XX. Here begins a new series of prophecies, extending to the close of Ezekiel 23, and immediately called out (Ezekiel 20:1), like Ezekiel 14, by an inquiry on the part of the elders of Israel. The subject of the inquiry is not given in either case, and can only be inferred from the prophecy itself.... [ Continue Reading ]
CAME TO ENQUIRE. — It does not appear that the elders actually proposed their enquiry. It doubtless had relation not to personal affairs, but to the welfare of the nation, and in this prophecy the Lord meets their unspoken question.... [ Continue Reading ]
I WILL NOT BE ENQUIRED OF BY YOU. — As in Ezekiel 14:3. St. Jerome thus comments on the words: — “ To the holy, and to those who ask for right things, the promise is given, ‘While they are yet speaking, I will say, Here I am;’ but to sinners, such as these elders of Israel were, and as those whose s... [ Continue Reading ]
WILT THOU JUDGE THEM? — The form of the repeated question is equivalent to an imperative — judge them. Instead of allowing their enquiry and entreaty for the averting of judgment, the prophet is directed to set before them their long series of apostasies and provocations. “Judge” is used in the sens... [ Continue Reading ]
WHEN I CHOSE ISRAEL. — In Ezekiel 20:5 the Lord takes up the first, or Egyptian period of the history* of Israel. The record of that period, as it has come to us in the Pentateuch, does not contain either any commands against idolatry, or any notice of the rebellion of the people against such comman... [ Continue Reading ]
THE GLORY OF ALL LANDS. — So Palestine is constantly spoken of, both in the promise and in its fulfilment. (Comp. Daniel 11:16.) However strange this may seem to us now in regard to parts of the land, after centuries of desolation, misrule, and oppression, it is plain from Joshua 23:14, and many oth... [ Continue Reading ]
THE LAND OF EGYPT. — Of this idolatrous rebellion, and of this threat of the Divine anger while they were still in Egypt, as already said, we have no specific record. But they had the same disposition then as they had afterwards; and, even without such a charge, we could infer the probability of the... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR MY NAME’S SAKE. — This is the express ground of Moses’ pleading for the people in the passage just referred to, and again in Exodus 32:12; Deuteronomy 9:28; and it is repeatedly given, as in Deuteronomy 32:27, as the ground on which the Lord spared His rebellious people. Had they been treated ac... [ Continue Reading ]
BROUGHT THEM INTO THE WILDERNESS. — Here begins the second period of the history under review — viz., the earlier part of the life in the wilderness (Ezekiel 20:10). It includes the exodus, the giving of the law, the setting up of the tabernacle, the establishment of the priesthood, and the march to... [ Continue Reading ]
HE SHALL EVEN LIVE IN THEM. — Comp. Deuteronomy 30:15. It becomes plain, on a careful perusal of this passage, that what was required was not a mere outward, technical, and perfunctory keeping of certain definite precepts, but a living and loving obedience to God’s will from the heart. The same fund... [ Continue Reading ]
I GAVE THEM MY SABBATHS. — “Not because it is of Moses, but of the fathers” (John 7:22). The Sabbath, like circumcision, was an institution far older than the period here spoken of, but was now commanded anew, and made the especial pledge of the covenant between God and His people. The verse is a qu... [ Continue Reading ]
REBELLED AGAINST ME. — See Exodus 32:1; Numbers 14:1; Numbers 14:16; Numbers 25:1; and for the desecration of the Sabbath in particular, Exodus 16:27; Numbers 15:32. I WILL POUR OUT MY FURY. — Comp. Exodus 32:10; Numbers 15:12; and on... [ Continue Reading ]
I WOULD NOT BRING THEM INTO THE LAND. — Numbers 14:28. In consequence of their rebellion and want of faith, all the men above twenty years old when they came out of Egypt were doomed by the Divine oath to perish in the wilderness. Yet He did not utterly take His mercy from them, but promised that th... [ Continue Reading ]
UNTO THEIR CHILDREN. — The prophet comes now to the third part of his historical retrospect (Ezekiel 20:18) — the generation which grew up in the free air of the wilderness, and under the influence of the legislation and institutions given at Sinai. At the same time, it would be a mistake to confine... [ Continue Reading ]
THE CHILDREN REBELLED. — The history of the wanderings in the wilderness, given in Exodus and Numbers, offers abundant illustrations of the truth of this and the following verse.... [ Continue Reading ]
I WOULD SCATTER THEM AMONG THE HEATHEN. — This threatening was not designed to be fulfilled in that immediate generation, as abundantly appears from Leviticus 26:33; Deuteronomy 4:27, Deut. 27:64, and the other passages in which it is given, especially Deuteronomy 29, 30. It was given to that genera... [ Continue Reading ]
STATUTES THAT WERE NOT GOOD. — In this verse the general statement is made of which a particular instance is given in the next. The “statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they should not live,” cannot be the same with those described in Ezekiel 20:11 as “judgments which, if a man do, he... [ Continue Reading ]
