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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadEzekiel, Jonah, and Pastoral Epistles by Patrick Fairbairn - Ezekiel 24:1 - 24:14
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Eze_24:2. Son of man, write thee the name of the day, this self-same day; it is the very day on which the king of Babylon lay against Jerusalem. (The usual meaning of ñָîַê is to lay against, to lean upon. Michaelis, Gesenius, and others have here imposed a different meaning on the word, and taken it in the sense of drawing near to, approaching. But Hav., Hitzig, properly adhere to the more exact and only ascertained meaning of laying against, or throwing oneself upon.)
3. And utter a parable to the rebellious house, and say to them, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Set on a caldron, set it on, and also pour water into it.
Eze_24:4. Gather into it its pieces (i.e. those which properly belong to it, and are in a sense its own), every good piece, thigh and shoulder, of the choice of bones full (i.e. the pieces that not only are in themselves best, but also enclose the strongest and firmest bones—for it means bones in the meat, not separate from it).
Eze_24:5. Of the choice of the flock take thou, and also pile the bones under it (the bony parts as distinguished from the fleshy); boil it thoroughly, and let them seethe the bones that are in the midst of it. (There is no need for any change in the clause ãּåּø äָòֲöָîִéí úַּçְúֶּéäָ , either by regarding úַּçְúֶּéäָ with Dathe, as superfluous, or with Newcome and many others substituting äָòֵöéí , wood, for bones. What the prophet means is, that the best, the fleshiest parts, full of the strongest bones, representing the most exalted and powerful among the people, were to be put within the pot and boiled; but that the rest, the very poorest, were not to escape: these, the mere bones, as it were, were to be thrown as a pile beneath, suffering first, and, by increasing the fire, hastening on the destruction of the others. ãּåּø is properly a noun, a pile; literally: And also let there be a pile of the bones underneath. The expression cannot signify, with Häv., a pile of wood for the bones; for ãּåּø is simply a pile, not a pile of wood, and when coupled with bones, can only mean a heap of these.)
6. Therefore, thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Woe to the bloody city! the caldron whose poisonous scum (verdigris) is in it. And the poisonous scum has not gone forth from it; on its every piece let it go forth; let no lot fall on it. (This seems to me the preferable way of understanding the latter part of Eze_24:6. Most commentators, including Hävernick and Hitzig, render: bring forth piece after piece. But why drop the it connected with the verb äåֹöִéàָäּ ? Bring it out—then, what it? The only thing made prominent in the preceding context is the poisonous scum; but it does not make sense to speak of bringing it forth piece by piece. This poisonous scum would not go out, the prophet had said, by such dealings as had already been resorted to; let it go out, then, he adds, upon each of the pieces in the pot; let the pot and its contents become alike infected with the corrupting taint: there is to be no lot cast, as if some were to escape; all were to be in the same category of evil. The communication of the poisonous scum is only to prepare the way for the application of the same consuming judgment to the caldron and its contents. And so the prophet immediately goes on to declare how the heaven-daring guilt was within and throughout the city, just as the poisonous scum was all through the pot and its pieces; whence all alike must suffer the vengeance of God’s destroying judgment. The confusion here commonly fallen into has arisen chiefly from pressing too closely the reference to Eze_11:7, where, certainly, the Lord speaks of fetching the people out of the caldron, and giving them up to strangers. But, in the passage before us, the idea throughout is of their being kept in the caldron till they were there utterly wasted and consumed.)
7. For her blood is in the midst of her; upon the parched rock she has put it; she did not pour it forth upon the earth, to cover it with dust.
