Ezekiel 1:1

THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET EZEKIEL

Chronological Notes relative to the commencement of Ezekiel's prophesying

-Year from the Creation, according to Archbishop Usher, 3409.

-Year of the Jewish era of the world, 3166.

-Year from the Deluge, 1753. -Second year of the forty-sixth Olympiad.

-Year from the building of Rome, according to the Varronian or generally received account, 159.

-Year from the building of Rome, according to Cato and the Fasti Consulares, 158.

-Year from the building of Rome, according to Polybius the historian, 157.

-Year from the building of Rome, according to Fabius Pictor, 153.

-Year of the Julian Period, 4119.

-Year of the era of Nabonassar, 153.

-Year from the foundation of Solomon's temple, 409.

-Year since the destruction of the kingdom of Israel by Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, 126.

-Second year after the third Sabbatic year after the seventeenth Jewish jubilee, according to Helvicus.

-Year before the birth of Christ, 591. -Year before the vulgar era of Christ's nativity, 595.

-Cycle of the Sun, 3.

-Cycle of the Moon, 15.

-Twenty-second year of Tarquinius Priscus, the fifth king of the Romans: this was the eighty-sixth year before the consulship of Lucius Junius Brutus, and Publius Valerius Poplicola.

-Thirty-first year of Cyaxares, or Cyaraxes, the fourth king of Media.

-Eleventh year of Agasicles, king of Lacedaemon, of the family of the Proclidae.

-Thirteenth year of Leon, king of Lacedaemon, of the family of the Eurysthenidae.

-Twenty-fifth year of Alyattes II., king of Lydia, and father of the celebrated Croesus.

-Eighth year of AEropas, the seventh king of Macedon.

-Sixth and last year of Psammis, king of Egypt, according to Helvicus, an accurate chronologer. This Egyptian king was the immediate predecessor of the celebrated Apries, called Vaphres by Eusebius, and Pharaoh-hophra by Jeremiah, Jeremiah 44:30.

-First year of Baal, king of the Tyrians.

-Twelfth year of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon.

-Fourth year of Zedekiah, the last king of Judah.

CHAPTER I

This chapter contains that extraordinary vision of the Divine

glory with which the prophet was favoured when he received the

commission and instructions respecting the discharge of his

office, which are contained in the two following chapters. The

time of this Divine manifestation to the prophet, 1-3.

The vision of the four living creatures, and of the four

wheels, 4-25.

Description of the firmament that was spread over them, and of

the throne upon which one sat in appearance as a man, 26-28.

This vision, proceeding in a whirlwind from the NORTH, seems to

indicate the dreadful judgments that were coming upon the whole

land of Judah through the instrumentality of the cruel

Chaldeans, who lay to the north of it.

See Ezekiel 1:14; Ezekiel 4:6; Ezekiel 6:1.

NOTES ON CHAP. I

Verse Ezekiel 1:1. In the thirtieth year] We know not what this date refers to. Some think it was the age of the prophet; others think the date is taken from the time that Josiah renewed the covenant with the people, 2 Kings 22:3, from which Usher, Prideaux, and Calmet compute the forty years of Judah's transgression, mentioned Ezekiel 4:6.

Abp. Newcome thinks there is an error in the text, and that instead of בשלשים bisheloshim, in the thirtieth, we should read בחמישית bachamishith, in the fifth, as in the second verse. "Now it came to pass in the fifth year, in the fourth month, in the fifth day of the month," c. But this is supported by none of the ancient Versions, nor by any MS. The Chaldee paraphrases the verse, "And it came to pass thirty years after the high priest Hilkiah had found the book of the law, in the house of the sanctuary," c. This was in the twelfth year of Josiah's reign. The thirtieth year, computed as above, comes to A.M. 3409, the fourth year from the captivity of Jeconiah, and the fifth of the reign of Zedekiah. Ezekiel was then among the captives who had been carried way with Jeconiah, and had his dwelling near the river Chebar, Chaborus, or Aboras, a river of Mesopotamia, which falls into the Euphrates a little above Thapsacus, after having run through Mesopotamia from east to west. - Calmet.

Fourth month] Thammuz, answering nearly to our July.

I saw visions of God.] Emblems and symbols of the Divine Majesty. He particularly refers to those in this chapter.