Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Ezekiel 31:1
And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third [month], in the first [day] of the month, [that] the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
1. The date is about two months before Jerusalem fell.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Ch. 31 Pharaoh under the figure of a great cedar cut down and flung upon the ground
The passage has three parts:
(1) Eze 31:1-9. Pharaoh, the impersonation of the spirit and might of Egypt, was a lofty cedar, with spreading branches, and its top in the clouds. All the fowls lodged in the branches, and all the beasts brought forth their young under it. Its waters nourished it and made it great. The trees in the garden of God did not equal it; all the trees of Eden envied it.
(2) Eze 31:10-14. The great tree shall be cut down by the mighty one of the nations, and thrown upon the ground. Its bulk shall fill the mountains and valleys of the land. All the nations shall depart from under the shadow of it; and the fowls and beasts of the field shall feed on it. Its heart was lifted up because of its great height, therefore it shall be cut down, that none of the trees lift themselves up and put their head among the clouds.
(3) Eze 31:5-18. Nature shall shudder and put on blackness over the fall of Pharaoh. And the great trees of the garden of God that are gone down to the pit shall be comforted when Pharaoh and his auxiliaries descend among them.
The allegory is easily read. The mighty cedar, burying its head in the clouds, is the proud king and his powerful state, aspiring to a greatness that belongs to heaven. The fowls and beasts lodging under the shadow of the tree are the nations of the earth seeking his protection and subject to him (Dan 4:12). The trees in the garden of God are other mighty states impersonated in their rulers. The universal meaning which was given to the judgment on Egypt by representing it as the day of the Lord in ch. 30 is suggested here in other ways, by the imposing height of the cedar, unapproachable by other trees in the garden of God; by the fowls and beasts of the field lodging in the tree all nations seeking the protection of the Pharaoh; and by the shock which all nature receives when the great tree is cut down and flung upon the ground; and finally by the commotion occasioned in Shel when Pharaoh descends among the dead (ch. 32 Isaiah 14). In some points the allegory has incongruities, as was natural. Pharaoh is a great cedar, but it is his waters the Nile that nourish him, and give him an altitude to which the trees of Eden cannot aspire. The cedar is in Lebanon, the home of cedars, but also by the great deep, and probably too in Eden ( Eze 31:11). The trees, once in Eden, descend into Shel with those that are gone down to the pit.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
In the third month – More than a month before Jerusalem was taken (compare Jer 39:2).
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Eze 31:1-18
The Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon.
The cedar in Lebanon
I. The soul that will not grow down must be cut down. Trees that are to stand the storm must send their roots deep into the earth. A man that is to face successfully the storms of life must have a downward growth of humility and faith. He that humbleth himself shall be exalted.”
II. The true teacher of man is greater than a monarch whose position only gives him power. Pharaoh must go to school to Ezekiel. A man is more than a king. (A London Minister.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
CHAPTER XXXI
This very beautiful chapter relates also to Egypt. The prophet
describes to Pharaoh the fall of the king of Nineveh, (see the
books of Nahum, Jonah, and Zephaniah,) under the image of a
fair cedar of Lebanon, once exceedingly tall, flourishing, and
majestic, but now cut down and withered, with its broken
branches strewed around, 1-17.
He then concludes with bringing the matter home to the king of
Egypt, by telling him that this was a picture of his
approaching fate, 18.
The beautiful cedar of Lebanon, remarkable for its loftiness,
and in the most flourishing condition, but afterwards cut down
and deserted, gives a very lately painting of the great glory
and dreadful catastrophe of both the Assyrian and Egyptian
monarchies. The manner in which the prophet has embellished his
subject is deeply interesting; the colouring is of that kind
which the mind will always contemplate with pleasure.
NOTES ON CHAP. XXXI
Verse 1. In the eleventh year] On Sunday, June 19, A.M. 3416, according to Abp. Usher; a month before Jerusalem was taken by the Chaldeans.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
In the eleventh year; as Eze 30:20.
in the third month; our June 26th old style, the 16th new style; just one month and eight days before the taking of the city on the 27th of July old style, but 17th of July new style. The first day of the month Tamuz.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
1. third monthtwo monthslater than the prophecy delivered in Eze30:20.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And it came to pass in the eleventh year,…. Of Zedekiah’s reign, and Jeconiah’s captivity:
in the third month, in the first day of the month: the month Sivan, which began on the twentieth of our May, and answers to part of May, and part of June; this was about seven weeks after the former prophecy, and about five weeks before the destruction of Jerusalem; according to Bishop Usher n, this was on the nineteenth of June, on the first day of the week, in 3416 A.M. or before Christ 588:
that the word of the Lord came unto me, saying; as follows:
n Annales Vet. Test. A. M. 3416.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
The might of Pharaoh resembles the greatness and glory of Asshur. – Eze 31:1. In the eleventh year, in the third (month), on the first of the month, the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 31:2. Son of man, say to Pharaoh the king of Egypt, and to his tumult, Whom art thou like in thy greatness? Eze 31:3. Behold, Asshur was a cedar-tree upon Lebanon, beautiful in branches, a shadowing thicket, and its top was high in growth, and among the clouds. Eze 31:4. Water brought him up, the flood made him high, its streams went round about its plantation, and it sent its channels to all the trees of the field. Eze 31:5. Therefore its growth became higher than all the trees of the field, and its branches became great, and its boughs long from many waters in its shooting out. Eze 31:6. In its branches all the birds of the heaven made their nests, and under its boughs all the beasts of the field brought forth, and in its shadow sat great nations of all kinds. Eze 31:7. And he was beautiful in his greatness, in the length of his shoots; for his root was by many waters. Eze 31:8. Cedars did not obscure him in the garden of God, cypresses did not resemble his branches, and plane-trees were not like his boughs; no tree in the garden of God resembled him in his beauty. Eze 31:9. I had made him beautiful in the multitude of his shoots, and all the trees of Eden which were in the garden of God envied him. – The word of God is addressed to King Pharaoh and to , his tumult, i.e., whoever and whatever occasions noise and tumult in the land. We must not interpret this, however, as Hitzig has done, as signifying the ruling classes and estates in contrast with the quiet in the land, for no such use of is anywhere to be found. Nor must we regard the word as applying to the multitude of people only, but to the people with their possessions, their riches, which gave rise to luxury and tumult, as in Eze 30:10. The inquiry, whom does Pharaoh with his tumult resemble in his greatness, is followed in the place of a reply by a description of Asshur as a glorious cedar (Eze 31:3-9). It is true that Ewald has followed the example of Meibom ( vanarum in Cod. Hebr. interprett. spec. III p. 70) and J. D. Michaelis, and endeavours to set aside the allusion to Asshur, by taking the word in an appellative sense, and understanding as signifying a particular kind of cedar, namely, the tallest species of all. But apart altogether from there being no foundation whatever for such an explanation in the usage of the language, there is nothing in the fact to justify it. For it is not anywhere affirmed that Pharaoh resembled this cedar; on the contrary, the question, whom does he resemble? is asked again in Eze 31:18 (Hitzig). Moreover, Michaelis is wrong in the supposition that “from Eze 31:10 onwards it becomes perfectly obvious that it is not Assyria but Egypt itself which is meant by the cedar-tree previously described.” Under the figure of the felling of a cedar there is depicted the overthrow of a king or monarchy, which has already taken place. Compare Eze 31:12 and Eze 31:16, where the past is indicated quite as certainly as the future in Eze 31:18. And as Eze 31:18 plainly designates the overthrow of Pharaoh and his power as still in the future, the cedar, whose destruction is not only threatened in Eze 31:10-17, but declared to have already taken place, can only be Asshur, and not Egypt at all.
The picture of the glory of this cedar recalls in several respects the similar figurative description in Ezekiel 17. Asshur is called a cedar upon Lebanon, because it was there that the most stately cedars grew. , a shade-giving thicket ( is a Hiphil participle of ), belongs to as a further expansion of , corresponding to the further expansion of by “its top was among the clouds.” If we bear this in mind, the reasons assigned by Hitzig for altering into an adjective , and taking as a substantive formation after the analogy of , lose all their force. Analogy would only require an adjective in the construct state in the event of the three statements ‘ , ‘ , and ‘ being co-ordinate with one another. But what is decisive against the proposed conjecture is the fact that neither the noun nor the adjective is ever met with, and that, in any case, cannot signify foliage. The rendering of the Vulgate, “ frondibus nemorosus ,” is merely guessed at, whilst the Seventy have omitted the word as unintelligible to them. For , thicket of clouds, see the comm. on Eze 19:11; and for , that on Eze 17:3. The cedar grew to so large a size because it was richly watered (Eze 31:4). A flood poured its streams round about the place where the cedar was planted, and sent out brooks to all the trees of the field. The difficult words ‘ are to be taken literally thus: as for its (the flood’s) streams, it (the flood) was going round about its plantation, i.e., round about the plantation belonging to the flood or the place situated near it, where the cedar was planted. is not to be taken as a preposition, but as a sign of the accusative, and dna , as an accusative used for the more precise definition of the manner in which the flood surrounded the plantation. It is true that there still remains something striking in the masculine , since , although of common gender, is construed throughout as a feminine, even in this very verse. But the difficulty remains even if we follow Ewald, and take to be a defectively written or irregular form of the Hiphil ; a conjecture which is precluded by the use of , to cause to run = to cause to flow away, in Eze 32:14. , its (the flood’s) plantation, i.e., the plantation for which the flood existed. is used here to signify the source of starting-point of a flood, as in Deu 8:7, where are co-ordinate with . – While the place where the cedar was planted was surrounded by the streams of the flood, only the brooks and channels of this flood reached to the trees of the field. The cedar therefore surpassed all the trees of the field in height and luxuriance of growth (Eze 31:5). f heb>, an Aramean mode of spelling for heb>; and as heb>, . . ., an Aramean formation with inserted, for , branches. For , see the comm. on Eze 17:6. cannot mean “since it (the stream) sent out the water” (Ewald); for although in Eze 31:4 is also construed as a masculine, the suffix cannot be taken as referring to , for this is much too far off. And the explanation proposed by Rosenmller, Hvernick, Kliefoth, and others, “as it (the tree) sent them (the branches) out,” is open to this objection, that would then contain a spiritless tautology; since the stretching out of the branches is already contained in the fact of their becoming numerous and long. the tautology has no existence if the object is left indefinite, “in its spreading out,” i.e., the spreading not only of the branches, but also of the roots, to which is sometimes applied (cf. Jer 17:8). By the many waters which made the cedar great, we must not understand, either solely or especially, the numerous peoples which rendered Assyria great and mighty, as the Chaldee and many of the older commentators have done. It must rather be taken as embracing everything which contributed to the growth and greatness of Assyria. It is questionable whether the prophet, when describing the flood which watered the cedar plantation, had the description of the rivers of Paradise in Gen 2:10. floating before his mind. Ewald and Hvernick think that he had; but Hitzig and Kliefoth take a decidedly opposite view. There is certainly no distinct indication of any such allusion. We meet with this for the first time from Eze 31:8 onwards.
In Eze 31:6-9 the greatness and glory of Asshur are still further depicted. Upon and under the branches of the stately tree, all creatures, birds, beasts, and men, found shelter and protection for life and increase (Eze 31:6; cf. Eze 17:23 and Dan 4:9). In , all kinds of great nations, the fact glimmers through the figure. The tree was so beautiful ( from ) in its greatness, that of all the trees in the garden of God not one was to be compared with it, and all envied it on that account; that is to say, all the other nations and kingdoms in God’s creation were far inferior to Asshur in greatness and glory. is the garden of Paradise; and consequently in Eze 31:9, Eze 31:16, and Eze 31:18 is also Paradise, as in Eze 28:13. There is no ground for Kliefoth’s objection, that if be taken in this sense, the words “which are in the garden of God” will contain a superfluous pleonasm, a mere tautology. In Gen 2:8 a distinction is also made between and the garden in Eden. It was not all Eden, but the garden planted by Jehovah in Eden, which formed the real paradisaical creation; so that the words “which are in the garden of God” give intensity to the idea of the “trees of Eden.” Moreover, as Hvernick has correctly pointed out, there is a peculiar emphasis in the separation of from in Eze 31:8: “cedars…even such as were found in the garden of God.” Not one even of the other and most glorious trees, viz., cypresses and planes, resembled the cedar Asshur, planted by God by many waters, in its boughs and branches. It is not stated in so many words in Eze 31:8 and Eze 31:9 that the cedar Asshur stood in the garden of God; but it by no means follows from this, that by the garden of God we are to understand simply the world and the earth as the creation of God, as Kliefoth imagines, and in support of which he argues that “as all the nations and kingdoms of the world are regarded as trees planted by God, the world itself is quite consistently called a garden or plantation of God.” The very fact that a distinction is made between trees of the field (Eze 31:4 and Eze 31:5) and trees of Eden in the garden of God (Eze 31:8 and Eze 31:9), shows that the trees are not all regarded here as being in the same sense planted by God. If the garden of God stood for the world, where should we then have to look for the field ( )? The thought of Eze 31:8 and Eze 31:9 is not that “not a single tree in all God’s broad earth was to be compared to the cedar Asshur,” but that even of the trees of Paradise, the garden in Eden, there was not one so beautiful and glorious as the cedar Asshur, planted by God by many waters.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| The King of Assyria’s Greatness. | B. C. 588. |
1 And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month, in the first day of the month, that the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, 2 Son of man, speak unto Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to his multitude; Whom art thou like in thy greatness? 3 Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a shadowing shroud, and of a high stature; and his top was among the thick boughs. 4 The waters made him great, the deep set him up on high with her rivers running round about his plants, and sent out her little rivers unto all the trees of the field. 5 Therefore his height was exalted above all the trees of the field, and his boughs were multiplied, and his branches became long because of the multitude of waters, when he shot forth. 6 All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations. 7 Thus was he fair in his greatness, in the length of his branches: for his root was by great waters. 8 The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him: the fir trees were not like his boughs, and the chestnut-trees were not like his branches; nor any tree in the garden of God was like unto him in his beauty. 9 I have made him fair by the multitude of his branches: so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied him.
This prophecy bears date the month before Jerusalem was taken, as that in the close of the foregoing chapter about four months before. When God’s people were in the depth of their distress, it would be some comfort to them, as it would serve likewise for a check to the pride and malice of their neighbours, that insulted over them, to be told from heaven that the cup was going round, even the cup of trembling, that it would shortly be taken out of the hands of God’s people and put into the hands of those that hated them, Isa 51:22; Isa 51:23. In this prophecy,
I. The prophet is directed to put Pharaoh upon searching the records for a case parallel to his own (v. 2): Speak to Pharaoh and to his multitude, to the multitude of his attendants, that contributed so much to his magnificence, and the multitude of his armies, that contributed so much to his strength. These he was proud of, these he put a confidence in; and they were as proud of him and trusted as much in him. Now ask him, Whom art thou like in thy greatness? We are apt to judge of ourselves by comparison. Those that think highly of themselves fancy themselves as great and as good as such and such, that have been mightily celebrated. The flatterers of princes tell them whom they equal in pomp and grandeur. “Well,” says God, “let him pitch upon the most famous potentate that ever was, and it shall be allowed that he is like him in greatness and no way inferior to him; but, let him pitch upon whom he will, he will find that his day came to fall; he will see there was an end of all his perfection, and must therefore expect the end of his own in like manner.” Note, The falls of others, both into sin and ruin, are intended as admonitions to us not to be secure or high-minded, nor to think we stand out of danger.
II. He is directed to show him an instance of one whom he resembles in greatness, and that was the Assyrian (v. 3), whose monarchy had continued from Nimrod. Sennacherib was one of the mighty princes of that monarchy; but it sunk down soon after him, and the monarchy of Nebuchadnezzar was built upon its ruins, or rather grafted upon its stock. Let us now see what a flourishing prince the king of Assyria was. He is here compared to a stately cedar, v. 3. The glory of the house of David is illustrated by the same similitude, ch. xvii. 3. The olive-tree, the fig-tree, and the vine, which were all fruit-trees, had refused to be promoted over the trees because they would not leave their fruitfulness (Judg. ix. 8, c.), and therefore the choice falls upon the cedar, that is stately and strong, and casts a great shadow, but bears no fruit. 1. The Assyrian monarch was a tall cedar, such as the cedars in Lebanon generally were, of a high stature, and his top among the thick boughs he was attended by other princes that were tributaries to him, and was surrounded by a life-guard of brave men. He surpassed all the princes in his neighbourhood; they were all shrubs to him (v. 5): His height was exalted above all the trees of the field; they were many of them very high, but he overtopped them all, v. 8. The cedars, even those in the garden of Eden, which we may suppose were the best of the kind, would not hide him, but his top branches outshot theirs. 2. He was a spreading cedar; his branches did not only run up in height, but run out in breadth, denoting that this mighty prince was not only exalted to great dignity and honour, and had a name above the names of the great men of the earth, but that he obtained great dominion and power; his territories were large, and he extended his conquests far and his influences much further. This cedar, like a vine, sent forth his branches to the sea, to the river, Ps. lxxx. 11. His boughs were multiplied; his branches became long (v. 5); so that he had a shadowing shroud, v. 3. This contributed very much to his beauty, that he grew proportionably large as well as high. He was fair in his greatness, in the length of his branches (v. 7), very comely as well as very stately, fair by the multitude of his branches, v. 9. His large dominions were well managed, like a spreading tree that is kept in shape and good order by the skill of the gardener, so as to be very beautiful to the eye. His government was as amiable in the eyes of wise men as it was admirable in the eyes of all men. The fir-trees were not like his boughs, so straight, so green, so regular; nor were the branches of the chestnut-trees like his branches, so thick, so spreading. In short, no tree in the garden of God, in Eden, in Babylon (for that stood where paradise was planted), where there was every tree that was pleasant to the sight (Gen. ii. 9), was like to this cedar in beauty; that is, in all the surrounding nations there was no prince so much admired, so much courted, and whom every body was so much in love with, as the king of Assyria. Many of them did virtuously, but he excelled them all, outshone them all. All the trees of Eden envied him, v. 9. When they found they could not compare with him they were angry and grieved that he so far outdid them, and secretly grudged him the praise due to him. Note, It is the unhappiness of those who in any thing excel others that thereby they make themselves the objects of envy; and who can stand before envy? 3. He was serviceable, as far as a standing growing cedar could be, and that was only by his shadow (v. 6): All the fowls of heaven, some of all sorts, made their nests in his boughs, where they were sheltered from the injuries of the weather. The beasts of the field put themselves under the protection of his branches. There they were levant–rising up, and couchant–lying down; there they brought forth their young; for they had there a natural covert from the heat and from the storm. The meaning of all is, Under his shadow dwelt all great nations; they all fled to him for safety, and were willing to swear allegiance to him if he would undertake to protect them, as travellers in a shower come under thick trees for shelter. Note, Those who have power ought to use it for the protection and comfort of those whom they have power over; for to that end they are entrusted with power. Even the bramble, if he be anointed king, invites the trees to come and trust in his shadow, Judg. ix. 15. But the utmost security that any creature, even the king of Assyria himself, can give, is but like the shadow of a tree, which is but a scanty and slender protection, and leaves a man many ways exposed. Let us therefore flee to God for protection, and he will take us under the shadow of his wings, where we shall be warmer and safer than under the shadow of the strongest and stateliest cedar, Psa 17:8; Psa 91:4. 4. He seemed to be settled and established in his greatness and power. For, (1.) It was God that made him fair, v. 9. For by him kings reign. He was comely with the comeliness that God put upon him. Note, God’s hand must be eyed and owned in the advancement of the great men of the earth, and therefore we must not envy them; yet that will not secure the continuance of their prosperity, for he that gave them their beauty, if they be deprived of it, knows how to turn it into deformity. (2.) He seemed to have a good bottom. This cedar was not like the heath in the desert, made to inhabit the parched places (Jer. xvii. 6); it was not a root in a dry ground, Isa. liii. 2. No; he had abundance of wealth to support his power and grandeur (v. 4): The waters made him great; he had vast treasures, large stores and magazines, which were as the deep that set him up on high, constant revenues coming in by taxes, customs, and crown-rents, which were as rivers running round about his plants; these enabled him to strengthen and secure his interests every where, for he sent out his little rivers, or conduits, to all the trees of the field, to water them; and when they had maintenance from the king’s palace (Ezra iv. 14), and their country was nourished by the king’s country (Acts xii. 20), they would be serviceable and faithful to him. Those that have wealth flowing upon them in great rivers find themselves obliged to send it out again in little rivers; for, as goods are increased, those are increased that eat them, and the more men have the more occasion they have for it; yea, and still the more they have occasion for. The branches of this cedar became long, because of the multitude of waters which fed them (Eze 31:5; Eze 31:7); his root was by great waters, which seemed to secure it that its leaf should never wither (Ps. i. 3), that it should not see when heat came, Jer. xvii. 8. Note, Worldly people may seem to have an established prosperity, yet it only seems so, Job 5:3; Psa 37:35.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
EZEKIEL – CHAPTER 31
ASSYRIA’S FALL TYPE OF DESTRUCTION OF EGYPT
Verses 1-18:
Verses 1, 2 affirm that a prophetic message came from the Lord, to Ezekiel, to deliver to Pharaoh, king of Egypt, in June, two months after that prophecy related Eze 30:20. He was directed to address Pharaoh and his Egyptian multitudes, making clear to them, in rhetorical language, to whom they were likened or compared. They were doomed to captivity, like Assyria had fallen before Nebuchadnezzar and Babylon, some twenty years earlier. Assyria’s fall was a picture of their own future doom. The announced doom of Egypt was designed to take from Judah any false hope of help from Egypt.
Verse 3 describes the former glory of the king of Assyria that was like a mighty, spreading cedar of Lebanon on the highest mountain, very visible from afar, Nah 3:18; Zep 2:13. Her boughs or limbs reached far out to entwine with limbs of other trees near her. Such seems to describe the once temporary might and visibility of the Assyrian empire, now crumbled in the dust, Dan 4:20-22; See also a similar image, Eze 17:3; Eze 23:24; Dan 4:37; Rev 7:1.
Verses 4, 5 state that ample rivulets of water, underground streams of water, fed the growth of Lebanon’s trees until her highest tree was spread in proud glory over all the trees of the field, by virtue of the rivers of water. Such a comparison reflected the arrogant pride of Assyria’s former king in his conquering glory, Isa 10:7; Isa 10:11; Isa 10:13; Dan 4:11. But his former glory now lay in ashes of destruction. As the Tigris and her feeder streams and canal conduits once irrigated the fertile crescent area of Assyria, but was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, so should the pride and glory of Egypt be destroyed, Jer 51:36.
Verses 6, 7 further describe Assyria’s former glory, v. 3. Both fowl and beast once gloried in the branches and shadows of her tall evergreen cedars as they reared their young in their security. And all nations rested secure under the boughs of her greatest cedar (her king). His roost, so well watered, had now dried up, Eze 17:23; Dan 4:12.
Verses 8, 9 tell of the excellence of this mighty cedar among the trees of the garden of God, of God’s trees; For all souls and men belong to God, by reason of creation and this daily sustaining of all men, Eze 18:4-5. This tree was more fair than any other existing tree, then in God’s garden of Eden. Neither the fir, chestnut, nor any other tree, was like this “tree-king” in beauty and splendor, Exo 28:13; Gen 2:8; Gen 13:10. All other kings were inferior to him; None eclipsed him in beauty or power, Exo 9:16; Psa 75:6; Dan 2:21; Dan 2:37-38; Dan 4:22-24; Dan 5:20-23.
Verses 10, 12 describe the abject fall of this mighty Assyrian king, because of his self-exaltation, pride, and disregard for God. God Himself therefore declared that He had delivered him into the “mighty one of the heathen,” then ruler of Babylon, destroyer of Nineveh. Where pride rules the heart of king or peasant, there the will of God is trampled under foot, 2Ki 17:24; 2Ch 25:25; Pro 16:18; Pro 16:25; Pro 18:12; Jas 4:6; 1Sa 15:33.
Verse 12 mirrors this once mighty king’s desertion by his former followers and helpers, both national and international. Like birds of prey that had once perched in his cool branches, these heathen, “fair-weather” foul-fowls, had now flown away, when trouble came their way, v. 5. His former helpers had deserted him and fled, as “fair weather” friends and “good time” lovers, Num 32:23; Eze 28:7; Eze 32:5.
Verse 13 explains his permanent Assyrian doom. The fowls of heaven (heathen rulers) would light upon his ashes of ruin. All the beasts of the field (wild, unruly beasts) should walk across and stretch upon his fallen branches, as dead trees in a forest, Eze 32:4; Isa 18:6. Or they would eat the fallen fruit of the trees in which they once found rest.
Verse 14 further states that not one of those trees,. by the waters, that once proudly supported the mighty Assyrian cedar-king, should support or identify with him or his empire any more, Psa 82:7. For they too had been delivered to death, subjection and ruin, with and as, those who “go down to the pit,” to rise no more, to be doomed forever, Eze 32:18; Job 3:9. National greatness does not assure permanency.
Verse 15 states that when the “cedar-king” of Assyria fell, went down to the grave, God Himself caused a mourning for him and caused the rivers that once supplied his life and glory, and that of his consorts, to be dried up, so that a dire mourning covered the land, Hab 2:5.
Verses 16, 17 declare that it was God who shook the nations at the fall of the Assyrian king, when he was cast down with him, Isa 14:9-15. But all those trees of Lebanon, pleasant as those in the garden of Eden, were comforted at his just judgment fall with his armed allies, Eze 32:3; Nah 2:3; Hag 2:7; Heb 12:26; Isa 14:8; Isa 14:15; Hab 2:17; Lam 4:20; Mar 4:32.
Verse 18 concludes that Pharaoh, king of Egypt, too shall soon fall to lie in death and destruction among the uncircumcised or heathen, an object of derision, like other fallen trees of Eden, Eze 28:10; Eze 32:19; Eze 32:21; Eze 32:24. The mighty do fall, Heb 9:27.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
THE DESTRUCTION OF ASSYRIA A TYPE OF THE DESTRUCTION OF EGYPT. (Chap. 31)
(Eze. 31:1-18.)
EXEGETICAL NOTES.Eze. 31:1. In the eleventh year, in the third month. Two months later than the prophecy delivered in chap. Eze. 30:20.
Eze. 31:2. Whom art thou like in thy greatness? The already accomplished fall of Assyria is held before the eyes of the king of Egypt as a mirror of his future. Twenty-four years before the delivery of this prophecy the Assyrian Empire was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, who twenty years later was to conquer Egypt. The practical purpose is the same as in previous prophecies, to quench any lingering hope in Judah of help from doomed Egypt.
Eze. 31:3. Behold the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon. Ewald translates the word Asshur as meaning the highest cedar; but Hitzig shows that this is a mistake, and that the prophet speaks of Assyria. Smend and MFarlan apply the passage to Egypt, but without sufficient grounds. The total destruction of Assyria depicted in this chapter was not true with regard to Egypt. The phrase is an answer to the question in Eze. 31:2, Whom art thou like in thy greatness? Thou art like the haughty king of Assyria. The cedar in Lebanon was often eighty feet high, and the diameter of the space covered by its boughs still greater, the symmetry perfect (cf. the similar image, chap. Eze. 17:3; Dan. 4:20-22). His top was among the thick boughsamong the clouds (Hengstenberg). The top, or topmost shoot, represents the king; the thick boughs the large resources of the empire.Fausset.
Eze. 31:4.The waters made him greatthe deep sent out her little rivers. The Tigris, with its branches and rivulets, or conduits for irrigation, was the source of Assyrias fertility. The deep is the overflowing water, never dry. Metaphorically, for Assyrias resources, as the conduits are her colonies.Fausset.
Eze. 31:8. The cedars in the garden of God could not hide himcould not out-top him. No other king eclipsed him. The total of the great men of the earth Ezekiel denotes as the garden of God, in which he regards them as the counterpart of the garden which God once planted in Edenof Paradise with its glorious trees. The comparison is the more suitable because, as Paradise was planted by God, so all human greatness has its origin from God.Hengstenberg.
Eze. 31:10. Because thou hast lifted up thyself in height. The greatness bestowed by God, being abused, is the cause of his fall.
Eze. 31:11. He shall surely deal with himaccording to his own pleasure and according to the Assyrians desert. The last Assyrian king has been ascertained by the inscriptions to have been Asshur-ebid-ilut, the second in succession from Sennacheribs son Esar-haddon, who planted the settlement in Samaria from Babylon, Cuthah, Ava, Hamath, and Sepharvaim (2Ki. 17:24). The final destruction of Nineveh was by the Medo-BabyIonian army under Cyaxeres and Nabopolassar. To either of these the expression the mighty one of the heathen refers. The destroyer of Nineveh is called the mighty one (El, a name of God), because he was Gods representative and instrument of judgment.Fausset. For his wickednessthe pride and the conduct flowing from it. Where pride has first occupied the heart, there all divine and human rights are trampled under foot.Hengstenberg.
Eze. 31:12. All the people are gone down under his shadow. They had formerly, like birds, perched upon the branches of the tree in its shade (Eze. 31:5).
Eze. 31:13. Upon his ruin. The ruin stands for the fallen tree, as if it were a living ruin. The fowls of heaven and the beasts of the field, the wild beasts that formerly sought protection under this tree, assemble now for another objectto peck and gnaw and take what they please of its fruits.Hengstenberg.
Eze. 31:14. That none of the trees exalt themselvesthat the nations should not proudly be elated because of their greatness and abundant resources. Neither their trees stand up in their height, all that drink waterthat no drinkers of water may stand upon their own greatness (Fairbairn). For they are all delivered unto deaththose proud trees, the grandees of the earth, who were tempted to haughtiness by their greatness, go down into the kingdom of the dead, where they are nothing else than ordinary sons of men (cf. Job. 3:9).Hengstenberg.
Eze. 31:15. I caused a mourning. The deep was darkened, the babble of the streams was hushed, Lebanon was saddened, and the trees of the field were faintness itself. In the fall of Assyria the former grandees of the earth once more went through the sorrow of their own fall.
Eze. 31:16. I cast him down to hellSheol, or Hades, the unseen world. I cast him into oblivion (cf. Isa. 14:9-11). All the trees of Eden shall be comfortedbecause so great a king as the Assyrian is brought down to a level with them. It is a kind of consolation to the wretched to have companions in misery.Fausset.
Eze. 31:17. They that were his armhis auxiliaries, the helpers or tools of his tyranny.
Eze. 31:18. Thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised. As circumcision was an object of mocking to thee, thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised, slain by their sword.Grotius. This is Pharaoh. Pharaohs end shall be the same humiliating one as I have depicted the Assyrians to have been. This is demonstrative, as if he were pointing with the finger to Pharaoh lying prostrate, a spectacle to all.Fausset. And all his multitude. His tumultthe noisy murmur of multitudinous life is for ever stilled.
HOMILETICS
NATIONAL GREATNESS NO GUARANTEE OF PERMANENCE
(Eze. 31:1-18.)
