Read Ezekiel 19 in the King James Bible (opens in a new tab)
Ezekiel 19 is a lamentation over the rulers of Judah, portraying their rise and downfall through the images of young lions and a once-fruitful vine. The lioness raises powerful cubs, but they become violent and are captured and taken away, showing the humiliation and removal of Judah’s kings. The second half describes Israel as a strong and fruitful vine whose branches were fit to rule, yet it was uprooted in divine wrath, dried by the east wind, and planted in a barren wilderness. Fire comes from one of its own branches and consumes its fruit, leaving no strong rod to rule. The chapter warns that earthly strength, royal authority, and national privilege cannot preserve those who persist in rebellion against God.
Ezekiel 19:1 - 19:14
1 Moreover take thou up a lamentation for the princes of Israel,
2 And say, What [is] thy mother? A lioness: she lay down among lions, she nourished her whelps among young lions.
3 And she brought up one of her whelps: it became a young lion, and it learned to catch the prey; it devoured men.
4 The nations also heard of him; he was taken in their pit, and they brought him with chains unto the land of Egypt.
5 Now when she saw that she had waited, [and] her hope was lost, then she took another of her whelps, [and] made him a young lion.
6 And he went up and down among the lions, he became a young lion, and learned to catch the prey, [and] devoured men.
7 And he knew their desolate palaces, and he laid waste their cities; and the land was desolate, and the fulness thereof, by the noise of his roaring.
8 Then the nations set against him on every side from the provinces, and spread their net over him: he was taken in their pit.
9 And they put him in ward in chains, and brought him to the king of Babylon: they brought him into holds, that his voice should no more be heard upon the mountains of Israel.
10 Thy mother [is] like a vine in thy blood, planted by the waters: she was fruitful and full of branches by reason of many waters.
11 And she had strong rods for the sceptres of them that bare rule, and her stature was exalted among the thick branches, and she appeared in her height with the multitude of her branches.
12 But she was plucked up in fury, she was cast down to the ground, and the east wind dried up her fruit: her strong rods were broken and withered; the fire consumed them.
13 And now she [is] planted in the wilderness, in a dry and thirsty ground.
14 And fire is gone out of a rod of her branches, [which] hath devoured her fruit, so that she hath no strong rod [to be] a sceptre to rule. This [is] a lamentation, and shall be for a lamentation.