Common English Bible

2 Esdras 7:103-111 Common English Bible (CEB)

103. Will parents be allowed to intercede for children, children for parents, siblings for each other, relatives for those close to them, faithful ones for those most dear to them?"

104. He replied to me: "Because I do indeed favor you, I will also show you this. The Judgment Day is decisive. It reveals the seal of truth to all. Even in the here and now a parent doesn’t send a child, or a child the parent, or a master his servant, or a faithful friend a dear confidant, so that the one should understand or sleep or eat or be taken care of in the other person’s place.

105. Just so, no one will ever intercede for another; everyone will then bear his or her own deeds of justice or injustice."

106. I answered: "How then do we find that Abraham first interceded for the people of Sodom; and Moses for our ancestors who sinned in the desert;

107. and Joshua, who came after him, for Israel, in the days of Achan;

108. and Samuel in the days of Saul; and David for the plague; and Solomon for those in the sanctuary;

109. and Elijah for those who received the rain, and for a dead person that he might live;

110. and Hezekiah for the people in the days of Sennacherib, and many for many people?

111. If, therefore, the just prayed for the wicked when corruption had increased and injustice had multiplied, why won’t it be the same then?"