The City of Blood
1 Moreover Yahweh’s word came to me, saying, 2 “You, son of man, will you judge? Will you judge the bloody city? Then cause her to know all her abominations. 3 You shall say, ‘The Lord Yahweh says: “A city that sheds blood within herself, that her time may come, and that makes idols against herself to defile her! 4 You have become guilty in your blood that you have shed, and are defiled in your idols which you have made! You have caused your days to draw near, and have come to the end of your years. Therefore I have made you a reproach to the nations, and a mocking to all the countries. 5 Those who are near and those who are far from you will mock you, you infamous one, full of tumult. 6 “‘“Behold, the princes of Israel, everyone according to his power, have been in you to shed blood. 7 In you have they treated father and mother with contempt. Among you they have oppressed the foreigner. In you they have wronged the fatherless and the widow. 8 You have despised my holy things, and have profaned my Sabbaths. 9 Slanderous men have been in you to shed blood. In you they have eaten on the mountains. They have committed lewdness among you. 10 In you have they uncovered their fathers’ nakedness. In you have they humbled her who was unclean in her impurity. 11 One has committed abomination with his neighbor’s wife, and another has lewdly defiled his daughter-in-law. Another in you has humbled his sister, his father’s daughter. 12 In you have they taken bribes to shed blood. You have taken interest and increase, and you have greedily gained of your neighbors by oppression, and have forgotten me,” says the Lord Yahweh. 13 “‘“Behold, therefore I have struck my hand at your dishonest gain which you have made, and at the blood which has been shed within you. 14 Can your heart endure, or can your hands be strong, in the days that I will deal with you? I, Yahweh, have spoken it, and will do it. 15 I will scatter you among the nations, and disperse you through the countries. I will purge your filthiness out of you. 16 You will be profaned in yourself in the sight of the nations. Then you will know that I am Yahweh.”’”
The indictment is read out as a list of offenses committed inside the city, and the repeated words are in you.
The charge sheet is unusual in form. It is not a description of a nation's character but a schedule of specific crimes, and almost every line begins the same way — in you, among you, in the middle of you. The city is being treated as the scene, and the effect of the repetition is that of an address being read out at a trial.
What is listed runs from the top of society downward. Princes who use their power to shed blood. Father and mother treated with contempt. The foreigner oppressed. The fatherless and the widow wronged. Holy things despised and Sabbaths profaned. Slander used to get men killed. Bribes taken so that blood could be shed lawfully. Interest and increase taken from neighbors, and gain made by oppression. The list is a fair summary of the ten commandments broken in company, and it interleaves the sacred and the social without marking any transition between them.
The sexual offenses in the middle of the list are given in the same flat register as the financial ones, and they are family offenses — a father's nakedness uncovered, a daughter-in-law defiled, a sister humbled, a neighbor's wife taken. The point of grouping them with bribery and interest is that they are all breaches of trust by people with access. Nothing here is done by strangers.
The summary clause is four words long and it is the hinge of the passage: and have forgotten me. Everything above it is what forgetting looks like in practice. And the judgment is described as a scattering with a purpose — I will purge your filthiness out of you — followed by a sentence that puts the whole chapter in a public frame: You will be profaned in yourself in the sight of the nations. Then you will know that I am Yahweh.
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