1. AND YOU, son of man [Ezekiel], take a sharp sword and use it as a barber's razor and shave your head and your beard. Then take balances for weighing and divide the hair into three parts.
2. You shall burn one part with fire in the midst of the city, when the days of the siege are fulfilled; and you shall take a second part and strike with the sword round about it; and a third part you shall scatter to the wind, and I will draw out a sword after them.
3. You shall also take from these a small number of hairs and bind them in the skirts of your robe.
4. And of these again take some hairs and cast them into the midst of the fire and burn them in the fire; from there a fire shall come forth into all the house of Israel.
5. Thus says the Lord God: This is Jerusalem; in the center of the nations I have set her, and countries are round about her.