'Children' in the Bible

And he said to me, Son of man, I am sending you to the children of Israel, to an uncontrolled nation which has gone against me: they and their fathers have been sinners against me even to this very day.

And the children are hard and stiff-hearted; I am sending you to them: and you are to say to them, These are the words of the Lord.

And he said to me, Son of man, take this roll for your food, and go and say my words to the children of Israel.

And he said to me, Son of man, go now to the children of Israel, and say my words to them.

For you are not sent to a people whose talk is strange and whose language is hard, but to the children of Israel;

But the children of Israel will not give ear to you; for they have no mind to give ear to me: for all the children of Israel have a hard brow and a stiff heart.

And go now to those who have been taken away as prisoners, to the children of your people, and say to them, This is what the Lord has said; if they give ear or if they do not.

Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the children of Israel: so give ear to the word of my mouth, and give them word from me of their danger.

And take a flat iron plate, and put it for a wall of iron between you and the town: and let your face be turned to it, and it will be shut in and you will make an attack on it. This will be a sign to the children of Israel.

Then, stretching yourself out on your left side, take the sin of the children of Israel on yourself: for as long as you are stretched out, so long will the sin of the children of Israel be on you.

For I have had the years of their sin measured for you by a number of days, even three hundred and ninety days: and you will take on yourself the sin of the children of Israel.

And when these days are ended, turning on your right side, you are to take on yourself the sin of the children of Judah: forty days, a day for a year, I have had it fixed for you.

And the Lord said, Even so the children of Israel will have unclean bread for their food among the nations where I am driving them.

And again take some of these and put them in the fire, burning them up in the fire; and say to all the children of Israel,

And I will put the dead bodies of the children of Israel in front of their images, sending your bones in all directions about your altars.

This is what the Lord has said: Give blows with your hand, stamping with your foot, and say, O sorrow! because of all the evil and disgusting ways of the children of Israel: for death will overtake them by the sword and through need of food and by disease.

And he said to me, Son of man, do you see what they are doing? even the very disgusting things which the children of Israel are doing here, causing me to go far away from my holy place? but you will see other most disgusting things.

So I went in and saw; and there every sort of living thing which goes flat on the earth, and unclean beasts, and all the images of the children of Israel, were pictured round about on the wall.

And before them seventy of the responsible men of the children of Israel had taken their places, every man with a vessel for burning perfumes in his hand, and in the middle of them was Jaazaniah, the son of Shaphan; and a cloud of smoke went up from the burning perfume.

And he said to me, Son of man, have you seen what the responsible men of the children of Israel do in the dark, every man in his room of pictured images? for they say, The Lord does not see us; the Lord has gone away from the land.

Then he said to me, Have you seen this, O son of man? is it a small thing to the children of Judah that they do the disgusting things which they are doing here? for they have made the land full of violent behaviour, making me angry again and again: and see, they put the branch to my nose.

Give up to destruction old men and young men and virgins, little children and women: but do not come near any man who has the mark on him: and make a start at my holy place. So they made a start with the old men who were before the house.

Then he said to me, The sin of the children of Israel and Judah is very, very great, and the land is full of blood and the town full of evil ways: for they say, The Lord has gone away from the land, and the Lord does not see.

And the spirit of the Lord came on me, and he said to me, Say, These are the words of the Lord: This is what you have said, O children of Israel; what comes into your mind is clear to me.

Son of man, your countrymen, your relations, and all the children of Israel, all of them, are those to whom the people of Jerusalem have said, Go far from the Lord; this land is given to us for a heritage:

And before their eyes, take your goods on your back and go out in the dark; go with your face covered: for I have made you a sign to the children of Israel.

You are to say to them, This is what the Lord has said: This word has to do with the ruler in Jerusalem and all the children of Israel in it.

Son of man, see, the children of Israel say, The vision which he sees is for the days which are a long way off, and his words are of times still far away.

You have not gone up into the broken places or made up the wall for the children of Israel to take your place in the fight in the day of the Lord.

And my hand will be against the prophets who see visions without substance and who make false use of secret arts: they will not be in the secret of my people, and they will not be recorded in the list of the children of Israel, and they will not come into the land of Israel; and it will be clear to you that I am the Lord.

So as to take the children of Israel in the thoughts of their hearts, because they have become strange to me through their false gods.

For this cause say to the children of Israel, These are the words of the Lord: Come back and give up your false gods and let your faces be turned from your disgusting things.

So that the children of Israel may no longer go wandering away from me, or make themselves unclean with all their wrongdoing; but they will be my people, and I will be their God, says the Lord.

That you put my children to death and gave them up to go through the fire to them?

