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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadEzekiel, Jonah, and Pastoral Epistles by Patrick Fairbairn - Ezekiel 25:1 - 25:7
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It cannot be regarded as accidental that the heathen nations who came here within the range of the prophet’s vision for judgment are precisely seven; first four, who are briefly disposed of in Ezekiel 25, and then three, whose case is spread over the seven following chapters. Considering the use that is made generally in Scripture, and particularly in some portions of prophetical Scripture (such as Daniel, Zechariah, the Apocalypse), of the number seven as a symbol of completeness, we may not unreasonably suppose that the prophet named those seven on the present occasion with some reference to this symbolical import of the number. And in that case he must be understood to intimate that the Divine judgment would not exhaust itself on those, but would also take effect on others who were similarly situated,—that in process of time the execution of God’s vengeance on sin would traverse the entire round of its domain in the world. We may the rather adopt this supposition, as in the second division we find Sidon named separately from Tyre, though properly but a part of the same maritime power; and yet on another account there was not wanting a reason for the special mention of Sidon, as we shall see when we come to the place. The rest were all such as might have been expected, and, with one grand exception, the whole, perhaps, that might have been expected in a catalogue like the present: Ammon, Moab, Edom, the Philistines—all the immediate neighbours and hereditary rivals and enemies of Israel; and, less hostilely affected, but still occupying somewhat of the same unfriendly relation, Tyre, Sidon, and Egypt. What we specially miss is Babylon herself—in Ezekiel’s time the great impersonation of the world’s sinfulness and power, and above all others the enemy of Israel’s pre-eminence among the nations; yet neither here nor elsewhere in this prophet’s writings is she expressly named as an object of vengeance. It is obviously impossible to account for such an omission from a desire not to exceed the number seven, for had this been all, some inferior state could easily have been sacrificed to make room for Babylon. Nor could the omission have arisen from Ezekiel’s residence in Chaldea, as if he was too near the throne of the kingdom to announce its coming downfall,—a supposition which the fearless character of the prophet forbids us to make, to say nothing of the fact of Daniel’s once and again proclaiming, in the very presence of the Chaldean monarch, the certain and not very distant overthrow of his empire. The reason most probably was, that as Babylon is constantly viewed by the prophet as the rod of God’s vengeance, it stood in some sense apart from the nations of the earth, and seemed too closely connected with the present execution of God’s purposes to be fitly represented as an object of his retributive justice. The more especially may such a consideration have weighed with the prophet, as one of the prevailing tendencies of the time was to overlook the hand of God in the present elevation of Babylon to its high ascendancy, and to fret against the dominion which God for a season had given her over the nations. Her final desolation, however, in common with that of all earthly dominions, was included in the prophecy already considered (chap. Eze_17:22-24), and, as we shall see, is still more distinctly embraced in some subsequent predictions. But to proceed now with the denunciations contained in this chapter.
I. The judgment of Ammon (Eze_25:1-7).
Eze_25:1. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
Eze_25:2. Son of man, set thy face toward the children of Ammon, and prophesy upon them:
Eze_25:3. And say unto the children of Ammon, Hear the word of the Lord Jehovah; Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because thou sayest Aha, to my sanctuary—for it is profaned; and to the land of Israel—for it is desolate; and to the house of Judah for it has gone into captivity; (The ëִּé in these three clauses ought plainly to be taken in the usual sense, for, assigning the cause of the joy and contempt of the Ammonites, and not when, as in our common version and many others.)
Eze_25:4. Therefore, behold, I give thee to the children of the east for a possession, and they shall pitch in thee their folds, (The common meaning of íִéøָä is undoubtedly a pen or fold for flocks, and is the only suitable meaning here, where the discourse is of shepherd tribes. Palaces, the rendering of the Authorized Version, is quite unsuitable.) and make their dwellings in thee; they shall eat thy fruit, and drink thy milk.