In this chapter we have an example of the dramatic genius of Ezekiel, the schylus of the Hebrews, and of the luxuriousness of his poetic fancy. Seizing upon the similitude of the cedar, in its stately magnificence, its many resources, its pre-eminence in stature and beauty over all other trees, and the calamity occasioned by its fall, the prophet describes the overshadowing greatness and ignominious downfall of Assyria, and with one vivid master-stroke applies the whole to the fate of Egypt. From the whole prophecy we learn
I. The prominent features of national greatness (Eze. 31:1-9.)
1. Preeminence over all other nations. Of an high statureexalted above all the trees of the field (Eze. 31:3; Eze. 31:5.) Assyria, though more recent in civilisation and more rapid in its growth, yet outstripped Egypt in extent of dominion and brilliance of career. Ninas, its most illustrious monarch, subdued Media, Babylonia, and several other kingdoms, and united them under one sceptre. Nineveh, its capital, built on the banks of the Tigris, was one of the most celebrated cities of antiquity. In the height of its prosperity Assyria overshadowed in greatness and power every other contemporary nation, as the cedar overtopped every other tree of the forest.
2. Enormous resources. The waters made him greathis root was by great waters (Eze. 31:4-5; Eze. 31:7). Its argosies and war-boats crowded the Tigris and Euphrates, wealth flowed into its coffers in a perpetual stream, trade and commerce assumed gigantic proportions, its mineral and agricultural products were illimitable, its public works were on a scale of unsurpassed grandeur, its arms were everywhere triumphant.
3. The strength and protection of other nations. His top was among the thick boughsall the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughsunder his shadow dwelt all great nations (Eze. 31:3-6.) The nations conquered by Assyria dreaded while they hated its power, and neighbouring kingdoms were proud to be its allies. They felt secure under the guardianship of its shield, and shone in the reflected splendour of its greatness and prestige.
4. The envy of less favoured nations. The cedars in the garden of God could not hide himall the trees envied him (Eze. 31:8-9.) For warlike courage and prowess, for majesty of bearing, for vigour of government, for symmetry and beauty of national unity, for opulence and display, Assyria was the admiration and envy of all nationalities. It outdistanced all competitors; it stood alone in the shining brilliance of its own star-like splendour.
II. The unmistakable symptoms of national decay (Eze. 31:10-17).
1. Vaunting pride. Because thou hast lifted up thyself (Eze. 31:10). It is difficult to be at once great and humble, and yet greatness is stable only as it rests on a firm foundation of humility. The greatest man, says Seneca, is he who chooses right with the most invincible resolution, who resists the sorest temptations from within and without, who bears the heaviest burdens cheerfully, who is calmest in storms and most fearless under menaces and frowns, whose reliance on truth, on virtue, and on God is most unfaltering. Prosperity breeds self-confidence, self-confidence pride, pride recklessness, and recklessness ruin. The greatest peril to the individual or the nation is found at the highest point in the delirium of success. When pride overleaps sound judgment just government receives its death-blow, decay sets in, and the end is not far off.
2. Prevailing vice. I have driven him out for his wickedness (Eze. 31:11). The ancient monarchiesSodom, the Hittites, Canaanites, Amalekites, &c.were ruined by their iniquities. So was it with Assyria. Amid the glitter of a refined civilisation we detect the dark destructive elements of immorality and vice. Righteousness exalteth a nation; but sin is a reproach to any people (Pro. 14:34). The seeds of our own punishment, says Hesiod, are sown at the same time we commit sin.
3. Loss of allegiance and territory. Strangers have cut him offupon the mountains and in the valleys his branches are fallenthe people have left him (Eze. 31:12-13; Eze. 31:17). The break-up of a great empire may be gradual, but it is not less evident and certain. Distant dependencies are quick to discover the weakening of the power that so long overawed them, and eagerly watch for the opportunity to fling off their allegiance. The rebellion of one province is the signal for a general revolt, and the mighty empire that has filled so large a space in the history of the world crumbles into ruins.
4. Sorrow and consternation. In the day he went down I caused a mourningthe nations shake at the sound of his fall (Eze. 31:15-16). The struggle for freedom of revolted states and the desperate efforts of the ruling power to retain the broken remnants of authority is the occasion of wide suffering and misery. The fall of a throne that seemed impregnable fills neighbouring nations with grief and alarm. If the mighty Assyria is overthrown, what throne can be secure? The foundations of national life are upheaved, and the confidence of the most astute rulers is shaken.
III. That national greatness is no guarantee of permanence (Eze. 31:2; Eze. 31:14; Eze. 31:18). This was the solemn and emphatic lesson the prophet sought to enforce. If Assyria, the magnificent, was destroyed, there was no hope that Egypt would escape a similar fate. After having ruled for more than 600 years, with great tyranny and violence, from the Caucasus and the Caspian to the Persian Gulf, and from beyond the Tigris to Asia Minor and Egypt, the Assyrian Empire vanished like a dream, and the very site of its vast capital was a doubtful question for twenty-four centuries. There have been greater nations than Assyria, but their greatness did not save them from extinction. They have been overbalanced and crushed by the weight of their own immensity. Centuries slowly crept along, and it seemed as if they would endure for ever; but the catastrophe came, and filled the world with horrified wonder. The mightiest and proudest nation has no room to boast. The loftier its eminence the more ignominious its fall. The true greatness of a nation consists not in material prosperity, but in the virtue and uprightness of its people. Genuine religion alone can give permanence to a throne, and only so long as its genuineness is maintained.
LESSONS.
1. The rise and fall of nations a suggestive study.
2. Moral greatness not always commensurate with material prosperity.
3. Kingly authority may be abused to a nations ruin.
GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES
Eze. 31:2. Whom art thou like in thy greatness? The Perils of Greatness.
1. Apt to breed a proud, self-sufficiency.
2. May use power tyrannically.
3. Under-estimates the significance of events which threaten to undermine the foundation on which it rests.
4. May grow beyond the control of the most successful.
Eze. 31:3; Eze. 31:6. His top was among the thick boughsthe fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughsunder his shadow dwelt all great nations. The Inter-dependence of Nations.
1. A great nation protects the lesser, and they in turn strengthen and increase their protector.
2. A strong nation is an amalgam of many nationalities.
3. Nations help each other, not by jealousies and strife, but by commerce and friendly intercourse.
4. No nation can long remain independent that does not cultivate the patriotic spirit.
Eze. 31:6. How different the security afforded by the Gospel-tree! The Gospel-kingdom gathers all under its saving covert for their present and eternal good, and for the glory of God, and not for self-aggrandisement and to the hurt of men, as is the way of the kingdoms of this world. Therefore it shall never fall, nor shall those who trust in its shadow (chap. Eze. 17:23; Mat. 13:32) ever be confounded, for it is a kingdom that is established on the everlasting principles of the Divine truth, righteousness, and love.Fausset.
Eze. 31:4; Eze. 31:7. The waters made him greathis root was by great waters. The River the natural source of Empire.
1. Affording a bulwark of protection.
2. A necessary element of sustenance.
3. An important highway of commerce.
4. Giving fertility to the soil.
5. Favourable for the massing together of great populations.
Eze. 31:4. Little rivers. Beneficence, justice, protection, encouragements that subjects need and good princes disperse among them. So the deep filled this king, and he sent out his streams to all his subjects in his kingdom.Pool.
Eze. 31:9. Envy has an aspect in which it may be regarded as a good for him whom it affects. Let us only reflect on the proverb, Better envied than pitied.Hengstenberg.
The tallest trees are weakest in the tops, and envy always aimeth at the highest.Trapp.
Eze. 31:10-15. Fallen Greatness.
1. Occasioned by the indulgence of an arrogant spirit. Because thou hast lifted up thyself in height (Eze. 31:10).
2. The inevitable result of a life of iniquity. I have driven him out for his wickedness (Eze. 31:11).
3. The victim of forces whose growing power was unnoticed or despised. I have delivered him into the hand of the mighty one of the heathenstrangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off (Eze. 31:11-12).
4. Abandoned alike by allies and dependents. All the people of the earth are gone down from his shadow, and have left him (Eze. 31:12).
5. An object of insulting ridicule by those who had been benefited in better days. Upon his ruin shall all the fowls of the heaven remain, and all the beasts of the field shall be upon his branches (Eze. 31:13, compared with Eze. 31:6; Eze. 31:18).
6. A suggestive warning to the proud of all nations. To the end that none of all the trees exalt themselves for their height (Eze. 31:14, comp. Eze. 31:16).
7. A subject for profound and widespread grief. I caused a mourningcovered the deepall the trees fainted for him (Eze. 31:15.)
Eze. 31:11. He shall surely deal with him. Heb., In doing he shall do for himhe shall do what he list with him, as Tamerlane since did with Bajazet, whom he carried about in an iron cage, using him on festival days for a footstool, and feeding him like a dog with crumbs fallen from his table. All which Tamerlane did, not so much for hatred to the man, says the historian, as to manifest the just judgment of God against the arrogant folly of the proud.Trapp.
Eze. 31:14. To the end that none of all the trees. This is the use men should make of Gods heavy judgments upon others. This mans forefather, Sennacherib, had a statue set up in Egypt, says Herodotus, with this in-inscription, Let him that looketh upon my misery learn to be modest and to fear God.Trapp.
Genuine humility brings to elevation its only corrective. It fixes the eye on the lowliness which in all human greatness is present with the greatness.Hengstenberg.
Eze. 31:18. Thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised. Death
1. Reduces all ranks to the same level.
2. Is indifferent to the contempt of fancied superiority.
3. Reveals the artificiality of social distinctions.
4. Its uncertainty should lead to a moral preparedness.
Transferred to the king of Assyria, whom the cedar represented, this parabolical history tells us in the first instance of his unparalleled greatness. He was the head and centre of a vast monarchy which was fed by the tributary streams of surrounding nations, and gathered within its ample bosom the resources of the civilised world. But its peerless grandeur proved the occasion of its overthrow, for it only served to nurse into fatal maturity that pride which goeth before a fall. How thoroughly the loftiness of spirit in the head of that monarchy kept pace with the growth and magnitude of his dominion may be seen from the Heaven-daring language of Sennacherib to Hezekiah, when, before the gates of Jerusalem, his servants openly blasphemed and defied the God of Israel. Most truly was his heart lifted up in his greatness, and the hand of a righteous God must cast him down. In an amazingly brief period the mighty fabric of Assyrian glory fell, an irrevocable ruin. It was a lesson, on a gigantic scale, to the world that then was, how God in His providence abases the proud and scatters the mighty from their seats; how all power and glory that is of the world is destined to vanish away as a dream of the night. And connected as it here is with the guilt and the doom of Pharaoh, it was to him, and to those who knew the will of God concerning him, an instructive warning and example of that which certainly awaited him!Fairbairn.
How dreadfully do the wicked scourge one another! Israel must be the first to fall; then Egypt, her ally; then Babylon, then Persia, then Greece, and lastly the iron power of Rome. These empires sank in succession, like the mighty swells of the ocean, and but faintly left their traces behind. They fell by the overflowing scourge which came suddenly upon them and involved the rich and the poor in one common ruin. But the poor who may survive have some resources in the labour of their hands. Lay not up, then, O my soul, thy treasures in earthly banks; build not thy mansion on the sand. Blessed is the man who has the Lord for his rock and trusts alone in His salvation.Sutcliffe.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
A. The Description of the Cedar 31:19
TRANSLATION
(1) And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month, in the first day of the month that the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, (2) Son of man, say unto Pharaoh king of Egypt and unto his multitude: Unto whom would you compare yourself in greatness? (3) Behold, Assyria was a cedar in Lebanon with beautiful branches, a foliage that provided shade, and a high stature; and its top was among the thick boughs. (4) Waters nourished it, the deep made it grow; her rivers ran around about her plantation, and she sent forth her channels unto all the trees of the field. (5) Therefore, its height was exalted above all the trees of the field; and its boughs were multiplied, and its branches became long, because of the many waters when it put them forth. (6) In its boughs all the birds of the heaven made their nests, and under its branches all the beasts of the field bring forth young, and in its shadow all great nations dwell. (7) Thus it was fair in its greatness, in the length of its branches; for its root was by many waters. (8) The cedars could not hide it in the garden of God; the cypress trees could not compare to its boughs, and the plane trees were not like its branches; no tree in the garden of God could compare to it in beauty. (9) I made it beautiful by the multitude of its branches, and all the trees of Eden which were in the garden of God were jealous of it.
COMMENTS
Pharaoh and his multitude (the Egyptian people) thought themselves to be incomparably great and powerful, yet they would not escape the judgment of God (Eze. 31:2). Assyria was once a lofty Lebanon cedar encircled at the top by leafy and thick boughs (Eze. 31:3). The subterranean reservoir of waters (the deep) sent forth a river to nourish the cedar, and smaller rivlets to water the other trees (Eze. 31:4). As a result, the cedar (Assyria) grew taller, stronger and more luxurious than the other trees (nations; Eze. 31:5). All the fowl of the heavens and beasts of the field symbolic of the peoples of the earth passed under the control of Assyria (Eze. 31:6). Receiving constant nourishment from many waters, the Assyrian cedar continued to spread out its branches to annex additional territories (Eze. 31:7). There were other great trees in the garden of God, i.e., the world; but none of them could compare to that mighty cedar (Eze. 31:8). That tree attained its stature and beauty from the God of Israel. It was an enemy of all the other trees which God had planted in His Eden, i.e., in the world (Eze. 31:9).
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
V. THE GREAT CEDAR TREE 31:118
This oracle follows the preceding one by some two months. The date according to the present calendar would be June 21, 587 B.C. (Eze. 31:1). In the first unit of this chapter Egypt is likened to a cedar (Eze. 31:2-9). This poetic comparison is followed by two prose oracles describing the downfall of the magnificent tree at the hands of foreigners (Eze. 31:10-14) and its descent into Sheol (Eze. 31:15-18).
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
1. Eleventh year, in the third month According to our reckoning this would be June, 586; about two months before the fall of Jerusalem.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Pharaoh and His People Are Like a Great Cypress ( Eze 31:1-9 ).
‘And so it was in the eleventh year, in the third month on the first day of the month, that the word of Yahweh came to me saying, “Son of man, say to Pharaoh King of Egypt, and to his multiplicity of people, ‘Whom are you like in your greatness?’ ” ’
The new oracle from Yahweh challenges Ezekiel to ask what Pharaoh and his large population can be compared to in their greatness. Note that their greatness is emphasised. But that is only so that its destiny then reveals the greatness of Yahweh.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
The Oracles Against Egypt ( Eze 29:1 to Eze 32:32 ).
This section of the book is composed of seven oracles issued against Egypt. The fact that there are seven is probably deliberate in order to emphasise the divine completeness of the condemnation, for throughout the Near East seven was the number of divine perfection.
Egypt was the great power to the south, as Assyria, Babylon and Persia were successively to the north. Except in very weak times, she had always seen the land of Canaan as hers and under her administration, and had only reluctantly ceded ground when forced to do so for a time by those great powers from the north. Her influence had never been good and she was responsible for much of the idolatry in Israel. This was necessarily so because Pharaoh saw himself as the manifestation of the god Horus, becoming the great Osiris on his death. Thus the destruction of Egypt’s power was necessary if ever Israel was to be free.
This denunciation of Egypt is looking at more than the current situation, although having that in mind. For centuries Egypt had dominated Israel. Again and again she had crushed her and exacted tribute. Now she was to receiver retribution.
Furthermore at this time Egypt was seeking to rally the peoples in and around Canaan, encouraging them to rebel against Babylon with promises of aid. But because of her own comparative weakness this could only lead them into deep trouble. She was not strong enough to lean on. So if His people were to know peace Egypt had to be dealt with, and dealt with thoroughly.
From this time on Egypt would never again rise to be the great power that she had been. And Ezekiel reveals this as being due to the activity of Yahweh.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Eze 29:5 And I will leave thee thrown into the wilderness, thee and all the fish of thy rivers: thou shalt fall upon the open fields; thou shalt not be brought together, nor gathered: I have given thee for meat to the beasts of the field and to the fowls of the heaven.
Eze 29:5
1Sa 17:44, “And the Philistine said to David, Come to me, and I will give thy flesh unto the fowls of the air, and to the beasts of the field.”
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Comparison Between Pharaoh’s Power and that of Assyria
v. 1. And it came to pass in the eleventh year, v. 2. Son of man, speak unto Pharaoh, king of Egypt, v. 3. Behold, the Assyrian, v. 4. The waters, v. 5. Therefore his height was exalted above all the trees of the field, v. 6. All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations, v. 7. Thus was he fair in his greatness, v. 8. The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him, v. 9. I have made him fair by the multitude of his branches,
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
EXPOSITION
Eze 31:1
In the eleventh year, etc. June, B.C. 586. Two months all but six days had passed since the utterance of Eze 30:20-26, when Ezekiel was moved to expand his prediction of the downfall of Egypt into a parable which is partly a replica of these in Eze 17:1-24. and Eze 19:1-14, and which also finds a parallel in Dan 4:10-14.
Eze 31:2
The parable is addressed, not to Pharaoh only, but to his multitude i.e; as in Eze 30:4, for his auxiliary forces. It opens with one of the customary formulae of an Eastern apologue (Mar 4:30), intended to sharpen the curiosity and win the attention of the prophet’s hearers or readers. It is significant that the question is repeated at the close of the parable, as if the prophet had left the interpretation to his readers, as our Lord does in saying, “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.”
Eze 31:3
Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon. The Hebrew text, as rendered in all versions and interpreted by most commentators, gives us, in the form of the parable of the cedar, the history of the Assyrian empire in its glory and its fall. That had passed away in spite of its greatness, and so should Egypt. The question in Eze 31:18 takes the place of “Thou art the man!” in Nathan’s interpretation of his parable (2Sa 12:7), or the mutato nominee de te fabula, narratur of the Roman satirist. Some recent commentaters, however, either like Ewald, taking the Hebrew word for, Assyrian” as describing a particular kind of cedar or fir tree, or, like Comill and amend, adopting a conjectural emendation of the text which actually gives that meaning (Tasshur for Asshur), refer the whole parable primarily to Egypt, and dwell on the fact that the words of Eze 31:10, Eze 31:18 are addressed to the living representative of a great monarchy, and not to a power that has already passed away into the Hades of departed glory. The former view seems to me the more tenable of the two, and I therefore adopt it throughout the chapter. It may be admitted, however, that the inner meaning of the parable at times breaks through the outward imagery, as was indeed to be expected, the prophet seeking to apply his apologue even before he had completed it. The “cedar in Lebanon” has already met us as the symbol of s kingdom, in Eze 17:2. The shadowing shroud may be noted as a specially vivid picture of the peculiar foliage of the cedar rendered with singular felicity. His top was among the thick boughs; better, clouds, as in the margin of the Revised Version. So Keil, Smend, and others (comp. Eze 17:10, Eze 17:14).
Eze 31:4
The waters made him great. The scenery is hardly that of Lebanon, but finds its counterpart in that of the Nile, perhaps also of the Tigris, with the waters of the river diverted into streams and channels by a careful system of irrigation. The cedar grew close to the river itself; the other trees of the field were watered only by the smaller channels, and so were inferior to it in the fullness of their growth. (For the general imagery, comp. Eze 17:5; Psa 1:3; Jer 17:8; Num 24:6.)
Eze 31:6
All the fowls of heaven as in Eze 17:23; Dan 4:9; Mat 13:32, was the natural symbol of the fact that all the neighboring nations owned the sovereignty of Assyria and were sheltered by her protection. In the great nation we have the parable passing into its interpretation.
Eze 31:8
The cedars in the garden of God. As in Eze 28:13, the thoughts of the prophet dwell on the picture of Eden in Gen 2:8. Far above all other trees, the cedar of Assyria rose high in majesty. All the trees that were in the garden of God envied him. The trees specially chosen for comparison are
(1) the fir tressprobably, as in Eze 27:5, the cypresses; and
(2) the chestnut trees, for which the Revised Version, following the Vulgate and the LXX. of Gen 30:1-43 :97, gives the “plane,” which held a high place in the admiration of Greek and Roman writers. Of this we have a special instance in the story of Xerxes, who decorated a plane tree near the Meander with ornaments of gold (Herod; 7.31; ‘AElicon,’ 5.14; also comp. Ecclesiasticus 24:14; Virg; ‘Georg.,’ 4.146; Cicero, ‘De Ont.,’ 1.7, 28).
Eze 31:10, Eze 31:11
Because thou hast lifted up thyself. The second and third persons are curiously mixed; probably the former was in the nature of a warning addressed to the King of Egypt, while the latter continues the parable of the history of Assyria. For boughs read clouds, as in Eze 31:3. Ezekiel writes as with the feeling which led Solon to note that the loftiest trees are those which are most exposed to the strokes of the thunderbolts of Zeus (Herod; Eze 7:10). The Assyrian’s heart was “lifted up with pride” (Isa 10:5), and therefore he was delivered to the mighty one of the nations; sc. to Nebuchadnezzar.
Eze 31:12
Strangers, the terrible of the nations. We note the recurrence of the phrase of Eze 30:11, as pointing, here as there, to the Chaldean invaders. The branches of the tree were broken, the people of the earth no longer dwelt under its shadow (Dan 4:11).
Eze 31:13
Upon his ruin. The prophet, as it were, corrects his imagery. The birds and beasts are still there, but instead of dwelling in the boughs, they (vultures and owls, jackals and hyenas) hover and creep as over the carcass of the dead, decaying trunk.
Eze 31:14
To the end that none, etc. With a characteristic amplitude of style, Ezekiel preaches the great lesson of the mutability of earthly greatness. This was the lesson that the history of Assyria ought to have taught the nations of the earth, and it was just that lesson that they refused to learn. They are all delivered to death. The scenery of the parable passes from Eden to Sheol, the Hades of the nations, and the prophet gives the first stroke of the imagery afterwards more fully developed in Eze 32:17-32.
Eze 31:15
I covered the deep for him. The face of the whole world of nature is painted by the prophet as sharing in the awe and terror of that tremendous fail Lebanon was made to mourn (literally, to be black), the waters failed in their channels, the trees (all that drink water) shuddered. They formed part, as it were, of the pageantry of woe at the funeral of the fallen kingdom. It is as if the prophet felt, in all its intensity, what we have learnt to call the sympathy of nature with the sorrows of humanity. It would, perhaps, be over-literal to press details; but the picture, in one of its features at least, suggests a failure of the inundation of the Nile, like that indicated in Eze 30:12.
Eze 31:16
Shall be comforted, etc. The Dante-like imagination of the prophet points the contrasts between the impression made by the fall of Assyria on the nations that yet survived, and on those that had already perished. The former mourn and shako with fear, for it is a warning to them that their turn also may come. On the other hand, the tress of Edenthe great monarchies that are already in Sheolshall he “comforted” with the thought that yet another kingdom mightier than they has fallen as they fell (comp. Isa 14:4-20; Eze 32:17-32, where the thought is elaborately expanded).
Eze 31:17
They that were his arm. The words point to the allies, in the first instance of Assyria, and secondly of Egypt. The last words of the verse present a striking parallel to Lam 4:20.
Eze 31:18
To whom art thou thus like, etc.? As in Eze 31:10, the prophet passes from the past to the present, from the third person to the second, and as it were says to Hophra, “Thou art the man! all that I have said of Assyria is true of thee.” This is Pharaoh and all his multitude. In the midst of thin uncircumcised (see note on Eze 28:10). As a matter of fact, the Egyptians practiced circumcision, and Ezekiel must be thought of as using the term as simply an epithet of scorn.
HOMILETICS
Eze 31:1-9
The great cedar.
Assyria is compared to a cedar of Lebanon, which is an emblem of earthly magnificence.
I. THE CEDAR IS MAGNIFICENT. It is the favorite tree in biblical imagery to express splendor. In this respect it could be taken as a symbol of a great triumphant empire such as that of Assyria. Thus it is plainly declared that there is a splendor of this world. We are not to be surprised when we see the wicked flourishing like a green bay tree (Psa 37:35). He may even attain to the proportions of the cedar of Lebanon. Note some of the characteristics of this magnificence.
1. Size. This is what first strikes one in viewing the cedar. Assyria was a big empire. Worldly success may be large.
2. Altitude. The cedar is not only broad-spreading. It towers high. There is an unchecked pride in worldly success.
3. Persistency. The cedar is green in winter. By clever devices unscrupulous people may escape many of the troubles of the true servants of God.
4. Fragrance. It cannot be denied that there is a certain fascination in worldly splendor.
II. THE CEDAR OF LEBANON EXCELS ALL THE TREES OF EDEN. There are points in which worldly magnificence surpasses the visible excellence of spiritual goodness. “Igor any tree in the garden of the Lord was like unto him in his beauty.” The reasons for this should be considered, lest we be disappointed and confounded.
1. The impressiveness of the external. The cedar bulks largely before the eye of an observer, while the vine seems to creep feebly among the rocks or round its much-needed support. Yet it is the vine that fields refreshing fruit. There is a striking aspect in worldly success. Spiritual achievements do not arrest attention in the same way, because they are spiritual. Yet God looks not to worldly greatness, but to spiritual success.
2. Unscrupulousness. Men who trample on conscience take short cuts to success. It is not surprising that they outbid the conscientious in the market of the world’s wares.
3. Want of restraint. The cedar is unpruned. It grows in wild, rank luxuriance on the unfrequented slopes of Lebanon. But the trees in the garden of the Lord are carefully pruned, Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth” (Heb 12:6).
III. THE CEDAR IS NOT INDEPENDENT OF SUPPLIES OUTSIDE ITSELF. “The waters made him great,” If the waters were dried up, the proud tree would droop and die. Proud men glory in their own resources. But no one can be strong and continue in vigor without receiving supplies from without. The mind must be fed with fresh knowledge, as the body with fresh food. Moreover, the success that a man seems to create for himself is largely due to favorable circumstances. If the water did not run by the root of the tree, the tree would not flourish in its magnificent state. Therefore the pride of self-sufficiency is founded on an error; and he who ignores his dependence on help from without will one day find that that help is cut off and he left to wither in despair. Men who will not acknowledge God are yet daily recipients of his bounty. While they lift their heads in worldly self-satisfaction, he is still mercifully watering their roots and giving the good things on which they build their pride.
1. This fact should teach humility.
2. It should excite gratitude.
3. It should cause fear in negligent self-sufficiency.
4. It should lead to trust in God rather than in superficial worldly advantages.
Eze 31:7
The root and the waters.
I. THE TREE FLOURISHES THROUGH ITS ROOT.
1. The root supports the tree. It is the foundation. Unless the root is deep and strong the tree will fall, blown over by the hurricane or swept away by the flood. Our life needs a root, a foundation.
2. The root brings nourishment to the tree. It sucks in moisture from the earth and draws the rich juices of the soil up into the plant. When the roots are cut the tree must wither and die. The child’s Christmas-tree looks green for the short season of festivities, but according to a common custom, being cut off without a proper root, it cannot live. There are souls that have no root in themselves (Mat 13:21). They can only endure for a while. We must find supplies of spiritual nourishment if we are to persevere unto everlasting life.
3. The root lies low. The lordly branches of the cedar wave in the air and toss themselves proudly against the sky, but they could not thus thrive without the lowly root. Souls thrive on their humbler experiences. They grow strong in humility and trust.
4. The root is unseen. It lies in dark underground regions. He is but a shallow being whose every experience lies on the surface. “The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him” (Psa 25:14). The tree will die if the root be laid bare to the sun. Spiritual experience should be decently covered, not dragged to the light and made a matter of common talk. Let the leaves and fruit be seen; keep the root in the dark.
5. The root must press down to deep sources of supply. If the water be far from the surface, the root must go after it. “The well is deep” (Joh 4:11); then the water will be all the more cool and refreshing. It is good to press down to the deeper experiences of the Christian life.
II. THE ROOT NEEDS GOOD SUPPLIES OF WATER.
1. It needs water. Trees will not grow on the Sahara Desert. But a little moisture will bring vegetation. On the rare occasion of rain falling in the desert a sudden greenness appears on the sand; but the minute vegetable growth disappears as quickly as it comes, for the moisture rapidly evaporates in the heated air. Souls need the living waters. They need these waters because, like trees, they are alive. The statue does not droop in the noonday sun, because it is of stone, dead stone. There are statuesque souls that seem to thrive without any spiritual supplies, but they have no vitality in them. They are too stolid to faint. Fiery souls pine and wither when deprived of living water.
2. It must be within reach of water. It is nearly useless for the water to fall on the leaves if the root is not reached, but when the root is in moisture, though the leaves are covered with dust and sadly need cleansing showers, the tree will still live. We can bear heat and drought in the world if the soul’s hidden roots are supplied by Divine grace. But we do not merely require superficial refreshment; we need such deep soul-supplies as shall penetrate to the roots of our being. For this purpose the roots must be near the water. Cattle can go down to the brooks and drink, but trees must be planted in moist soil. It is customary in the East to cut channels for water deflected from larger streams, that this may run among the roots of trees. The best trees grow by rivers of water (Psa 1:3). Souls must be within reach of Divine supplies. It is not sufficient that God is gracious and that Christ can give of the water of life. We must be near the water ourselves. There must be personal appropriation. This is only possible by means of that spiritual neighborhood which is sympathy. The use of “means of grace”prayers, Christian fellowship, meditation on Scripture, etc.helps to rouse that sympathy, and so to bring the roots near to the great waters.
Eze 31:10-14
Pride humiliated.
The proud cedar is laid low. Assyria falls. The fate of this great empire gives warning for all ages. Magnificence does not secure protection.
I. PRIDE IS THE BESETTING FAULT OF WORLDLY SUCCESS. Many things contribute to the excitement of this passion.
1. The perception of the success. No man can thrive in a worldly way without perceiving the fact.
2. The consciousness of power. The greatest success is that to which a person attains by his own efforts. When he puts forth energy and finds it fruitful, he is naturally tempted to think much of himself.
3. The attraction of the superficial. This worldly success is but a shallow growth. But lying all on the surface, it is very obvious to the eye and appears to be much more important than it really is.
4. The flattery of others. Directly a man is successful a host of flatterers arise about, him, some greedily expecting- crumbs from his table, others slavishly adoring his worldly greatness. Now, flattery accepted makes for pride.
II. THE PRIDE OF WORLDLY SUCCESS IS A GREAT SIN IN THE SIGHT OF GOD.
1. It is false. The success is not so glorious a thing as the proud man imagines it to be. Moreover, it is not purely created by the man who attains to it. He takes many advantages that are given to him by Providence, and claims them as of his own making.
2. It is ungrateful. The gifts of Heaven are held as though their owner were under no obligation to him who sent them.
3. It is impenitent. The proud man will not admit his faults. He attempts to hide his sin under his success.
4. It is selfish. Proud Assyria crushed her subject-nations. All pride is a glorification of self, too often at the expense of others. Pride excludes love.
5. It is worldly. This pride is simply concerned with earthly success. It shuts out all contemplation of the spiritual and the eternal Thus it beclouds the view of heaven and destroys the reverence that should be felt for God; it lowers the soul while it exalts self-esteem.
III. THIS PRIDE WILL BRING ITS OWN DOWNFALL. Because the cedar has lifted himself up in height, God has delivered him into the hands of the mighty one.
1. This is a Divine judgment. God is higher than the highest. He has power over the greatest. No pride can assert itself successfully in face of his wrath. At a touch from the hand of God the grandest pretensions crumble to dust. Empires topple to the earth at a glance from the Almighty.
