9. But if you on your part warn a wicked man to turn from his way and he does not turn from his way, he will die in his iniquity, but you have delivered your life.
10. "Now as for you, son of man, say to the house of Israel, 'Thus you have spoken, saying, "Surely our transgressions and our sins are upon us, and we are rotting away in them; how then can we survive?"'
11. Say to them, 'As I live!' declares the Lord God, 'I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn back, turn back from your evil ways! Why then will you die, O house of Israel?'
12. And you, son of man, say to your fellow citizens, 'The righteousness of a righteous man will not deliver him in the day of his transgression, and as for the wickedness of the wicked, he will not stumble because of it in the day when he turns from his wickedness; whereas a righteous man will not be able to live by his righteousness on the day when he commits sin.'
13. When I say to the righteous he will surely live, and he so trusts in his righteousness that he commits iniquity, none of his righteous deeds will be remembered; but in that same iniquity of his which he has committed he will die.
14. But when I say to the wicked, 'You will surely die,' and he turns from his sin and practices justice and righteousness,
15. if a wicked man restores a pledge, pays back what he has taken by robbery, walks by the statutes which ensure life without committing iniquity, he shall surely live; he shall not die.
16. None of his sins that he has committed will be remembered against him. He has practiced justice and righteousness; he shall surely live.
17. "Yet your fellow citizens say, 'The way of the Lord is not right,' when it is their own way that is not right.
18. When the righteous turns from his righteousness and commits iniquity, then he shall die in it.
19. But when the wicked turns from his wickedness and practices justice and righteousness, he will live by them.
20. Yet you say, 'The way of the Lord is not right.' O house of Israel, I will judge each of you according to his ways."
21. Now in the twelfth year of our exile, on the fifth of the tenth month, the refugees from Jerusalem came to me, saying, "The city has been taken."
22. Now the hand of the Lord had been upon me in the evening, before the refugees came. And He opened my mouth at the time they came to me in the morning; so my mouth was opened and I was no longer speechless.
23. Then the word of the Lord came to me saying,
24. "Son of man, they who live in these waste places in the land of Israel are saying, 'Abraham was only one, yet he possessed the land; so to us who are many the land has been given as a possession.'
25. Therefore say to them, 'Thus says the Lord God, "You eat meat with the blood in it, lift up your eyes to your idols as you shed blood. Should you then possess the land?
26. You rely on your sword, you commit abominations and each of you defiles his neighbor's wife. Should you then possess the land?"'
27. Thus you shall say to them, 'Thus says the Lord God, "As I live, surely those who are in the waste places will fall by the sword, and whoever is in the open field I will give to the beasts to be devoured, and those who are in the strongholds and in the caves will die of pestilence.