12. “Human, say to your people: ‘The goodness of those who do right will not save them when they sin. The evil of wicked people will not cause them to be punished if they stop doing it. If good people sin, they will not be able to live by the good they did earlier.’
13. If I tell good people, ‘You will surely live,’ they might think they have done enough good and then do evil. Then none of the good things they did will be remembered. They will die because of the evil they have done.
14. Or, if I say to the wicked people, ‘You will surely die,’ they may stop sinning and do what is right and honest.
15. For example, they may return what somebody gave them as a promise to repay a loan, or pay back what they stole. If they live by the rules that give life and do not sin, then they will surely live, and they will not die.
16. They will not be punished for any of their sins. They now do what is right and fair, so they will surely live.
17. “Your people say: ‘The way of the Lord is not fair.’ But it is their own ways that are not fair.
18. When the good people stop doing good and do evil, they will die for their evil.
19. But when the wicked stop doing evil and do what is right and fair, they will live.
20. You still say: ‘The way of the Lord is not fair.’ Israel, I will judge all of you by your own ways.”
21. It was in the twelfth year of our captivity, on the fifth day of the tenth month. A person who had escaped from Jerusalem came to me and said, “Jerusalem has been captured.”
22. Now I had felt the power of the Lord on me the evening before. He had made me able to talk again before this person came to me. I could speak; I was not without speech anymore.
23. Then the Lord spoke his word to me, saying:
24. “Human, people who live in the ruins in the land of Israel are saying: ‘Abraham was only one person, yet he was given the land as his own. Surely the land has been given to us, who are many, as our very own.’