Eze_24:8. In order that fury may come up, that vengeance may be executed, I have put her blood upon the parched rock, that it might not be covered. (Blood is here mentioned as the consummation of all wickedness; that, the existence of which presupposes every other form of guilt. It is also brought specially into notice with a view to Gen_4:10, where, even though the ground did receive the blood of Abel, still it cried to Heaven for vengeance. Here the people are represented as, with shameless and hardened effrontery, setting the blood they had shed in the most exposed and prominent place, on the naked rock, where there was nothing to conceal it, or intercept its cry to Heaven. And the Lord says not only that they had spilt it there, but that he himself also had set it there; that is, he had ordered matters so as to make the blood appear thus prominent, that the connection be tween the guilt and the punishment might be more easily perceived. Hence the proposal of some, after the Septuagint, to change the text in Eze_24:7, so as to read: upon the parched rock I have put it, etc., instead of she, proceeds upon a superficial view of the passage. It was the city herself that did so, yet not without the overruling providence of God outwardly turning things into that direction; so that in one respect it might be said, she had set it, and in another, God had set it on the rock.)
9. Therefore, thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Woe to the bloody city; also I will make the pile great:
Eze_24:10. Heap on wood, kindle the fire, consume the flesh, and boil it into a compound, (The radical meaning of the verb øָ÷ַç appears to be the artificial amalgamation of various substances into one, as in the case of the formation of sweet spices or ointments, usually done by pounding and boiling. Hence the meaning here of äַøְ÷ַç äַîֵּøְ÷ָçָä is, let it be sodden into a compound, or reduce it to a pulp. Vulgate: coquatur universa compositio.) and let the bones be burned.
Eze_24:11. And let it be set upon the coals empty, so that the brass of it may be hot, and may burn, and that its filthiness may be dissolved in the midst of it, its poisonous scum consumed.
Eze_24:12. The toilsome labours it has wearied out (exhausted), (This is substantially the rendering of the Vulgate: multo labore sudatum est. It indicates the pains or toilsome labours God had taken with Jerusalem to get her purified, but without effect; she had wearied them out, or allowed them to exhaust themselves without parting with her sins. úְּàֻðִéí nowhere else occurs in the sense here ascribed to it; but there is now a general agreement that it bears this sense here, derived from the root àåּï , which sometimes has the meaning of trouble or distress, and in Arab., of being fatigued.) and yet its great poisonous scum has not gone forth; in the fire be its poisonous scum!
Eze_24:13. In thy filthiness is infamy, because I have purged thee, and thou wast not purged; thou shalt not be purged from thy filthiness any more till I have caused my fury to rest on thee.
Eze_24:14. I Jehovah have spoken it; it comes, and I do. I will not relax, (The verb ôָּøַò is used with considerable latitude. But the primary meaning seems to be that of uncovering, or making bare, in which sense it occurs in Num_5:18, and other parts of the Pentateuch. Hence the secondary meaning of loose, relax, or dissolve, in which sense, probably, it is used, Exo_32:25, for the people were not properly naked, but in a relaxed and dissolute state. I take it in this sense also here. In Pro_1:25, and other places, it bears the still stronger sense of unbridled, lawless, or contemptuous treatment. It never means to go back.) I will not spare, and I will not repent; according to thy ways, and according to thy doings, shall they judge thee, saith the Lord Jehovah.
THESE fourteen verses contain the first part of the message given to Ezekiel on this occasion. The occasion was a melancholy one, being marked by the actual investiture of Jerusalem by the armies of Nebuchadnezzar. It was the ninth year of Jehoiachin’s captivity, and the tenth day of the tenth month. This is noted in other passages (2Ki_25:1; Jer_39:1) as the day and time on which the siege properly commenced. And that this fact should have been communicated to Ezekiel among the Babylonian exiles, and announced by him immediately after, must have been to afford another proof of his true prophetical character. By such an announcement he put his Divine commission in pledge, as he did still further, and more remarkably, by the clear delineation of the disastrous results in which he declared the siege thus begun was sure to terminate.
The image which is chosen for the purpose of unfolding the message to be delivered on this painful subject, that of a caldron set upon the fire to boil, with the best pieces of the meat in it, and the bones piled underneath, was evidently suggested by the proverb formerly noticed as having been bandied about among the people: “The city is the caldron and we are the flesh” (Eze_11:3). In a proud feeling of fancied security they had spoken thus; but they were now to find, in bitter experience, that there was a dreadful truth couched in the image, which was to rebuke their senseless folly. So far from the city proving to them a place of secure strength, like the iron ribs of a strong caldron, it was to be set as a seething-pot upon the fire; and the people, like so many pieces of meat destined to be devoured, were to be put into it and subjected to a boiling heat. None were to be spared; the mighty and the noble, as well as the comparatively poor and mean, were to suffer in the calamity; the only difference should be like that between consumption in the fire at once— the punishment of the poorer sort—and perishing by the somewhat slower and more lingering process of boiling, from which the rich could not escape.
