4.9–17 Ezekiel is commanded to bake bread and eat it and then to drink water according to a specific rationing.
4.9 Wheat…spelt. This mixture of six foodstuffs, known in both Israel and Babylon, probably symbolizes that no one grain or legume is found in sufficient quantity to allow the preparation of something to eat.
4.10 Twenty shekels. One shekel weighed almost half an ounce; hence twenty shekels would weigh almost half a pound.
4.11 One-sixth of a hin, about two-thirds of a quart. One hin (the word belongs to an Egyptian system) equals slightly less than a gallon.
4.12–13 The Hebrew syntax and term barley-cake make it unclear whether the barley bread is the one Ezekiel baked (v. 9).V. 12 may begin a new symbolic action that emphasizes impurity rather than scarcity, which appears to be the point in vv. 9–11. Human dung as fuel is otherwise unattested in ancient Israel. According to Deut 23.12–14 human fecal material violates holiness.
4.14 For Ezekiel to have cooked over a fire fueled with human offal would have introduced impurity; it would have defiled him, which would have been especially pernicious since Ezekiel was a priest. The cases that Ezekiel attests, eating something that was not properly slaughtered (Lev 22.8) and meat that has not been eaten within a specific time limit (carrion flesh; Lev 7.18), are forbidden in Israel’s ritual legislation.
4.16–17 The prophet returns to the imagery of vv. 9–11, that of scarcity; cf. Lev 26.26 for similar language.
EZEKIEL 5
A Sword against Jerusalem
1And you, O mortal, take a sharp sword; use it as a barber’s razor and run it over your head and your beard; then take balances for weighing, and divide the hair. 2One third of the hair you shall burn in the fire inside the city, when the days of the siege are completed; one third you shall take and strike with the sword all around the city;a and one third you shall scatter to the wind, and I will unsheathe the sword after them. 3Then you shall take from these a small number, and bind them in the skirts of your robe. 4From these, again, you shall take some, throw them into the fire and burn them up; from there a fire will come out against all the house of Israel.
5Thus says the Lord GOD: This is Jerusalem; I have set her in the center of the nations, with countries all around her. 6But she has rebelled against my ordinances and my statutes, becoming more wicked than the nations and the countries all around her, rejecting my ordinances and not following my statutes. 7Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: Because you are more turbulent than the nations that are all around you, and have not followed my statutes or kept my ordinances, but have acted according to the ordinances of the nations that are all around you; 8therefore thus says the Lord GOD: I, I myself, am coming against you; I will execute judgments among you in the sight of the nations. 9And because of all your abominations, I will do to you what I have never yet done, and the like of which I will never do again. 10Surely, parents shall eat their children in your midst, and children shall eat their parents; I will execute judgments on you, and any of you who survive I will scatter to every wind. 11Therefore, as I live, says the Lord GOD, surely, because you have defiled my sanctuary with all your detestable things and with all your abominations—therefore I will cut you down;b my eye will not spare, and I will have no pity. 12One third of you shall die of pestilence or be consumed by famine among you; one third shall fall by the sword around you; and one third I will scatter to every wind and will unsheathe the sword after them.
13My anger shall spend itself, and I will vent my fury on them and satisfy myself; and they shall know that I, the LORD, have spoken in my jealousy, when I spend my fury on them. 14Moreover I will make you a desolation and an object of mocking among the nations around you, in the sight of all that pass by. 15You shall bec a mockery and a taunt, a warning and a horror, to the nations around you, when I execute judgments on you in anger and fury, and with furious punishments—I, the LORD, have spoken—16when I loose against youd my deadly arrows of famine, arrows for destruction, which I will let loose to destroy you, and when I bring more and more famine upon you, and break your staff of bread. 17I will send famine and wild animals against you, and they will rob you of your children; pestilence and bloodshed shall pass through you; and I will bring the sword upon you. I, the LORD, have spoken.
