Ezekiel 28:1-26

Ezekiel 28. Tyre's Fall from Heaven. In a remarkable passage, Ezekiel now conceives the pride of Tyre as incarnate in her king. The detail is often obscure and difficult, reminiscent of a mythological background similar to Genesis 3. The commercial genius and success of Tyre flushed her with impious pride: she fancied herself divine. But her marvellous wisdom was only commercial wisdom; she had no instinct for the worship of anything but herself and her abounding prosperity: so the terrible Babylonians must come and lay them low in an unhonoured death (Ezekiel 28:1). A dirge is then sung over the fallen genius of Tyre, impersonated by her king. Once he had walked in the garden of God, fair, wise, and resplendent, companion of the cherubs who guard the holy abode; but for his pride he was hurled out of Paradise symbol of the ruin to which Tyre's commercial pride will bring her. (In Ezekiel 28:12 the meaning of thou sealest up the sum is quite uncertain, as also tabrets and pipes in Ezekiel 28:13. For the anointed cherub that covereth (Ezekiel 28:14), which is more than obscure, should possibly be read (set) among the cherubs was thy dwelling. The last clause of Ezekiel 28:16 should perhaps be read, the cherubs with whom thou hadst converse, drove thee out, etc. cf. LXX. The fiery stones suggests the supernatural glories of the sacred mountain. [It should perhaps be mentioned that J. G. Frazer (Adonis, Attis, Osiris, i. 114f.) connects the walking in the midst of the stones of fire with the custom of the fire-walk, which may have been an amelioration of an earlier custom of burning alive, or, as is suggested in Balder the Beautiful, ii. 1ff., merely a stringent form of purification. A. S. P.] For sanctuaries in Ezekiel 28:18, perhaps holiness. In Ezekiel 28:16 the conduct and fate of the king tend to be merged in that of the city.)

Zidon shares in the doom of Tyre (Ezekiel 28:20), and their destruction is meant to prepare the way for the ultimate restoration of Israel, and the glory and holiness of Yahweh, which the restoration of Israel and the destruction of her enemies will so signally illustrate (Ezekiel 28:24). These verses (Ezekiel 28:24) really furnish us with the key to the whole section Ezekiel 28:25.