It is not for your sake that I will act: God’s message to the Israelites in verses 22-32 ends with this reminder of why he was about to save them. But here he only includes the first part of the reason given in verse 22. He repeats the first part to stop the people from thinking that he was blessing them because they were good or in any way deserved what he was about to do. This is the real point of the message, and to make the point strongly, God adds the solemn formal declaration says the Lord GOD (see verse 14).

Let that be known to you: God stresses that the people must “take good note” (New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh) of his reminder. This is a strong statement. Moffatt says “mark this,” and New English Bible has “be sure of that.” Another model is “Make sure you remember that.”

Be ashamed and confounded for your ways, O house of Israel: The Hebrew verbs rendered Be ashamed and confounded both refer to shame, and together they give the sense of very great shame, which may be expressed by saying “you should be utterly ashamed” (New Living Translation), “you must suffer shame and disgrace” (Contemporary English Version; similarly Good News Translation, Revised English Bible), or “Be ashamed and embarrassed” (New Century Version). The people of Israel are to feel this shame because of their sinful conduct. Your ways refers to the sins they committed in the past, which caused them to go into exile, not their present sins, as Good News Translation seems to imply. For house of Israel, see verse 10.

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 .