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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadEzekiel, Jonah, and Pastoral Epistles by Patrick Fairbairn - Ezekiel 28:11 - 28:19
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Eze_28:11. And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,
Eze_28:12. Son of man, raise a lamentation over the king of Tyre, and say to him, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Thou sealest completeness, (Literally, according to the present text and punctuation, which I take to be correct, “Thou art the one sealing exactness.” For çåֹúֵí is the participle, and consequently means obsignans, sealing, the person sealing. Instead of úָּëְðִéú , all the ancients appear to have read úָּáְðִéú , as they give the sense of similitude or resemblance, and many moderns still prefer this to the received text. But this, of course, necessitates the further change of çåֹúָí for çåֹúֵí , seal for sealing; and is to be rejected as arbitrary. The noun is from äָּëַï , to weigh, to measure exactly, to level, etc.; hence applicable to any thing that is of an exact or perfect nature. In chap, 43:10, the prophet uses it of the complete or perfect pattern he had exhibited of the temple; and here more generally, of what is every way exact or complete. To say of the king of Tyre that he sealed up this, was, in other words, to declare him every way complete: he gave, as it were, the finishing stroke, the seal, to all that constitutes completeness; or, as we would now say it, he was a normal man—one formed after rule and pattern. Hence it is immediately explained by what follows: “full of wisdom and perfect in beauty;” in this stood his sealing completeness. Thus, without any alteration in the text, or even in the punctuation, we get a much more suitable meaning than can be obtained even by conjectural emendations. Take, for example, Hitzig’s: “Thou art a curiously wrought seal-ring,” a seal-ring full of wisdom. No wonder that, with such a commencement, he should have had to resort to many other alterations, and should have held the whole passage to be very corrupt.) full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty.
Eze_28:13. In Eden, the garden of God, thou wast; every precious stone was thy covering, the ruby, the topaz, and the diamond, the chrysolite, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the carbuncle, and the emerald, and gold; (The representation of the king of Tyre as the normal or perfect man, not unnaturally led the prophet back to the garden of Eden, where the man that really was such had his abode; and so he ironically represents this assumed pattern of perfection as having his local habitation there, in the normal land just as afterwards (Eze_31:8-9; Eze_36:35) the garden of Eden is variously employed by him as the region of ideal beauty and perfection. But occupying such a blessed region, all objects of natural preciousness and beauty of course lay at the king’s command; and as we are told in Genesis (chap. 2.) of the gold and the jewels with which that land originally abounded, so here the prophet speaks of them as forming the very apparel of the king. How much also Oriental monarchs are in the habit of bespangling and almost literally covering themselves with such things, is well known. A notion very early prevailed, that the precious stones here mentioned were those of the high-priest’s breastplate; and on that account, it is supposed, the LXX. translator made up their number to twelve. Even still Ewald and Hitzig think that respect was had to those sacred gems in this enumeration, and the former even regards the mention of them here as connected with an instrument of oracular wisdom and purposes of divination. The idea in any form is entirely gratuitous and out of place. The rendering of the names for the different jewels is what is now generally adopted. We deem it needless to enter into details.) the service of thy tambourines and of thy females were prepared with thee in the day when thou wast created. (Endless changes and arbitrary meanings have been resorted to from the earliest times, to lighten the difficulty of this last clause of Eze_28:13. I adhere to the received text, and the most natural meanings. úֻôִּéí has no other signification in Scripture than tambourines, or kettle-drums, an instrument of music in frequent use among the Orientals, and commonly played on by women. ðְ÷ָáִéí , on the other hand, is never found of a musical instrument, such as pipes, the rendering adopted by our translators and, many others. Indeed, as a plural word it never occurs at all; and the only single word which can be thought of is ðְ÷ֵáָä , female. Elsewhere, however, it is used only to denote the female sex, not precisely women; and there is besides the anomaly of a masculine instead of a feminine termination. Yet this is not without a parallel, as appears from such examples as ðùéí , women, and on the other side, àáåú , fathers, the first with a masculine, the other with a feminine termination. I think, therefore, with Hävernick, that the objects denoted here are the musical instruments, tambourines, and the women who played on them; and that this peculiar word ðְ÷ֵáָä , female, rather than any other, was used, because of the reference, which the passage bears to Gen_1:27, “Male and female created he them.” Tambourines, and female musicians to play on them, were provided for this king of Tyre on the day of his creation; that is, from the very first, from the period of his being a king, he was surrounded with the customary pleasures, as well as the peculiar treasure, of kings. The royal house of Tyre (for it is of this at large that the discourse must be understood) had not, like many others, to work its way with difficulty and through arduous struggles, but started at once into the full possession of royal power and splendour; no sooner formed than, like Adam, surrounded with fitting attendants and paradisiacal delights. So already Michaelis: “All things poured in around thee which could minister to thy necessities, thy comfort, or even thy pleasure, as they did formerly to Adam in the garden of Eden, which God granted to him.”)
