To rouse my wrath means God will become very angry. New Century Version says “To stir up my anger” (similarly New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh). The Hebrew expression for to take vengeance (“to take revenge” in Contemporary English Version) often means to get even or pay someone back (so New International Reader’s Version), but when God is the subject, it means to punish people in a way they deserve. The two expressions To rouse my wrath and to take vengeance are not two separate events. The second event is dependent on the first one, so they may be rendered “To make me angry enough to punish the people as they deserve.”

I have set on the bare rock the blood she has shed, that it may not be covered: In verse 7 the wicked people of Jerusalem poured the blood of their victims on the bare rock and did not cover it and everyone could see it. Now God says he put the blood in the same place, meaning that he made sure that it stayed there for everyone to see, and as a reminder for himself to punish the wicked people of Jerusalem.

A model for this verse is:

• I have put the blood of those murdered people on the bright rocky cliff, where it will not be hidden. I did this so that I will become more and more angry and I will punish the people of Jerusalem as they deserve.

Quoted with permission from Gross, Carl & Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on Ezekiel. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2016. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .