the walls, and scattering.
1 “You, son of man, take a sharp sword. You shall take it as a barber’s razor to yourself, and shall cause it to pass over your head and over your beard. Then take balances to weigh and divide the hair. 2 A third part you shall burn in the fire in the middle of the city, when the days of the siege are fulfilled. You shall take a third part, and strike with the sword around it. A third part you shall scatter to the wind, and I will draw out a sword after them. 3 You shall take a small number of these and bind them in the folds of your robe. 4 Of these again you shall take, and cast them into the middle of the fire, and burn them in the fire. From it a fire will come out into all the house of Israel. 5 “The Lord Yahweh says: ‘This is Jerusalem. I have set her in the middle of the nations, and countries are around her. 6 She has rebelled against my ordinances in doing wickedness more than the nations, and against my statutes more than the countries that are around her; for they have rejected my ordinances, and as for my statutes, they have not walked in them.’ 7 “Therefore the Lord Yahweh says: ‘Because you are more turbulent than the nations that are around you, and have not walked in my statutes, neither have kept my ordinances, neither have followed the ordinances of the nations that are around you; 8 therefore the Lord Yahweh says: ‘Behold, I, even I, am against you; and I will execute judgments among you in the sight of the nations. 9 I will do in you that which I have not done, and which I will not do anything like it any more, because of all your abominations. 10 Therefore the fathers will eat the sons within you, and the sons will eat their fathers. I will execute judgments on you; and I will scatter the whole remnant of you to all the winds. 11 Therefore as I live,’ says the Lord Yahweh, ‘surely, because you have defiled my sanctuary with all your detestable things, and with all your abominations, therefore I will also diminish you. My eye won’t spare, and I will have no pity. 12 A third part of you will die with the pestilence, and they will be consumed with famine within you. A third part will fall by the sword around you. A third part I will scatter to all the winds, and will draw out a sword after them. 13 “‘Thus my anger will be accomplished, and I will cause my wrath toward them to rest, and I will be comforted. They will know that I, Yahweh, have spoken in my zeal, when I have accomplished my wrath on them. 14 “‘Moreover I will make you a desolation and a reproach among the nations that are around you, in the sight of all that pass by. 15 So it will be a reproach and a taunt, an instruction and an astonishment, to the nations that are around you, when I execute judgments on you in anger and in wrath, and in wrathful rebukes—I, Yahweh, have spoken it— 16 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. 17 I will send on you famine and evil animals, and they will bereave you. Pestilence and blood will pass through you. I will bring the sword on you. I, Yahweh, have spoken it.’”
Scripture text: World English Bible (public domain).