Eze_25:5. And I turn Kabbah into a stable for camels, and the children of Ammon into couching of flocks; (“Into couching of flocks.” ìְîִøְáַּõÎöֹàï to be a sort of complex phrase, made up of the noun denoting the subject, and the participle indicating the position or attitude; couching flocks, or flocks-in a couching position; couching being added to render the idea more graphic—flocks for men, and not that merely, but flocks in a state of perfect repose. It makes no proper sense: children of Ammon into a couching-place of flocks; for what sort of revolution could change men into places, lairs for flocks? What the prophet means to declare is evidently that flocks were to take the place of men, or that the fertile parts of the territory were, by changes to the worse, to become pastoral.) and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze_25:6. For thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because thou hast clapped thy hand and stamped with the foot, and rejoiced with all thy disdain, with relish (literally, with soul, i.e. the most hearty delight or relish), toward the land of Israel;
Eze_25:7. Therefore, behold, I stretch out my hand upon thee, and I give thee for a prey (The Kri reading here, ìָáַæ instead of ìְáַâ , is almost universally adopted. Häv. defends the text, and would derive the word from the Sanscrit, bhagga, part or portion. This, of course, would render the meaning nearly the same, whichever word were adopted. But as ìáâ is nowhere else found in Hebrew, and so many codices also read ìáæ that it has been actually received into the text in the Complutensian Bible, we incline to prefer the latter. The ancient versions express this sense.) to the nations, and I will cut thee off from among the peoples, and will cause thee to perish from among the countries; I will destroy thee; and thou shalt know that I am Jehovah.
The feelings attributed to the Ammonites in these verses are evidently those of bitter hostility toward the covenant-people, and that mainly on religious grounds. The first element in their joy respecting the desolations of Israel was because the sanctuary of God was profaned, seeing in that, as they thought, the triumph of heathenism over the rival claims of Jehovah. At an earlier period,, most probably in the time of Jehoshaphat, we find this feeling ascribed to them in its most offensive form in Psalms 83, where the combined enemies of Judah, headed by Ammon and Moab (for it is said of the others merely, that “they stretched. out the hand to the children of Lot”), are represented as saying: “Let us cut them off from being a nation, that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance; let us take the houses of God for a possession.” Now, at length, this impious wish was for the present realized. The long-cherished grudge against the chosen seed is gratified; and, as persons in an ecstasy of delight at what they greatly desired, but hardly expected to see accomplished, they clapped their hands and shouted their huzzas over the prostrate and captive foe. It would appear also, from 2Ki_24:2, that they took an active part, along with the Chaldeans, in accomplishing the destruction.
Viewed, therefore, in respect to their state of feeling, the Ammonites were, in the strictest sense, enemies of God; they were warring with the purposes of Heaven; and expressly on this account is the judgment here denounced against them,—a judgment which declared that their then fertile and cultivated region should be overrun by the children of the East (the sons of Ishmael, Arabians), that their lands and cities should be pastured by flocks, and their name as a separate people become utterly extinct. The prediction began very soon to be fulfilled, for the territory of Ammon was a portion of the lands which were shortly afterwards ravaged by the armies of Nebuchadnezzar (Jer_49:28, etc.; Josephus, Ant. x. 9. 1). And though the Ammonites still existed as a separate people when the Jews returned from Babylon, and gave indications of their old hostility, yet they appear to have been in an enfeebled condition. Some generations later they became subject, with other tribes in that district, to the Ptolemies of Egypt; and one of the Ptolemies (Philadelphia) found their capital Rabbah in so ruined a state that he caused it to be built anew, and called it after himself Philadelphia. The Ammonites are never afterwards heard of as a separate and independent people, and seem to have become gradually merged in the general Arab population. There is enough surely in these facts to justify the prediction of Ezekiel; and to point to the desolations of that region, as described by travellers in the present day, seems to us somewhat beside the purpose; for the region has long since ceased to be the territory of the children of Ammon, and it was simply as connected with them that any judgment was pronounced against it. The moment it became a desolation for the people then inhabiting it, and they themselves became scattered and dispersed, the word of Ezekiel was fulfilled; then God’s displeasure against their enmity had taken full effect. It mattered little what might subsequently become of the region; and if under new occupants and a settled government it should again rise into fertility and cultivation, the word uttered by Ezekiel would not in the least be affected by it.