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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Ezekiel 20:45 - 20:45
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The Burning Forest
Eze 20:45. And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 20:46. Son of man, direct thy face toward the south, and trickle down towards the south, and prophesy concerning the forest of the field in the south land; Eze 20:47. And say to the forest of the south land, Hear the word of Jehovah; Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I kindle a fire in thee, which will consume in thee every green tree, and every dry tree: the blazing flame will not be extinguished, and all faces from the south to the north will be burned thereby. Eze 20:48. And all flesh shall see that I, Jehovah, have kindled it: it shall not be extinguished. Eze 20:49. And I said, Ah, Lord Jehovah! they say of me, Does he not speak in parables? - The prophet is to turn his face toward the south, and prophesy concerning the forest of the field there. הִטִּיף is used for prophesying, as in Amo 7:16 and Mic 2:6, Mic 2:11. The distinction between the three epithets applied to the south is the following: תֵּימָן is literally that which lies on the right hand, hence the south is a particular quarter of the heavens; דָּרֹום, which only occurs in Ezekiel and Ecclesiastes, with the exception of Deu 33:23 and Job 37:17, is derived from דָּרַר, to shine or emit streams of light, and probably signifies the brilliant quarter; נֶגֶב, the dry, parched land, is a standing epithet for the southern district of Palestine and the land of Judah (see the comm. on Jos 15:21). - The forest of the field in the south is a figure denoting the kingdom of Judah (נֶגֶב is in apposition to הַשָּׂדֶה, and is appended to it as a more precise definition). שָׂדֶה is not used here for a field, as distinguished from a city or a garden; but for the fields in the sense of country or territory, as in Gen 14:7 and Gen 32:3. In Eze 20:47, יַעַר , forest of the south land, is the expression applied to the same object (הַנֶגֶב, with the article, is a geographical term for the southern portion of Palestine). The forest is a figure signifying the population, or the mass of people. Individual men are trees. The green tree is a figurative representation of the righteous man, and the dry tree of the ungodly (Eze 21:3, compare Luk 23:31). The fire which Jehovah kindles is the fire of war. The combination of the synonyms לַהֶבֶת שַׁלְהֶבֶת, flame of the flaming brightness, serves to strengthen the expression, and is equivalent to the strongest possible flame, the blazing fire. כָּל־פָּנִים, all faces are not human faces or persons, in which case the prophet would have dropped the figure; but pânim denotes generally the outside of things, which is the first to feel the force of the flame. “All the faces” of the forest are every single thing in the forest, which is caught at once by the flame. In Eze 21:4, kŏl-pânim (all faces) is interpreted by kŏl̇-bâsar (all flesh). From south to north, i.e., through the whole length of the land. From the terrible fierceness of the fire, which cannot be extinguished, every one will know that God has kindled it, that it has been sent in judgment. The words of the prophet himself, in Eze 20:49, presuppose that he has uttered these parabolic words in the hearing of the people, and that they have ridiculed them as obscure (mâshâl is used here in the sense of obscure language, words difficult to understand, as παραβολή also is in Mat 13:10). At the same time, it contains within itself request that they may be explained. This request is granted; and the simile is first of all interpreted in Eze 21:1-7, and then still further expanded in Eze 21:8.