14. Thou art the cherub of anointing (an anointed or consecrated cherub) that overshadows; and I did set thee so; upon the holy mount of God thou wert, and thou didst walk among stones of fire. (Here, again, a great many expedients have been resorted to, both in the way of textual alterations, and extraordinary meanings. The chief verbal difficulty hangs on îִîְùַּׁç , which nowhere else occurs; and the Vulgate rendering of extentus (the LXX. omits it altogether) has led to the supposition that it was derived from some Aramaic root, signifying to extend. But there is no solid ground for this, though it has the authority of Gesenius. The Chaldaic version gives the sense of anointing, taking it as a derivative from îָùַׁç in its usual meaning. And one does not see why there might not be îָùַׁç , anointing, from îָùַׁç , as well as îִîְëָּø , sale, from îָëַø , or îִîְùַׁì , government, from îָùַׁç . Indeed, in this very chapter, in Eze_28:24, we have a verbal adjective formed in precisely the same way, îַîְàִéø from hiphil of îָàַø , bitter or painful, from to make bitter. Cherub of anointing would thus make substantially the same sense as the anointed cherub, ëְּøåּá çַîַּùְׁçִéú ; the cherub that is consecrated to the Lord by the anointing oil. In regard to the next difficulty in the passage, which respects “the holy mountain of God on which he was,” Hävernick says, it would indeed be a wonderful representation, if the prophet described the king of Tyre as having been placed on Mount Sion, and he therefore renders a holy God’s mount, on which he was raised aloft, as a being of a higher nature, as one of those hill-gods, whom the Syrians worshipped (1Ki_20:23). But the holy hill of God can only be understood of a mount which has been consecrated by peculiar manifestations of Godhead therefore, either Mount Sinai, or Mount Sion, which is elsewhere named” the holy hill of God.” And if the king of Tyre could be placed in God’s garden, surely he might also be placed on God’s hill. The objection proceeds on a misapprehension of the nature of the representation. Hävernick is no happier in regard to the next expression, the stones of fire, amid which the king is said to have walked. He considers it to have respect to the worship of the Tyrian Hercules as the fire-god, and to the two pillars in his temple, the one of gold, the other of emerald, which were kept shining by night. But as Hitzig justly remarks, these were not stones, but pillars, and only one of them of stone, and even that not fiery, though resplendent. Besides, what a confusion would it make to throw together in one sentence God’s holy mount and any emblems of fire-worship in the city of Tyre! The reference seems to be to the description in Exodus 24, where Moses and the elders of Israel are said to have gone up to the mount to meet God, and to see “under his feet as it were a paved work of sapphire-stone,” while “the sight of the glory of the Lord was like devouring fire on the top of the mount.” It is just another mode of expressing the peculiar nearness of the King of Tyre to God: he was on God’s holy mount, where he trod, as it were, the very stones that are beneath the feet of God—stones of fire; for all is fire where God has his dwelling.)