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a Heb it
b Another reading is I will withdraw
c Gk Syr Vg Tg: Heb It shall be
d Heb them
5.1–4 Ezekiel and the blade of a barber. In the final symbolic action of this series, Ezekiel is to take a sharp instrument (sword, or “sharp blade”) and use it to cut his hair and beard (cf. Isa 7.20 for the imagery of a foreign enemy as a razor). The manipulation of the hair in three parts and then a small number (vv. 2–4) suggests that no part of Israel will be immune from destruction. What Ezekiel does to the hair—weighing, dividing, burning, striking, scattering, binding—may symbolize God’s punishment. Fire is a destructive element at both beginning and end.
5.5–17 God vows that he will destroy Jerusalem using various weapons. This long speech is replete with the prophetic speech formulas thus says the Lord GOD in vv. 5, 7, 8, 11 and I, the LORD, have spoken in vv. 13, 15, 17.
5.5 This is Jerusalem signifies that the divine oracle interprets the purport of the foregoing symbolic actions, especially the last one, as referring to Jerusalem. In the center of the nations resonates with traditions of a holy site or city being located at the earth’s central point (cf. 38.12). Here, however, that tradition involves no divine protection for the city and, instead, allows for judgment in the next verse.
5.6 My ordinances and my statutes, i.e., specific requirements created by God’s covenant with Israel. Jerusalem’s becoming more wicked than the nations is a theme also present in ch. 16.
5.8 I…against you. Cf. Nah 2.13; 3.5.
5.10 Ezekiel takes the case of parents consuming children (cf. Lev 26.29; 2 Kings 6.29; Jer 19.9) and adds its converse, otherwise unattested, children consuming parents. Here and in v. 12 Ezekiel uses imagery drawn from covenant curses.
5.11 Defiled my sanctuary. See chs. 8, 11 for specific desecrations.
5.12 This verse builds on the fractional symbolism of 5.1–2.
5.16–17 On God’s arsenal, cf. Deut 32.23–24, which suggests Ezekiel is using standard notions of ways in which God can inflict punishment.
EZEKIEL 6
Judgment on Idolatrous Israel
1The word of the LORD came to me: 2O mortal, set your face toward the mountains of Israel, and prophesy against them, 3and say, You mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord GOD! Thus says the Lord GOD to the mountains and the hills, to the ravines and the valleys: I, I myself will bring a sword upon you, and I will destroy your high places. 4Your altars shall become desolate, and your incense stands shall be broken; and I will throw down your slain in front of your idols. 5I will lay the corpses of the people of Israel in front of their idols; and I will scatter your bones around your altars. 6Wherever you live, your towns shall be waste and your high places ruined, so that your altars will be waste and ruined,a your idols broken and destroyed, your incense stands cut down, and your works wiped out. 7The slain shall fall in your midst; then you shall know that I am the LORD.
8But I will spare some. Some of you shall escape the sword among the nations and be scattered through the countries. 9Those of you who escape shall remember me among the nations where they are carried captive, how I was crushed by their wanton heart that turned away from me, and their wanton eyes that turned after their idols. Then they will be loathsome in their own sight for the evils that they have committed, for all their abominations. 10And they shall know that I am the LORD; I did not threaten in vain to bring this disaster upon them.
11Thus says the Lord GOD: Clap your hands and stamp your foot, and say, Alas for all the vile abominations of the house of Israel! For they shall fall by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence. 12Those far off shall die of pestilence; those near
by shall fall by the sword; and any who are left and are spared shall die of famine. Thus I will spend my fury upon them. 13And you shall know that I am the LORD, when their slain lie among their idols around their altars, on every high hill, on all the mountain tops, under every green tree, and under every leafy oak, wherever they offered pleasing odor to all their idols. 14I will stretch out my hand against them, and make the land desolate and waste, throughout all their settlements, from the wilderness to Riblah.b Then they shall know that I am the LORD.