This is what the Lord has said: Because your unclean behaviour was let loose and your body uncovered in your loose ways with your lovers and with your disgusting images, and for the blood of your children which you gave to them;

You are the daughter of your mother whose soul is turned in disgust from her husband and her children; and you are the sister of your sisters who were turned in disgust from their husbands and their children: your mother was a Hittite and your father an Amorite.

Son of man, give out a dark saying, and make a comparison for the children of Israel,

And has not taken flesh with the blood for food, or given worship to the images of the children of Israel; if he has not had connection with his neighbour's wife, or come near to a woman at the time when she is unclean;

Who has not taken the flesh with the blood for food, or given worship to the images of the children of Israel, and has not had connection with his neighbour's wife,

But you say, The way of the Lord is not equal. Give ear, now, O children of Israel; is my way not equal? are not your ways unequal?

But still the children of Israel say, The way of the Lord is not equal. O children of Israel, are my ways not equal? are not your ways unequal?

For this cause I will be your judge, O children of Israel, judging every man by his ways, says the Lord. Come back and be turned from all your sins; so that they may not be the cause of your falling into evil.

Put away all your evil-doing in which you have done sin; and make for yourselves a new heart and a new spirit: why are you desiring death, O children of Israel?

But the children of Israel would not be controlled by me in the waste land: they were not guided by my rules, and they were turned away from my orders, which, if a man does them, will be life to him; and they had no respect for my Sabbaths: then I said that I would let loose my passion on them in the waste land, and put an end to them.

And I said to their children in the waste land, Do not be guided by the rules of your fathers or keep their orders or make yourselves unclean with their images:

But the children would not be controlled by me; they were not guided by my rules, and they did not keep and do my orders, which, if a man does them, will be life to him; and they had no respect for my Sabbaths: then I said I would let loose my passion on them to give full effect to my wrath against them in the waste land.

For this cause, son of man, say to the children of Israel, This is what the Lord has said: In this your fathers have further put shame on my name by doing wrong against me.

For this cause say to the children of Israel, This is what the Lord has said: Are you making yourselves unclean as your fathers did? are you being untrue to me by going after their disgusting works?

And when you give your offerings, causing your sons to go through the fire, you make yourselves unclean with all your images to this day; and will you come to me for directions, O children of Israel? By my life, says the Lord, you will get no direction from me.

As for you, O children of Israel, the Lord has said: Let every man completely put away his images and give ear to me: and let my holy name no longer be shamed by your offerings and your images.

For in my holy mountain, in the high mountain of Israel, says the Lord, there all the children of Israel, all of them, will be my servants in the land; there I will take pleasure in them, and there I will be worshipped with your offerings and the first-fruits of the things you give, and with all your holy things.

And you will be certain that I am the Lord, when I take you in hand for the honour of my name, and not for your evil ways or your unclean doings, O children of Israel, says the Lord.

Put a pillar at the top of the road for the sword to come to Rabbah in the land of the children of Ammon, and to Judah and to Jerusalem in the middle of her.

And you, son of man, say as a prophet, This is what the Lord has said about the children of Ammon and about their shame: Say, A sword, even a sword let loose, polished for death, to make it shining so that it may be like a flame:

Son of man, the children of Israel have become like the poorest sort of waste metal to me: they are all silver and brass and tin and iron and lead mixed with waste.

For when she had made an offering of her children to her images, she came into my holy place to make it unclean; see, this is what she has done inside my house.

Son of man, let your face be turned to the children of Ammon, and be a prophet against them:

And say to the children of Ammon, Give ear to the word of the Lord; this is what the Lord has said: Because you said, Aha! against my holy place when it was made unclean, and against the land of Israel when it was made waste, and against the people of Judah when they were taken away as prisoners;

For this cause I will give you up to the children of the east for their heritage, and they will put their tent-circles in you and make their houses in you; they will take your fruit for their food and your milk for their drink.

And I will make Rabbah a place for housing camels, and the children of Ammon a resting-place for flocks: and you will be certain that I am the Lord.

To the children of the east I have given her for a heritage, as well as the children of Ammon, so that there may be no memory of her among the nations:

And there will no longer be a plant with sharp points wounding the children of Israel, or a thorn troubling them among any who are round about them, who put shame on them; and they will be certain that I am the Lord.

This is what the Lord has said: When I have got together the children of Israel from the peoples among whom they are wandering, and have been made holy among them before the eyes of the nations, then they will have rest in the land which is theirs, which I gave to my servant Jacob

And it will be clear to all the people of Egypt that I am the Lord, because you have been a false support to the children of Israel.

And Egypt will no longer be the hope of the children of Israel, causing sin to come to mind when their eyes are turned to them: and they will be certain that I am the Lord.

In that day I will make a horn put out buds for the children of Israel, and I will let your words come freely among them, and they will be certain that I am the Lord.