15. Perfect wert thou in thy ways from the day of thy creation until iniquity was found in thee.
Eze_28:16. By the greatness of thy traffic they have filled thy midst with violence, and thou hast sinned; and I profane thee from the mount of God (i.e. cast thee from it as a polluted thing), and I destroy thee, thou cherub that overshadowest from the midst of the stones of fire. (This 16th verse also contains several difficulties; at least what have been regarded as such. The clause, “they have filled thy midst with violence,” which beyond all question is the literal rendering of the text, has been thought to give an unsuitable meaning—one applicable rather to the city as a whole than personally to the king—and hence supposed corruptions in the text, and also violent renderings. We refer only to Hävernick’s, who abides by the existing text, but forces it into a meaning strictly applicable to the king; therefore úָּåֶëְ must denote middle in the physical sense of venter, belly, or the body with respect to its middle part; and the plural verb must be explained by a peculiar construction, according to which an active is sometimes substituted in the place of a passive, even where it is not quite suitable; thus the sense is obtained, “they have filled thy body,” for “thou art filled as to thy body, with violence.” It is not sense after all. If it had been lust, or wickedness generally, that was represented as filling him, one could have made something of such an interpretation. And so, indeed, Hävernick shoves in frevei, wickedness, instead of violence, when he comes to give the general import, but without any right to do so. The Vulgate long ago gave substantially the same rendering: in multitudine negotiationis tuæ repleta sunt interiora tua iniquitate. But besides, no example can be produced of úָּåֶêְ ever signifying either the inward parts of a man or his body in general; though used with great frequency, it is always in the sense of midst—the middle of a great city, a people, or such like. Therefore I adopt, as the only natural rendering,” they have filled thy midst with violence;” which undoubtedly has respect to the city, but not, it must be remembered, without at the same time implicating the king. He, as head of the state, is to a certain extent identified with the whole of it; and he is evidently viewed in that light here. For when the prophet says, “by the greatness of thy traffic,” he plainly includes the state along with the king; and when he says further, that through this “his midst was filled with violence,” what does it indicate but that he had not ruled as he should have done, for righteousness? He had become the head of a state that was filled with violence; and so it is immediately added, “and thou hast sinned.” Thou hast not restrained the iniquity that prevails around thee; so far from it, thou art thyself also a transgressor. Thus understood, there is quite a natural meaning, and a regular progression of thought. It is admitted on all hands that the îָìåּ of the received text is for îָìְàåּ (which also stands in many codices), as îָìֵúִé for îָìֵàúִé in Job_32:18. The expression, “and I profane thee from the mount of God,” is quite similar to, “thou hast profaned his crown to the ground,” in Psa_89:39. In both cases it is a pregnant construction, and means that the person was dealt with as no longer sacred but profane, and as such was driven from the position of honour he had hitherto held to a despicable place.)
17. Thy heart hast been lifted up through thy beauty; thou hast corrupted thy wisdom together with thy splendour; I throw thee down to the earth, I lay thee before kings, that they may look upon thee. 18. Through the multitude of thine iniquities, by the dishonesty of thy traffic, thou hast profaned thy sanctuaries; (The sanctuaries which the king of Tyre is charged with having profaned, are to be understood of the sacred places with which the prophet had in the preceding verses associated him, viz. the holy mount of God, and the garden of God. It is his ideal position there, not his actual position in the city of Tyre, that is meant; for the latter could in no proper sense be called his sanctuary, still less, in the plural, his sanctuaries. And the fire, that is presently afterwards represented as going out of his midst and reducing him to ashes—so different as an instrument of destruction from the violent hands of strangers shortly before mentioned—was doubtless suggested by the stones of fire amid which in those ideal sanctuaries he had his abode. So far from finding it a good thing for him to have dwelt there, now that he had sinned, there would proceed thence, as it were, a consuming fire against him; his very elevation, having been abused, carried with it the element of his destruction.) and I make fire to go out from the midst of thee, it shall devour thee, and I will turn thee into ashes upon the earth before all that see thee.
Eze_28:19. All that know thee among the peoples shall be astonished at thee; thou shalt be ruins, and shalt be no more for ever.
