Ezekiel

Against Pharaoh I

On the first day of the third month of the eleventh year, the word of the Lord came to me:

“Son of man, say to Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and to his multitude: Who is comparable to you in your greatness?

You are like a very tall cedar in Lebanon, with beautiful branches providing forest shade, with its top among the clouds.

It grew. The waters made it grow, and the streams ascending from the deep springs that watered all the trees of the land through the canals, flowed straight to its place.

Higher than all the other trees, its boughs increased and its branches grew larger because of the plentiful water.

The birds of the air nested in its boughs and all the animals brought forth their young under its branches. Numerous nations lived in its shade.

It became majestic in height and in the thickness of its branches, for its roots were turned towards plentiful water.

The other cedars in the garden of God could not equal it. The pine trees could not equal its boughs nor could the plane trees rival its branches. No other tree in God’s garden was comparable to it in beauty.

I made it beautiful in the abundance of its branches, the envy of the trees in the garden of God in Eden.

That is why thus says the Lord: Because it grew tall and reached the clouds and became proud,

I will hand it over to the ruler of the nations, who will treat it according to its wickedness. I have rejected it.

Foreigners, the most terrible among the nations, have felled it, cut it down on the mountains: its boughs have fallen in all the valleys, its branches lie broken in ravines. All the nations have fled from its shade and abandoned it.

The birds of the air alight on its broken boughs and the animals are found among its fallen branches.

This is to prevent well-watered trees from attaining such a height and reaching the clouds. For all are destined to die, and go below, among those who descend to the pit.

Thus says the Lord: The day the cedar descended to the netherworld I made the depths mourn for it. I restrained its rivers and held back the abundant waters. Darkness covered Lebanon; and all the trees of the field were faint.

The nations were shaken at the noise of its fall; when I made it depart to the lower regions, with those who go down to the pit. Then all the trees from Eden, the finest trees of Lebanon, all that were well-watered, were comforted in the earth below.

Those from among the nations who lived in its shade, they, too, went down, together, to those slain by the sword.

O tree, splendid and glorious, who among the trees of Eden was comparable to you? But you were made to go down to the lower regions, like the other trees of Eden. You lay among the uncircumcised people, victims of the sword; you, Pharaoh, and all your multitudes,word of the Lord.”