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a Syr Vg Tg: Heb and be made guilty
b Another reading is Diblah
6.1–14 Destruction with survivors.
6.1–7 Ezekiel addresses first the mountains of Israel and then all Israel. Cf. ch. 36 for similar imagery, employed after the destruction foretold in ch. 6; see also 3.22, where Ezekiel is speaking in a valley. Geographic imagery is prominent throughout the book.
6.2–4 The mountains themselves are personified and addressed, as are valleys. Mountains are important because Israel had built improper religious sites on them. High place, anything from a small ritual platform to a temple complex. High places are frequently related to Canaanite religious practices. For OT polemic against such places, see, e.g., 2 Kings 23.8; Jer 19.5 (high places could also be located in valleys; so Jer 7.31). Even Yahwistic high places were to have been destroyed after the reforms of Josiah. Altars, incense stands, and idols indicate that Ezekiel understands these shrines to have been major installations. Idols (Hebrew gillulim), used thirty-nine times in Ezekiel, is characteristic of this book.
6.5–6 Instead of the sacrifices normally expected at the high places, God will provide corpses (cf. Jer 7.31–33).
6.6 Your works, a reference to religious implements made by human hands (see Isa 17.7–8).
6.7 You shall know that I am the LORD, a sentence, common in Ezekiel (over sixty times), that regularly marks the boundary of a speech, e.g., 7.27. Here remembering and self-loathing lead to knowledge.
6.8–10 Those who survive will be exiled.
6.9 I was crushed. God has been affected personally and does not simply enforce covenant curses.
6.11–14 An oracle that begins with a new device, ritual use of hands, foot, and voice. On alas, cf. the related Hebrew word translated aha in 25.3; 26.2; 36.2.
6.12 The possibility for survivors seems remote. Far off, nearby may refer to proximity to Jerusalem.
6.13 An allusion to the imagery of vv. 1–7.
6.14 From the wilderness to Riblah, a general description of Israel’s boundaries at their greatest extent. Wilderness, southern Judah (Ex 23.31); Riblah (Diblah in Hebrew; the letters r and d may be easily confused) lies in Syria (2 Kings 23.33).
EZEKIEL 7
Impending Disaster
1The word of the LORD came to me: 2You, O mortal, thus says the Lord GOD to the land of Israel:
An end! The end has come
upon the four corners of the land.
3Now the end is upon you,
I will let loose my anger upon you;
I will judge you according to your ways,
I will punish you for all your abominations.
4My eye will not spare you, I will have no pity.
I will punish you for your ways,
while your abominations are among you.
Then you shall know that I am the LORD.
5Thus says the Lord GOD:
Disaster after disaster! See, it comes.
6An end has come, the end has come.
It has awakened against you; see, it comes!
7Your dooma has come to you,
O inhabitant of the land.
The time has come, the day is near—
of tumult, not of reveling on the mountains.
8Soon now I will pour out my wrath upon you;
I will spend my anger against you.
I will judge you according to your ways,
and punish you for all your abominations.
9My eye will not spare; I will have no pity.
I will punish you according to your ways,
while your abominations are among you.
Then you shall know that it is I the LORD who strike.
10See, the day! See, it comes!
Your doomb has gone out.
The rod has blossomed, pride has budded.
11Violence has grown into a rod of wickedness.
None of them shall remain,
not their abundance, not their wealth;
no pre-eminence among them.c
12The time has come, the day draws near;
let not the buyer rejoice, nor the seller mourn,
for wrath is upon all their multitude.
13For the sellers shall not return to what has been sold as long as they remain alive. For the vision concerns all their multitude; it shall not be revoked. Because of their iniquity, they cannot maintain their lives.d
14They have blown the horn and made everything ready;
but no one goes to battle,
for my wrath is upon all their multitude.
15The sword is outside, pestilence and famine are inside;
those in the field die by the sword;
those in the city—famine and pestilence devour them.