2. This is brought about through the direct working of pride. It acts inwardly on the proud man and compasses his ruin. The height and breadth of the majestic cedar make it a prey to the whirlwind. The tall tree attracts the lightning. The rich man is waylaid by thieves, who neglect the poor man and so leave him in safety. The successful man is an object of envy. But pride increases the danger tenfold. It destroys sympathy and excites animosity. It also throws a man off his guard, making him think himself safe from attack or strong to defend himself. The false sense of security which it induces lays a snare for the man who harbors it. Our safety lies in the opposite directionin humility, confession of sin, and trust in the pardoning, protecting grace of God.
Eze 31:18
The disappearance of Eden.
The downfall of Assyria is compared to the falling of a great cedar, and the shock that this event produces among the nations is likened to the shaking of neighboring trees when the cedar is laid low. The cedar disappears, as Eden has disappeared. The poetic image suggests more than that the tree lies prone on the ground. It pictures it sinking into the earth and passing out of sight, as it supposes the trees of Eden to have done before. This striking idea of the old Paradise going down into the depths of the earthlike an enchanted garden that sinks at the magician’s wand, and leaves only a desolate wilderness on its siteseems to be referred to by Ezekiel as a prevalent popular notion.
I. EDEN HIS DISAPPEARED. According to the account in Genesis, man was expelled from the garden, but the garden itself was not laid waste or removed. On the contrary, flaming swords kept man from re-entering its coveted precincts. But we see no garden of Eden. Geographers search in vain for its situation on the map. The old Eden has vanished. This is not the only charm of the world’s childhood that has passed away. Primitive innocence has disappeared. The unfading flowers and unblighted fruit of the Eden of soul-purity have vanished from off the earth. The fresh strong imagination of the world’s childhood has passed away. Our later age produces no ‘Iliad.’
II. EDEN CANNOT BE RECOVERED. The fair garden that has descended into the earth will never rise again. Beneath the ground the miner finds vast remains of primeval forests. These Edens of the past have become coal-fields. Never again can they be green and fruitful gardens. Primitive innocence can never be restored. The child-mind, once lost, cannot be had back again. There are irreparable losses.
III. THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN IS BETTER THAN THE GARDEN OF EDEN. The original Paradise cannot be regained. But a better Paradise is created by Christ. The earthly Paradise had its serpent lurking in the grass. The heavenly is more safe, more fruitful, more beautiful. Yet, though it is heavenly, i.e. in its origin and in its character, it is for the earthit is planted in this world, and it is to be enjoyed in the present life. “The kingdom of God is within you” (Luk 17:21).
IV. A STILL FAIRER EDEN IS RESERVED FOR THIS EARTH IN THE FUTURE. The New Testament promises a millennium. In our weary disappointments we are tempted to quench the hope of that glorious future. But if the rule and truth of Christ is to spread among all men, the blessed time must come. Then, indeed, the dead Eden itself will be forgotten and despised in the splendor of the reign of Christ.
V. THERE IS A PARADISE FOR THE BLESSED DEAD. Jesus promised it for the crucified robber. “Today shalt thou be with me in Paradise” (Luk 23:43). Old Eden goes down. The beauty and pomp of earth descend. But the spirits of Christ’s people ascend. They do not go down to the grave with their bodies, and their Paradise is not beneath, but above. Heaven is the eternal Eden of souls.
“There everlasting spring abides,
And never-withering flowers.”
HOMILIES BY J.R. THOMSON
Eze 31:1-9
The greatness of Assyria.
The Prophet Ezekiel, in witnessing against Pharaoh and Egypt, inculcated the lesson with all the more emphasis by the help of an historic parallel. He has to remind Egypt that, great as is her power, there have been powers as great as she that have been brought low. The consequences of national pride and self-confidence, the downfall and destruction of the mighty, may be learnt by considering the history and the fate of Assyria. References to the kingdom of which Nineveh was the magnificent capital are all the more interesting and intelligible to us because of the explorations which in our own time have brought to light so many monuments of Assyrian greatness, and so many illustrations of the social, religious, and military habits of the population of that long-vanished empire. The figure under which Ezekiel sets forth the grandeur and the fall of Assyria is one beautiful in itself, and peculiarly impressive to his own mind and to those who, like him, were acquainted with the scenery of Syria. Under the similitude of a lofty and spreading cedar of Lebanon, the prophet exhibits the dignity, the strength, the vastness and beauty of the kingdom which nevertheless perished, as the monarch of the forest is felled, cast to the earth, and delivered to destruction. The figure brings before us
I. THE MAGNITUDE OF THE ASSYRIAN KINGDOM. The noble cedar of lofty stature and spreading boughs is a striking figure of the great world-empire of which colossal vastness is considered the most characteristic feature.
II. ITS PROSPERITY. The vigor and vitality of the proud cedar of Lebanon are artistically set forth by the poet-prophet. “The waters nourished him, the deep made him to grow; her rivers ran round about her plantation,” etc. So the great state throve, all circumstances concurring to enhance its prosperity, all allies and tributaries furnishing material for its growth.
III. ITS STRENGTH. The exalted stature, the multiplied boughs, the long branches, are signs of the cedar’s strength; the storms may beat upon its head, but it withstands the fiercest blast, and endures whilst generation after generation admire its grandeur, and come and go. The Assyrian empire seemed of unassailable power; the sovereigns arrogated to, themselves, an unquestionable authority; men thought of Nineveh”that great city as of a city which could never be moved.”
IV. ITS BEAUTY. Fair was the cedar in his greatness, in the length of his branches, nor was any tree in the garden of God like unto him in his beauty. Evidently to the mind of the prophet there was beauty in Assyria such as no choice similitude could exaggerate. This may not be so obvious to us as the assertion of Assyria’s strength; but so it seemed to the mind of the world of old.
V. ITS INFLUENCE. This seems to be the idea conveyed by the sixth verse: “All the fowls of the heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations.” A power so commanding, a position so authoritative, secured the homage of lesser states, which looked up to Nineveh for protection, and were ever ready, by flattery or by service, to minister to her greatness.
VI. ITS PRE–EMINENCE. The stature of the cedar of Lebanon was exalted above all the trees of the field. Even so, during its palmy days, Nineveh was the leader, the chief of the nations. It was long before that supremacy was questioned and disputed. Yet the day came, and Assyria fell.
APPLICATION.
(1) A great nation enjoying prosperity and wielding influence is especially bound to remember whence its power is derived; and
(2) to cultivate the conviction and sense of responsibility for the use made of gifts and influence entrusted to it. From God all comes, and to God the account must be rendered.T.
Eze 31:10-13
The penalty of pride.
The description of Assyria’s power and glory is introduced by the prophet in order to give point to the account now given of that nation’s tragic fate. The more majestic the cedar, the more awful its downfall, and the more affecting the desolation thus wrought. For the warning of Egypt the prophet brings to memory the fate of one of the mightiest and most famous of the kingdoms of the East.
I. THE OFFENSE. This lay, not in the greatness and the might of the nation, which were appointed by Divine providence, but in the misuse of the position attained. The language used by Ezekiel concerning Assyria is very instructive as to Assyria’s sin: “His heart is lifted up in his height.” It is not the gifts bestowed in which the offence is to be sought, but it is in the erroneous view taken by the possessor, and in his abuse of those gifts. When we read of the heart being lifted up, we are led to understand that the nation took credit to itself for its position and acquirements, and for the influence thus enjoyed. In fact, as our Lord has expressly taught us, the heart is the seat and the source of all sin. Especially apparent is this in the case of the gifts of national exaltation, wealth, and military power; when the hearts of king and of people are filled with pride, self-confidence, and self-glorification.
II. THE CHASTISEMENT. The tree was smitten and felled by the hand of the stranger. A foreign foe, a rival nation, was employed to humble the pride of Assyria. The mighty one of the nations (by which we are to understand the King of the Babylonians) dealt with Assyria’s pretensions to supremacy, and confounded them. “Strangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off.” No greater calamity could have befallen the proud and boastful nation; no more unexpected disaster!
III. THE RUIN. The figurative language used to describe this, though succinct, is conclusive and appalling: “Upon the mountains and in all the valleys his branches are fallen, and his boughs are broken by all the water-courses of the land,” etc. The description affirms of the conquered Assyria:
1. Humiliation; for the lofty is laid low.
2. Desertion: “All the people of the earth have gone down from his shadow, and have left him.” Those who praised and flattered Assyria in prosperity, in the time of adversity forsake and flout her.
3. The ruined nation becomes the prey of other peoples, who seek to profit by its fall.T.
Eze 31:14
The lesson for all nations.
Doubtless the immediate aim of the downfall of such a nation as Assyria has respect to the people and their rulers, upon whom the judgment comes. But there is a universal lesson intended for the benefit of all peoples throughout all time.
I. GOD INCULCATES MORAL LESSONS BY THE WORDS UTTERED BY HIS SERVANTS. His law-givers, such as Moses; his prophets, such as Ezekiel; his priests and scribes, such as Ezra, have messages of instruction, encouragement, warning, for all mankind in every age. And God summons the children of men to give heed to his servants when they utter their messages, prefacing them with the assertion, “Thus saith the Lord.”
II. GOD ENFORCES THESE VERBAL LESSONS BY FACTS, AND ESPECIALLY BY THE EVENTS OF HISTORY. In such catastrophes as the downfall of Assyria, as the siege of Jerusalem, as the destruction of Tyro, as the humiliation of Egypt, the eternal, righteous, and omnipotent Ruler of mankind speaks to his subjects with an authoritative and unmistakable voice. Facts embody principles. Historical incidents elucidate moral laws. Judgments enforce commands.
III. THE WONDER OF MEN‘S INSENSIBILITY TO THESE LESSONS. It might be expected that those upon whom the message of the herald produces no impression would be roused from their apathy by the stirring incidents of political change and national disaster. But, as a matter of fact, multitudes are unaffected even by the downfall of a city, the revolution of a government, the displacement of a dynasty, the transference of the balance of power among the nations. Is not this in accordance with Christ’s own words, “If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead?”
IV. THE FOLLY AND PENALTY OF INDIFFERENCE TO THESE LESSONS. They who give heed to Divine counsels, who profit by Divine admonitions, deliver their soul in the day of trouble and temptation. But they who hear unmoved, incredulous, unresponsive, the solemn and faithful appeals of God, uttered as with a voice of thunder in the events that befall the nations of mankind, by their conduct aggravate their guilt an& pen their own condemnation.
V. THE WISDOM OF IMMEDIATE ATTENTION TO THESE LESSONS, WITH THE PROPER FRUITS OF SUCH ATTENTION IN REPENTANCE AND OBEDIENCE. The parable was spoken, the providential interposition was recounted,” To the end that none of all the trees by the waters exalt themselves.” “He that hath an ear, let him hear.”T.
Eze 31:15-17
Mourning and lamentation.
The description here given of the distress and mourning which took place upon the occasion of the downfall of Assyria is very poetical, and might appear exaggerated were we not able, by the aid of imagination, to place ourselves in the position of an observer at that critical epoch in the history of the world. It was necessary that Pharaoh and his people should be enabled to enter into the fate of Assyria in order that they might learn the warning intended to be conveyed by that awful event. It was the aim of Ezekiel to portray Assyria in all her glory and in all her desolation, in order to impress upon the
Egyptians the lesson which at that conjuncture it was so important, for them to lay to heart. The mourning raised over the one kingdom might speedily be required by the condition of the other.
I. THE CAUSE OF MOURNING. The immediate cause was the disaster which befell Assyria and the allied and dependent nations. But to those who looked beneath the surface there was a deep-seated cause in the sin by which the mighty kingdom and its rulers brought upon themselves a fate so calamitous and irreversible. Wherever there is lamentation it may be suspected that the ultimate explanation of it is sin.
II. THE MOURNERS. The prophet speaks of the mighty rivers and the terrible ocean, of the majestic trees of the forest, as taking part in this lamentation. The nations shook at the Sound of Assyria’s fall, when it went down to Hades. The literal fact is thisthat all spectators with intelligence to understand what had occurred, and with a nature susceptible of feeling, viewed the calamity with appreciative pity. It was a catastrophe never to be forgotten, and the compassion of those who witnessed it rose to sublimity.
III. THE EXTENT AND VASTNESS OF THE MOURNING. This is evident from the fact of the Divine intervention. “Thus saith the Lord God, I caused a mourning.” There could then be nothing petty or trivial in it. Originating in the counsels of the Eternal, and diffused throughout the earth, and reaching to the gates of Hades, this lamentation was worthy of the event. And it certainly justifies us in making our own the sorrows, not of individuals alone, but of nations and of mankind. It is a Divine exercise so to sympathize. “In all their afflictions he is afflicted.”
IV. THE PROFIT OF MOURNING. We are assured upon high authority that “it is better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting.” It is a whole some and chastening discipline of the Soul. To mourn for our own faults is morally necessary. “They that lack time to mourn lack time to mend.” But the case before the reader of this passage is that of mourning for the sins and the chastisement of humanity generally, and especially of the nations with whose experience we are personally conversant. A common sorrow binds hearts together, and enables men to realize their community. Grief over sin and its consequences is no inconsiderable protection against participation in the evil lamented.T.
Eze 31:18
Greatness no exemption from retribution.
The argument of Ezekiel is clear. His appeal is to Egypt. Having related the fall of Assyria the great, he turns to Pharaoh and to his people, and reminds them that the fate which overtook Assyria is not impossible to them. Greatness is manifestly no security against judgment. It is no sure defense against the arms of men, and no defense at all against the judgments of the almighty Ruler of mankind.
I. GREATNESS MAY AND OFTEN DOES SECURE THE ADMIRATION AND EVEN THE ADULATION OF MEN.
II. BUT EARTHLY GREATNESS IS AS NOTHING IN THE SIGHT OF GOD.
III. IT IS NOT GREATNESS, BUT RIGHTEOUSNESS OF ACTION AND FAITHFULNESS TO ITS VOCATION, WHICH IS A NATION‘S TRUE SECURITY.
IV. A TIME OF PRORATION COMES TO EVERY NATION, WHEN UNFAITHFULNESS AND SELF–CONFIDENCE MEET WITH THEIR DESERTS IN CHASTISEMENT AND HUMILIATION.
APPLICATION. Greatness is best shown in
(1) subjection to the King of all, and
(2) service and help rendered to the feebler and less favored.T.
HOMILIES BY J.D. DAVIES
Eze 31:1-18
A terrible perdition.
Precious lemons can be learnt from God’s treatment of others. As in others’ conduct we may find a mirror of our own, so in others’ chastisement we may find a reflected image of our own deserts. The principles on which God acts are these of eternal immutability. Therefore we may learn with certainty what will sooner or later happen. On the part of God, it is an act of genuine kindness that he holds up the perdition of one to deter others from sin. Thus he would turn the curse into a blessingretribution into a Gospel.
I. WE HAVE HERE GREAT PRIVILEGE. The Assyrian monarch is compared to a “cedar in Lebanon, with fair branches, with shadowing foliage, and of high stature.”
1. He enjoyed a position of superior elevation. What a cedar of Lebanon was, compared to other trees, the Assyrian king was in respect to other men. He possessed superior qualities. Possibly he had larger capacity of mind, and had larger opportunities of furnishing it. Certainly he had external advantages such as no others enjoyed. He enjoyed an eminence above other men, yea more, above other kings.
2. He received generous treatment from God. “The waters made him great.” An unfailing stream from the heavenly fount irrigated his roots. Divested of poetical form, it means that God sustained body and soul by hourly supplies of good, though his hand was unseen. If his bodily strength did not languish, it was owing to a constant stream of vitality from God. If the capacity of his mind was maintained, it was due to the Divine succor. Substantial blessing, through invisible channels, was incessantly flowing into his roots. He was entirely dependent on the kindness of another.
3. He had a prosperous growth. As the result of so much blessing, he grew and prospered. In himself, in his kingdom, in his reputation, he flourished. His people were loyal; his army was valiant; his empire grew. Over every province, over every department of his government, the sunshine of Heaven rested. All that a king’s heart could desire he had. He was the envied among contemporary kings: “the cynosure of neighboring eyes.”
4. Large influence was within his reach. “All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs. Under his shadow dwelt all great nations.” Such a tree was not simply an image of beauty, the delight of the human eye; it was useful to various forms of life. It was a source of blessing. So with the King of Assyria. His strong government was a protection to all classes of the people. It was a bulwark against invasion. It was a shield for industry, investigation, and commerce. The rich and the poor could dwell securely. All grades of his subjects could pursue their occupations without fear of molestation. Greater influence still he might have exerted. He could have fostered learning, encouraged many arts, established peace among surrounding nations, diffused joy in a myriad homes, lifted up the nation to a higher life. Such varied usefulness is a fountain of bliss.
II. GREAT FOLLY. “His heart is lifted up in his height.”
1. Self-adulation. To admire one’s self so as to forget our Divine Benefactor is both foolishness and sin. This is to cheat God of his due. If robbery is criminal anywhere, it is specially criminal when directed against God. To interpose ourselves between God and his proper worship is grievous sin.
2. False ground for admiration. To find satisfaction in external rank or elevation is a sore mistake. Neither wealth, nor station, nor anything outside ourselves is a proper ground for solid satisfaction. We should find our chief delight in real excellencein likeness to God. Else we divert our minds from substantial good, and are taken up with gaud and tinsel.
3. Self-trust. Pride arrogates to itself qualities and possessions which do not belong to it. It is a condition of mind we may call “self-inflation.” Self-trust is ruinous, because it is reliance upon a broken reed. Human strength, apart from God, is sheer frailty. No figure can exaggerate its feebleness. It is a vapor, a shadow, a mere cobweb. Man is strong only when affiliated to God. Therefore self-trust is self-deception, is suicide.
III. A GREAT DOWNFALL. Carrying out the harmony of the figure, there is:
1. Mutilation. “His boughs are broken.” So pitiful is God, that he does not at once destroy. He visits with partial chastisement, in the hope that repentance and amendment may be the result. If he can spare from destruction, he will. This mutilation of his beauty was a lesson he ought to have taken to heart. If a higher being than he could, against his will, despoil him of some of his members, could he not despoil him of all? A wise man would have halted, reflected, turned over a new leaf. This mutilation represents dismemberment, loss of territory. This outward mutilation indicates diminution of vitality: “Grey hairs were here and there upon him, though he knew it not.”
2. Scattering. “Upon the mountains and in all the valleys his branches are fallen.” Memorials of this ruined cedar were distributed far and wide. Every stream bore them on. Every storm of wind scattered them. So in the time of a nation’s misfortune, fair-weather allies easily desert. As prosperity brings many superficial friends, so adversity scatters them. At such a time a hundred foes will start out of ambush to annoy, if they cannot injure. When God becomes our foe, our resources speedily waste like snow at midday.
3. Degradation. “Upon his ruin shall all the fowls of heaven remain, and all the beasts of the field shall be upon his branches!” In other words, he shall be treated with contempt. Those before whom he has paraded his superiority shall, in turn, triumph over him. This conduct is to many a sweet revenge. It gives to them a conviction that they too have some hidden merit which now shall come to light. This degradation in the scale of being, in the scale of society, is a bitter element in God’s penalty. “He that exalteth himself shall be abased.” The pendulum that has swung too, far in one direction will presently swing to the other extreme.
4. Commiseration. I caused Lebanon to mourn for him, and all the trees of the field fainted for him.” The fall of a flourishing king naturally causes consternation and concern in every palace. The self-security of others is rudely shaken. Every throne on earth seems to totter with the great vibration. Then, in noble minds, the sense of brotherhood appears. A tender tie, though often unseen, runs through the human race. The fall of one is a lesser fall to all. We all have a common interest in the fortune and destiny of humanity.
5. Diabolic triumph. “All the trees of Eden shall be comforted in the nether parts of the earth.” This sense of exultation over the fall of anotherwhether it be latent or expressedis base and devilish. Hence we learn that the feelings of men, in the state of Hades, is not improved by suffering: the exact reverse. Intelligent natures degenerate in hell. “Evil men wax worse and worse.” Some, too, to whom the king, in prosperity, rendered signal service, will be disposed to taunt him in the day of his fall. An ingrate becomes the blackest of demons.
IV. A GREAT LESSON. “To the end that none of all the trees by the waters exalt themselves for their height.” The terrible fall of the Assyrian king is used as a lesson and a warning to Pharaoh. God’s judgments are stepping-stones to mercy. Over the most lurid cloud he flings the rainbow of his kindness. The darkest events may become to us fountains of blessing, if we are willing to gain the good. Thus God exhibits the strength and fullness of his love. If by any method, by any example, he can win us back from evil courses, he will. Marvelous is the obduracy of the human heart that will not yield to the charms of infinite love! The death of one may become life to many. God’s aims are magnificent and far-reaching. By-and-by, he shall have the praise which is his rightful due. If with such displays of Divine kindness men are not ashamed of their sin, they must become more hardened and more depraved than ever. “My soul, come not thou into their secret!”D.
HOMILIES BY W. CLARKSON
Eze 31:7
The source of strength and beauty.
The “great power” of Assyria is likened in this parable to a noble cedar planted in (or transferred to) the garden of Eden, raising its head high above all the other trees in that “garden of God;” its eminence and its beauty being largely due to the fact that it was so well watered at its roots, that “the waters nourished him, the deep made him to grow; her rivers ran about her plantations” (Eze 31:4, Revised Version); and that “his root was by many waters“ (Revised Version). Here we have a picture of strength showing itself beautiful, extending its influence far and wide, owing everything to the hidden source below.
I. GREAT STRENGTH. The greatness of Assyria was the greatness of national power. We are accustomed to speak of the greater nations of the earth as the “great powers.” As history has shown us, such “powers” have often proved to be little better than weakness when the hour of trial came; still, in appearance, in size, in equipment, in eminence, or in reputation, they have been comparatively great and strong. Greatness, as we recognize it, is seen in national position, in physical strength and skill, in mental grasp and literary accomplishment, in art and science, in social rank, in statesmanship, in character and moral weight. In any one of these spheres a community or a man may be “great” in the sight of its (his) contemporaries.
II. GREATNESS SHOWING ITSELF FAIN. “He was fair [or, ‘beautiful’] in his greatness.” Greatness may be either
(1) imposing, compelling the homage of all who behold it, instantly commanding their regard and their tribute; or it may be
(2) admirable, such that the longer it is watched by observant and critical eyes the more it is esteemed and the higher it is prized; or it may be
(3) attractive, of such gracious and winning mien that every one is drawn towards it and desires to come into closer association with it. There is much “greatness,” or what commonly passes for such, that is distinctly unbeautiful. Possibly, indeed, it may be imposing or attractive to minds that are easily imposed upon or readily captivated; but it is devoid of all that is really excellent, and no true eye, that can distinguish the good from the pretentious, would call it fair. All beauty that is worthy of the name, and the only excellency that will last, is that which commends itself to the mind of the heart-searching Truthbeauty on which purity can look with pleasure, and which love can regard with genuine delight.
III. EXTENDING ITS INFLUENCE. One of its characteristics is “the length of its branches.” It is the province of greatness to make itself felt on every hand, just as a noble tree throws out its branches far around its stem. This it may do deliberately and determinately; or it may do this unconsciously, as the simple and inevitable result of its own nature and life. The extension of our influence should be regarded by us, not as a right, but as a duty and a privilege. So far as we can make ourselves felt, and inasmuch as we believe ourselves to be the possessors and exponents of what is right and true, we should seek, even diligently, to “spread the branches” of our power as far as they will go. We should therefore shun all acts and extirpate all habits that tend to dwarf these branches, to diminish the influence we might be and should be exerting.
IV. THE SOURCE OF STRENGTH AND BEAUTY. This great cedar was what it was because “its root was by great [many] waters.” It was always nourished from below. It drew its strength from its roots, and its roots found their resources in the abundant streams that never failed to water and to refresh them. Strength and beauty grow out of character, moral and spiritual, as the leaves and the branches and the stem grow out of the roots of the tree. And character must be fed by the living streams of truth that flow in the garden of God; not any one truth, nor yet one set or class of truths, but “all the truth” (Joh 16:13) which we are able to receive: our root is to be “by many waters.” We must, if we would be the symmetrical and fruit-bearing tree we should aspire to become, take care that mind and heart are well nourished by all the truth we can gather from the great Teacher, or glean from those who spoke in his Name. Nor must we forget that, beside the root drinking in the moisture below, there are the myriad leaves drinking in the air and sunshine above. We must open all the leaves of our nature to receive the warm sunshine of the love of God, and to admit all the direct Divine influences which the Spirit of God will breathe upon us.C.
Eze 31:8, Eze 31:9
The garden of God.
“The garden of God,“ standing, as it does, for the ideal region in which man in his perfection was placed when God was” well pleased with “him, may be taken as a picture of human society itself as it once was for however brief a period, and as it shall be again when the purposes of the Redeemer are fulfilled.
I. A REGION ABOUNDING IN FRUITFULNESS. In the first garden of God there grew every tree that was “good for food.” The ideal state of human society is one in which all conceivable fruitfulness will be found; there will be ready for the hand of the Husbandman the fruits of faith, of devotion, of love, of sacred joy, of helpfulness, of calm contentment, of happy and unquestioning obedience. From all hearts and lives these fair fruits will spring.
II. A SCENE OF EXQUISITE BEAUTY. “The garden of God” must be, quite independently of all reference to Eden, a place of perfect beauty. Its trees and shrubs, its herbs and flowers, its lawns and paths must together present the appearance of perfect pleasantness to the eye. Such should, such (one day) shall our human societies, our communities, and our Churches be; they will be scenes where there is every form of human loveliness. There must be no unnatural monotony. As in our gardens we like to have vegetation of every possible variety of size and shape and hue, so in “the garden of God” shall there be every manifestation of moral worth, of spiritual beauty. One will not say to another, “There is no need of your particular excellence;” but each will rejoice in the manifold graces which are to be seen on every hand.
III. THE SPHERE OF HAPPY CULTURE. Our first parents were placed in Eden “to dress it and to keep it.” Even “the garden of God” requires attention, planting, culture. So, certainly, does the most refined and Christianized human society. There may be much knowledge and there may be excellent habits within it, but it will always need careful and diligent culturemuch seed-sowing; some weeding; some pruning and occasional transplanting. We may learn:
1. That it is better to be the humblest herb in the garden of God than the stateliest cedar outside it; better be utterly obscure in the right place than very prominent in the wrong one.
2. That each particular flower in the garden of God lends its own fragrance to the air; the garden would not be complete without it.
3. That not only does it behoove us to be as a flower in the garden of God, but it also befits us to be as a gardener extending the grounds, or planting or tending within its bounds.C.
Eze 31:10-18
The spectacle of fallen greatness.
This very beautiful parable is suggestive of many things. The latter verses of the chapter bring the Divine meaning into full view. By the fact of the prophecy itself, we are reminded of
I. THE DELUSION TO WHICH GREATNESS IS SUBJECT; Viz. that of imagining that it is invulnerable and irremovable. The strong kingdom says, “What power will touch me to hurt me? ‘ The strong man says, “What misfortune will overtake, what enemy will prevail against me?” (see Psa 49:11). It is in the very nature of human exaltation to become foolishly assured of its own security, and to defy the assaults of time and change.
II. THE PREGNANT LESSON OF HISTORY. Egypt was now to learn of Assyria; to consider how surpassingly great she had been in her prime (Eze 31:1-9), and to reflect upon the utter humiliation to which she had been condemned in the retributive providence of God. We may now learn of Egypt herself, to whom this lesson was addressed, and also of Macedonia, of Greece, of Rome, of Spain, etc; that a nation may tower high and far above the others, like this parabolic cedar (Eze 31:5) above the trees of the garden, and yet be discrowned, be leveled to the very dust. And not only the lofty nation, but the ancient family, the proud dynasty, the titled and wealthy individual.
III. THE PENALTY OF UNRIGHTEOUSNESS. It is certain that no kingdom or “power” of any kind will very long outlive its purity, its virtue, its simplicity. Two things determine its doom.
1. God will punish its pride (see Eze 31:10, Eze 31:11, Eze 31:18).
2. Iniquity begets strife, folly, inward corruption, weakness; and this must end, in time, in disaster and ruin. The seeds of death are already sown when power, either in the aggregate or in the individual man, gives way to iniquity. Without any extraordinary means, by God letting his righteous laws do their constant work, such a one is “driven away for his wickedness” (Eze 31:11). And the end of evil is nakedness and desertion, emptiness and misery (Eze 31:12). Incidental truths are here portrayed, viz.
IV. THE UNRELIABLENESS OF HUMAN PROPS. Eze 31:12, “All the people of the land have gone from his shade, and have left him.” There are noble souls that will cleave to the sinking cause or to the failing man just because it is sinking, because he is failing. But their name is not legion; these are not the rule, but the exception. When the day of decadence comes, and the hour when the house is likely to fall, then expect those who have lived in the shadow of it to leave it to its fate. Nay, there will be found many of those who in the day of its strength enjoyed its hospitality that on the night of its adversity will find themselves comfortable seats upon its ruins (Eze 31:13). We have another trace of
V. THE DEPTH TO WHICH GREATNESS WILL DESCEND IN BECOMING THE OBJECT OF GENERAL COMPASSION. (Eze 31:15.) Once it was the province of the great power to pity the necessitous and to stretch forth its strong hand of help and healing; now it lies prostrate and is itself the object of universal commiseration. “And none so poor to do it reverence.”
1. Let human greatness beware. It is high and uplifted in the sight of men; but beware lest its heart be lifted up in arrogance and in self-confidence; for, if that be so, or if it be allowing evil to creep into any cracks of its walls, it will call down the condemnation of Heaven, and, in time, it will meet its doom. Where other prostrate powers lie, where the humblest and commonest are stretched, “in the midst of the children of men,” “delivered to death” (Eze 31:14), there shall it also be found, down and dishonored.
2. Let the holy humble-hearted be filled with a wise contentment. How much better than the greatness which is humiliated is the lowliness which is blessed and crowned!blessed with the benediction of God and man, crowned with the glory to which righteousness conducts and in which it ends.C.
Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary
CHAPTER 31
1And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third [month], on the first of the month, that the word of Jehovah came to me, saying: 2Son of man, say to Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, and to his tumult, To whom art thou like in thy 3greatness? Behold, Asshur [was] a cedar tree upon Lebanon, beautiful of foliage, and a shadowing thicket, and high of stature, and between the clouds was his 4top. Waters made him become great, the flood made him high, with its streams it went round about its planting, and it sent forth its canals to all the trees of 5the field. Therefore his stature became higher than all the trees of the field, and his branches became many [great], and his foliage-branches [boughs] became long, from many waters in his spreading himself forth. In his branches nested 6all the fowls of heaven, and under his boughs every living thing of the field 7brought forth, and in his shadow dwelt all the many nations. And he became beautiful in his greatness, in the length of his twigs [shoots], for his root was on 8many waters. Cedars darkened him not in the garden of God; cypresses were not like his branches, and plane trees were not like his foliage-branches [boughs]; 9all wood in the garden of God was not like him in his beauty. Beautiful had I made him in the multitude of his shoots; and all the trees of Eden, which were 10in the garden of God, envied him.Therefore, thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because thou becamest high in stature, and he gave his top even to between the 11clouds, and his heart raised itself in his height; Therefore will I give him into the hand of the mighty one of the heathen; he will do, do to him: in [on account of] 12his wickedness I drove him out. And strangers hewed him down, the violent ones of the heathen, and left him upon the mountains; and in all the valleys his shoots fell, and his foliage-branches [boughs] were broken in all hollows of the earth; and all the nations of the earth went down out of his shadow and left 13him. On his ruins all the fowls of heaven alight, and on his boughs is every living creature of the field. 14To the end that none of the trees of the waters become lofty in their stature, nor give their top up between the clouds, and that no drinkers of water should remain standing by themselves in their height; for they are all given to death, to the underground, among the children of men, to those who go down to the grave. 15Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, In the day of his going down to hell [sheol] I caused to mourn [I made a mourning]; I veiled on account of him the flood, and stayed its streams, and there were many waters held back; and I made Lebanon dark over him, and all the trees of the field sank in weakness over him. At the sound of his fall 16I made the heathen quake, in that I made him go down to hell with those that go down to the grave; and all the trees of Eden, the choice and good of Lebanon, all drinkers of water, comforted themselves in the underground. 17They also went down with him to hell, to be pierced through with the sword, namely, those who, his arm, dwelt in his shadow among the heathen 18nations. To whom, then, art thou like in glory and in greatness among the trees of Eden? And thou art cast down with the trees of Eden to the underground; in the midst of the uncircumcised shalt thou lie with those pierced through by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his tumult. Sentence of the Lord Jehovah.
Eze 31:1. Sept.:
Eze 31:2. ; Vulg. similis facts es
Eze 31:3. … Vulg. et inter condensas frondes
Eze 31:4. … flumina ejus manabant in circuitu radicum ejus ligna regionis.
Eze 31:5. Other readings ,.
Eze 31:6. Vulg.: Cumque extendisset umbram suam, in (Anoth. read.: )
Eze 31:7. Sept.; … .
Eze 31:8. . . . Vulg.: Cedrinon altiores abietes non adquaverunt summitatem ejus(Another read.: or with .)
Eze 31:9. Sept.: . . .. . . Vulg.: quoniam speciosum feci et multis condensisque frondibus omnia ligna voluptatis
Eze 31:10. … . . Vulg.: sublimatus est summitatem suam virentem atque condensam.
Eze 31:11. . , . . . (Other read: .)
Eze 31:14. Vulg.: Quam ob rem non elevabuntur inter nemorosa atque frondosa. (Other read.: fortes eorum: sibi, super se, . For , there is a reading .)
Eze 31:15. Sept.: … , .induxi luctum, operui eum abysso(Anoth. read.: .)
Eze 31:16. . . ..qui descendebant in locum. Et consolata sunt ligna voluptatis egregia et prlara
Eze 31:17. , . . . Nam et descendent et brachium uniuscvjusque sedebit sub(Another read.: ,.)
Eze 31:18. ; . . Cui assimilatus es, O inclyte atque sublimis inter ligna voluptatis? Ecce cum lignis voluptatis
EXEGETICAL REMARKS
Egypt (Pharaoh) and Assyria.
The whole chapter is taken up with this prophetical allegory, which the indication of time in Eze 31:1 places not quite two months later than Eze 30:20 sq. (Schmieder: therefore one month and eight days before the conquest of Jerusalem). In accordance with the antithesis there, a highly poetical parallel now follows, which might work in a more powerful manner upon hearers and readers, as it was taken from the still fresh experience of his contemporaries; for in 606 Nineveh had been laid prostrate by the combined attack of the Babylonians and Medes, and the kingdom which had domineered in Asia above five centuries had reached its end. The year after that was the year of the battle at Carchemish; and thus had the fate of Assyria become palpable shortly before the calamity which was threatening Egypt. Comp. besides the juxtaposition of Assyria and Egypt elsewhere, Isa 7:18; Isa 27:13; Jer 2:36; Hos 12:2 [1]; Zec 10:10.
Eze 31:2. The commencement is made properly by the question which is addressed to Pharaoh and his tumult (, see at Eze 30:10; Eze 29:19), in the answer to which the prophet sets forth a prognostication for himself and his people. Hengst.: The matter has respect not to an opinion, but to a real resemblance. Hitzig limits the reference to the official Egypt, being that which made tumultuous noise in the land, which had something to say and to order; the governing classes and ranks (Isa 3:2-3), in contrast to the quiet people in the land (Psa 35:20), who keep silence and obey. According to Schmieder, the question calls for the answer: No one! Thou art incomparable, alone of thy kind. This was also the feeling of Pharaoh Hophra. But Ezekiel, etc. (along with in Eze 31:18), not = strength, but also not precisely: fancied greatness huge self-elation (Raschi), as at Isa 10:12 of Assyria, for Egypts very ancient culture already gave him still a real precedence, and in other respects also placed him before Assyria.
Eze 31:3-9. Assyrias Glory
Eze 31:3. Behold, a call to attention, introducing the answer which the divine word has to give. Hengst.: the future in a historical dress, as at Ezekiel 19 the history of Jehoahaz and Jehoiachim. (comp. Eze 27:6) is taken by Ewald for a definite kind of cedar, the highest of its kind; against which compare the convincing proof of Hitzig. Hv. also justly remarks against the construction of the word, as an adjective, that the most distinguished characteristic for a cedar tree is the accompanying designation: upon Lebanon; comp. besides, Eze 17:3. It is a common image for people of great might, princes. The Sept. renders by .Because , thickness, may signify a forest, Hengst. translates here (taking as partic. Hiphil from ), shading the forest or wood. The representation is carried out farther , as well as by between the clouds, etc.; also by (from , stature) .Upon , see at Eze 19:11; on , comp. Eze 17:3.
Eze 31:4. Explanation of such growth.What is said of the waters, that they made him become great, fits too well to the image of the cedar for one to be able to get something still better by a reference to the description of paradise (as Hv.), or by bringing into account the situation of Nineveh, which was important for the history of Assyria, with the Tigris on the west, the Zabatos (Lykos) on the south, with its neighbouring stream Bumodus on the east, and the brook Khosr on the north.Still more, the flood (not the rain: comp. Isa 44:14) contributed to the prosperity. The designation, therefore, previously, of the Lebanon was epitheton ornans. is the water-treasure in the depths pouring itself forth in springs, etc. Hitzig: image of the multitude of men flowing together into Assyria, on the basis of which the political power rose. More correctly Hengst.: the water and the flood denote what the world calls good fortune, the divine blessing., either: with, or taken accusatively: what concerns.Hence is here kept feminine; the streams are those of the flood, and the masculine , which is likewise to be referred to the flood, is justified after this manner, that can also be used as a masculine; and the masculine in the present case, as Hengst. remarks, is the more suitable, being preceded by .The planting (Eze 17:7) can scarcely be referred, with Hengst., through the fem. , to Assyria as a tree; but is conceived of with reference to the flood, whether it might be because this had a share in the prosperity spoken of, or, which the recommends, because it streams around this cedar-planting, the place on which it grows. The , first coming into consideration in the second line, are to be understood of the overflowings of the water-fulness that rises up (), just as the all trees of the field are distinguished from the cedar tree described; and this, in Eze 31:5, is raised into prominence over against them. Hengst. takes the subjects to be designated by the expression; Hitzig applies it to other lands and princes. Of the inhabitants of Egypt we are as little to think as, with Rosenmller, of the Nile.
Eze 31:5. , from his overflow of water his greater height than all the trees finds its explanation, Eze 19:11 (, Aram, for )(, Aram. for , with inserted)., under which must here especially be understood the fruit-bearing ones, Eze 17:6., Hengst.: because in his time of shooting he had many waters. [Hv.: at his sending forth, namely, the twigs on all sides. Tautology. Vulg. connects it with Eze 31:6.]
Eze 31:6. Eze 17:23. The closing words give the signification of the figure (Dan 4:9). Bird and living thing, in contrast to domestic creatures, the Assyrians themselves. The imperfect expresses, in contradistinction to the preceding perfects, the incomplete, the continuous, the progressive. [Ewald: sat gladly all the many, etc.] , Bunsen: all great peoples (?); Keil: all sorts of great nations; Rosenm.: the entirety of many peoples.
Eze 31:7. , through, on account of.Eze 17:6.
Eze 31:8 carries still higher the pre-eminent glory brought prominently out in Eze 31:5, through the diversified comparison and the designation in the garden of God, on which comp. Eze 28:12. That (to darken = excel) separates this nearer designation from , is very impressive (Hv.): even such as were found in paradise. Hitzig: in an eminent sense, planted by God, Gen 2:9; Num 24:6. What still has not been expressed is more distinctly indicated in Eze 31:9, that what God had done to Assyria even transcended the trees of paradise, therefore the eminent divine planting was even more marked in the case of Assyria. The paradise-creation was, after all, only nature, symbolizing grace, consequently might be the similitude for a state-creation, without, however, being like the latter, as little as also the most glorious trees themselves. Every tree, namely in this, in a natural respect, so that the tree of life and the tree of knowledge (Genesis 2.), as being of a spiritual nature, are exempted, and the simply parabolical allusion to Eden and to the garden of paradise is clear. [Hengst. makes the totality of the great men of the earth as stately trees in the garden of God as a counterpart of paradise, since all human greatness has its origin in God. Klief. (Raschi) regards the garden of God directly as the world-planting, since all peoples and kingdoms of the world have been planted as trees by God. Grot.: in Babylonia, where formerly paradise stood. Osiander: no king of the people of God was like him!][This parabolical representation, as formerly in the case of Tyre, Ezekiel 28 combines the historical with the figurative. While the cedar that represents the king of Babylon is called a cedar of Lebanon, it is presently transferred in the prophets imagination to the land of primeval beauty and perfection, the Eden in which was the garden that God had planted. There this cedar is described as growing and flourishing, till it overtopped in magnificence and beauty all the trees around it. But it was only that it might afford another specimen of that instability and transitoriness which belong to all on earth, when the good bestowed by Heaven is abused to purposes of selfishness, and the creature begins to thrust himself into the place of his Creator.P. F.]
Eze 31:9. This beauty is here explained as having been made by God, as a historical creation act (), and expresses, while at the same time bringing the similitude to a close, the impression which the striking elevation of the Assyrian grandeur was fitted to produce.That the trees of Eden, as in the larger sense they are called (in respect to local position), should be designated as those which belonged to the garden of God, distinguishes them still more; it is an ascension. Kliefoth takes trees of Eden freely, as equivalent to trees of beauty, lovely trees. That more is meant by the expression, while still paradise is thought of merely in the way of similitude, appears from Eze 31:16.
Eze 31:10-14. The Judgment executed on Assyria.
Eze 31:10. This verse transfers us into the midst of the things already in fact brought to pass. We might render : thus said to him, etc.: He who made the Assyrian so beautiful, even He, announced to him the overthrow that should take place, because of what he made out of himself.The whole passage expresses the cause of the judgment of Jehovah upon Assyria, namely, that with such a glory from God (Eze 31:5; Eze 31:3) the position of the heart was not in correspondence; there was not humility in all the greatness, but high-mindedness on account of it. The commencing address, Thou, in the life-like character of the representation, becomes changed into a declaration respecting himand he., Deu 8:14. Only in conformity with the gift, not in accordance with the grace. Comp. Eze 31:14.
Eze 31:11. Here the sentence of judgment, as just going to be pronounced for the first time, is, by the use of the imperfect, placed more distinctly before us. Hengst: which was the more suitable, as the like in Egypt was shortly to be repeated. is Nebuchadnezzar, the mighty (), not God. [Hitzig: , ram, for prince, champion, under which Cyaxares is to be thought of.]What he will do to him discovers itself in what follows; it will be nothing but doing; for Asshur it remained merely to suffer. Piel, with reference to his paradisiacal glory (Gen 3:24). The perfect agrees with the quieter mode of speech.
Eze 31:12. As what was said last has taken place, there is now by means of the historical tenses a narration; consequently the execution of the pronounced judgment carried out. (Others make it future, with application now to Egypt, now to Assyria.)Eze 30:12; Eze 30:11. is: to let go, therefore either: to let him lie (Hengst.), or: to push away, to throw down (Eze 29:5). Throwing down is already indicated in the hewing, and is expressed through the falling; and on the other hand, the leaving is again resumed at the close, while it is extended to all peoples. The mountains prepare for the valleys, and the falling, the being broken in all hollows (Eze 6:3). Still, in its overthrow, the greatness as well as lofty elevation of this cedar tree is vividly displayed. abides closely by the image, according to Eze 31:6, partly of birds which had nested in its branches, partly also of beasts which had brought forth under its boughs, which, according to Eze 31:12, had its place on the mountains, so that in both respects the going down out of his shadow is clear, and there is no need, with Hitzig, to read , from , to fly, for which would otherwise present no obstacle; but here, as at Eze 31:6, the reality at the close breaks through the figure.
Eze 31:13. If in Eze 31:16 refers to here (Eze 26:15; Eze 26:18; Eze 27:27), there is no necessity, with Raschi, Kimchi, and later expositors, to think of the substitution of the image of a corpse (carcase, Jdg 14:8), and of eagles, ravens, and other beasts of prey which rend and gnaw the members of Assyria, signified by his boughs (Hitzig); but , from , is with Gesen. simply: the fallen or hewed-down stem, which is, as it were, a living ruin (Hengst.)., otherwise than at Eze 17:23, as is shown also by the immediately following and on his boughs is; since those who had nested and brought forth there (Eze 31:6) now betook themselves away from him, taking, perhaps, whatever they could of his fruit, reaping the greatest possible advantage from the mighty catastrophe.
Eze 31:14, by way of conclusion, expresses the divine intention, the practical aim, the moral, and that with respect to Egypt. To the end that (since Eze 31:12-13 may be regarded as parenthetical expansions) can be connected with Eze 31:11. signifies primarily: those standing on the waters, what afterwards is more nearly indicated by (, just as Sanscr. padapa, designating the tree as drinking with its foot, through its root): those which attain to height and glory from the position granted to them by Godof which description was Egypt, from its relation to the Nile (Ezekiel 29). Hengst.: the great of the earth, to whom God gives joyful prosperity.Comp. on Eze 31:10. As there: and his heart raised itself, etc., so it is said here: , therefore to be understood of self-assumption, as in Sept. instead of is no hindrance; as is also Keils ultimate conclusion, since is common, and poetic, Psa 2:5.[Other expositions: and their strong ones do not continue in their high-mindedness all water-drinkers; or, and their oaks (terebinths, Isa 61:3) do not stand there (remain standing) in their elevation, all, etc. Rosenmller: and stand not to them, that is, allied to them in their height, where they had grown so high, all, namely, the other water-drinkers, that is, powerful and rich princes. Klief.: and that henceforth among all their strong trees that drink water no one may remain in his height. Ewald: and no water-drinkers assail (! !) their gods in their pride (!), which he afterwards more particularly explains: So that trees, beings who might raise themselves ever so high, are still always dependent on their nourishment, and cannot live of themselves in a spirit of contempt toward their Creator, nor, again, arrogantly war with their superior (their Creators, gods), since they still are all destined to go down as common men to the lower world.] Comp. Eze 26:20. They could give themselves nothing, since they themselves were given away, as such were already appointed; therefore also could not remain standing where they were standing, and assumed the airs of continuing to stand, but must go down to the lower world, therefore be brought low, be humiliated, though not before humble, come to stand on a footing with the children of men. The expression: among the children of men, is to be regarded as parallel with: given to death; and: to those who go down to the grave, with: to the underground. Those that go down, men continually dying, even the highest; or, those that have gone down, as Ewald: those sunk into the grave.
Eze 31:15-18. The Impression and Close.
As at Eze 26:15 sq. Eze 31:15. (, inf. constr. of ) The connection is made with what immediately precedes, so that the reference is not (as Hitzig) to Eze 31:13. Upon , see Doct. Reflect.The mourning is immediately defined more nearly without being asyndetically joined to it, as Hv., Ewald, Hengst.: to cover with mourning, to veil in mourning, I made it veil itself for mourning. The mourning which Jehovah effects through His judgment upon Assyria touches primarily the flood, in thorough accord with Eze 31:4, as that which in the first line contributed to the cedar its increase. Therefore , on his account. That the flood was covered upon him, as the Syriac, Arab., and Vulg., is at least not indicated in what precedes (Eze 31:12). Comp. on the contrary, Eze 26:19. We must (it was thought) suppose a historical reference, since the siege of Nineveh was protracted to two years, while in the spring of the third year, in consequence of a sudden swell in the Tigris, raised by excessive falls of rain, the mighty flood in one night tore down the wall next the stream, and so laid open a wide breach to the enemy (Duncker, 1. p. 806; Nah 1:8; Nah 2:7 [6]). However, in this passage the discourse is not properly of the overthrow of Assyria in process of accomplishment,
Eze 31:15 giving no representation of the judgment itself, as Hv. maintains,but of the impression of the same as one already accomplished; and as to veil is, even without , perfectly intelligible, but how it is meant in respect to the flood is made sufficiently plain by the (not future). Hitzig: In mourning, people commonly draw themselves in and hold back, the loose garment is changed into the narrow ; and so the flood also withdraws its waters into itself, which it had hitherto joyfully poured forth and spread abroadwhich Hitzig applies to the influx of people come to a standstill. Theodoret: to the refusal of tribute. Comp. on the figure, Eze 31:4. points back to Eze 31:5-7.The mourning produced by Jehovah next affects Lebanon (comp. Eze 31:3), therefore the height as well as the depth. , parallel with , Hiphil from: to be dark, black, therefore: to darken, as much as: to make sad, to cause to mourn. Lebanon is otherwise the white mountain. [According to Hitzig, the other princes must be indicated by this; according to Hengst., the kingdoms of the heathen.]The trees of the field (Eze 31:4) are the third party whom the mourning affects, which is therefore also represented as far and near, , in Pual, to be covered; transferred to the consciousness: to become powerless. has been explained as a verbal from Pual with derivative , languishing, or instead of , fem. of the preterite Pual, since from the connection a perfect seems to be required (Ewald), the plural construed with the feminine singular.Keil, as Umbreit, makes all nature (?) be painfully moved by Assyrias fall, whereas the impression of this fall is merely kept in the figurative style of Eze 31:3-4.
Eze 31:16. Eze 26:15. Since that is the same expression () as in Eze 31:13, and in Eze 31:15 his going down was spoken of, so we are carried back to Eze 31:12. The going down of the peoples out of his shadow in that passage is explained; at the same time, however, the of Eze 31:15 is comprised in the , and referred to the Sheol.Now, according as is translated comforted themselves, as reflexive of Piel, since here still another feeling than in Eze 31:15 may be expressed, or the Niphal and they sighed is what is to be understood (Ewald, Hengst.), we have either a distinction between the lower world and the trembling people of the upper world, or the two are parallel the one to the other. For the first interpretation speaks the comparison of Isaiah 14. Hitzig understands by the trees of Eden princes carried down with Assyria; in particular the Assyrian war-princes, who feel themselves comforted because the much more powerful one for whose cause they have fallen, their murderer, shares their fate; while Hengst. more correctly understands by them the former great ones of the earth, those who resembled the trees of paradise in glory. As paradise was itself a thing of the past, those who were likened to the trees of its region were contemplated as now existing in the realms of the dead. The allegorical character of the expression is proved by the exegesis: the choice and good. Besides, comp. at Eze 31:14.
Eze 31:17. They also are not those last named in Eze 31:16, but the parties presently going to be described more closelyalready, indeed, indicated in Eze 31:16 as those with whom Jehovah made Assyria go down to hell (, not , as in Eze 31:14). And his arm defines more exactly the they also as the subject of the going down,his help, his assistant, the vassals, subject-kings, commanders, and such like, to whom the words: who dwelt in his shadow among the heathen, very well suit, and not less that they are associated with those pierced through with the sword. Assyria was not only a political, but also a military power among the nations. [If must apply to all the trees of Eden in Eze 31:16, so must with him be made equal to not less than he, just as Hengst., looking away from simultaneousness, views them as already in Sheol when Assyria arrives there. Therefore: they also, like him, went down before, etc. Ewald reads with the Sept.: , and his seed (!).]
>Eze 31:18. This verse gives the conclusion, pointing back to Eze 31:2; it makes the application to Pharaoh, who is the party addressed., Hitzig: in such a fashion, in circumstances of such a kind, when this cedar after such a manner went down. The reference among the trees belongs to the to whomComp. at Eze 28:10. From this passage, also, there appears to emerge the opposite of what is commonly found in it, viz. that the Egyptians appear as uncircumcised with our prophet. According to Herodotus, the practice of circumcision was actually of Egyptian origin. Origen confines it to the priesthood among the Egyptians. The kings certainly were not uncircumcised; so the vis of our passage shines clearly out: This is Pharaoh, sq. Hitzig: so shall it happen to Pharaoh. is the predicate.
DOCTRINAL REFLECTIONS
1. Although the prophecy in Ezekiel 29 is of a general character, yet by the reference to Nebuchadnezzar, and especially from Eze 29:17 onwards, it gets a more specific character. We have therefore to hold by a fulfilment through the Chaldeans, and, indeed, in connection with what is said respecting Tyre. Apart from the circumstance that we have here to do with a prophet of God, we could not judge otherwise simply on this account, that a little reflection upon the inevitable disgrace of such a self-deception as would have been the case in respect to Tyre must alone have kept Ezekielinstead of merely suppressing the prophecy in question while the book was still in his own handfrom wishing now to compensate for the mistake by awakening like inconsiderate and rash expectations concerning Nebuchadnezzar in regard to Egypt. For one to whom the prophet is nothing but a writer must still at least credit him with this much of worldly prudence in respect to his literary honour. And if Ezekiel must needs prophesy ex eventu (as Hitzig, for example, conceives), then prophecies like those contained in Ezekiel 26 and some following ones are purely unthinkable, so far as they remained unfulfilled; since it cannot but be supposed, that when our prophet closed his book, matters must have stood before him widely different from what they are presented in his prophecy. The dogmatic criticism, however, cannot once admit now that a prophecy has been fulfilled,a limitation of the standpoint which is not improved by the circumstance that the truth of the divine word (2Pe 1:21) is made dependent on the statements or the silence of profane writers, and even of such as have given notoriously imperfect reports. The false prophet, he whose word did not come to pass, has by Gods word (Deu 18:22) been as clearly as possible excluded from the canon.
2. The reward for work, which, as Hitzig rightly enough says, had still to be given to Nebuchadnezzar, raises no question as to the conquest and, as could not fail to happen after a thirteen years siege, the destruction of Tyre. If the booty might have been thought of for the army, for Nebuchadnezzar it is necessary to think of Egypt. The song of triumph demanded by Hitzig for the fulfilment of the prophecy against Tyre is the double lamentation which we find in Ezekiel 27, 28. Every one has his peculiar manner. But as regards the so-called historical witnesses, who should speak the decisive word on the fulfilment or non-fulfilment particularly of the prophecy of Ezekiel in respect to Egypt, they are the Greek historians, at the head of whom stands Herodotus, and they know absolutely nothing of a Chaldean invasion of Egyptnay, their narration is opposed to anything of the kind (Hitzig). This is imposing; let us reflect, however, that Herodotus had also learned nothing from his Egyptian informants of the defeat at Carchemish. We need only mention farther, that this Greek historian himself reproaches the priests of Egypt, and precisely in regard to this particular time, with embellishing the history of their country. Now, according to Herodotus, Pharaoh Hophrain consequence of the defeat which his army sustained from the Cyrenians, against whom it was to have rendered help to the Libyans, and of the revolt which in consequence thereof, and of the foreign mercenary troops retained in Egypt, broke forth on the part of the Egyptian warrior-class against Amasis, who, instead of bringing back the rebels to obedience, suffered himself to be proclaimed king by themlost freedom and his throne, and by the infuriated people was even murdered. Tholuck, who, if the cattle with the ark of the Lord should once turn aside, would not obstinately drive forward, remarks that as a witness Herodotus alone comes into consideration; before whom, however, the testimony of Ezekiel, himself a contemporary of the events, has no need to be abashed. If Herodotus readily received intelligence of the prosperous battle fought by Necho at Megiddo, but none respecting the much more important defeat sustained by him on the Euphrates from the Chaldeans, should it be thought strange if the priests observed silence also regarding the irruption of the Chaldeans into their own land? yea, if the miserable end which Hophra suffered through the foreign conqueror should have been rather represented by them as the deed of his own people? (So also Rawlinsons Herod. B. ii. appen. c. 8.) With a fair appreciation of the historical representation of Herodotus, the cause there assigned, especially the revolution among the warrior-class of Egypt, might suffice for the overthrow of Hophra. Yet the hatred of the Egyptian people, not only expressed in Herodotus, but confirmed by monumental evidence (Rossellini points in this connection to a by-name of Hophra on the monuments: Remesto)such a hatred as is described in Herodotus toward Hophra (ii. 161169), manifested in respect to a native ruler, is scarcely to be explained from what is stated, if it did not come into some sort of connection with a Chaldean invasion of Egypt, whereby the haughtiness of Hophra might well appear all the more hateful to the Egyptian people, as the misery of the land and the inhabitants, occasioned by him, stood in sharpest contrast to the previous prosperity and splendour. The grudge of the Egyptian warrior-class against the foreign mercenaries could not be of such moment as some have supposed, since even Amasis, who thereafter held possession of the throne till his death (forty-four years), and was succeeded in it by his son, took lonians for his bodyguard, and generally granted to the Greeks still greater favour and privileges than his predecessor. Besides, as generally held, there is also the outline of the prophecy against Egypt in Ezekiel 29, which exhibits a distinction between Eze 29:6 sq. and Eze 29:4 sq.in the one, the sword constitutes the figure (Eze 29:8); in the other, overthrow with reference to the wilderness. Especially if Hitzigs interpretation of the fish (Eze 29:4) as denoting Pharaohs men of war is accepted, and under the wilderness there is couched an allusion to Libya, what is said in Eze 29:4 sq. might be explained by the narration which is reproduced by Herodotus, and Eze 29:6 sq. would, with the sword of Nebuchadnezzar, be such a supplementing as the conquest of Tyre to the siege of that city, also given elsewhere. Out of the miserable condition in which Hophra perished, Amasis would then have raised Egypt. Anyhow, as Tholuck brings out, the death of Hophra falls exactly into the time in which the occupation of Egypt by Nebuchadnezzar must have occurred; and thus the position of matters approaches to that which is wont to be extracted from Josephus in confirmation of our prophecycontr. Ap. i. 19. It is there stated that Berosus reports of the Babylonian (Nebuchadnezzar) that he conquered Egypt, Syria, Phnicia, etc. Again, in Ezekiel 20, he states that Megasthenes placed Nebuchadnezzar above Hercules, since he had subjected to himself a great part of Libya and Iberia (comp. Antiq. x. 11. 1, and Strabo xv. 1. 6; see also Hv. Comm. p. 435, against Hitzigs remarks). In the 10th book of the Antiq. Eze 9:7, Josephus expresses himself to this effect, that in the fifth year after the destruction of Jerusalem, which was the twenty-third of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, he made an expedition against Clesyria; and when he had got possession of it, he made war against the Ammonites and Moabites; and when he had brought these nations into subjection, he fell upon Egypt in order to overthrow it, and did indeed slay the king who then reigned, but set up another; after which he took those Jews that were there captive, and brought them to Babylon, etc. The ten years time, which Hitzig doubts as the period of the earlier warlike expeditions, is maintained by Tholuck. The fifth year after the taking of Jerusalem would be 581; the thirteen years siege of Tyre would fall into the period 586572 or 573. For the different actions which were in part parallel as to time, we have only to suppose various divisions of the army employed, so that the whole might of Nebuchadnezzar did not at the same time lie before Tyre. The forty years of the Egyptian oppression, Tholuck, like Niebuhr, extends over the entire space that lies between the disaster at Carchemish and the overthrow of Hophra (thirty-six years), during which Egypt, through the continued and in great part unfortunate warlike enterprises of Hophra, must have been much depopulated and extremely weakened, till at length the inroad of the Chaldeans consummated the oppression. Tholuck thinks that, as the prophets in the beginning of the fulfilment comprehended the future (Jer 13:18; Eze 30:24), in the last and completed fulfilment they also comprehended the earlier incomplete ones. The symbolical explanation of the forty years is not thereby denied (see the exposition). The worth of the statements of Josephus may be questioned, as is done by Hitzig; but for the relation of profane history to our prophecy, it suffices that Hophra miserably perished (Eze 29:4 sq.; Jer 44:30 sq.), and that Egypt again revived, as took place under Amasis, although as a kingdom it was fit to be compared neither with its ancient glory nor with other great monarchies (Eze 29:13 sq.). As regards the resuscitation of Egypt, Duncker mentions that, according to a return of the priests, it then reckoned 20,000 country towns and cities (Herzogs Realencyc. 1 p. 150), though it was the last period of Egypts glory; and Lepsius says of the same, that Egypt succumbed to the first pressure of the Persian power, and remained from 525 to 504 a Persian province; that afterwards it became again for a short time independent, until in 340 it was reconquered by the Persians, and in 332 fell under Alexander the Great, etc.
3. Upon the importance of Egypt for the revenge of Nebuchadnezzar, see the exposition of Eze 29:18. Also generally for the Chaldean policy the transition to Egypt is rendered plain to us from Eze 29:17 sq. (Hv.: if Nebuchadnezzar would make the possession of Phnicia once for all sure, Egypt must be completely broken.) Of the importance of Egypt by itself, its characteristic importance, some notice has already been taken, toward the close of the introductory remarks to Ezekiel 25; as also of the distinction, indicated with correct feeling by Keil, between Egypt and the other nations mentioned by Ezekiel. But what Egypt signifies in its connection here, this must be discerned from its relation to Israel. It is quite true that the charge laid against Ammon, Moab, etc., also against Tyre, for spiteful joy, hostility, envy toward Israel, is not mentioned in respect to Pharaoh and Egypt. It may be said that Egypts guilt in regard to Israel was that rather of a false, treacherous friendship. If, on the other hand, the excess of proud self-sufficiency must be regarded as the characteristic of Egypt, the same sort of self-elation meets us in the king of Tyre (Ezekiel 28); and in this respect Tyre formed a fitting transition-point to Egypt. The distinction between Tyre and Egypt might perhaps be found in this, that while in particular the kingdom of Tyre had had its time of sacred splendour and past greatness, as we have seen, in its former connection with the kingdom of David, Egypt on its part acquired importance on account of the sojournings of the pilgrim-fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and still more on account of the formation of their descendants into a people. Above all, the idea of redemption was associated with the land of Egypt. Here, therefore, the inverse relation holds good: Tyre has gone with Israel to school; Israel, on the other hand, was at school in Egypt, as was evidenced in manifold agreements and contrasts exhibited in their peculiarity as a people, without our needing on that account to ride off on the Spencerian principle [namely, of a servile borrowing from the institutions of Egypt]. More than from anything else, may be understood from Israels reminiscences as a people, and the impress of Egyptian style and manner even upon their sacred things, their abiding sympathetic turning back toward Egypt. That Israel could not let Egypt go out of sight had its root in human nature; we must learn even from the children of this world (Luk 2:6). But it had also its dangerous side. It was Israels worldliness, relapse, since Israel had been delivered by Jehovah from this world, and Jehovah had through Moses threatened them in connection with Egypt with the greatest evils (Deu 28:68). We have tribulation in the world, and we may have fear before the world; such fear, however, may be salutary in its operation. But dangerous is the stay that is sought in Egypt, trust and confidence therein. In this respect Egypt is designated a remembrancer of iniquity (Eze 29:16), since for Israel it had, and not as of yesterday, but from of old (comp. also Eze 16:26; Eze 23:8; Eze 23:19), the fatal significance of a pride which resists Jehovah and leads away from Him, of a consciousness of worldly power, which amid the characteristic Pharaonic arrogance expressed itself just as distinctly (Eze 29:3; Eze 29:9) as in Exo 5:2, and had this the more seductively, as a self-conscious abiding worldly power is in fact fitted to impose on people. Friendship with Egypt is the most contemptuous relation in which Israel can be thought of, on account of the indifference which it necessarily implied on the part of the Israelitish people not only in regard to their former house of bondage, but also to the mighty deliverance obtained from it, and generally in what concerned their relation to Jehovah, on whom, as their own and their fathers God, they had been thrown from their state of childhood. To make account of this specific historical position in respect to each other, according to which the growth, bloom, and decay of Israel were closely interwoven with Egypt, the prophecy of Ezekiel dwells at greater length on Egypt than on the other nations (Hv.). Still more, however, it serves to explain the representation of the judgment upon Egypt as strikingly parallel with that on Israel, and to the last carried out (comp. Eze 29:5; Eze 29:9 sq., 12, 13, etc.). Not less remarkable, because singular, is the prospect and declaration in regard to the resuscitation of Egypt, and of it alone, which have been introduced into the prediction of our prophet; by this also is Egypt quite expressly kept parallel with Israel. The reminiscence which brings up Egypt so distinctly is not simply that of the house of bondage, or of iniquity, but it is Josephs post of honour, and the corn granaries of Jacob, together with his family. Comp. also Deu 23:7.