Ethiopia and Put and Lud and all the mixed people and Libya and the children of the land of the Cherethites will all be put to death with them by the sword.

In order that no trees by the waters may be lifted up in their growth, putting their tops among the clouds; and that no trees which are watered may take their place on high: for they are all given up to death, to the lowest parts of the earth among the children of men, with those who go down to the underworld.

Son of man, give a word to the children of your people, and say to them, When I make the sword come on a land, if the people of the land take a man from among their number and make him their watchman:

So you, son of man, I have made you a watchman for the children of Israel; and you are to give ear to the word of my mouth and give them news from me of their danger.

And you, son of man, say to the children of Israel, You say, Our wrongdoing and our sins are on us and we are wasting away in them; how then may we have life?

Say to them, By my life, says the Lord, I have no pleasure in the death of the evil-doer; it is more pleasing to me if he is turned from his way and has life: be turned, be turned from your evil ways; why are you looking for death, O children of Israel?

And you, son of man, say to the children of your people, The righteousness of the upright man will not make him safe in the day when he does wrong; and the evil-doing of the evil man will not be the cause of his fall in the day when he is turned from his evil-doing; and the upright man will not have life because of his righteousness in the day when he does evil.

But the children of your people say, The way of the Lord is not equal: when it is they whose way is not equal.

And still you say, The way of the Lord is not equal. O children of Israel, I will be your judge, giving to everyone the reward of his ways.

And as for you, son of man, the children of your people are talking together about you by the walls and in the doorways of the houses, saying to one another, Come now, give ear to the word which comes from the Lord.

And they will be certain that I the Lord their God am with them, and that they, the children of Israel, are my people, says the Lord.

Because yours has been a hate without end, and you have given up the children of Israel to the power of the sword in the time of their trouble, in the time of the punishment of the end:

And I will let your numbers be increased, all the children of Israel, even all of them: and the towns will be peopled and the waste places will have buildings;

Yes, I will have you walked on by the feet of men, even my people Israel; they will have you for a heritage and you will be theirs, and never again will you take their children from them.

This is what the Lord has said: Because they say to you, You, O land, are the destruction of men, causing loss of children to your nation;

For this reason you will no longer take the lives of men and will never again be the cause of loss of children to your nation, says the Lord.

Son of man, when the children of Israel were living in their land, they made it unclean by their way and their acts: their way before me was as when a woman is unclean at the time when she is kept separate.

But I had pity for my holy name which the children of Israel had made unclean wherever they went.

For this cause say to the children of Israel, This is what the Lord has said: I am doing this, not because of you, O children of Israel, but because of my holy name, which you have made unclean among the nations wherever you went.

And at the memory of your evil ways and your wrongdoings, you will have bitter hate for yourselves because of your evil-doings and your disgusting ways, O children of Israel.

Not because of you am I doing it, says the Lord; let it be clear to you, and be shamed and made low because of your ways, O children of Israel.

This is what the Lord has said: The children of Israel will again make prayer to me for this, that I may do it for them; I will make them increased with men like a flock.

Then he said to me, Son of man, these bones are all the children of Israel: and see, they are saying, Our bones have become dry our hope is gone, we are cut off completely.

And you, son of man, take one stick, writing on it, For Judah and for the children of Israel who are in his company: then take another stick, writing on it, For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and all the children of Israel who are in his company:

And when the children of your people say to you, Will you not make clear to us what these things have to do with us?

And say to them, These are the words of the Lord: See, I am taking the children of Israel from among the nations where they have gone, and will get them together on every side, and take them into their land:

And they will be living in the land which I gave to Jacob, my servant, in which your fathers were living; and they will go on living there, they and their children and their children's children, for ever: and David, my servant, will be their ruler for ever.

And the children of Israel will be seven months putting them in the earth, so as to make the land clean.

So the children of Israel will be certain that I am the Lord their God, from that day and for the future.

And it will be clear to the nations that the children of Israel were taken away prisoners for their evil-doing; because they did wrong against me, and my face was covered from them: so I gave them up into the hands of their attackers, and they all came to their end by the sword.

For this cause the Lord has said, Now I will let the fate of Jacob be changed, and I will have mercy on all the children of Israel, and will take care of the honour of my holy name.

And my face will no longer be covered from them: for I have sent the out-flowing of my spirit on the children of Israel, says the Lord.

And the man said to me, Son of man, see with your eyes and give hearing with your ears, and take to heart everything I am going to let you see; for in order that I might let you see them, you have come here: and give an account of all you see to the children of Israel.

And he said to me, Son of man, this is the place where the seat of my power is and the resting-place of my feet, where I will be among the children of Israel for ever: and no longer will the people of Israel make my holy name unclean, they or their kings, by their loose ways and by the dead bodies of their kings;