16If any survivors escape,
they shall be found on the mountains
like doves of the valleys,
all of them moaning over their iniquity.
17All hands shall grow feeble,
all knees turn to water.
18They shall put on sackcloth,
horror shall cover them.
Shame shall be on all faces,
baldness on all their heads.
19They shall fling their silver into the streets,
their gold shall be treated as unclean.
Their silver and gold cannot save them on the day of the wrath of the LORD. They shall not satisfy their hunger or fill their stomachs with it. For it was the stumbling block of their iniquity. 20From theire beautiful ornament, in which they took pride, they made their abominable images, their detestable things; therefore I will make of it an unclean thing to them.
21I will hand it over to strangers as booty,
to the wicked of the earth as plunder;
they shall profane it.
22I will avert my face from them,
so that they may profane my treasuredf place;
the violent shall enter it,
they shall profane it.
23Make a chain!g
For the land is full of bloody crimes;
the city is full of violence.
24I will bring the worst of the nations
to take possession of their houses.
I will put an end to the arrogance of the strong,
and their holy places shall be profaned.
25When anguish comes, they will seek peace,
but there shall be none.
26Disaster comes upon disaster,
rumor follows rumor;
they shall keep seeking a vision from the prophet;
instruction shall perish from the priest,
and counsel from the elders.
27The king shall mourn,
the prince shall be wrapped in despair,
and the hands of the people of the land shall tremble.
According to their way I will deal with them;
according to their own judgments I will judge them.
And they shall know that I am the LORD.
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a Meaning of Heb uncertain
b Meaning of Heb uncertain
c Meaning of Heb uncertain
d Meaning of Heb uncertain
e Syr Symmachus: Heb its
f Or secret
g Meaning of Heb uncertain
7.1–27 Sayings concerning the end for Israel. Thus says the Lord GOD introduces two of the three oracles that make up this chapter, vv. 1–4, 5–9, 10–27. T
he formula Then you shall know that I am the LORD occurs at the end of each oracle. These oracles share much imagery and phraseology with other OT texts, e.g., Isa 13–14.
7.1–4 End occurs three times and provides the basic theme of the first oracle. Am 8.2 also understands God’s judgment to be “the end.” Four corners of the land, possibly “four corners of the earth,” emphasizing the destruction’s cosmic scope, but Hebrew ’adamah, “land,” is regularly used by Ezekiel to refer to Israelite territory, e.g., 11.17. Cf. Isa 11.12.
7.3 Let loose my anger. See Ex 15.7; Ps 78.49.
7.4 Eye. Cf. Pss 33.18;34.15.
7.5–9 The end is defined as the day, which is imminent. The “day of the LORD” as a time for destruction and disorder is a prominent motif in other prophetic texts, e.g., Joel 1.15; Zeph 1.14; Zech 14.1; Mal 4.1. The general terms doom, end, disaster, and tumult are presented as God’s personal wrath, which will be meted out in proportion to the people’s ways; cf. ch. 18.
7.10–27 What will happen to humans on the day is spelled out.
7.10–11 Rod. Another word with the same consonants in Hebrew could mean “injustice” (RSV). Pride, wickedness, symbolized by twigs that grow larger.
7.12–13 Normal life, as exemplified in market transactions, is inappropriate since many will die.
7.14–17 They have blown the horn. Those on guard and responsible for mustering defensive forces have issued the call, but the onslaught of sword, pestilence, and famine has prevented a military response. Some may flee, but they will only be able to moan.
7.18 Wearing sackcloth and shaving the head (baldness) are lamentation practices.
7.19–20 Silver and gold. Wealth generally, as well as specific objects made out of precious metal, including idols, provide no protection from disaster.
7.21–22 It (v. 21), riches (as in v. 20), which God can give over to the foreign army in order to fulfill the promise of desecration, which also includes profanation of the temple.
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