1 AGAIN I lifted up my eyes and behold, I saw a scroll flying or floating in the air!
2 And the angel said to me, What do you see? And I answered, I see a flying scroll; its length is twenty cubits or thirty feet and its breadth is ten cubits or fifteen feet.
3 Then he said to me, This is the curse that goes out over the face of the whole land; for everyone who steals shall be cut off from henceforth according to it [the curse written on this subject on the scroll], and everyone who swears falsely shall be cut off from henceforth according to it. [Isa. 24:6; Mal. 3:8, 9.]
4 I will bring [the curse] forth, says the Lord of hosts, and it shall enter into the house of the thief and into the house of him who swears falsely by My name; and it shall abide in the midst of his house and shall consume it, both its timber and its stones.
5 Then the angel who talked with me came forward and said to me, Lift up now your eyes and see what this is that goes forth.
6 And I said, What is it? [What does it symbolize?] And he said, This that goes forth is an ephah[-sized vessel for separate grains all collected together]. This, he continued, is the symbol of the sinners mentioned above and is the resemblance of their iniquity throughout the whole land. [Amos 8:5.]
7 And behold, a round, flat weight of lead was lifted and there sat a woman in the midst of the ephah[-sized vessel].
8 And he said, This is lawlessness (wickedness)! And he thrust her back into the ephah[-sized vessel] and he cast the weight of lead upon the mouth of it!
9 Then lifted I up my eyes and looked, and behold, there were two women coming forward! The wind was in their wings, for they had wings like the wings of a stork, and they lifted up the ephah[-sized vessel] between the earth and the heavens.
10 Then said I to the angel who talked with me, Where are they taking the ephah[-sized vessel]?
11 And he said to me, To the land of Shinar [Babylonia] to build it a house, and when it is finished, to set up the ephah[-sized vessel–the symbol of such sinners and their guilt] there upon its own base.