4. The interpretation of Neteler strikes out what is certainly a quite different path, strikingly reminding one of Cocceius, only with a specially Catholic tendency. According to him, the prophecies against the foreign nations constitute four groups, each of which contains four pieces: the first, Ezekiel 25; the second, the overthrow of the Canaanitish culture – development, standing in contrast to the higher calling of Jerusalem, and reaching its culmination in Tyre. The prophecy against Sidon he severs from Tyre, in the interest of this fourfold division; it belongs to the Egyptian group, inasmuch as Sidons bloom falls into the time in which Egypt was the bearer of the Hamitic power and culture, and the Sidonian development was a shoot of the Hamitic-Egyptian. The promises for Israel in this third section (Eze 28:20 to Eze 30:19) must stand parallel with those of the same kind in the first group, wherein punishment is threatened to the four nations with reference to Israel; as the first group, through Ezekiel 21 (Ammon), is placed in connection with the first destruction of Jerusalem, so the third stands, through the opening of the mouth which occurs in it, in closer relation to the symbol of the second destruction of Jerusalem. The four last prophecies against Egypt are mere symbols, according to Neteler. As Ammon drove the surviving remnant, after the destruction of Jerusalem, out of Judea, so had Moab decoyed Israel into gross idolatry before their entrance into Canaan; and so, in the prophecies against Ammon and Moab, the beginning and end of Israel in regard to Canaan are connected together. The punishment of Edom and the Philistines must point to the re-establishment of the house of David. In regard to Tyre Neteler expresses himself thus: The command given to Israel to root out the Canaanites, but by them neglected to their destruction, God will execute on Tyre through Nebuchadnezzar; and this command must stand in a noteworthy relation to the historical development of the last period of 800 years before Christ, in which those to the west (Carthaginians, Greeks, Romans) brought a real advance, while those to the east (the Hamitic kingdoms of Ethiopia and Egypt, the Semitic kingdoms of Assyria and Chaldea, the Japhetic Medians and Persians) repeat the development of the two earlier periods in smaller measure, yet as if thereby the problem of the western circle should be solved. He says: If Israel, through the extirpation of the Canaanites, according to Num 36:6-9 (!), had entered into the place of the Phnicians, it would have formed the first member in the development of this period, and would have shown the right path to the Greek culture which came forth in the second third of it. To retrieve as much as possible that which was neglected (! ?), Nebuchadnezzar must subject the Hamitic Tyre, even to the pillars of Hercules, and unite the eastern circle to the monstrous Chaldean kingdom, so that the externally insignificant Israel might be set in the centre of this gigantic Semitic power, which extended its sway even over the Turanian tribes in the high north. This contrast between the Semitic and Hamitic races (already occurring in the prophecy of Noah) must be of great importance for the understanding of the symbolical representation of Ezekiel in the prophecies relating to Tyre and Egypt. Upon the third group which Neteler distributes, and which reaches to Eze 30:19, we learn that, first of all, in the prophecy against Sidon, the second possession of the land is associated with the first, as in Ezekiel 20 the first deliverance from Egypt is made parallel with a deliverance in a higher sense. As Israel did not fully carry out the extirpation of the Canaanites, whose place, according to Num 33:54, it was their part to occupy, these were turned for them into thorns and briers. With the second possession, on the other hand, the servitude of Canaan, which was announced even by Noah, was after a sort realized, since the Canaanitish history becomes extinct. The second piece in this section, namely Eze 29:1-16, connects the end of the first Israelitish sojourn in Canaan, brought about by Egypts iniquity, with the end of Egypt; and the humiliation of Egypt is such an elevation of Israel, that Christianity will not be under temptation to lean upon a decaying heathenism. The forty years occurring at Eze 29:11 sq. must not be distinguished from the forty years of Judah, for which the prophet had to lie forty days upon his right side; that is, as Neteler remarks on Ezekiel 4, a symbolical designation of the time, reaching from the destruction of the temple to the return from exile, derived from the sojourn in Kadesh. The two first pieces, Eze 28:20 to Eze 29:16, set forth the world-historical ideas, which were to be realized by the introduction of Christianity, but give, as to the way and manner in which the realization should be prepared for, begun, and carried forward, no informationthis being first introduced by the prophet in the third piece (Eze 29:17-21). The might of Shem, through which God conquered Canaan in the worlds history, must also carry forward the work in regard to Egypt. In the interest of Israel, whose service to God stands in contrast to Canaanitish industry, God will turn the Semitic world-power against Egypt, by which Israel was compelled to do Canaanitish work, and establish for them, on account of their labour in respect to Canaan, claims for compensation, which God would render valid because of the bondage laid by Egypt on the Israelites. The booty which God took from Egypt after the conflict, on occasion of the first deliverance, was only a type of a later plundering, which in a preparatory manner was begun by Nebuchadnezzar, and after the second deliverance from Egypt, that is, after the redemption achieved by the sufferings of the Servant of God was realized, when all power in heaven and on earth was committed to the episcopate of the Church (!!). The consequence of this victory over Egypt (Eze 30:1-19) is given in the form of a judgment upon Egypt, in which is delineated its desolation and the annihilation of its idols and yokes; but the sons also of the covenant – land are smitten by the judgment, which points to a fall that should take place among them. The continuation of this Catholic-theological-historical explanation and interpretation of Ezekiel will be given in No. 9.
5. Cocceius remarks on Eze 29:21 : Evil Merodach gave Jehoiachin freedom, and the first place of honour among the kings. Farther, Daniel was great in the kingdom of Nebuchadnezzar, and under the Persian dominion. Cyrus was called by God to give command to lead the people back, that they might rebuild the temple. Still higher grew the horn of Israel when they became free, and their priests assumed the diadem, as a sign of the freedom of the people, and the Israelites had become greater than their fathers, as announced in Deu 30:5. But most especially was it so, when out of Davids house the horn grew, which set the people free from all slavery, which subdued their enemies, and rendered the Gentiles subject to Israel, Psa 132:13-18.
6. The day of Jehovah, Kliefoth remarks, is not judgment in one point of time and destruction over the whole heathen world; and then he continues: The day of Jehovah is a period of indefinite duration, in the course of which God will punish with judgment and destruction all heathen nations in succession, just as they have shown their hostility to the people of God, and He sees that their time has come. From this point of view, also, is the announcement always to be understood, that this day of Jehovah is at hand. The day continues so long, that it lasts till, in the final judgment, the whole world, in so far as hostile to God, shall be destroyed; but it constantly begins anew, when any particular people, on account of their malevolence manifested to the people of God, falls under the righteous doom of perdition. Hence the day of Jehovah upon the heathen nations has, in the several prophecies, a different terminus a quo, according as they refer to this or that kind of relations. Only it must not be overlooked, that in Eze 30:1 sq. not indeed Egypt alone is contemplated, but Egypt in its connection with heathen nations; and yet, that it is not the day of judgment upon all anti-theocratic powers that is to be understood, as already Hvernick makes the prophet see this general idea obtaining realization; but as the time of Jerusalem was come, the time when judgment had begun at the house of God, so the time must now be near when this judgment of God shall go forth upon the heathen. Hengstenberg finds here the fundamental passage for Luk 21:24, and points to the overthrow of the Roman Empire,the mountain which was to be cast into the sea after the fig-tree of the Jewish people was withered (Matthew 21.), the mulberry-tree which was to be plucked up and removed into the sea (Luk 2:7.).
7. As in the kingdom of Tyre, Ezekiel 28, allusion was made to a time of sacredness upon the holy mount of God, so there was also found there, by way of similitude, a bringing to remembrance of Eden, and especially of the garden of God. This retrospect of paradise furnishes the beau-ideal, the standard for the Old Testament world generally; hence with Assyria, and in connection therewith in reference to Egypt, which had not the same historical position as Tyre, it appropriately comes back again in Ezekiel 31. As in the New Testament all is measured with heaven, so in the Old Testament what is or was glorious upon earth is made to hold of Eden and paradise.
8. On the derivation of the word Sheol there confessedly prevails a great diversity of opinion. For the biblical idea, especially the signification of the word in the Old Testament, this only is to be learned from this matter of etymological controversy, that as well the derivation from , to be hollow (therefore for ), since it points to hollowing, and in so far to the grave, as the derivation which Hupfeld adopts from: to sink down, and: to go apart from one another, therefore: sinking down, depth, abyss, and: cleft, hollow, empty spacesince the burying and the being in the sepulchre can be thereby expressedboth alike avail for the affirmation, that Sheol and the grave more or less run together. The derivation, on the other hand, from to demand, expresses as to Sheol only what constitutes generally the power and manner of death to demand for itself with insatiable desire all living beings (comp. Isa 5:14; Hab 2:5; Pro 27:20; Pro 30:16). As to form an infinitive verbal substantive, the use of the word belongs predominantly to the poetic language of the Old Testament, whence also is to be explained the circumstance that it never stands with the article. Sheol appears as the aggregate of all graves. Who could venture to deny this aspect of the matter, at least for the 31st and 32d chapters of Ezekiel? It is the universal grave, which calls down to itself all earthly life, how high soever it may have reached, however magnificent it may have been, however valiantly it may have fought. But much, also, as Sheol and the grave () sometimes appear to approach (comp. also Isa 14:11; Isa 14:15), to cover one another, it must still not be overlooked that the grave, more exactly considered, is only the entrance into Sheol (Psa 16:10), which certainly, as it is commonly represented, keeps the hue of the grave, in generals as well as in particulars ( , Eze 32:23); it is the carrying over of the grave to the future state (while the grave as such is still always something here). It is quite reconcilable with this representation when Sheol is conceived of as a locality, and indeed as a deep abyss, just as the standing form of speech: to go down, to be thrown down, is thence explained as equivalent to being consigned to the dead. The occasional poetic delineation of this future must only not be formally dogmatized into an actual under-world with gates, rivers, etc. (Job 38:17; Psa 18:5 sq.) The going down of the company of Korah (Num 16:30) is often what is floating before the writers mind; and not so much the locality of Palestine, which was rich in grottoes and caverns, or the darkness of the Hebrew family tomb-vaults, the stillness of the Egyptian catacomb-world. The interior and inmost part of the earth (Eze 26:20; Eze 32:18), however, is not the earths inner region as such, but is the Sheol beneath (the underground, Eze 31:14); that is, partly the contrast to heaven as the region of the divine life, partly the distinction from the surface turned toward heaven, the face of the earth. Out of that contrast, in which, however, the earth also and its life have their place, and still more in accordance with this distinction from the earthly life, must Sheol and what is connected therewith be understood. The death to which one is surrendered (Eze 31:14) is not simply a going down, not annihilation, but as punishment for sin, the necessary consequence of the negation of God. Considered as a state, it is the contrast in respect to God, as curse, as judgment upon the sinner; hence the contrast in respect to life as divine, as salvation and blessedness, even to eternal perdition; and so Sheol posits a concrete, individual prolongation of life: the dead are represented in Ezekiel (Ezekiel 31.) as living on individually and in space. Passages such as Psa 104:29; Psa 146:4, and others, certainly have respect to the earthly life in the body, with its purposes and undertakings, doing and thinking, knowledge and wisdom together, Ecc 9:10 (so our Lord Himself in Joh 9:4 makes account of it for His diligence in working while in the flesh). As life on earth in a mortal body is for all men a troublesome, poor, and sorrowful thing, so certainly the advancing decay of the powers of life, with the dissolution of the union between soul and body, necessarily becomes quiescence, impotence, and withdrawal of their life-energy in regard to the appointed sphere of action. But passages like Job 26:5 sq., Eze 38:17, Pro 15:11, Psa 139:8, testify to the presence of the living God, through whom the subsisting and passing away of all beings is conditioned, as is said also in the made parallel with Sheol (comp. Mar 12:27; Luk 20:38). The contrast, therefore, to the heavenly upper world as the proper region of the divine life is not that of not-being and being; and just as little is the continued existence in Sheol an unconscious shade-existence, at least not according to Ezekiels representation: the heroes in Sheol speak and know themselves as such over against others, feel, etc. As the designation of shades () for the dead in the Old Testament times cannot be proved, so the appearance, for example, of Samuel (1 Samuel 28.), so entirely accordant with the spirit and address of Samuel as he actually lived, is not at all brought forward as an exception, somewhat after the manner of the Theban seer Tiresias (Odyss. x. 492 sq.). In the Old Testament, also, we read nothing of an instinctive repetition and continuation of the past life connected with the possession of blood. The representation of Sheol, into which there has often been greatly too much imported of heathen elements, is in no respect the localizing of the image, which, as Meier says, remains like a blanched, bloodless, shadowy form, in the spirit of the living, of their dead and buried fellow-men. Life in Sheol cannot, indeed, run counter to the conditions that prevail in respect to human life. Man is soul, but he has spirit, which for him constitutes the power wherein the life of the individual consists; while the soul is plainly the seat of that, as the body is its organ. If the life connected with the body appears as life in the flesh, when separated therefrom it will become an existence of the spirit, and departed men will necessarily have to be thought of as spirits, and can only in so far be termed souls as a retrospective sense of the earlier corporeal life has place. On this side the description of Sheol is certainly, and especially as contradistinguished from the earthly upperground life, kept in due regard to the state of things existing there. With the going down into the grave, the bright joyful sunlight vanishes for men; hence Sheol is the land of darkness and of the shadow of death (Job 10:21). While the world of light is an organized one, the midnight region of Sheol appears as a confused intermingling of substances, chaotic (Job 10:22). Busy life, so repeatedly designated tumult in this chapter of Ezekiel, becomes motionless in the grave; so in Psa 115:17 the dead go down to silence, to stillness (comp. Psa 104:17; Psa 31:18). The expression, however, of land of forgetfulness, Psa 88:12, must not be overstretched, though the reference is to be held fast in which it is said that, as God has given the earth to the children of men (Psa 115:16), so the manifestation of His wonder-working power and righteousness is promised to them on the earth while they are in the flesh. Not in the heathen materialistic sense, but Christologically, however still on the temporal side, the thought as to its form was presented in the Old Covenant. And thence are such passages as Psa 6:5; Psa 30:10 [Psa 30:9], Psa 88:10-11, Psa 115:17, Isa 38:18, to be understood. The dead, accordingly, are done (Psa 88:5); their state, Sheol, is without a history (on the other hand, comp. 1Co 15:19). But to complete our knowledge of the Old Testament Sheol, the ethical side is not to be overlooked, that is, the idea of recompense comes therein likewise into consideration (comp. Eze 32:23 sq.). The godly are there gathered to their fathers (Gen 25:8; Gen 35:29, etc.). It is a mode of representation which incidentally receives a very touching illustration in Luk 16:22 for the poor, who has no brother in the world, who is an abject, forlorn, when he is said to be received into Abrahams bosom. The righteous snatched away enters into peace, and rests therein upon the foundation of the grave (Isa 57:1). How far with the soul, when unclothed of the body, there takes place an ineffectual tormenting effort to consolidate itself corporeally (Beck)the spirit, however, being incapable of being contemplated apart from the soul, which conditions its individuality, therefore also not to be thought of as sunk after death into the corruption of the fleshmay be left undecided. It is enough that the rich man found himself in torment. With justice, however, Lange presses the thought that for the wicked Sheol is still not hell.
9. Neteler (comp. 4) maintains concerning Eze 30:21 to Eze 32:32, that is, the fourth of the groups set off by him, that through four symbols the overthrow of a power standing in antagonism to the Church is exhibited, and that what is said is to be taken eschatologically in a wider sense. Egypt is considered by him as a symbol of the power of Magog, and under the Chaldeans is found a combination of Romans and Germans. And here Netelers book dwells on the Russian Panslavism. The two last symbols must be fulfilled in the overthrow of Magog only provisionally, so that their complete fulfilment belongs to a still later future.
HOMILETIC HINTS
On Ch. 29
Eze 29:1-5. The close is made with Egypt, as Egypt was the beginning in respect to Israel.Egypt is with Ezekiel the oldest country of his peoples disgrace (Umer.).How clear is what God causes to be said to us! The address is plainly written, and can occasion no doubt to whom the word is directed; and not less clearly does it shine forth whose subscription stands under it, and who, therefore, will look after the punctual execution of the things spoken. It will not proceed according to mans sayings and opinions, but as God the Lord has said.The prophetic word so much the surer as the fulfilment of it now lies completely before us.What still survives of the Pharaohs lies in the midst of the wilderness; they are ruins to which the sand has still refused burial!Where can a mortal say: This is mine, or: This remains to me? But prosperity, where it is not understood as Gods blessing, makes people stupidly proud. See there, too, the blessing of tribulations, which demonstrate before our eyes, that nothing is our right, and nothing our abiding property (Stck.).Those who do not seek after the things which are above regard the Nile, which flows on the earth, with precisely such eyes.But that there is also a spiritual Egypt may be seen from Rev 11:8, and that is a people, kingdom, and dominion which holds in fetters the people of God and makes them slaves. Now, as under the great dragon in the sea Antichrist also comes to be considered, together with his scales and members that stick to him, and are in a manner innumerable, so shall this power also after the prince of Tyre receive his doom, with all his adherents, who by overbearing conscience have done so much wrong to the faithful. Then also will appear the vain help which the house of Israel has sometimes assumed as belonging to the reed of the fleshly arm (B. B.).Satan says to Jesus: All this will I give thee, all the kingdoms of the world and their glory, though still there was not an atom thereof in reality his (Luther).Oh how vain is man in prosperity! (St.)
Eze 29:4-5. Higher still than the highest is the Most High. He who comes from heaven is higher than all.It is bad when only amid loss people come wisely to learn that they had all of God, of which they were so proud and boasted themselves (Stck.).Pharaoh in the wilderness, and Jesus in the wilderness.They who set themselves up above others may readily observe that they are thrown off and away before they are themselves aware of it!The judgment of Jehovah upon the Pharaohs!Jehovah at the Pyramids, a very different object from Napoleon before them.The overthrow in the wilderness an image of a desolate ruin.
Eze 29:6-7. God punishes not those only who rely upon flesh, but those also who are flesh and yet wish others to find comfort in them.No knowledge of God and no knowledge of selfthis is what gives false self-confidence, and false confidence in man.The love of God in discovering the false and rotten props.A reed is everything that is in this world, as mans favour, temporal prosperity, beauty, yea, the corporeal life itself; from without it appears like a staff, and as if many were walking with it, but within it is hollow and brittle (Stck.).But for none is such a reed more suspicious than for the people to whom God has pledged Himself, and therewith all His wisdom and His omnipotence.It is certainly the same with the deceit and show of ones own righteousness, good purposes, and pious works. One cannot keep hand and shoulder far enough from these.How many a one has such like splinters in his conscience!The false reed-splinters in our bones, which make our going so feeble and our holding so insecure.The soldiers give to Christ a reed in mockery, Matthew , 27. (Luther).
Eze 29:8-16. The judgment of God by the sword in its significance for enemy and friend, warrior and conqueror, land and people.Desolation is always a mark of punishment. First men become waste, then their place is laid waste.Where the people become waste as regards God, there God causes the land to be waste of its people.Whosoever will have it that he has made himself to be what he says that he is, with him God must make an end, so that he may learn what he himself is, and how still God can do all.The mine and thine, as the grand controversy which moves the worlds history.So the sin of the people is their ruin; but though ancient history is full of examples, those who now live are not disposed to profit by them.Should one not be ashamed of such a speech, since it must so soon be changed into a pastit has been mine; and this often with much sorrow? (B. B.)The description of the earth is also a description of divine justice.By means of fragments and arrow-heads in the yellow sands of the desert, and obelisks which still point heavenwards, people now read the names of men, of kings, and such like; but the feci of God is likewise to be read there.The divine seasons of respite.The years of humiliating in their significance for Egypt and for us all as punishments and deliverance from high-mindedness.To stand low is to stand more secure than to go beyond bound and limit.All changes in the world have their bearing ultimately on the Church (St. ).God knows how to withdraw from the eyes of His own what dazzled their eyes and held them captive.Such is the aim of all the judgments that are inflicted, to withdraw the body of the faithful from confidence in what is human, and to supplant it by a firm trust in God (B. B.).
Eze 29:17-21. Warrior service hard service. He who serves God does not serve without pay.The recompense of our works is never made on the ground of merit, but is always of grace.The downfall of the world is the deliverance of the chosen (H. H.). Therefore lift up your heads, for your redemption draweth nigh (Luk 21:28).When the world becomes poor, then the bones of the righteous flourish.The new life out of ruins.Upon silence to speak is better than to be silent upon speech.It is God who must open the mouth for us, and He also can do it.Immortality in the world and the eternal life in the sanctuary, Psa 23:6.
On Ch. 30
Eze 30:1-9. The judgments of God pass from His own people to other peoples; hence the day of the heathen could not be far off (Cocc.).Despair howls, hope waits.A day in clouds is also the day of death; the earth is shrouded from the eye, and especially when first the heaven has been covered to the spirit. Darkness then reigns below and above. How dark, then, is the grave!Bad times are met by watchfulness; howling merely goes before them as the loud blast before the outburst of the thunderstorm.
Eze 30:4-5. Many others are carried along with the fall of one. In every judgment that takes place in the world, behold a type and prelude of the judgment which is to be executed on the world.If not with the sinner immediately, yet on the sinner, and therefore through the sinner his companions shall be punished.Where God strikes the blow, there not only is the stir which a people makes, and with which it makes such a noise, its work and gain brought down, but also law and order and that whereon all rests are overthrown.
Eze 30:6-7. How helpless with all his appliances may one that was helpful to us prove in a night! May God be our help, who has made heaven and earth.
Eze 30:9. Everything does service as a messenger for God; in particular His word, which hence cannot be bound, but accomplishes that whereto it is sent.Gods seat of judgment stands always among mankind, and the worlds history is Gods judgment.The terrors in the history of the world.As there is a false security in individual men, so is there also a bad security with whole peoples.The national security a national loss.
Eze 30:10-19. When men do not sanctify God on holidays, God makes their bustling activity to keep holiday.When God wills, a mans name can cause terror to the world. But only One Name is given under heaven to men wherein we can happily exult before all terrors.Upon deeds of violence come still more violent ones, and tyrants are precipitated through tyrants.Whosoever sells himself to sin has already in doing so sold himself to his enemy (Stck.).Gods blessing fills, His curse impoverishes a land.
Eze 30:13. The hand of God alights some time upon all idols.From the overthrow of heathenism is seen the vanity of idols.Where are the famous cities of the olden times? Why do they lie buried in disorderly stone-heaps? Sinner, behold what sin may effect (St.),how it may build very high indeed, yet not for continuance, and still more may destroy.Gods and princes combined the common delusion of idolatry, at first in splendour, so afterwards in ruin!Terror is the opposite of courage, but not the fear of the Lord.Where God kindles a fire, it is always for judgment; the old is consumed therein, but a new springs forth out of the ruins.Without casting down, no progress in the life of humanity.
Eze 30:16. Must not man always be engaged in conflict?
Eze 30:17. With its youth the human future of a people goes down. Even the youth should be the chosen of God; instead of this, Satan at no period has so much of his nature in men as in the season of youth.
Eze 30:18-19. Walk in the light while ye still have the light,we, that is, who have the knowledge of God in the face of Jesus Christ.The judgment of God may, through the dogmas of men and a false philosophy, veil to us also the sun of truth, and wrap in darkness to mens view heaven and eternity.When at length, with the authority of God, the authority also of the law over men gives way, then, where superstition gives place to unbelief, there falls upon them yoke for yoke, one in the room of another; there is only an exchange of tyrants.How much old and high renown have the gravediggers of the worlds history already buried under the sod among other sweepings! What is gloria mundi?a transit.The new plagues of Egypt.The spirit of Pharaoh continued to be the spirit of the Pharaohs.Self heights are no heightsnone, at least, that stand in the judgment of God, and remain above though all else should go down and disappear; but a height in the true sense is that simply whereof it is said, As high as heaven is above the earth, Psa 103:11. This ought to be recognised, and that not merely at the last, amid howlings and gnashings of teeth, but betimes, when it may still serve for peace, with the calm open eye.The most wretched of all thoughts is that of having no part in God. How many an evil-doer has readily presented his head to the sword, in the conviction that through the punishment he should become a partaker of God! (H.)
Eze 30:20-26. How many the things are that men prize as an arm, and how easily these arms are broken!The arm of the Lord (Isaiah 53.), and the arm of man, and the armies of princes.More easily is an arm broken than healed; but now first of all the conscience, how Gainfully does it sting, and how long is it in healing! (Stck.)What God has broken, God only can heal.
Eze 30:22. But man never has enough by a fracture; so long as he can still move and stir otherwise, he must show himself. Therefore shall there come to be a destruction without mercy, if we will not submit to God on the footing of grace.Sickness breaks one arm, death both arms (Stck.).Every breakage which we must suffer is a call to repentance.
Eze 30:23. He who will not fear God in his fatherland has no injustice done him, if in a foreign land he is made to experience all sorts of misfortune (St.).
Eze 30:24-26. Strength and weakness come both from God (W.).Upon whose side Jehovah stands, that man prevails in the conflict; to him there is prosperity in life; he enjoys a blessing with his work. But this favour has the Lord promised to the righteous. Without God all ends unfortunately, mournfully, and in perdition (Stck.).What serves God, that serves also the kingdom and the power of the Spirit; just as at the last, all the kingdoms of this world shall become Gods and His Christs.
On Ch. 31
Eze 31:1-2. The greatness of Egypt was the presumption against the warnings of the prophet. But greatness is no security against destruction; no greatness upon earth can withstand the strokes of God (H.).With justice are kingdoms compared in Scripture to trees, as well on account of their form, the protection and shadow they afford to men and beasts, as also on account of their fruits; and still farther in this respect, that kingdoms, like trees, flourish and again cease to exist, torn up by the wind, or cut down by the hatchet of man (L.).It is very well for people to compare themselves with others, though not for the purpose of thinking better of themselves than others, as the Pharisee in the temple over against the publican, or in order to envy others; but humbly to learn that we are a part of mankind, and that what is human may befall us, and shall at last take place without exception. Also to make each one more contented with his lot, a comparison with others is, as a rule, fitted to be serviceable.Both the one and the other inference is right: As God has elevated that humble one, so can He, in His own time, elevate me; as God has abased that proud one, so may it also be done with me (Stck.).
Eze 31:3-9. The histories of the world might teach great lords much, that they should not rely upon their own powers (Lg.).Rulers and princes should be shady trees to the righteous.God has done good also to the heathen, that they might seek Him, if haply they might find Him, Act 17:26-27 (Stck.).Oh, what streams of grace flow upon the unthankful, if they would only perceive them! The waters are indeed not of one sortone portion swims in pure felicity, another in tribulation and adversity; but the aim is uniform, and the divine loving-kindnesses which are concealed under the latter are certainly greater than the former, in the eyes of those who know to estimate things aright (B. B.).But their favourable condition and the friendliness of God only serve with many to puff them up, and render them proud and arrogant,an end for which certainly all this was not given.He with whom it overflows should make it trickle over upon others.
Eze 31:7. To be radical in the proper sense is a good thing, namely, that one should know that his root is in God.The true comeliness of a prince stands in comely virtues, which adorn every man, especially a prince,clemency and justice above all; to afford protection and solace to the persecuted; to spread forth as it were his branches to the miserable; to have about him servants resplendent with his own virtues, so that, as in every branch the nature of the tree, so in every servant the character of the prince, may appear reflected. He and they must not be terrible to the good, nor oppressive to his subjects. The love of the people is a good root for a race of princes (Cocc.).
Eze 31:8. Better to be envied than commiserated. God makes man beautiful, as He alone also makes him good; the latter is the divine nature, the former the divine form, of a man.
Eze 31:10-13. I have given thee into the hand of such and such an onethis explains much darkness.The haughty spirit going before, the key to the fall afterwards.Now, however, we are all in Adam inclined to pride of soul; and the perishing things of this world, riches, honour, splendour, beauty, knowledge, etc., nourish our natural inclination, being all things which we overestimate. However, even a plain smockfrock often covers a repulsive arrogance. But kings are through their flatterers nourished in this vice, which is the root of all others (L.).One must grow in order to be able to lift the top so high; this is not so quickly reached;on the other hand, to arrive at the lowest depth there needs only one overthrow, which may take place in a single moment.One falls more quickly down a stair than one mounts up again.God cannot suffer pride; I am meek and lowly in heart, it was said by Him who was God manifest in the flesh, Mat 11:29.Out of the heart of man proceed also all high things that are offensive to God, which need not always wear a crown, but may have merely a pen behind the ear, or a pair of spectacles on the nose.
Eze 31:12-13. From the foreign land comes much sufferingfirst foreign sins, then punishment through foreigners.A shameful fall into sin, and a frightful fall into misfortuneboth invite to study.There must also fall into the valleys branches that have been broken off, that poor people may not think the great ones of the earth are freed from death and judgment.When the punishments of God break forth, then such as can flee gladly make off, while they were not to be enticed out of the shadow of sin, in which they delighted themselves.God shakes the luxurious tree from top to bottom, and then all that stuck to its branches fall off; and so they are struck off, since they did not allow themselves to be warned off.How does the shadow of the rich vanish with the sun of prosperity, and with the shadow depart also the flatterers and panegyrists ! (Stck.)He who chooses to be forsaken must become poor.Fate can keep up the interest, but a rich man who has become poor is a woe-begone phenomenon for the world.How often do the goods of a rich man become scattered over the world after his death! (Stck.)Discern false friends in adversity!To cut, and peck, and aid in plundering the very person in whose prosperity men formerly basked, and whom they hardly knew how to laud highly enough!So deeply is the friendship of the world rooted, and its caresses. So long as all goes well, friends and worshippers are readily found. But when that changes, all goes otherwise(B. B.).
