6:8 escape. Ezekiel introduces the remnant theme (9:8; 11:12, 13; 12:16; 14:22, 23; 20:39–44). The remnant is a group or individual who has experienced some calamity, ordinarily in judgment for sin, and has survived. This group of survivors becomes the nucleus for the continuation of the group: they embody the future hopes of the people, and they inherit the promises of God afresh. The Exile was to be a period of purging and refining so that a pure people would emerge from it.