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.’