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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadPaul Kretzmann Commentary - Ezekiel 27:26 - 27:36
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The Fall of Tyre
v. 26. Thy rowers have brought thee into great waters, Tyre being once more represented as a stately vessel of the galley variety, driven by one or more rows of oars in the hands of powerful oarsmen. The east wind, which often blows in sudden, furious gusts, hath broken thee in the midst of the seas, in a shipwreck which meant the death-blow of Tyre in the midst of her glory.
v. 27. Thy riches, all the marvelous wealth heaped up in her banks and storehouses, and thy fairs, the wares with which she traded, thy merchandise, thy mariners, and thy pilots, thy calkers, and the occupiers of thy merchandise, those who actually handled and sold the goods, and all thy men of war that are in thee, and in all thy company which is in the midst of thee, that is, all the inhabitants of the city, shall fall into the midst of the seas in the day of thy ruin, the destruction being complete, as in the case of a foundered ship, which sinks with all those on board.
v. 28. The suburbs, the smaller towns immediately dependent upon Tyre, shall shake at the sound of the cry of thy pilots, as they, the very ones upon whom the ship of state depended, found themselves facing annihilation.
v. 29. And all that handle the oar, the mariners, and all the pilots of the sea, namely, those of other ships and nations, shall come down from their ships, disembarking on account of the intensity of the horror which they felt, they shall stand upon the land,
v. 30. and shall cause their voice to be heard against thee, in loud lamentation, and shall cry bitterly and shall cast up dust upon their heads, Cf Job_2:12; they shall wallow themselves in the ashes, Cf Jer_6:26, these latter acts being tokens of deep and uncontrollable grief;
v. 31. and they shall make themselves utterly bald for thee, shaving their heads as another sign of deep mourning, and gird them with sackcloth, as mourners were in the habit of doing, and they shall weep for thee with bitterness of heart, in an excess of grief, and bitter wailing.
v. 32. And in their wailing they shall take up a lamentation for thee and lament over thee, in a mournful dirge, saying, What city is like Tyrus, like the destroyed in the midst of the sea! now so silent after the former noisy bustle which characterized her.
v. 33. When thy wares went forth out of the seas, like plants and fruits out of the ground, namely, by virtue of the fact that the many vessels of her commercial pursuits brought in the goods, thou filledst many people, meeting their demand for goods of every description; thou didst enrich the kings of the earth with the multitude of thy riches and of thy merchandise, for Tyre had included in her trade the richest and most costly goods of the earth.
v. 34. In the time when thou shalt be broken by the seas, or, "now that thou hast been shattered," or, "hast foundered," in the depths of the waters thy merchandise and all thy company in the midst of thee shall fall, all her inhabitants being included in the judgment of destruction upon her.
v. 35. All the inhabitants of the isles shall be astonished at thee, all those who had the benefit of Tyre's commerce standing aghast at her downfall, and their kings, their merchant rulers, shall be sore afraid, they shall be troubled in their countenance, trembling lest they share her fate.
v. 36. The merchants among the people shall hiss at thee, for envy is apt ever to produce a malicious joy when a rival is overthrown; thou shalt be a terror, an object of horror, and never shalt be any more. Cf.Ezekiel 26:21. It is a vividly impressive passage, which concludes this section of the prophecy against Tyrus, one setting forth the just wrath of a holy God.