Ver.14. Precautions must be taken that the trees do not grow into the heavens.All are born nakedno one comes in purple into the world; but that is far from working so powerfully as the thought that the king must die as the beggar.Death the moral of the human fable.A mighty lesson for our time (Richt.).Somewhat for People who would see clearly upon the death of Napoleon.That there is to be a general judgment after this life is evident alone from death, which strikes all, even great men.The consideration of the inevitable exit of all who live should beget moderation in pretensions. We take nothing with us of that which so many desire with such eagerness (L.).
Eze 31:15-18. Great fates cast forth also great shadows.If our terrors did but lead us to the knowledge of our misery, as well as of the glory of God!The grave unites all at the last.The glory of the earth must become dust and ashes, etc.But who believes our report may be said also here: he who exalts himself shall be abased, and he who humbles himself shall be exalted.Thus God throws the loftinesses of men into one heap (B. B.).And so circumcision makes a distinction in deathnot, of course, that which is done in the flesh, but the circumcised heart; so that a circumcised person may have his place also among the uncircumcised, as, on the other side, uncircumcised persons, who are not so in heart, may be counted as circumcised. At the close, however, the prophet writes the name Pharaoh on the lid of the coffin (Cocc.).
On Ch. 32
Eze 32:1-2. How far otherwise have the court-poets ever and anon elegized !The comparison with lions and dragons withdraws much that is human in respect to Pharaoh.This robberfish (?) and dragon, which with his feet troubles the streams, is like the beast that should ascend out of the sea (Revelation 13.). Pharaoh is hence the enemy of the chosen, a roaring lion, which troubles the waters of heavenly wisdom with the slime of human additions, so that they provide no proper drink for those who thirst for salvation (H. H.).Should Christian kings be like lions and dragons? They ought to be the fathers of their country, caring day and night for the welfare of their subjects (St.).Tyrants and the covetous are insatiable, and cannot be at rest (Stck.).Ah! how much misfortune can be brought about by a restless ruler! Therefore pray for a peaceful government of the kingdom (St.).
Eze 32:3-10. The godless hasten to meet their destruction, without being afraid of it, but often secretly driven thereto by God (H. H.).God is the supreme hunter and fisher; He can throw upon the lions His toils, and upon the whales His net, to catch and destroy them (W.).God knows how to tame the untamed, to humble the proud, and to curb the fierce; who can resist His power? (Stck.)To be rejected, if not thrown entirely away, is the end of the mighty after the flesh.Corruption the last strophe also in heroic poetry.How mournful is it to be cast away by God! (Stck.)Even the ass will plant his footstep on the wounded dying lion.What the rich boast themselves so much of is but a carcase, which those who live after them will divide among themselves.After death, shame and reproach overtake the wicked and shameless (H. H.).
Eze 32:5-6. Overflowing for overflowing; for the waters of Egypt, now the blood of the hosts of Pharaoh.They who formerly swam in pleasures, shall by and by swim in their own blood (Stck.).
Eze 32:7. The greatness of the calamity is described by the prophet from the sense of those whom the tribulation affects, to whom it seems as if the whole world were enveloped in darkness (H. H.).The lights of heaven truly shine only for the happy; the sun exists not but for the sunlit eye (H.).The godly sustain themselves in such circumstances by the thought that the Lord is their light, and therefore will not suffer the light of their heart to go out (L.).But he who despises the light of grace, for him the light of glory also shall not shine (Stck.).It is also dark, and the stars even fall from the heaven, when great, noble, important, eminent men, heroes, sages, lawgivers, governors, teachers, are carried off by deathor worse, when they fall away into superstition or unbelief, ungodliness, injustice, and violence.
Eze 32:9. Many a fall leads to the elevation of others (St.).To be frightened is still not to be awakened, and awakening without enlightenment is spiritual tumult without spiritual life.The grave, too, is an unknown land, and thither we are all journeying. Yet for faith there is a sun which rises upon it, that never goes down.So the Lord loves to inspire terror, that He may break fleshly confidence (H. H.).Happy for him whom a sincere conversion has made secure against the terrors which seize upon the whole earth!He who still has to fear for his soul, let him consider that the whole world can profit him nothing!Every moment are we in danger of death, and consequently in sight of eternity.
Eze 32:11-16. If no other cure proves effectual, then God betakes Himself to the sword.The method of salvation through blood and iron; but what is the state of society presupposed in connection with it!The guillotine and the sword both do their work quickly, and bring what is before as it were under them.
Eze 32:13. It touches a miserly man much more nearly if his beast dies, than if his children are taken from him by death (St.).A stock of cattle a state of peace.
Eze 32:14-15. The stillness of the desert is indeed stillness, but it is not peace, any more than to flow like oil is the soft nature of the spirit.There is rest in the grave, but much unrest thereafter, yea, more unrest, and of a worse kind than existed before.There go the waters softly, as in mourning (Umbr.).But God knows how to set at rest a land and its creatures which have been plagued and misused by men. Where have the oppressors gone? They also lie still.Lamentation does not take away the pain, but in the lamentation it lives on.
Eze 32:17-32. Whoever would gain a thorough insight into the dominions and powers of the earth, he must look down into hell.The instructive glance into hell.The song of hell.La divina comdia of Ezekiel.The doctrine of Sheol as the doctrine of the state after death.What does the Sheol of the Old Testament signify? (1) According to its name, the demand of death on all persons and things, therefore the power of death over every individual person and thing; therefore that death is the wages of sin, the judgment of Gods wrath which takes effect on the flesh. (2) As to the thing, it is the state after death as existence in a spacious grave; that is, notwithstanding the dissolution of the body and the separation of soul and body, a continuous life of the spirit, and that with consciousness and recollectionhence, according to the character of this, in peace or disquiet.Woe to him whom the doom of death precipitates into condemnation in death!One can strike up no song to the living more unacceptable, yet at the same time none more profitable, than one about dying; should any one refuse to accompany it, it will still be sung upon him.He to whom the earth was all, when he sinks into the grave, all sinks with him. It is thus easily comprehensible how death stretches into the future, even into the grave, and how all appears as grave and graves.People and princes, Sheol demands both.Only to the pious is the tomb a chamber where they softly sleep, a resting-place without pain and commotion, a mothers bosom (as we are from the earth), a place of repose to lie down in (Stck.).
Eze 32:19. It will be so much the worse if one has been nothing but fleshly, for death seizes in a rough and frightful manner.
Eze 32:20. The sword cuts into the life, severs from life, sadly if also from God. For to die is what still goes on, to corrupt also; but to become lost for ever, that is the death without end, to die for evermore.
Eze 32:21. The salutation of the dead toward the living when they die.
Eze 32:22 sq. What is received into the human heart, finds its grave also there; so round about the prince of death are his grave-places, wherein after a spiritual manner he is buried (Gregory).The grave for the unconverted, the condemned, the perspective of the future world.The grave is very deep, even though in a material point of view it may be but a few feet down: it is deep enough to shroud all glory (H.).Powerfully seizes the mind and humbles the pride the ever-recurring There, when the subject of discourse has respect to a fallen king and his hosts. We look upon a limitless field of graves, and it is remarkable and peculiar to our prophet, that he transfers the graves also to the lower world (Umbr. ).As the elect come from the east and the west, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of God, so the cast off find their way to the uncircumcised, to the pierced by the sword, in the depths below (H. H)Here many graves, in the house of the Father many mansions.The counterpart of the fellowship of believers upon earth, of the elect in heaven.The lowest Sheol and the heavenly Jerusalem.The earth is everywhere indeed the Lords, but not all the dead die in the Lord.
Eze 32:27. Men take with them into the state of the dead their knowledge, and along therewith the judicial sentence due to their manner of life.Nothing is forgotten before God which is not forgiven.The wrath of God remains on them, it is said in John.
Eze 32:31. It is a wretched consolation which is derived from the circumstance that people see in others the same torments which themselves experience. And yet misguided mortals do really comfort themselves with it. It is a common necessity, they say; others have experienced the same, and are experiencing it daily, etc. (H. H.)The word of God, however, brings home to every man at last the application: this is such and such an one; as we find written on the tombstones: Here lies N. N.The Pharaohs prepare to swallow up without mercy: Jacobs Shepherd laughs at them, etc. (Hiller.)
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
CONTENTS
The Prophet is still discoursing concerning Egypt. The great monarchy of Assyria is brought forward by way of illustrating, that al Nineveh fell, so shall Egypt.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
It is worthy the Reader’s remark, that while the Lord is chastising his own people, the rod is exercised over numbers of the surrounding nations. We have here the humbling of Egypt still threatened, as in the preceding chapters, and a great humbling it should seem to have been. In order to set it forth more fully, the Prophet is commissioned to state how the King of Assyria had been brought down, and to say that such should be the ruin of Egypt. The date of the Prophet’s sermon is marked, by way of ascertaining more clearly the certainty of the thing itself. I hope the Reader, in going over those histories of the overthrow of nations, will not fail to connect with them the instruction they bring spiritually. Our whole nature, like those nations, is exposed to the just displeasure of Almighty God. But the gracious interposition of the Lord Jesus becomes the salvation of his redeemed.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Eze 31:3
In Proserpina, after quoting this passage, Ruskin proceeds: ‘Now hear what follows. “The cedars in the Garden of God could not hide Him. The fir-trees were not like His boughs, and the chestnut-trees were not like His branches; nor any tree in the Garden of God was like unto Him in beauty.” So that you see, whenever a nation rises into consistent, vital, and, through many generations, enduring power, there is still the Garden of God; still it is the water of life which feeds the roots of it; and still the succession of its people is imaged by the perennial leafage of the trees of Paradise. Could this be said of Assyria, and shall it not be said of England? How much more, of lives such as ours should be; just, laborious, united in aim, beneficent in fulfilment, may the image be used of the leaves of the tree of Eden!’
Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson
XVII
PROPHECIES AGAINST THE FOREIGN NATIONS
Ezekiel 25-32
Ezekiel has grouped his prophecies in regard to the foreign nations that came in contact with Israel, as Jeremiah also groups his prophecies in Ezekiel 46-51. Isaiah also groups his, in reference to the foreign nations, in Ezekiel 13-23. These three greatest of the prophets had oracles on the nations with whom Israel came in contact during that period of their history. Amos also devotes the earlier part of his prophecies to utterances regarding these same nations. Nahum devotes his prophecy to predicting the downfall of Nineveh and the Assyrian Kingdom. Obadiah’s entire prophecy relates to the downfall of Edom.
Some may ask the question, Why these prophecies against the foreign nations? Let us endeavor to find some reasons why Ezekiel should give these oracles against the foreign powers. They were written during the siege of Jerusalem, at a time when Ezekiel was perfectly sure that the city would fall, as he had been preaching for many years that doctrine to the exiles. Jeremiah had been preaching the same thing to the people in Jerusalem and Judah. The fall of Jerusalem at the hands of foreign and heathen powers would seem to establish the triumph of heathenism. The nations would conclude from this fact that because Jehovah’s kingdom, city, and Temple had fallen and the great heathen powers had triumphed, therefore Jehovah was inferior to the heathen gods.
On this point the prophets of Jehovah had something to say, and such was apparently the occasion for these prophecies. They would serve to confirm the sentence of God upon Israel in showing that God dealt with the foreign nations as he did with Israel; that he punishes sin as surely and as severely among the heathen as he does in Israel, and although the heathen nations seem to survive for awhile, they are no exception to the rule of righteousness with Jehovah. Again, the downfall of these nations at the hand of Jehovah and the prophecies regarding them, would have their influence upon Israel for the future. With the heathen nations out of the way, Israel would be free to return to her land and set up the everlasting kingdom that Jeremiah and Isaiah and Ezekiel had prophesied. The enemies, the old hereditary enemies of Israel, shall be destroyed utterly and absolutely, therefore the kingdom of God shall have free course to be glorified.
Ezekiel speaks of seven nations; five of them are small, but two of them are large nations. He says nothing of Babylon except by way of inference. He is living in Babylon and doubtless that was sufficient reason for refraining from speaking against that great empire.
The prophecy against Ammon is found in Eze 25:1-7 . Ammon bordered on the tribe of Reuben, and when that tribe was deported by Tiglath-pileser, Ammon seized the territory of Reuben contrary to what was right. Ammon had suffered at the hands of Jephthah, and also David through his general, Joab. Ammon bore hatred against Israel, but along with Judah he rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar, out of no friendship to Judah, but with the possible hope of freedom for himself. When Judah was destroyed, Ammon rejoiced and because of that Ezekiel hurls his denunciation against him: “Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because thou saidst, Aha, against my sanctuary, when it was profaned; and against the land of Israel, when it was made desolate; and against the house of Judah, when they went into captivity; therefore, behold, I will deliver thee into captivity; thou shalt be utterly destroyed and thy capital, Rabbah, shall be a stable for camels and thy territory shall be possessed by the roving Bedouin Arabs of the desert.” He holds out no hope for the future whatever. Jeremiah did prophesy a future for Ammon, but Ezekiel does not.
Ezekiel’s prophecy against Moab is recorded in Eze 25:8-11 . Isaiah and Jeremiah also have oracles against Moab. Moab had, like Ammon, seized a part of the territory of Reuben and was famous for her pride, an inordinate, selfish pride. When Jerusalem fell Moab also scorned her and rejoiced over her fall and said, “Behold, the house of Judah is like unto all the nations.” Because Moab said that Jehovah’s people, with their king, was just like other nations, “therefore,” says Ezekiel, “Moab shall be overwhelmed and destroyed forevermore.” No hope for the future is held out for Moab by Ezekiel. Jeremiah did give some hope to Moab, but none is given by Ezekiel.
Then follows the prophecy against Edom (Eze 25:12-14 ). The country of Edom lies south of the Dead Sea and north of the Gulf of Akabah. Edom had borne hatred against Israel since the days of Esau. It was born in her, and she was nourished in animosity toward her neighbor. David almost exterminated the Edomites, and they were brought into subjection time and time again. They never forgave Israel, and when Judah and Jerusalem were overwhelmed, Edom also rejoiced and took captive all the fleeing Israelites she could and sold them into slavery. Because of that Ezekiel pronounces an irretrievable doom: “Therefore thus saith the Lord God, I will stretch out my hand upon Edom, and will cut off man and beast from it; and I will make it desolate from Teman; even unto Dedan shall they fall by the sword.”
The prophecy against Philistia (Eze 25:15-17 ): These were likewise the old, hereditary foes of Israel. They were very much like the Edomites in their feelings against her. They were revengeful, filled with an everlasting enmity, and rejoiced when Jerusalem went up in smoke. Because of that Ezekiel hurls his denunciations against the Philistines: they were to be crushed by the yoke Nebuchadnezzar. They had already been almost wiped out by the Assyrians. They were destroyed as a nation by the Babylonians, and at the time of the Maccabees they were completely exterminated as a nation.
Tyre was one of the greatest commercial nations of the old world, corresponding to the English nation in the modern world. The date of this prophecy is 586 B.C., the first day of the first month of the siege of Jerusalem. The prophet devotes three chapters to his oracles against Tyre. That city had achieved great commercial importance. She traded with every known nation in the world; she had lent her influence to every nation; she was the envy of almost every nation. She was the most active, the most aggressive, had the greatest commercial power, in some respects the greatest wisdom and the greatest skill, as well as the greatest colonizing power, of any nation at that period. From the thirteenth century Tyre was the commercial center. She had been friendly to Judah and Jerusalem under David and Solomon and some later kings, but for a century or two her relations to Judah had been changed; she had grown jealous of Judah’s commercial advantages, and was now exhibiting the same hatred and jealousy toward Judah that all the other nations were manifesting. She rejoiced over the fall of Jerusalem the same as the other nations. Her business rival was now destroyed; her own chances were enhanced and, with the true spirit of commercial greed, she was glad that her sister nation had perished.
The destruction of the city of Tyre is described in Eze 26 . In Eze 26:2 the prophet gives his reason for hurling this denunciation and prophecy of destruction against Tyre: “Son of man, because that Tyre hath said against Jerusalem, Aha, she is broken that was the gate of the people; she is turned unto me; I shall be replenished, now that she is laid waste.” Therefore, he denounced her and predicted her fate.
It was by Nebuchadnezzar, and in predicting her fall and end, Eze 26:5 says, “She shall be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea; for I have spoken it, saith the Lord God; and she shall become a spoil to the nations.” He would scrape the great rock, the island upon which Tyre was built, so that the very dust itself would be taken off and there would be nothing there but a bare rock for spreading and drying the nets of the fishermen. That is almost literally true today and has been for centuries.
From that verse on, he predicts the siege of the city by Nebuchadnezzar. Tyre was built upon an island rock a short distance from the shore and was one of the strongest forts of the world. Nebuchadnezzar had to build a causeway from the mainland to reach the city. Ezekiel describes his mode of attacking the city in verse Eze 26:9 : “And he shall set his battering engines against thy walls, and with his axes he shall break down thy towers,” and he continues with a full description of the rushing of the chariots over the streets and the indiscriminate slaughter of the inhabitants, with a sack of the great city.
From Eze 26:15-19 we have the consternation of the various nations over the fall of this great commercial center. If New York, that center of commercial life, were to be destroyed, it would not send a greater thrill of consternation throughout the civilized world and would not more seriously affect the industrial life of America than did the fall of Tyre shock every nation and affect the commerce of every people of the world. They are represented as being in a state of consternation and it says in Eze 26:17 , “They shall take up a lamentation for thee, and say to thee, How art thou destroyed, that wast inhabited by seafaring men, the renowned city, that was strong in the sea, she and her inhabitants, that caused their terror to be on all that dwelt there.” In the last two verses of that chapter he describes the inhabitants of Tyre as sinking down into Sheol, the pit, or abyss, the abode of the dead, and there abiding in darkness forever.
We have a magnificent description of Tyre by Ezekiel under the figure of a great ship in Eze 27 . In this chapter we have one of the finest passages in the Old Testament and one of the best opportunities for the study of ancient commerce to be found anywhere. Tyre is pictured as a gallant ship, a splendid big ship, one of the great merchantmen of that age: “They have made all thy planks of fir trees from Senir [Hermon]; they have taken a cedar from Lebanon to make a mast for thee. Of the oaks of Bashan have they made thine oars; they have made thy benches of ivory inlaid in boxwood, from the isles of Kittim [Cyprus.”] Her sail was made of fine linen from Egypt, and it was an ensign. Ships did not carry flags in that age, but they had colored sails and figures marked upon them which served the purpose of a flag. Thus the purple of Egypt served as an ensign, or flag. Blue and purple linen of Elishah [which refers to Peloponnesus] furnished the awning for the ship.
The men of Sidon, a town about twenty miles north, and the men of Arvad, a town still farther north on the Mediterranean coast, were its mariners, or rowers. Ships in that age had one or two sets of rowers. The ship in which Paul sailed had rowers, and the mariners in Jonah’s ship rowed hard. The men of Tyre, the wisest of the world, as they thought, and the best seamen and navigators of the world, were their pilots. The elders of Gebal, the best carpenters, were their calkers, literally, the leak-stoppers. Look at the army on board to guard this magnificent ship: They were men of Arvad; “Persia and Lud, and Phut were in thine army, thy men of war: they hanged the shield and helmet in thee; they set forth thy comeliness . . . and valorous men were in thy towers.”
Then he goes on in (Eze 27:12-14 ) to describe the sea commerce of the great city of Tyre. To Tarshish, away on the western coast of Spain, the Strait of Gibraltar on the Atlantic Ocean her trade extended. “Tarshish was thy merchant by reason of the multitude of all kinds of riches; with silver, iron, tin, and lead, they traded for thy wares.” From Javan, Tubal, (south of the Black Sea) and Meshech, they brought vessels of brass and slaves. Togarmah is supposed to be modern Armenia, probably bordering on the Black Sea also. They reached this country by ships through the Black Sea and the straits. What did they get there? Horses and mules. So much for the sea commerce.
Now he gives the land commerce (Eze 27:15-25 ). Dedan was the Arab tribe bordering on the southern and eastern boundary of Palestine and Edom. Here they got horns of ivory and ebony which indicates that these merchants either went into Africa and made use of the elephant tusks, or went into India and obtained the ivory and ebony there.
Syria, round about Damascus, supplied them with emeralds, purple and broidered work, fine linen, coral and rubies.
Judah supplied them with wheat of Minnith, and Pannag (perhaps a kind of confection), honey, oil, and balm.
Damascus supplied them with the wine of Helbon, the finest and best wine of the world at that time; also with white wool.
Vedan and Javan supplied them with bright iron, cassia, and calamus.
Dedan supplied them with precious clothes for riding. When the ladies would go out riding, the fine clothes they wore came all the way from Dedan, probably located in southeastern Arabia.
Arabia and the princes of Kedar supplied them with lambs, rams, and goats.
Sheba and Raamah supplied them with all kinds of spices, precious stones, and gold.
Haran, Canneh, Eden, Asshur, and Chilmad supplied them with blue cloth and broidered work, and in chests of rich apparel, bound with cords and made of cedar.
Now that is a magnificent description of the commerce of Tyre. It is the analogue of that marvelous description which we find in Rev 18:1-20 , where John pictures all the merchants of the earth mourning over the fall of the great city, Babylon. Many things there are identical with the articles of commerce here.
Next we have the fate of this magnificent ship (Eze 27:26-36 ): “Thy rowers have brought thee into great waters: the east wind hath broken thee in the heart of the seas. Thy riches, and thy wares, thy merchandise, thy mariners, and thy pilots, thy calkers, and the dealers in thy merchandise, and all thy men of war, that are in thee, with all thy company which is in the midst of thee, shall fall into the heart of the seas in the day of thy ruin.” Her rowers had rowed into dangerous waters, and the divine powers broke upon her. The east wind, or divine judgment, produced the fall of the great city of Tyre. In Eze 27:28-36 there is the lamentation of the nations over the fall of this great city, just as John pictures all the merchants of the world lamenting over the fall of the great mystical Babylon, Rome.
The pride and fall of Tyre are represented in Eze 28:1-19 . This is a representation of what he had already said, only here he takes the prince of Tyre as a personified spirit of the city, the prince, representing the people, and gathering up in himself, as it were, the spirit of the people. He directs his lamentation against the prince. He represents the prince of Tyre as saying, “I am a god, I sit in the seat of God, in the midst of the seas.” That was the spirit of Tyre and is the spirit of every great commercial center where the commercial spirit rules and reigns.
Babylon said, “I am, and there is none else beside me.” Self-glorification, self-deification, idolizing self, is the besetting sin of every great commercial city. It has been and is today, and because of this great commercialism and inordinate pride, the prince of Tyre was doomed to destruction. They had great wisdom, worldly wisdom; they had great power, great wealth, great glory, but they were great idolaters and as such they perished. In Eze 28:11-19 he pictures the prince of Tyre as a cherub in the garden of God, or on the mountain of God, clothed in all the magnificence of the finest and most precious and costliest stones that could be found. This cherub, this angelic being, fell prey to sin and was destroyed.
There is also a prophecy against Sidon in Eze 28:20-24 . (For the prophecies of this passage see the text.) Sidon was an important city a few miles north of Tyre and her fate was involved in the fate of Tyre. When Nebuchadnezzar destroyed one he destroyed the other, with all the villages and towns adjacent to it.
Then follows another wonderful prophecy of the restoration of Israel and the blessings upon her after her return (Eze 28:25-26 ).
Egypt was a great nation, one of the greatest nations of the world, and Ezekiel devotes four chapters to her fall. The date of it was during the siege of Jerusalem, 587 B.C. The following is a summary of the prophecy against her:
1. A general statement of the fall of Egypt (Eze 29:1-16 ). Egypt is compared to a dragon, a crocodile, a huge alligator floundering around in the river Nile and boasting, as he says in the latter part of verse Eze 29:3 : “My river is mine own, and I have made it for myself.” That was the spirit of Egypt. That great dragon-crocodile shall be taken with hooks in his mouth and Jehovah will pull him up and drag him forth and all the little fishes that belong to him will hang onto his scales, and he will be taken out into the wilderness and there he will be meat for the beasts and fowls of the air. This means that Egypt shall be destroyed from one end to the other, from the tower of Seveneh unto the border of Ethiopia. “Yet thus saith the Lord God: At the end of forty years will I gather the Egyptians from the peoples whither they were scattered; and I will bring back the captivity of Egypt, and will cause them to return into the land of Pathros, into the land of their birth; and they shall be there a base kingdom.” After that Egypt shall be the basest of the kingdoms; “neither shall it any more lift itself up above the nations: and I will diminish them, that they shall no more rule over the nations.” From that time until this, Egypt has been a poor, weak, and worthless power.
2. The reward of Nebuchadnezzar for failure to get booty at Tyre (Eze 29:17-21 ). The prophecy against Tyre that we have been studying was uttered in the year 586 B.C. Shortly after the fall of Jerusalem Nebuchadnezzar besieged Tyre and continued the siege for thirteen years. We are not told whether he succeeded in capturing and destroying the city or not. Now, this prophecy came from Ezekiel in the year 570 B.C., the first month, first day of the month, sixteen years after he had written the previous prophecy. During those sixteen years Nebuchadnezzar had been besieging Tyre for thirteen years and had apparently destroyed the city as Ezekiel had prophesied, but had taken no spoil. Ezekiel had definitely prophesied that Nebuchadnezzar would utterly and completely overwhelm Tyre, and he had seemingly done it. This prophecy throws some light upon the situation. Eze 29:18 says, “Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, caused his army to serve a great service against Tyre; every head was made bald, and every shoulder was worn; yet had he no wages, nor his army, from Tyre, for the service he had served against it.” How extremely hard was this thirteen years of toil I Now that plainly indicates that Nebuchadnezzar did not succeed in securing the wealth of the Tyre.
The truth seems to be that the people of Tyre spirited away by ships all their wealth and most of their inhabitants, and capitulated to Nebuchadnezzar at the end of about thirteen years, and when he entered the city he had nothing to destroy nor any wealth to take. Such seems probable, though we have no history that would justify the statement.
Now, because Nebuchadnezzar had performed this service for Jehovah against Tyre and had received no wages (Eze 29:19-20 ), God says, “Therefore, thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I will give the land of Egypt unto Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon; and he shall carry off her multitude, and take her spoil, and take her prey; and it shall be the wages for his army. I have given him the land of Egypt as his recompense for which he served, because they wrought for me, saith the Lord God.”
3. The terror and dismay of the surrounding nations (Eze 30:1-19 ). The fall of a nation sends a thrill of horror and dismay through the world, and the fall of a great nation like Egypt struck terror into the hearts of all the surrounding nations, Arabia, Ethiopia, Crete, etc.
4. The broken arm of Egypt (Eze 30:20-26 ). Egypt had had one arm broken, probably by Nebuchadnezzar. Now Ezekiel prophesies that Egypt shall have both arms broken, and her power shall be destroyed.
5. Pharaoh represented as a lordly cedar cut down (Eze 31:3 ), “Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon.” He is using Assyria as an example for Egypt. He goes on with his magnificent description of the cedar. It is cut down. The Babylonians and Medes lay the ax at the roots and the cedar falls, crashing among the nations. In Eze 31:16 he pictures them as going down into the nethermost part of the earth into the pit of Sheol to abide forever.
6. Lamentation over the fall of Egypt (Eze 32:1-16 ). Here we have the picture of the dragon again, destroyed and left for a prey of the birds and beasts.
7. The welcome to Sheol, or Hades, by the nations (Eze 32:17-32 ).
This has been said to be the most weird piece of literature in all the world. All the people of Egypt, the princes, the mighty men, the soldiers, who were slain in these wars, go down into Sheol, the underworld, the place of the departed, and there existing in their shadowy and weak existence, grouped together and with them is Assyria and all her hosts that were slain with the sword: grouped together also and with them, Elam and all her hosts; grouped around them Mesheck, Tubal, and all her multitude; Edom, her kings, and all her princes, and all the Sidonians grouped together in Sheol. These are all in the shadowy world below, surrounding Egypt. In Eze 32:31 , Pharaoh and his hosts and all these foreign countries and their hosts, are said to be in Sheol where light is as darkness, and are gathered together in groups and Pharaoh shall see them and shall be comforted over all this multitude of slain ones. It is a picture of their conception of the underworld, Sheol, which is the place of the dead who have passed through what we know to be the grave, down into the spirit world. Thus Ezekiel leaves these nations in Sheol, the place where there is no light.
QUESTIONS
1. What prophets prophesied against foreign nations and what can you say of the grouping of their prophecies?
2. Why these prophecies against foreign nations?
3. What and why the prophecy against Ammon? (Eze 25:1-7 .)
4. What and why the prophecy against Moab? (Eze 25:8-11 .)
5. What and why the prophecy against Edom? (Eze 25:12-14 .)
6. What and why the prophecy against Philistia? (Eze 25:15-17 .)
7. What can you say of Tyre’s commercial importance and her attitude toward Judah and Jerusalem?
8. How is the destruction of the city of Tyre described in chapter 26?
9. Give the magnificent description of Tyre by Ezekiel under the figure of a great ship (27).
10. How is the pride and fall of Tyre represented in Eze 28:1-19 ?
11. What is the prophecy against Sidon in Eze 28:20-24 , when fulfilled and what prophecy relative to the children of Israel?
12. Summarize the prophecy against Egypt (Ezekiel 29-32).
13. What is the added prophecy concerning Tyre in Eze 28:17-21 ?
Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible
Eze 31:1 And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third [month], in the first [day] of the month, [that] the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
Ver. 1. In the third month. ] Two months after the former prophecy, and a month before the city was taken.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Ezekiel Chapter 31
The prophet next gives us in striking figures the ruin of Egypt. The awful warning of the downfall of the Assyrian, the greatest of earth’s monarchs in that day, is applied to Pharaoh’s kingdom, illustrating the principle of which scripture makes such frequent use with individuals: that the Lord abases the proud as He exalts the lowly.
“And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month, in the first day of the month, that the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying, Son of man, speak unto Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to his multitude; Whom art thou like in thy greatness? Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a shadowing shroud, and of an high stature; and his top was among the thick boughs. The waters made him great, the deep set him up on high with her rivers running round about his plants, and sent out her little rivers unto all the trees of the field. Therefore his height was exalted above all the trees of the field, and his boughs were multiplied, and his branches became long because of the multitude of waters, when he shot forth. All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations. Thus was he fair in his greatness, in the length of his branches: for his root was by great waters. The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him: the fir trees were not like his boughs, and the chestnut trees were not like his branches; nor any tree in the garden of God was like unto him in his beauty. I have made him fair by the multitude of his branches: so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied him.” (Ver. 1-9)
Assyria had been beyond the powers hitherto known for magnificence, but as a kingdom, not as an imperial system. Egypt, disposed as it might be to take an imperial place, must fall after the same example. Political wisdom might be proud, but it could no more secure that object of ambition than force of numbers or extent of territory. God controls and governs, not only in what pertains to His things but in those of man. As the cedar of Lebanon among the trees, for tallness, size, and extent of shade as well as beauty, so had the Assyrian been among the nations. God had grudged nothing that could adorn or aggrandise Nineveh or the people of whom it was the capital, yea, gave it to exercise enormous outreaching power and influence over countries round about, so as to be envied by all.