It is clear from the very commencement of this singular passage, from the mention made here of the garden of Eden, that the representation contained in it is of an ideal character; that it is, in short, an historical parable. The kings of Tyre are first personified as one individual—an ideal man, and one complete in all natural excellence, perfect manhood. Not unnaturally so, since Tyre having sprung from a barren rock, and grown till she had become the mistress of the world’s commerce, was a kind of new creation in the earth as a state the most singular product in existence of human energy and enterprising skill. Therefore this ideal man, the representative of whatever there was of greatness and glory in Tyre, and in whom, consequently, the Tyrian spirit of self-elation and pride appear in full efflorescence, is ironically viewed by the prophet as the type of humanity in its highest states of existence upon earth. All that is best and noblest in the history of the past he sees, in imagination, meeting in this so-called beau-ideal of humanity. It was he who in primeval time trod the hallowed walks of paradise, and used at will its manifold treasures, and regaled himself with its corporeal delights. It was he who afterwards assumed the form of a cherub—ideal compound of the highest kinds of animal existence—type of humanity in its predestined state of ultimate completeness and glory; and as such, had a place assigned him among the consecrated symbols of God’s sanctuary in the holy mount, where, in the immediate presence of the Most High, he overshadowed the mercy-seat. Thus occupying the highest spheres of created life, and familiar even with the sight of the Divine glory, he knew what it was to dwell amidst the consuming fire, and to walk as on burning stones of sapphire. Whatever humanity has had, or has been typified to have, of dignity and honour in the past history of God’s administration, it has been thine to possess. So thou thinkest, thou ideal man, thou concentration of human excellence, thou quintessence of human greatness and pride. Thou thinkest that manhood’s divinest qualities, and most honourable conditions of being, belong peculiarly to thyself, since thou dost nobly peer above all and standest alone in thy glory. Let it be so. But thou art still a man, and, like humanity itself in its most favoured conditions, thou hast not been perfect before God, thou hast yielded thyself a servant to corruption. With creaturely waywardness and inconstancy thou hast gone astray on thy high places, and hast abused to the gratification of thine own lust and vanity the ample gifts and resources which should have been all employed in subservience to the will and glory of God. Therefore thou must be cast down from thy proud elevation; thou must lose thy cherubic nearness to God; the sacred and blissful haunts which thou hast defiled with thy abominations shall no longer know thee; and thou shalt henceforth be a monument to all of forfeited honours, abused privileges, and hopeless ruin.
Such we take to be the style and import of this vision. It is one of the most highly figurative representations in prophecy, and is only to be compared with Isaiah’s lamentation (in Isa_14:1.) over the downfall of the king of Babylon. It characteristically differs from this, however, in that while it moves with equal boldness and freedom in an ideal world, it clothes the ideal according to the usage of our prophet in an historical drapery, and beholds the past revived again in the personified existence of which it treats. But it is no wild play of fancy, or arbitrary indulgence of a lawless imagination. A sublime moral runs through the parable. It reads over again the great lesson of man’s weakness and degeneracy, and shows how inevitably the good, when unaccompanied by a really Divine element, turns in him to corruption and ruin. In the royal head of the state of Tyre a new trial was made of humanity with the greatest earthly advantages, he being endowed with the amplest resources of wealth and art, and placed on the loftiest pinnacle of the world’s wisdom and prosperity. But all in vain. The good only served, as in other cases, to feed the well-spring of human depravity; and the day of retribution could not fail to come with its recompenses of evil, and God’s justice be as conspicuously displayed in the overthrow of Tyre as his goodness had been in her singular rise and prosperity. So that the cry which the prophet would utter through this parabolical history in the ears of all is, that man in his best estate—with everything that art or nature can bring to his aid—is still corruption and vanity. The flesh can win nothing for itself that is really and permanently good. It carries in its bosom a principle of self-destruction, and the more that it can surround itself with the comforts and luxuries of life, the more does it pamper the godless pride of nature, and draw down upon itself calamity and destruction. Therefore “let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might; let not the rich man glory in his riches; but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me, that I am the Lord which exercises loving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth; for in these things I delight, saith the Lord.”