TO PASS THROUGH THE FIRE. — The word “fire” here, as in Ezekiel 16:21; Ezekiel 23:37, is not in the original, but is rightly supplied from Ezekiel 20:31. The custom referred to was probably that of consecrating their seed to Moloch, expressly forbidden in Leviticus 20:1. (Comp. also Acts 7:43.) The... [ Continue Reading ]
YOUR FATHERS HAVE BLASPHEMED ME. — The fourth period of Israelitish history, though actually far the longest, is very briefly passed over (Ezekiel 20:27). It includes the whole period of the settlement in Canaan, from the conquest to the prophet’s own time, and was marked by the same characteristics... [ Continue Reading ]
IS CALLED BAMAH. — Bamah itself means _high place._ Some have fancied that the word is derived from the two words “go” and “where,” and therefore that it contains a play upon the question in the first part of the verse; but this etymology must be considered fanciful.... [ Continue Reading ]
ARE YE POLLUTED? — This and the two following verses constitute the fifth and concluding portion of this historical review, and relate to the then existing generation. The questions asked answer themselves, and yet in the following verse are answered for the sake of emphasis. They bring home to Ezek... [ Continue Reading ]
I WILL NOT BE ENQUIRED OF BY YOU. — This takes up the refrain of Ezekiel 20:3, and with the following verse fitly closes this portion of the prophecy which was introduced by the coming of the elders to enquire.... [ Continue Reading ]
AS THE HEATHEN. — The desire to be “like the nations that are round about,” had long been a ruling ambition with the Israelites, as shown in their original desire for a king (1 Samuel 8:5; 1 Samuel 8:20), and this desire, as shown in the text, had been one chief reason for their tendency to idolatry... [ Continue Reading ]
WITH A MIGHTY HAND, AND WITH A STRETCHED OUT ARM. — As the delineations of this whole passage are founded upon the exodus from Egypt (comp. Hosea 2:14), so this particular expression is the standing form in the Pentateuch for the series of mighty acts by which the Lord effected that deliverance (see... [ Continue Reading ]
BRING YOU OUT FROM THE PEOPLE. — This and the parallel clause, “gather you out of the countries,” cannot refer to the restoration of the people to their land, both because it is an avenging act, “with fury poured out”; and also because its object is said in the next verse to be to bring them into th... [ Continue Reading ]
INTO THE WILDERNESS OF THE PEOPLE. — As in the past there was a period of probation and discipline in the wilderness, so shall there be in the future. The similarity is insisted upon in Ezekiel 20:36, and the phrase “face to face” is taken from Deuteronomy 5:4, not to show that the Lord will interpo... [ Continue Reading ]
TO PASS UNDER THE ROD. — A figure taken from the shepherd’s way of counting and examining his flock. (Comp. Leviticus 27:32; Jeremiah 33:13; Micah 7:14.) By this the people were to be brought _“_into the land of the covenant,” selected and reconstituted God’s covenant people.... [ Continue Reading ]
I WILL PURGE OUT. — The discipline of affliction should have the effect of separating the rebellious in heart from the purified remnant, so that they should not return with them to the land of their fathers. A striking instance of the way in which the Divine purposes are fulfilled through the operat... [ Continue Reading ]
GO YE, SERVE YE EVERY ONE HIS IDOLS. — Comp. Joshua 24:15. If, after the warning given, ye still refuse obedience, then the Lord gives you up to your fate; “go, serve your idols.” Such should be the terrible end of the persistently rebellious part of the nation, as with the obdurate sinner of all ag... [ Continue Reading ]
IN MINE HOLY MOUNTAIN. — See note on Ezekiel 17:23. The former prophecy was distinctly Messianic; in this, taken by itself, there is nothing which might not refer to the restoration from the exile. Yet in view of the parallelism and connection between the two, we can hardly avoid the supposition, th... [ Continue Reading ]
YE SHALL LOTHE YOURSELVES. — The especial sin above all others for which Israel had been reproved in past ages, and which still formed the burden of Ezekiel’s denunciations, was idolatry; from this they were weaned, once for all, at the restoration, and whatever other sins may have been committed by... [ Continue Reading ]
TOWARD THE SOUTH. — The parable of Ezekiel 20:45 forms what might be called the text of the discourse in Ezekiel 21. The word south, here occurring three times, is represented in the Hebrew by three separate words, which mean, by their derivation, respectively, “on the right hand” (the orientals alw... [ Continue Reading ]
EVERY GREEN TREE IN THEE, AND EVERY DRY TREE — _i.e.,_ persons of every condition, the condition here having reference probably to their moral state; the approaching desolation should be so complete, that, like other national judgments, it should sweep away all alike. No distinction could be made in... [ Continue Reading ]
DOTH HE NOT SPEAK PARABLES? — Or enigmas — things that we cannot understand. This the prophet did designedly, as he had done in other cases, to awaken the attention of the people to the explanation he was about to give.... [ Continue Reading ]