But the Assyrian coveted for himself the glory of a king of kings; and this lifting up of his heart in his height brought his doom upon him. “Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah; Because thou hast lifted up thyself in height, and he hath shot up his top among the thick boughs, and his heart is lifted up in his height; I have therefore delivered him into the hand of the mighty one of the heathen; he shall surely deal with him: I have driven him out for his wickedness. And strangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off, and have left him: upon the mountains and in all the valleys his branches are fallen, and his boughs are broken by all the rivers of the land; and all the people of the earth are gone down from his shadow, and have left him. Upon his ruin shall all the fowls of the heaven remain, and all the beasts of the field shall be upon his branches: to the end that none of all the trees by the waters exalt themselves for their height, neither shoot up their top among the thick boughs, neither their trees stand up in their height, all that drink water: for they are all delivered unto death, to the nether parts of the earth, in the midst of the children of men, with them that go down to the pit. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah; In the day when he went down to the grave I caused a mourning: I covered the deep for him, and I restrained the flocks thereof, and the great waters were stayed; and I caused Lebanon to mourn for him, and all the trees of the field fainted for him. I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to hell with them that descend into the pit: and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, shall be comforted in the nether parts of the earth. They also went down into hell with him unto them that be slain with the sword; and they that were his arm, that dwelt under his shadow in the midst of the heathen.” (Ver. 10-17) Tremendous was the overthrow from such towering grandeur to the utmost degradation and impotence: a lesson for all that might aspire beyond their measure, a call to mourn and quake.
Had Egypt profited morally? On the contrary did it not after all hasten to follow in the same steps? And if Pharaoh emulated the Assyrian’s glory and affected as much or more, should he not justly know the same annihilation? “Whom art thou thus like in glory and in greatness among the trees of Eden? yet shalt thou be brought down with the trees of Eden unto the nether parts of the earth: thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised with them that be slain by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, saith the Lord Jehovah.” (Ver. 18) To the nether parts of the earth must Egypt go with the rest. The power and the policy of nature can give no exemption. In God alone is continuance, and He will display it in His people on earth, as in heaven, when they have bowed to learn themselves as well as Him. Till then, Israel’s circumcision is made uncircumcision, and they are even more guilty than the Gentiles they despise.
Fuente: William Kelly Major Works (New Testament)
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Eze 31:1-9
1In the eleventh year, in the third month, on the first of the month, the word of the LORD came to me saying, 2Son of man, say to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to his hordes,
‘Whom are you like in your greatness?
3Behold, Assyria was a cedar in Lebanon
With beautiful branches and forest shade,
And very high, And its top was among the clouds.
4The waters made it grow, the deep made it high.
With its rivers it continually extended all around its planting place,
And sent out its channels to all the trees of the field.
5Therefore its height was loftier than all the trees of the field
And its boughs became many and its branches long
Because of many waters as it spread them out.
6All the birds of the heavens nested in its boughs,
And under its branches all the beasts of the field gave birth,
And all great nations lived under its shade.
7So it was beautiful in its greatness, in the length of its branches;
For its roots extended to many waters.
8The cedars in God’s garden could not match it;
The cypresses could not compare with its boughs,
And the plane trees could not match its branches.
No tree in God’s garden could compare with it in its beauty.
9I made it beautiful with the multitude of its branches,
And all the trees of Eden, which were in the garden of God, were jealous of it.’
Eze 31:1 See note at Eze 29:1. The date is 587 B.C.
Eze 31:2-3 say to Pharaoh The literary unit dealing with God’s judgment in Egypt began in chapter 29 and continues through chapter 32. Therefore, it is surprising to have Assyria addressed in Eze 31:3. Assyria is mentioned in Eze 32:22-32. There are two options.
1. Pharaoh is to view God’s judgment on Assyria as an example of what will befall him and his nation (Jewish Study Bible, p. 1101).
2. The Hebrew text, (BDB 1677), is corrupt and must be emended to
a. I will liken you (RSV), (BDB 1003, Qal IMPERFECT)
b. a variant spelling of cypress (or a type of cedar, KB 1677) and, therefore, parallel to cedar (cf. Eze 27:6)
3. I regard, (BDB 1003)
Eze 31:3-9 The nation is described as
1. beautiful branches for shade
2. very tall (i.e., MT, NKJV, among thick boughs’ LXX, among the clouds)
3. deep roots into good water
4. watered other trees
5. protection for many animals (i.e., nations)
6. greater than the trees of Eden
7. many branches
In essence this is the global/cosmic tree metaphor (cf. Psalms 80; Daniel 4). Trees were places of special reverence and respect. They often served as holy sites (e.g., Gen 35:4; Gen 35:8; Jos 24:26; palm tree, Jdg 4:5; oaks of Ophrah, cf. Jdg 6:11; Jdg 6:19; 1Ki 13:14; 1Ch 10:12) and also sites of fertility worship (e.g., 1Ki 14:23-24; Hos 4:13). However, this one tree symbolized a universal motif. It, of course, is a hyperbole in this context describing Egypt. YHWH allows nations to rise and He causes nations to fall. In YHWH’s garden His trees continue to grow and bear fruit (cf. Eze 47:12; Rev 22:2). Heaven is symbolized as a beautiful, fruitful garden (cf. Genesis 2 and Revelation 22).
Eze 31:8
NASB, NJB,
JPSOAcypresses
NKJV, NRSV,
TEVfir trees
REBjuniper
LXX, NEBpines
The UBS, Fauna and Flora of the Bible, pp. 162-163, identifies this (BDB 141) as an Aleppo pine, which is the largest conifer in the Mediterranean area. They can reach over 50′ in height. Its wood is hard enough to use as building material (cf. 1Ki 5:8; 1Ki 5:10; 1Ki 6:15; 1Ki 6:34; 2Ch 2:8; Isa 14:8; Eze 27:5; Eze 31:8). It is used to characterize a nation in Hos 14:8; Zec 11:1-3.
NASB, NRSV,
TEV, NJBthe plane trees
NKJVthe chestnut trees
The UBS, Fauna and Flora of the Bible, pp. 166-167, calls this a plane tree. The Hebrew (BDB 790) root means stripped of bark (cf. Gen 30:37). It is native to Palestine and grows near a water source. They are large and long-lived.
Eze 31:9 Eden Eden is a geographical location (i.e., in Ugaritic, a plain) in Genesis 2-3 which contained a special garden planted and prepared by God for His highest creation (i.e., in image and likeness, cf. Gen 1:26-27), mankind (cf. Gen 2:8).
The special garden is alluded to in Isa 51:3; Eze 28:13; Eze 31:9; Eze 31:16; Eze 31:18(twice); Eze 36:35; and Joe 2:3.
Apparently the word means abundance from an Aramaic root. In Hebrew (BDB 727 III, 792 II) the root means delight or pleasure (lit). After Genesis the term is a metaphor for a well watered, fruitful place.
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
the eleventh year. See note on Eze 30:20, and p. 1105. the third month. About two months before the fall of Jerusalem.
the LORD. Hebrew. Jehovah. App-4.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Shall we turn now to Ezekiel, chapter 31.
In chapters 29 and 30 of Ezekiel, he was prophesying concerning the judgment of God that was to come against the nation of Egypt, who was like a reed when Israel sought to lean upon it, it broke and only injured Israel. They were, of course, warned about leaning upon Egypt, but the warnings were not heeded and thus Egypt became as a broken staff and did not really help Israel except only temporarily when Pharaoh Haaibre came against Babylon for a time and they stopped the siege against Jerusalem for a short period.
Now in chapter 31 he begins a prophecy against the Pharaoh himself. And in this prophecy against the Pharaoh, he turns to more or less a parable in which he likens the Egyptian leader to a great cedar tree in Lebanon. Now Lebanon used to be famous for its huge cedar trees. And, of course, you remember that the king of Tyre, Hiram, made a covenant with Solomon to provide the cedars, with David and with Solomon to provide the cedars for the building of the temple in Jerusalem. And so in a parabolic way, the Lord speaks of the parable, really, of the Pharaoh as a giant cedar in Lebanon.
It came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month ( Eze 31:1 ),
This would be the eleventh year of king Zedekiah, or 586 B.C.
The word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Son of man, speak unto Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to his multitude; Who are thou like in greatness? ( Eze 31:1-2 )
Egypt, of course, was a great, powerful empire in the ancient world. It was one of the world empires, or the world-dominating, or leading empires, and always a force to be reckoned with. “Who are you like?” And he likens them unto the Assyrians, who were also a great world power. It was the Assyrians who conquered over the Northern Kingdom of Israel. And so they are like unto Assyria.
[They are like] a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and a shadowing shroud, of high stature; the top among the thick boughs. And the waters made him great ( Eze 31:3-4 ),
That would be the Nile River.
the deep set him on the high with her rivers running round about his plants, and sent out her little rivers unto the trees of the field ( Eze 31:4 ).
The tributaries and the delta area where the Nile spread out in the delta and that rich farm land.
Therefore his height was exalted above the trees of the field, and his boughs were multiplied, his branches became long because of the multitude of waters, when he shot forth. And all of the fowls of heaven made their nest in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations ( Eze 31:5-6 ).
So Egypt was one of the great nations and overshadowed the other nations. Notice the parable here, the birds lodged in the branches. This is also said by Daniel of Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian kingdom. But bringing it into the New Testament, we remember Jesus gave a kingdom parable, “The kingdom of heaven is like unto a mustard seed, which is a small little seed, but it was planted and it grew into a tree. And the birds of the air came and lodged in it” ( Luk 13:19 ). Now, in a parabolic way, birds are always thought of in an evil sense. You remember that when the seed was planted and it fell by the wayside, the birds of the air plucked it up so that it wasn’t able to take root and they were likened unto the evil one who comes and plucks the Word of God out of a person’s heart so that it doesn’t have any effect.
So in that kingdom parable of the mustard seed that grew into a tree, first of all, that is abnormal. A mustard seed is not a tree seed, it is a bush, but there was this abnormal growth. It grew into a tree and all of the birds came and lodged in it. Is a parable, really, of the Gentile church that would become a haven for every kind of bird that exists. And so we look at the Gentile church today and see all the weird birds lodging in its branches. It’s amazing the things that have been brought into the church, incorporated as a part of Christianity, and the people who have taken on the name or the title of Christian. But, of course, it certainly reminds us of what Jesus said, “Not all who say, ‘Lord, Lord,’ are going to enter into the kingdom of heaven” ( Mat 7:21 ). So Jesus is referring to the fact that as the Gentile church grows, the abnormal type of growth, that it is not a healthy, solid growth, that it is become the haven for birds.
Now here, “The fowls of the heaven made their nest in the boughs.” That is, these other nations conquered by… these other peoples conquered by Egypt.
Thus was he fair in his greatness, in the length of his branches: for his root was by the great waters. And the cedars in the garden of God could not hide him: and the fir trees were not like his boughs, and the chestnut trees were not like his branches; nor any tree in the garden of God was like unto him in his beauty. I have made him fair by the multitude of his branches; so that all the trees of Eden, that were in garden of God, envied him ( Eze 31:7-9 ).
The great cedar. A parable, of course, of Egypt, how it became such a great nation, the envy of other nations.
Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Because thou hast lifted up thyself in height, and hath shot up his top among the thick boughs, his heart is lifted up in his height; and I have therefore delivered him into the hand of the mighty one of the heathen; and he shall surely deal with him: I have driven him out for his wickedness ( Eze 31:10-11 ).
So the Pharaoh, judgment is pronounced upon him and again the reason for the judgment, notice carefully, is his pride. Because his heart was lifted up for his height, for his greatness. “Pride cometh before destruction, a haughty spirit before the fall” ( Pro 16:18 ).
It is extremely difficult for men to handle a position of power or authority. I think one of the hardest things in the world is to be in a position of ruling over other men, because there is always that danger of pride coming in. And looking at your position and saying, “Look what I have done.”
You remember, and we’ll get to it, you remember it trustfully, for about four years ago when we were in Daniel and we’ll be getting there pretty soon again, when Nebuchadnezzar was looking over Babylon, no doubt walking through the hanging gardens, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, and walking through this beautiful garden and this fabulous city that he had built, walls three hundred feet high, eighty feet thick. And he said, “Is not this the great Babylon that I have built?” And a voice came from heaven saying, “Hey, the watchers have been watching you, and your heart has been lifted up with pride.” And Nebuchadnezzar came to Daniel and said, you know, told him of this experience of hearing this voice saying that the watchers had been watching and saw his pride and God was going to bring him into judgment, and Daniel says, “Hey, walk carefully. Be careful.” About a year later, again old Nebuchadnezzar was boasting in his greatness, “The great Babylon that I have built,” and the voice came from heaven and said, “That’s it, you’ve had it.” And he had a period of insanity where for seven seasons he lived with the animals in the field. He ate grass like the oxen. His hair grew like feathers, and the dew of the heaven settled on him. And he lived like a wild man until he knew that the God in heaven is the one who sets upon the kingdoms those whom He will.
The pride was the thing that brought Nebuchadnezzar to this place of being broken, until seven seasons had passed over him, and then God restored and he made that tremendous proclamation, declaring his belief and faith in the God of heaven who establishes upon the kingdoms those whom He would. Now, all the way along through history, from the beginning, pride is a destroyer. It has destroyed so many. Shakespeare has the statement in one of his plays, “Cromwell, flee from pride, for by this sin did the angels fall.” Satan said, “I will exalt my throne.” And here is the Pharaoh of Egypt being lifted up with pride, and yet, God says, “I will destroy, I will deliver him to the hand of mighty one of the heathen, and he shall surely deal with him. And I have driven him out for his wickedness.” So God was to use Nebuchadnezzar the mighty one of the heathen to destroy the Pharaoh.
And, of course, Jeremiah was making a similar prophecy. He was telling those in Jerusalem, “Now don’t trust in the Pharaoh. Don’t lean upon Egypt. For Egypt also will be destroyed by Babylon. Egypt will not be a real help.” And, of course, they wouldn’t listen to Jeremiah and they finally, of course, went down to Egypt, and there at Tahpanhes, he took and put these rocks down and he said, “Above these rocks,” he buried these rocks. He said, “Above these rocks Nebuchadnezzar will build his throne and rule in Egypt.” And, of course, it was fulfilled.
The strangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off, and have left him: upon the mountains and in all the valleys his branches are fallen, his boughs are broken by rivers of the land; and all the people of the earth are gone down from his shadow, and have left him. Upon his ruin shall all the fowls of heaven remain, and all the beasts of the field shall be upon his branches: To the end that none of all of the trees by the waters exalt themselves for their height, neither shoot up their top among the thick boughs, neither their trees stand up in their height, all that drink water: for they are delivered unto death, to the nether parts of the earth, in the midst of the children of men, with them that go down to the pit. Thus saith the Lord GOD; In the day when he went down to hell [Sheol in the Hebrew] I caused a mourning: I covered the deep for him, I restrained the floods thereof, and the great waters were stayed: and I caused Lebanon to mourn for him, and all of the trees of the field fainted for him. And I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to hell with them that descend into the pit: and all the trees of Eden, the choice and the best of Lebanon, all that did drink water, shall be comforted in the nether parts of the earth. And they also went down into hell with him, unto them that be slain with the sword; and they that were his arm, and that dwelt under his shadow in the midst of the heathen. To whom art thou thus like in glory and in greatness among the trees of Eden? Yet shalt thou be brought down with the trees of Eden to the nether parts of the earth: thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised with them that be slain by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, saith the Lord ( Eze 31:12-18 ).
So that destruction and being cast down to hell is predicted by God to be the destiny of the Pharaoh of Egypt.
“
Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary
Eze 31:1-9
THE EXAMPLE OF ASSYRIA
WAS A WARNING TO EGYPT
The source of the features of this allegory is not to be sought in Babylonian mythology, as supposed by May, nor should we believe that “The Garden of God” referred to herein is a reference “to a mythological `Garden of Eden.’
The background of the chapter was the historical situation of those times, namely, on June 21,587. B.C., which was only a couple of months before the fall of Jerusalem, and less than twenty-five years after the dramatic fall of Nineveh to Babylon in 612 B.C. “The fall of the great Assyrian empire was still fresh in the memory of those times, and it could not have failed to make a deep impression upon the minds of Ezekiel’s hearers.
No one can fail to be aware of the two different interpretations of this chapter, each of which has its advocates. (1) Some understand the lofty cedar as a description of Pharaoh, an understanding involving an emendation of the Hebrew text. (2) Others understand Assyria as being meant by the lofty cedar. Fortunately, the meaning of the chapter is exactly the same either way. The disgraceful end of the proud Pharaoh is prophesied in either interpretation. We shall explore these views further under Eze 31:3, below:
Our own position favors the view of accepting Assyria as represented by the beautiful, lofty cedar. We favor this because both our version (ASV) and the KJV alike translate the text with this clear meaning. Some of the greatest scholars of our day have warned us that, “For purposes of accurate study, the American Standard Version of 1901 is the best of all the versions.” Furthermore, the New English Bible retains the same meaning with KJV and American Standard Version; and, as even some of the advocates of the other view have pointed out,
The old interpretation is by no means indefensible. As it stands in the Hebrew and in all the ancient versions, the whole chapter is a description of the greatness, not of Egypt, but of Assyria. Thus Assyria is compared to the great cedar, and then Egypt is compared to Assyria. That the fate of Assyria contained a warning against the pride of Pharaoh is a thought in itself intelligible, and is just the kind of thought that Ezekiel might very well have expressed.
In addition to this, the ensuing description fits Assyria much better than it fits Egypt, as we shall note, below.
The divisions of the chapter, easily discernible, are: (1) the description of the mighty cedar (Eze 31:1-9); (2) its disastrous overthrow (Eze 31:10-14); and (3) the consequences of it (Eze 31:14-17); and (4) the God-given answer to the question raised in Eze 31:2 (Eze 31:18).
THE LOFTY CEDAR
Eze 31:1-9
“And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month, in the first day of the month, that the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying, Son of man, say unto Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to his multitude: Whom art thou like in thy greatness? Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a forest-like shade, and of high stature, and its top was among the thick boughs. The waters nourished it, the deep made it grow; the rivers thereof ran about its plantation; and it sent out its channels unto all the trees of the field; and its boughs were multiplied, and its branches became long by reason of many waters, when it shot them forth. All the birds of the heavens made their nests in its boughs; and under its branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young: and under its shadows dwelt all great nations. Thus was it fair in its greatness, in the length of its branches; for its root was by many waters. The cedars in the garden of God could not hide it; the fir trees were not like its boughs, and the plane-trees were not as its branches; nor was any tree in the garden of God like unto it in its beauty. I made it fair by the multitude of its branches, so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God envied it.”
“Whom art thou like in thy greatness …” (Eze 31:2)? This question declares the following description to be of a person whom Pharaoh is “like,” not a description of Pharaoh.
“The Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon …” (Eze 31:3). A cedar in Lebanon cannot possibly refer to Egypt. Lebanon was a province of Assyria. Nevertheless, “the emenders” of God’s Word emended Assyria out of the passage, making it read: “Behold, I will liken you to a cedar in Lebanon.” (Revised Standard Version). Any one can see, that if this change was correct, the initial question would have been, “What art thou like?” not “Whom art thou like?”
Nevertheless, Beasley-Murray explained the emendation thus: “The initial letter of t’assur (cedar) fell out leaving assur (meaning Assyria). The context clearly shows that Pharaoh is in mind. This is a beautiful theory, but there is no proof of it. The Hebrew and all the ancient versions read as does our text in ASV; and we are unwilling to allow the present generation of scholars to revise the Bible to make it read like what they thought the author “was trying to say.” As long as the ancient text is understandable as it stands, such emendations are absolutely contraindicated.
“The waters nourished it, the deep made it to grow …” (Eze 31:4). ‘The deep’ here was understood by Bunn as, “the primordial waters beneath the earth, the deep which figures so largely in Babylonian mythology.” Such nonsense should be rejected with contempt.
The fundamental reason why such allegations as that just cited cannot be allowed by true believers is that the allowance of such a thing would mean that God Himself, the true author of Ezekiel, accepted and allowed as truth the monstrous Babylonian myth concerning a great subterranean ocean. To inject that myth into the prophecy leaves Ezekiel as the ignorant author of it; it leaves God out of it altogether, and raises the question that if Ezekiel was wrong about this, why should he be trusted in anything else found in the prophecy?
“The `deep’ which nourished the growth of Assyria was nothing less than the tremendous source of waters provided by the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.
And it sent out its channels unto all the trees of the field …” (Eze 31:4). These were undoubtedly the elaborate system of canals that pertained to the Euphrates, and perhaps also to the Tigris. We should notice how the modern crop of perverters of God’s Word, once they start fiddling with the text, branch out in all directions. The Good News Bible, for example translates this verse,
“There was water to make it grow,
And underground rivers to feed it.”
There is not a word in this passage about “underground waters,” which cannot possibly be represented, as in our text, by the word “channels.” What is indicated is that the so-called Good News Bible is giving us Babylonian mythology instead of God’s Word!
Having emended Assyria into cedar, Cooke then proceeded to translate it “pine tree,” better to fit Egypt. This is another excellent example of how one emendation always leads to others. However, Cooke admitted that, “Nothing could be less suggestive of the land Egypt than the tall cedar trees and scenery of Lebanon. It is sad, however, that he missed the point, namely that the description here is not of Egypt at all, but of Assyria.
The extravagant glory of the great Assyrian empire is fittingly represented here as being the envy even of those trees that God had planted in the garden of Eden. The Assyrian empire had existed since the days of Nimrod; and it was doubtless considered to be as established and permanent as the earth itself; but because of their inordinate pride, cruelty, and sadistic blood-lust, and contrary to all that anyone on earth could possibly have anticipated, they had fallen, totally and completely, to Babylonians in 612 B.C. In Eze 31:18, the prophecy would call upon Pharaoh to accept the meaning of that event to him and to Egypt.
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
The fifth prophecy was directed against the greatness of Pharaoh. Ezekiel was commanded to address himself to Pharaoh and his multitudes. This he did, first by describing his greatness. He fist asked, “Whom art thou like in thy greatness?” To this inquiry he replied by describing the greatness of the Assyrian, the intention evidently being that Pharaoh should apply that description to himself. The greatness of Assyria was set forth under the figure of a stately tree in Lebanon, overtopping all the rest, nourished by the waters that ran about its roots, so great that all the fowls took refuge in its branches and the beasts of the earth beneath its shadow, so fair that all the trees of Eden envied him.
The prophet then foretold the destruction of this greatness, first by the same figure, and then by a graphic and awful picture of the descent of Pharaoh into Sheol. The fallen tree, with its broken branches lying by all the water courses, so that the fowls of the heaven dwelt in the ruin and the beasts lay down on the branches, set forth the earthly side of the destruction of Egypt. So great had the power of Egypt been that when Pharaoh and his hosts descended to the underworld all nature was moved. The waters were stayed, and Lebanon mourned, while yet the trees of Eden were comforted. The direct application of these figures to Pharaoh closed the fifth prophecy.
Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible
Chapter Thirty-one
Assyrias Pride And Fall
In this chapter God, through His prophet, in a message given about two months later than the previous predictions, directs the attention of Pharaoh and his people to the judgment that had already fallen upon Assyria in order that Egypt might learn therefrom the folly of self-exaltation and independence of God. Assyria and Egypt had been the two greatest dominions in the world of their day prior to the meteor-like rise of the Babylonian empire. At one time it seemed as though Assyria was destined to rule the world, but that was not Gods plan. The day came when this great kingdom was utterly destroyed, and Chaldea became the outstanding Asiatic power, as Egypt was the outstanding African kingdom. The same God who had dealt with Assyria was now dealing with Egypt; and He called upon Pharaoh to learn a lesson from that which had taken place in Mesopotamia in order that he himself might be humbled before God ere the predicted judgment fell in all its fury upon him.
And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month, in the first day of the month, that the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying, Son of man, say unto Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to his multitude: Whom art thou like in thy greatness? Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a forest-like shade, and of high stature; and its top was among the thick boughs. The waters nourished it, the deep made it to grow: the rivers thereof ran round about its plantation; and it sent out its channels unto all the trees of the field. Therefore its stature was exalted above all the trees of the field; and its boughs were multiplied, and its branches became long by reason of many waters, when it shot them forth. All the birds of the heavens made their nests in its boughs; and under its branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young; and under its shadow dwelt all great nations. Thus was it fair in its greatness, in the length of its branches; for its root was by many waters. The cedars in the garden of God could not hide it; the fir-trees were not like its boughs, and the plane-trees were not as its branches; nor was any tree in the garden of God like unto it in its beauty. I made it fair by the multitude of its branches, so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied it-vers. 1-9.
The Assyrians were likened to a great cedar in Lebanon with outstretched branches and a forest-like shade under which the beasts of the field might find refuge, and in whose branches the birds of the heaven might build their nests. The same figure was afterwards used of Babylon as headed up in Nebuchadnezzar; and in a somewhat different way, a similar figure was used by our Lord Jesus Christ later on to depict the great world church which was to be developed as a result of the corruption of the Church by religious politics. This is seen in the parable of the mustard tree.
Assyria included that portion of Asia in which the garden of Eden originally had its place. It was a great oasis between the two rivers, the Euphrates and the Tigris, and just as Egypt was dependent upon the Nile so was Assyria dependent upon these mighty streams.
From a small beginning a vast empire had been built up in central Asia-an empire which one might have supposed would have stood for many centuries, but when it came to the height of its power its kings were so inflated with a sense of their own superiority and so carried away by their dependence upon their false gods that Jehovah dealt with them in judgment; and Nineveh and all the great cities of Assyria fell before vast floods and invading armies. Thus Babylon came to the front soon to assume world-dominion. Let Egypt learn from the fate of Assyria the folly of vaunting itself against God.
Therefore thus said the Lord Jehovah: Because thou art exalted in stature, and he hath set his top among the thick boughs, and his heart is lifted up in his height; I will even deliver him into the hand of the mighty one of the nations; he shall surely deal with him; I have driven him out for his wickedness. And strangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off, and have left him: upon the mountains and in all the valleys his branches are fallen, and his boughs are broken by all the watercourses of the land; and all the peoples of the earth are gone down from his shadow, and have left him. Upon his ruin all the birds of the heavens shall dwell, and all the beasts of the field shall be upon his branches; to the end that none of all the trees by the waters exalt themselves in their stature, neither set their top among the thick boughs, nor that their mighty ones stand up in their height, even all that drink water: for they are all delivered unto death, to the nether parts of the earth, in the midst of the children of men, with them that go down to the pit-vers. 10-16.
In this particular section God speaks retrospectively. Some have thought that these verses apply directly to Egypt inasmuch as Assyria had already fallen to rise no more until the coming day when this great kingdom will be revived under Messiahs reign to share with Israel and with Egypt in the glory of Christs earthly kingdom. Of this we read in Isa 19:24. It seems clear that the prophet is still directing the attention of Pharaoh to that which God had wrought in connection with Assyria in order that he might learn a much-needed lesson as to his own utter inability to fight successfully against Jehovah. These verses depict the judgment that came on Assyria and carry us on to the doom of its leaders in the unseen world. We read, They are all delivered unto death, to the nether parts of the earth, in the midst of the children of men, with them that go down to the pit.
God had declared in Psa 9:17, The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God. Hell here is not the lake of fire, the final doom of the unsaved, but it is the same as Hades in the New Testament, the place of departed spirits awaiting the final day of judgment. In that dark abode can be found all who have fought against God and died unrepentant, and all who have lived in neglect of His Holy Word and forgotten their obligations to walk in obedience to the revelation He has given. There are those who insist that Sheol is but the grave; but it speaks of something deeper far than any tomb. Men may build sepulchers and possess them themselves, but Sheol is the abode of the spirits that have to do with God after the death of the body. Verses 15 to 17 confirm this.
Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: in the day when he went down to Sheol I caused a mourning: I covered the deep for him, and I restrained the rivers thereof; and the great waters were stayed; and I caused Lebanon to mourn for him, and all the trees of the field fainted for him. I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to Sheol with them that descend into the pit; and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, were comforted in the nether parts of the earth. They also went down into Sheol with him unto them that are slain by the sword; yea, they that were his arm, that dwelt under his shadow in the midst of the nations-vers. 15-17.
The nations that had been in alliance with Assyria were struck dumb with astonishment and made to tremble in fear as those at the head of that mighty dominion were cut off with the sword and went down under divine judgment into Sheol-there to await the day when they would answer before God for their arrogant pride.
The reference to the trees of Eden has to do, as intimated, with the fact that the location of Eden as given in Genesis was the same as that of Assyria afterward. No people had been able to stand against Nebuchadnezzar. Destroyed by the triumphant Chaldean armies they, too, went down into Sheol with Assyria, unto those who before them had been slain by the sword. What hope then had Egypt to withstand the power of the Chaldeans when it was God Himself who had decreed that they should be used to visit judgment upon all nations!
To whom art thou thus like in glory and in greatness among the trees of Eden? Yet shalt thou be brought down with the trees of Eden unto the nether parts of the earth: thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised, with them that are slain by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, saith the Lord Jehovah-ver. 18.
Let Pharaoh learn from what had taken place in Asia and understand that however he might seek to guard against destruction, so long as he lifted himself up against the God of Israel he but exposed himself to the same doom as that which had overtaken Assyria. This, says the prophet, is Pharaoh and all his multitude, for they, too, must suffer in the same way as their great sister kingdom.
Fuente: Commentaries on the New Testament and Prophets
Eze 31:1-18. Pharaohs greatness is described in the first part of the chapter (Eze 31:1-9). He is compared to the Assyrian, once so powerful and proud. The fall and desolation of the proud monarch under the picture of a tree follows in Eze 31:10-14. The overthrow of Egypt and the resulting consternation among the nations is predicted in the last section of this chapter (Eze 31:15-18).
Eze 32:1-32. The lamentation over Pharaoh is contained in Eze 32:1-10, followed by the final announcement of the sword of the King of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, in Eze 32:11-16. The most interesting part in this last chapter of these great predictions of national judgments is the funeral dirge and the unveiling of the unseen world (Eze 32:17-32).
Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)
third month
i.e. June.
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
in the eleventh: On Sunday, June 19, am 3416, according to Usher; and about a month before the capture of Jerusalem. Eze 1:2, Eze 30:20, Jer 52:5, Jer 52:6
Reciprocal: Eze 8:1 – in the sixth year Eze 20:1 – in the seventh Eze 24:1 – the ninth year
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Eze 31:1. The present message is dated in the same year that the one against Tyrus has, and it means the eleventh year after Ezekiel was taken to Babylon.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Eze 31:1-2. In the eleventh year, in the third month, &c. This was another revelation upon the subject of the destruction of Egypt, imparted two months after that which is mentioned in the conclusion of the foregoing chapter. Whom art thou like in thy greatness? Thou pridest thyself, as if there never was any prince or king that could compare with thee. The prophet here asks a question, not to receive an answer from Pharaoh, but to answer it himself, as he does in the next and following verses, wherein he acquaints the king of Egypt that the king of Assyria was equally as powerful as he, and yet came to a miserable end; from whence he might learn, that he had no security for the continuance of his grandeur, but might be soon cast down as the king of Assyria had been.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Eze 31:1. In the eleventh year, in the third month, in the first day, about a month before Jerusalem was taken by storm.
