Ezekiel 4:16
Moreover he said unto me, Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread in Jerusalem: and they shall eat bread by weight, and with care; and they shall drink water by measure, and with astonishment: Moreover he said unto me, Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread in Jerusalem: and they shall eat bread by weight, and with care; and they shall drink water by measure, and with astonishment:
Ezekiel 4:16 belongs to an acted miniature of Jerusalem's siege and its consequences, in which the prophet dramatizes what would fall upon the city. It is a sign-act in which his own famine diet portrays the famine and suffering that would come upon the city and Israel, with his privations serving as a warning of coming distress.
It prophesies siege and famine in which the food supply of Jerusalem would fail, so that bread would be eaten rationed by weight and with care and anxiety, and water would be drunk by measure and with astonishment and distress. The weighed bread and measured water are a symbolic act typifying the awful judgments awaiting the Jews, representing the scant, careful food the children of Israel would eat in captivity among the Gentiles. The surrounding mention of defiled bread links that scarcity and humiliation to the hardships of the Babylonian captivity. The famine comes as a consequence of faithlessness, so that when God's people are unfaithful crops fail and bread is rationed by weight and famine comes upon the land.
The chapter gives a key to prophetic time in which a day in prophecy symbolizes a year. The staff of bread means that bread was regarded in Bible times as the staff of life, the support that forms healthy blood and strong muscles. In its natural state the wheat kernel contains in about right proportions all the elements needed to build and repair the body, give energy and heat, and feed brain and nerves, including the nitrogenous portion and medicinal salts lying near the surface under the bran.
To break the staff is to strip away those essential elements, as is done in highly refined white flour, which is not a staff but a broken reed that fails those who lean on it with disastrous results to health, while good, wholesome, well-baked loaves of whole-wheat Graham bread preserve the staff. Bread is the cheapest of foods and should be provided in large variety, with more expensive foods used sparingly alongside it, and the verse's bread image commends bread instead of meat.