1-2 Twenty-five years after King Jehoiachin and the rest of us had been led away as prisoners to Babylonia, and fourteen years after the Babylonians had captured Jerusalem, the Lord's power took control of me on the tenth day of the first month. The Lord showed me some visions in which I was carried to the top of a high mountain in Jerusalem. I looked to the south and saw what looked like a city full of buildings.
3 In my vision the Lord took me closer, and I saw a man who was sparkling like polished bronze. He was standing near one of the gates and was holding a tape measure in one hand and a measuring stick in the other.
4 The man said, “Ezekiel, son of man, pay close attention to everything I'm going to show you—that's why you've been brought here. Listen carefully, because you must tell the people of Israel what you see.”
5 The first thing I saw was an outer wall that completely surrounded the temple area. The man took his measuring stick, which was three metres long, and measured the wall; it was three metres high and three metres thick.
6-7 Then he went to the east gate, where he walked up steps that led to a long passageway. On each side of this passageway were three guardrooms, which were three metres square, and they were separated by walls two and a half metres thick. The man measured the distance between the opening of the gate and the first guardroom, and it was three metres, the thickness of the outer wall.At the far end of this passageway, I saw an entrance room that faced the courtyard of the temple itself. There was also a distance of three metres between the last guardroom and the entrance room