Ezekiel

Ezekiel or Ezechiel (/ɪˈziːkiəl/; Hebrew: יְחֶזְקֵאל Yəḥezqēʾl [jə.ħɛzˈqeːl]; Greek: Ἰεζεκιήλ Iezekiḗl [i.ɛ.zɛ.kiˈel]) was an Israelite priest. He is the eponymous protagonist of the Book of Ezekiel in the Hebrew Bible.

The Abrahamic religions acknowledge Ezekiel as a Hebrew prophet. In Judaism and Christianity, Ezekiel is believed to have already been active as a prophet in the Kingdom of Judah, where he prophesized the destruction of Judah's capital city Jerusalem, but also the restoration of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel in the aftermath. Following the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem, which destroyed Solomon's Temple and brought an end to the Jewish–Babylonian War in 587 BCE, Ezekiel continued his activity as a prophet during the Babylonian captivity.

It is believed that he died around 570 BCE; Ezekiel's Tomb is the most important Jewish religious site in Mesopotamia. The name "Ezekiel" means "God is strong" or "God strengthens" in the Hebrew language. In 539 BCE, three decades after the believed date of his death, the Babylonian captivity ended with the Persian conquest of Babylon and the Jews were subsequently repatriated in an event known as the return to Zion, which began after the Persian king Cyrus the Great issued the Edict of Cyrus.