So I went in and saw: Ezekiel entered the room and looked around.

And there, portrayed upon the wall round about …: And there is literally “and behold” (see Ezek 8.4). Ezekiel saw another surprising thing. All the disgusting things that God had already mentioned were portrayed upon the wall round about, that is, they were carved on all the walls of the room. The Hebrew word for portrayed is literally “carved” (New Jerusalem Bible), but it may also be rendered “drawn” or “painted” in this context. There were drawings of all kinds of creeping things. The Hebrew word for creeping things covers snakes and other reptiles, small animals, and crawling insects—in fact, almost any creature whose body moves close to the ground. According to Lev 11.44 and 46, they were considered ritually unclean. If there is no easy general term for creeping things, translators may say “animals and insects that crawl on the ground.” In addition, there were pictures of loathsome beasts, that is, four-footed animals that were ritually unclean which the Jews were not allowed to eat (see Lev 11). Translators may say “ritually unclean animals” or “animals the Jews could not eat.” These animals and reptiles were probably part of some Babylonian or Egyptian religion that some people in Jerusalem were following at that time. As well as these pictures of animals and reptiles, there were pictures of all the idols of the house of Israel, which indicates the people were worshiping false gods. For idols, see 6.4; for the house of Israel, see Ezek 8.6. Portrayed upon the wall round about is a passive construction; it doesn’t say who did the carvings or drawings. Some languages express it more naturally with a subject by rendering this whole sentence as “People had drawn pictures [or, made carvings] on the walls of all kinds of creeping things and other unclean animals, and of all the idols the people of Israel were worshiping.”

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 .