After having briefly given the ground of the parabolical description, the prophet proceeds, in Eze_24:6-14, to make special and pointed application of it. His leading object is to show that it was the excessive and inveterate wickedness of the people which provoked, and even rendered necessary, the severe dealing to which they were now subjected.
All measures of a less extreme kind had been tried in vain; those were now exhausted; and as the iniquity appeared to be entwined with the whole fabric and constitution of things, nothing remained but to subject all to the crucible of a severe and overwhelming catastrophe. This is represented by keeping the caldron on the fire till its contents were stewed away, and the very bones burnt. And as if even this were not enough, as if something more were necessary to avenge and purge out such scandalous wickedness, the caldron itself must be kept hot and burning till the pollution should be thoroughly consumed out of it. The wicked city must be laid in ruins. It is the very same thought which occurs in Isa_4:4, where the filth of the daughters of Zion is said to be washed away, and the blood of Jerusalem to be purged from the midst of it, by the spirit of judgment and the spirit of burning; only, after the manner of our prophet, the image is extended to many minute and particular details. In plain terms, the Lord was no longer going to deal with them by half-measures; their condition called for the greatest degree of seventy compatible with their preservation as a distinct and separate people, and so the indignation of the Lord was to rest on them till a separation was effected between them and sin.
As to the principle of dealing, there is no essential difference between what God did then with Israel and what he still does with those who stand in a similar relation to him and pursue a similar course. Where there is the profession of a belief in God’s word and a regard to God’s authority, though intermingled with much that is false in sentiment or unrighteous in conduct, there must still be dealings of severity and rebuke, to bring the professor, if possible, to a sense of his sinfulness, and lead him to renounce it; but failing this, to vindicate concerning him the righteousness of God, and leave him without excuse if his iniquity should prove his ruin. In the case of sincere, God-fearing people, the severity exercised will always be attended with salutary results; for they have the root of the matter in them, and are sure to profit by the chastening of the Lord. But with those who have the profession only, without the principle of true godliness, the iniquity is clung to in spite of all the severity that is exercised, until the wrath falls on them to the uttermost. There is enough in New Testament Scripture, and the experience of men under the present dispensation, to warrant us to expect so far a similarity in God’s method of procedure to the representation here given of his conduct toward Israel. But, on the other hand, a difference may also be expected, in so far as his dealings now, in accordance with the genius of the new dispensation, respect men more as individuals, less as public communities, and bear more immediately upon their inward state and spiritual relations. He who would regard aright the operations of the Lord’s hand, and profit by the corrections of his rod of chastisement, must keep a watchful eye upon the things that concern his own experience and history. There may be signs of the Divine displeasure, sufficient to startle the tender conscience and call for deep humiliation of spirit, while nothing appears outwardly wrong, and all may even wear a smiling aspect, as far as regards social and public relations. Should there be a restraining of Divine grace within, an absence of spiritual refreshments, a felt discomfort of mind, or an obvious withdrawal of spiritual privileges, there is beyond doubt the commencement of a work of judgment; and if such marks of God’s displeasure are slighted, others of a more severe and alarming kind may assuredly be looked for. But as men’s tempers and circumstances in life are infinitely varied, so there is a corresponding variety in the methods employed by God to check the risings of sin and expel its poison from the heart. And it is the part of spiritual wisdom to seek for the wakeful ear and the discerning eye, which may enable one to catch even the earliest intimations of God’s displeasure, and so improve these as to render unnecessary the heavier visitations of wrath.
The second part of the vision which Ezekiel saw on this occasion bore respect more immediately to himself, although it was really a revelation to the people.