Eze 31:3; Eze 31:8. The Assyrian was a (tall) cedar. The Vulgate reads, none of the cedars in the paradise of God were taller or fairer than he. A fine figure of the Babylonian empire.
As the heights of Lebanon are the soil congenial to the cedar, this text favours the ancient opinion, that paradise was seated on a mountain, which would be the earliest land fit for habitation; and not cold, because the highest mountain had at that time only a small elevation above the seas. This idea relieves geology of the darkness which involves the formation of secondary rocks. They succeed the primitive rocks, which are massive; whereas the secondary are tabular, and often mixed with organic remains; and particularly so in the superior formations. The retirement of the waters from the continuous elevation of the mountains by subterranean crystalization, would give time for the secondary rocks to form in all their genera, species, families, and varieties. In the district from Bristol rocks to Chippenham hills, after a residence of seven years on the ground, I perceive the following order of the larger strata.
(1) The granite at the mouth of the Avon.
(2) The mountain limestone.
(3) The puddingstone.
(4) The oldest red sandstone, and the whiter sandstone.
(5) The oldest marine coal in the deep pits of Clandown.
(6) The recent marine coal of Kingswood to the vicinity of Bath.
(7) The shelly or brown limestone, full of organic remains.
(8) The oolite, or fine stone for masonry, lying in couches, and always approached with rubble.
(9) The chalk.
(10) The red ground with quartzose rocks, and timber coal, and organic remains floated from the torrid zones, as in Dudley, with veins of recent sandstone superposed.
All these formations were effectuated by the Noachial deluge, and subsequent inundations. Of the gradual retirement of the ocean, the whole face of nature is replete with proof. What need then of myriads of ages before the birth of man?
Eze 31:6. The fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs. The nations which formed alliances with Babylon are his branches, the long arms of his power.
Eze 31:12. Strangers, the Medes, have cut him off. The allegory of the fall of Babylon is continued, by the lopping off the branches, and the final fall of this vast cedar.
Eze 31:14; Eze 31:18. Thou shalt be brought downto the nether parts of the earth: thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised. The prophet returns here from the cedar of Babylon to the king of Egypt, who shall fall with his armies before the Chaldeans; yea, their souls, it would seem, should go to the shades beneath; for when the scriptures speak of the death of a good man, they say that he was gathered to his people. Virgil, in like manner, neid 6., represents the wicked who fall in war, as going to Tartarus, the kingdom of Pluto. This idea of the final justice of God operates in deterring men from crimes, and demonstrates the righteousness of the supreme Being. Yet it does not exclude any one from the grace of true repentance.
REFLECTIONS.
How dreadfully do the wicked scourge one another. Israel must be the first to fall. Then Egypt her ally, then Babylon, then Persia, then Greece, and lastly, the iron power of Rome. These empires sunk in succession like the mighty swells of the ocean, and but faintly left their traces behind. They fell by the overflowing scourge, which came suddenly upon them, and involved the rich and the poor in one common ruin. But the poor, who may survive, have some resources in the labours of their hands.
Lay not up then, oh my soul, thy treasures in earthly banks; build not thy mansion on the sand. Blessed is the man who has the Lord for his rock, and trusts alone in his salvation.
Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Ezekiel 31. Fallen is the Mighty Cedar.In this striking poem, Pharaoh (= Egypt) is likened to a cedar of surprising height and beauty, fed by the waters of the deep (i.e. the Nile) and giving shelter to birds and beasts (i.e. protection to dependent peoples). For beauty, height, luxuriance no tree (= nation) could compare with itit was the envy of all (Eze 31:1-9). (In Eze 31:3 delete the Assyrian, and read simply, there was a cedar, etc. For thick boughs read clouds with LXX. In Eze 31:4 for the trees of the field, read its soil.)
But the mighty Nebuchadrezzar, with his terrible army, will send it crashing with a blow, boughs and branches will be scattered over mountain and valley, those whom once it sheltered will sit in triumph on its ruins; and its fate will serve as a warning to others not to lift themselves haughtily (Eze 31:10-14). (In Eze 31:12 watercourses = ravines. In Eze 31:14 the trees = nations.)
Eze 31:15-18. Its fall would be widely mournedby Lebanon, on which it grew, and by the waters, which nourished it. Others fainted away at the thought that the like might happen to themselves. The trees (i.e. the other dead nations) in the underworld would be comforted to find this mighty cedar (Egypt) sharing their fate. Thus would this incomparable treePharaoh and his multitudebe brought down: like the unburied slain they would lie dishonoured in the underworld. (In Eze 31:15 omit I covered, and read, I caused the deep to mourn for him. Eze 31:16. Hell, i.e. Sheol, the underworld. Eze 31:17. They that were his arm, read perhaps his helpers. Eze 31:18. Circumcision was important in Egypt: this explains the peculiar horror of their fate in Sheol.)
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
31:1 And it came to pass in the {a} eleventh year, in the third [month], in the first [day] of the month, [that] the word of the LORD came to me, saying,
(a) Of Zedekiah’s reign, or of Jeconiah’s captivity.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
A poem extolling Assyria’s glory 31:1-9
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
The Lord gave Ezekiel a third oracle against Egypt on June 21, 587 B.C., less than two months after the previous one (Eze 30:20-26). [Note: Parker and Dubberstein, p. 28.]
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
EGYPT
Eze 29:1-21; Eze 30:1-26; Eze 31:1-18; Eze 32:1-32
EGYPT figures in the prophecies of Ezekiel as a great world-power cherishing projects of universal dominion. Once more, as in the age of Isaiah, the ruling factor in Asiatic politics was the duel for the mastery of the world between the rival empires of the Nile and the Euphrates. The influence of Egypt was perhaps even greater in the beginning of the sixth century than it had been in the end of the eighth, although in the interval it had suffered a signal eclipse. Isaiah (chapter 19) had predicted a subjugation of Egypt by the Assyrians, and this prophecy had been fulfilled in the year 672, when Esarhaddon invaded the country and incorporated it in the Assyrian empire. He divided its territory into twenty petty principalities governed by Assyrian or native rulers, and this state of things had lasted with little change for a generation. During the reign of Asshurbanipal Egypt was frequently overrun by Assyrian armies, and the repeated attempts of the Ethiopian monarchs, aided by revolts among the native princes, to reassert their sovereignty over the Nile Valley were all foiled by the energy of the Assyrian king or the vigilance of his generals. At last, however, a new era of prosperity dawned for Egypt about the year 645. Psammetichus, the ruler of Sais, with the help of foreign mercenaries, succeeded in uniting the whole land under his sway; he expelled the Assyrian garrison, and became the founder of the brilliant twenty-sixth (Saite) dynasty. From this time Egypt possessed in a strong central administration the one indispensable condition of her material prosperity. Her power was consolidated by a succession of vigorous rulers, and she immediately began to play a leading part in the affairs of Asia. The most distinguished king of the dynasty was Necho II, the son and successor of Psammetichus. Two striking facts mentioned by Herodotus are worthy of mention, as showing the originality and vigour with which the Egyptian administration was at this time conducted. One is the project of cutting a canal between the Nile and the Red Sea, an undertaking which was abandoned by Necho in consequence of an oracle warning him that he was only working for the advantage of foreigners-meaning no doubt the Phoenicians. Necho, however, knew how to turn the Phoenician seamanship to good account, as is proved by the other great stroke of genius with which he is credited-the circumnavigation of Africa. It was a Phoenician fleet, despatched from Suez by his orders, which first rounded the Cape of Good Hope, returning to Egypt by the straits of Gibraltar after a three years voyage. And if Necho was less successful in war than in the arts of peace, it was not from want of activity. He was the Pharaoh who defeated Josiah in the plain of Megiddo, and afterwards contested the lordship of Syria with Nebuchadnezzar. His defeat at Carchemish in 604 compelled him to retire to his own land; but the power of Egypt was still unbroken, and the Chaldaean king knew that he would yet have to reckon with her in his schemes for the conquest of Palestine.
At the time to which these prophecies belong the king of Egypt was Pharaoh Hophra (in Greek, Apries), the grandson of Necho II Ascending the throne in 588 B.C., he found it necessary for the protection of his own interests to take an active part in the politics of Syria. He is said to have attacked Phoenicia by sea and land, capturing Sidon and defeating a Tyrian fleet in a naval engagement. His object must have been to secure the ascendency of the Egyptian party in the Phoenician cities; and the stubborn resistance which Nebuchadnezzar encountered from Tyre was no doubt the result of the political arrangements made by Hophra after his victory. No armed intervention was needed to ensure a spirited defence of Jerusalem; and it was only after the Babylonians were encamped around the city that Hophra sent an Egyptian army to its relief. He was unable, however, to effect more than a temporary suspension of the siege, and returned to Egypt, leaving Judah to its fate, apparently without venturing on a battle. {Jer 37:5-7} No further hostilities between Egypt and Babylon are recorded during the lifetime of Hophra. He continued to reign with vigour and success till 571, when he was dethroned by Amasis, one of his own generals.
These circumstances show a remarkable parallel to the political situation with which Isaiah had to deal at the time of Sennacheribs invasion. Judah was again in the position of the “earthen pipkin between two iron pots.” It is certain that neither Jehoiakim nor Zedekiah, any more than the advisers of Hezekiah in the earlier period, would have embarked on a conflict with the Mesopotamian empire but for delusive promises of Egyptian support. There was the same vacillation and division of counsels in Jerusalem, the same dilatoriness on the part of Egypt, and the same futile effort to retrieve a desperate situation after the favourable moment had been allowed to slip. In both cases the conflict was precipitated by the triumph of an Egyptian party in the Judaean court; and it is probable that in both cases the king was coerced into a policy of which his judgment did not approve. And the prophets of the later period, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, adhere closely to the lines laid down by Isaiah in the time of Sennacherib, warning the people against putting their trust in the vain help of Egypt, and counselling passive submission to the course of events which expressed the unalterable judgment of the Almighty. Ezekiel indeed borrows an image that had been current in the days of Isaiah in order to set forth the utter untrustworthiness and dishonesty of Egypt towards the nations who were induced to rely on her power. He compares her to a staff of reed, which breaks when one grasps it, piercing the hand and making the loins to totter when it is leant upon. Such had Egypt been to Israel through all her history, and such she will again prove herself to be in her last attempt to use Israel as the tool of her selfish designs. The great difference between Ezekiel and Isaiah is that, whereas Isaiah had access to the councils of Hezekiah and could bring his influence to bear on the inception of schemes of state, not without hope of averting what he saw to be a disastrous decision, Ezekiel could only watch the development of events from afar, and throw his warnings into the form of predictions of the fate in store for Egypt.
The oracles against Egypt are seven in number:
(1) Eze 29:1-16;
(2) Eze 29:17-21;
(3) Eze 30:1-19;
(4) Eze 30:20-26;
(5) Eze 31:1-18.;
(6) Eze 32:1-16;
(7) Eze 32:17-32.
They are all variations of one theme, the annihilation of the power of Egypt by Nebuchadnezzar, and little progress of thought can be traced from the first to the last. Excluding the supplementary prophecy of Eze 29:17-21, which is a later addition, the order appears to be strictly chronological. The series begins seven months before the capture of Jerusalem, {Eze 29:1} and ends about eight months after that event. How far the dates refer to actual occurrences coming to the knowledge of the prophet it is impossible for us to say. It is clear that his interest is centred on the fate of Jerusalem then hanging in the balance; and it is possible that the first oracles {Eze 29:1-16; Eze 30:1-19} may be called forth by the appearance of Hophras army on the scene, while the {Eze 30:20-26} plainly alludes to the repulse of the Egyptians by the Chaldaeans. But no attempt can be made to connect the prophecies with incidents of the campaign; the prophets thoughts are wholly occupied with the moral and religious issues involved in the contest, the vindication of Jehovahs holiness in the overthrow of the great world-power which sought to thwart His purposes.
Eze 29:1-16 is an introduction to all that follows, presenting a general outline of the prophets conceptions of the fate of Egypt. It describes the sin of which she has been guilty, and indicates the nature of the judgment that is to overtake her and her future place among the nations of the world. The Pharaoh is compared to a “great dragon,” wallowing in his native waters, and deeming himself secure from molestation in his reedy haunts. The crocodile was a natural symbol of Egypt, and the image conveys accurately the impression of sluggish and unwieldy strength which Egypt in the days of Ezekiel had long produced on shrewd observers of her policy. Pharaoh is the incarnate genius of the country; and as the Nile was the strength and glory of Egypt, he is here represented as arrogating to himself the ownership and even the creation of the wonderful river. “My river is mine, and I have made it” is the proud and blasphemous thought which expresses his consciousness of a power that owns no superior in earth or heaven. That the Nile was worshipped by the Egyptians with divine honours did not alter the fact that beneath all their ostentatious religious observances there was an immoral sense of irresponsible power in the use of the natural resources to which the land owed its prosperity. For this spirit of ungodly self-exaltation the king and people of Egypt are to be visited with a signal judgment, from which they shall learn who it is that is God over all. The monster of the Nile shall be drawn from his waters with hooks, with all his fishes sticking to his scales, and left to perish ignominiously on the desert sands. The rest of the prophecy (Eze 29:8-16) gives the explanation of the allegory in literal, though still general, terms. The meaning is that Egypt shall be laid waste by the sword, its teeming population led into captivity, and the land shall lie desolate, untrodden by the foot of man or beast for the space of forty years. “From Migdol to Syene”-the extreme limits of the country-the rich valley of the Nile shall be uncultivated and uninhabited for that period of time.
The most interesting feature of the prophecy is the view which is given of the final condition of the Egyptian empire (Eze 29:13-16). In all cases the prophetic delineations of the future of different nations are coloured by the present circumstances of those nations as known to the writers. Ezekiel knew that the fertile soil of Egypt would always be capable of supporting an industrious peasantry, and that her existence did not depend on her continuing to play the role of a great power. Tyre depended on her commerce, and apart from that which was the root of her sin could never be anything but the resort of poor fishermen, who would not even make their dwelling on the barren rock in the midst of the sea. But Egypt could still be a country, though shorn of the glory and power which had made her a snare to the people of God. On the other hand the geographical isolation of the land made it impossible that she should lose her individuality amongst the nations of the world. Unlike the small states, such as Edom and Ammon, which were obviously doomed to be swallowed up by the surrounding population as soon as their power was broken, Egypt would retain her distinct and characteristic life as long as the physical condition of the world remained what it was. Accordingly the prophet does not contemplate an utter annihilation of Egypt, but only a temporary chastisement, succeeded by her permanent degradation to the lowest rank among the kingdoms. The forty years of her desolation represent in round numbers the period of Chaldean supremacy during which Jerusalem lies in ruins. Ezekiel at this time expected the invasion of Egypt to follow soon after the capture of Jerusalem, so that the restoration of the two peoples would be simultaneous. At the end of forty years the whole world will be reorganised on a new basis, Israel occupying the central position as the people of God, and in that new world Egypt shall have a separate but subordinate place. Jehovah will bring back the Egyptians from their captivity, and cause them to return to “Pathros, the land of their origin,” and there make them a “lowly state,” no longer an imperial power, but humbler than the surrounding kingdoms. The righteousness of Jehovah and the interest of Israel alike demand that Egypt should be thus reduced from her former greatness. In the old days her vast and imposing power had been a constant temptation to the Israelites, “a confidence, a reminder of iniquity,” leading them to put their trust in human power and luring them into paths of danger by deceitful promises (Eze 29:6-7). In the final dispensation of history this shall no longer be the case: Israel shall then know Jehovah, and no form of human power shall be suffered to lead their hearts astray from Him who is the rock of their salvation.
Eze 30:1-19.-The judgment on Egypt spreads terror and dismay among all the neighbouring nations. It signalises the advent of the great day of Jehovah, the day of His final reckoning with the powers of evil everywhere. It is the “time of the heathen” that has come (Eze 30:3). Egypt being the chief embodiment of secular power on the basis of pagan religion, the sudden collapse of her might is equivalent to a judgment on heathenism in general, and the moral effect of it conveys to the world a demonstration of the omnipotence of the one true God whom she had ignored and defied. The nations immediately involved in the fall of Egypt are the allies and mercenaries whom she has called to her aid in the time of her calamity. Ethiopians, and Lydians, and Libyans, and Arabs, and Cretans, the “helpers of Egypt,” who have furnished contingents to her motley army, fall by the sword along with her, and their countries share the desolation that overtakes the land of Egypt. Swift messengers are then seen speeding up the Nile in ships to convey to the careless Ethiopians the alarming tidings of the overthrow of Egypt (Eze 30:9). From this point the prophet confines his attention to the fate of Egypt, which he describes with a fulness of detail that implies a certain acquaintance both with the topography and the social circumstances of the country. In Eze 30:10 Nebuchadnezzar and the Chaldaeans are for the first time mentioned by name as the human instruments employed by Jehovah to execute His judgments on Egypt. After the slaughter of the inhabitants the next consequence of the invasion is the destruction of the canals and reservoirs and the decay of the system of irrigation on which the productiveness of the country depended. “The rivers” (canals) “are dried up, and the land is made waste, and the fulness thereof, by the hand of strangers” (Eze 30:12). And with the material fabric of her prosperity the complicated system of religious and civil institutions which was entwined with the hoary civilisation of Egypt vanishes for ever. “The idols are destroyed; the potentates are made to cease from Memphis, and princes from the land of Egypt, so that they shall be no more” (Eze 30:13). Faith in the native gods shall be extinguished, and a trembling fear of Jehovah shall fill the whole land. The passage ends with an enumeration of various centres of the national life, which formed, as it were, the sensitive ganglia where the universal calamity was most acutely felt. On these cities, each of which was identified with the worship of a particular deity, Jehovah executes the judgments, in which He makes known to the Egyptian His sole divinity and destroys their confidence in false gods. They also possessed some special military or political importance, so that with their destruction the sceptres of Egypt were broken and the pride of her strength was laid low (Eze 30:18).
Eze 30:20-26.-A new oracle dated three months later than the preceding. Pharaoh is represented as a combatant, already disabled in one arm and sore pressed by his powerful antagonist, the king of Babylon. Jehovah announces that the wounded arm cannot be healed, although Pharaoh has retired from the contest for that purpose. On the contrary, both his arms shall be broken and the sword struck from his grasp, while the arms of Nebuchadnezzar are strengthened by Jehovah, who puts His own sword into his hand. The land of Egypt, thus rendered defenceless, falls an easy prey to the Chaldaeans, and its people are dispersed among the nations. The occasion of the prophecy is the repulse of Hophras expedition for the relief of Jerusalem, which is referred to as a past event. The date may either mark the actual time of the occurrence, {as in Eze 24:1} or the time when it came to the knowledge of Ezekiel. The prophet at all events accepts this reverse to the Egyptian arms as an earnest of the speedy realisation of his predictions in the total submission of the proud empire of the Nile.
Chapter 31 occupies the same position in the prophecies against Egypt as the allegory of the richly laden ship in those against Tyre (chapter 27). The incomparable majesty and overshadowing power of Egypt are set forth under the image of a lordly cedar in Lebanon, whose top reaches to the clouds and whose branches afford shelter to all the beasts of the earth. The exact force of the allegory is somewhat obscured by a slight error of the text, which must have crept in at a very early period. As it stands in the Hebrew and in all the ancient versions the whole chapter is a description of the greatness not of Egypt but of Assyria. “To whom art thou like in thy greatness?” asks the prophet (Eze 31:2); and the answer is, “Assyria was great as thou art. yet Assyria fell and is no more.” There is thus a double comparison: Assyria is compared to a cedar, and then Egypt is tacitly compared to Assyria. This interpretation may not be altogether indefensible. That the fate of Assyria contained a warning against the pride of Pharaoh is a thought in itself intelligible, and such as Ezekiel might very well have expressed. But if he had wished to express it he would not have done it so awkwardly as this interpretation supposes. When we follow the connection of ideas we cannot fail to see that Assyria is not in the prophets thoughts at all. The image is consistently pursued without a break to the end of the chapter, and then we learn that the subject of the description is “Pharaoh and all his multitude” (Eze 31:18). But if the writer is thinking of Egypt at the end, he must have been thinking of it from the beginning, and the mention of Assyria is out of place and misleading. The confusion has been caused by the substitution of the word “Asshur” (in Eze 31:3) for “Tasshur,” the name of the sherbin tree, itself a species of cedar. We should therefore read, “Behold a Tasshur, a cedar in Lebanon,” etc.; and the answer to the question of Eze 31:2 is that the position of Egypt is as unrivalled among the kingdoms of the world as this stately tree among the trees of the forest.
With this alteration the course of thought is perfectly clear, although incongruous elements are combined in the representation. The towering height of the cedar with its top in the clouds symbolises the imposing might of Egypt and its ungodly pride (cf. Eze 31:10, Eze 31:14). The waters of the flood which nourish its roots are those of the Nile, the source of Egypts wealth and greatness. The birds that build their nests in its branches and the beasts that bring forth their young under its shadow are the smaller nations that looked to Egypt for protection and support. Finally, the trees in the garden of God who envy the luxuriant pride of this monarch of the forest represent the other great empires of the earth who vainly aspired to emulate the prosperity and magnificence of Egypt (Eze 31:3-9).
In the next strophe (Eze 31:10-14) we see the great trunk lying prone across mountain and valley, while its branches lie broken in all the water-courses. A “mighty one of the nations” (Nebuchadnezzar) has gone up against it, and felled it to the earth. The nations have been scared from under its shadow; and the tree which “but yesterday might have stood against the world” now lies prostrate and dishonoured-“none so poor as do it reverence.” And the fall of the cedar reveals a moral principle and conveys a moral lesson to all other proud and stately trees, its purpose is to remind the other great empires that they too are mortal, and to warn them against the soaring ambition and lifting up of the heart which had brought about the humiliation of Egypt: “that none of the trees by the water should exalt themselves in stature or shoot their tops between the clouds, and that their mighty ones should not stand proudly in their loftiness (all who are fed by water); for they are all delivered to death, to the underworld with the children of men, to those that go down to the pit.” In reality there is no more impressive intimation of the vanity of earthly glory than the decay of those mighty empires and civilisations which once stood in the van of human progress; nor is there a fitter emblem of their fate than the sudden crash of some great forest tree before the woodmans axe.
The development of the prophets thought, however, here reaches a point where it breaks through the allegory, which has been hitherto consistently maintained. All nature shudders in sympathy with the fallen cedar: the deep mourns and withholds her screams from the earth; Lebanon is clothed with blackness, and all the trees languish. Egypt was so much a part of the established order that the world does not know itself when she has vanished. While this takes place on earth, the cedar itself has gone down to Sheol, where the other shades of vanished dynasties are comforted because this mightiest of them all has become like to the rest. This is the answer to the question that introduced the allegory. To whom art thou like? None is fit to be compared to thee; yet “thou shalt be brought down with the trees of Eden to the lower parts of the earth, thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised, with them that are slain of the sword.” It is needless to enlarge on this idea, which is out of keeping here, and is more adequately treated in the next chapter.
Chapter 32 consists of two lamentations to be chanted over the fall of Egypt by the prophet and the daughters of the nations (Eze 32:16, Eze 32:18). The first (Eze 32:1-16) describes the destruction of Pharaoh, and the effect which is produced on earth; while the second (Eze 32:17-32) follows his shade into the abode of the dead, and expatiates on the welcome that awaits him there. Both express the spirit of exultation over a fallen foe, which was one of the uses to which elegiac poetry was turned amongst the Hebrews. The first passage, however, can hardly be considered a dirge in any proper sense of the word. It is essential to a true elegy that the subject of it should be conceived as dead, and that whether serious or ironical it should celebrate a glory that has passed away. In this case the elegiac note (of the elegiac “measure” there is hardly a trace) is just struck in the opening line: “O young lion of the nations!” (How) “art thou undone!” But this is not sustained: the passage immediately falls into the style of direct prediction and threatening, and is indeed closely parallel to the opening prophecy of the series (chapter 29). The fundamental image is the same: that of a great Nile monster spouting from his nostrils and fouling the waters with his feet (Eze 32:2). His capture by many nations and his lingering death on the open field are described with the realistic and ghastly details naturally suggested by the figure (Eze 32:3-6). The image is then abruptly changed in order to set forth the effect of so great a calamity on the world of nature and of mankind. Pharaoh is compared to a brilliant luminary, whose sudden extinction is followed by a darkening of all the lights of heaven and by consternation amongst the nations and kings of earth (Eze 32:7-10). It is thought by some that the violence of the transition is to be explained by the idea of the heavenly constellation of the dragon, answering to the dragon of the Nile, to which Egypt has just been likened. Finally all metaphors are abandoned, and the desolation of Egypt is announced in literal terms as accomplished by the sword of the king of Babylon and the “most terrible of the nations” (Eze 32:11-16).
But all the foregoing oracles are surpassed in grandeur of conception by the remarkable Vision of Hades which concludes the series-“one of the most weird passages in literature” (Davidson). In form it is a dirge supposed to be sung at the burial of Pharaoh and his host by the prophet along with the daughters of famous nations (Eze 32:18). But the theme, as has been already observed, is the entrance of the deceased warriors into the under-world, and their reception by the shades that have gone down thither before them. In order to understand it we must bear in mind some features of the conception of the underworld, which it is difficult for the modern mind to realise distinctly. First. of all, Sheol, or the “pit,” the realm of the dead, is pictured to the imagination as an adumbration of the grave or sepulchre, in which the body finds its last resting-place; or rather it is the aggregate of all the burying-grounds scattered over the earths surface. There the shades are grouped according to their clans and nationalities, just as on earth the members of the same family would usually be interred in one burying-place. The grave of the chief or king, the representative of the nation, is surrounded by those of his vassals and subjects, earthly distinctions being thus far preserved. The condition of the dead appears to be one of rest or sleep; yet they retain some consciousness of their state, and are visited at least by transient gleams of human emotion, as when in this chapter the heroes rouse themselves to address the Pharaoh when he comes among them. The most material point is that the state of the soul in Hades reflects the fate of the body after death. Those who have received the honour of decent burial on earth enjoy a corresponding honour among the shades below. They have, as it were, a definite status and individuality in their eternal abode, whilst the spirits of the unburied slain are laid in the lowest recesses of the pit, in the limbo of the uncircumcised. On this distinction the whole significance of the passage before us seems to depend. The dead are divided into two great classes: on the one hand the “mighty ones,” who lie in state with their weapons of war around them; and on the other hand the multitude of “the uncircumcised, slain by the sword”-i.e., those who have perished on the field of battle and been buried promiscuously without due funeral rites. There is, however, no moral distinction between the two classes. The heroes are not in a state of blessedness; nor is the condition of the uncircumcised one of acute suffering. The whole of existence in Sheol is essentially of one character; it is on the whole a pitiable existence, destitute of joy and of all that makes up the fulness of life on earth. Only there is “within that deep a lower deep,” and it is reserved for those who in the manner of their death have experienced the penalty of great wickedness. The moral truth of Ezekiels representation lies here. The real judgment of Egypt was enacted in the historical scene of its final overthrow; and it is the consciousness of this tremendous visitation of divine justice, perpetuated amongst the shades to all eternity, that gives ethical significance to the lot assigned to the nation in the other world. At the same time it should not be overlooked that the passage is in the highest degree poetical, and cannot be taken as an exact statement of what was known or believed about the state after death in Old Testament times. It deals only with the fate of armies and nationalities and great warriors who filled the earth with their renown. These, having vanished from history, preserve through all, time in the underworld the memory of Jehovahs mighty acts of judgment; but it is impossible to determine whether this sublime vision implies a real belief in the persistence of national identities in the region of the dead.
These, then, are the principal ideas on which the ode is based, and the course of thought is as follows. Eze 32:18 briefly announces the occasion for which the dirge is composed; it is to celebrate the passage of Pharaoh and his host to the lower world, and consign him to his appointed place there. Then follows a scene which has a certain resemblance to a well-known representation in the fourteenth chapter of Isaiah (Isa 14:9-11). The heroes who occupy the place of honour among the dead are supposed to rouse themselves at the approach of this great multitude, and hailing them from the midst of Sheol, direct them to their proper place amongst the dishonoured slain. “The mighty ones speak to him: Be thou in the recesses of the pit: whom dost thou excel in beauty? Go down and be laid to rest with the uncircumcised, in the midst of them that are slain with the sword.” Thither Pharaoh has been preceded by other great conquerors who once set their terror in the earth, but now bear their shame amongst those that go down to the pit. For there is Asshur and all his company; there too are Elam and Meshech and Tubal, each occupying its own allotment amongst nations that have perished by the sword (Eze 32:22-26). Not theirs is the enviable lot of the heroes of old time who went down to Sheol in their panoply of war, and rest with their swords under their heads and their shields covering their bones. And so Egypt, which has perished like these other nations, must be banished with them to the bottom of the pit (Eze 32:27-28). The enumeration of the nations of the uncircumcised is then resumed; Israels immediate neighbours are amongst them-Edom and the dynasties of the north (the Syrians), and the Phoenicians, inferior states which played no great part as conquerors, but nevertheless perished in battle and bear their humiliation along with the others (Eze 32:29-30). These are to be Pharaohs companions in his last resting-place, and at the sight of them he will lay aside his presumptuous thoughts and comfort himself over the loss of his mighty army (Eze 32:31 f.).
It is necessary to say a few words in conclusion about the historical evidence for the fulfilment of these prophecies on Egypt. The supplementary oracle of Eze 29:17-21 shows us that the threatened invasion by Nebuchadnezzar had not taken place sixteen years after the fall of Jerusalem. Did it ever take place at all? Ezekiel was at that time confident that his words were on the point of being fulfilled, and indeed he seems to stake his credit with his hearers on their verification. Can we suppose that he was entirely mistaken? Is it likely that the remarkably definite predictions uttered both by him and Jeremiah {Jer 43:8-13; Jer 44:12-14; Jer 44:27-30; Jer 46:13-26} failed of even the partial fulfilment which that on Tyre received? A number of critics have strongly maintained that we are shut up by the historical evidence to this conclusion, They rely chiefly on the silence of Herodotus, and on the unsatisfactory character of the statement of Josephus. The latter writer is indeed sufficiently explicit in his affirmations. He tells us that five years after the capture of Jerusalem Nebuchadnezzar invaded Egypt, put to death the reigning king, appointed another in his stead, and carried the Jewish refugees in Egypt captive to Babylon. But it is pointed out that the date is impossible, being inconsistent with Ezekiels own testimony, that the account of the death of Hophra is contradicted by what we know of the matter from other sources (Herodotus and Diodorus), and that the whole passage bears the appearance of a translation into history of the prophecies of Jeremiah which it professes to substantiate. That is vigorous criticism, but the vigour is perhaps not altogether unwarrantable, especially as Josephus does not mention any authority. Other allusions by secular writers hardly count for much, and the state of the question is such that historians would probably have been content to confess their ignorance if the credit of a prophet had not been mixed up with it.
Within the last seventeen years, however, a new turn has been given to the discussion through the discovery of monumental evidence which was thought to have an important bearing on the point in dispute. In the same volume of an Egyptological magazine Wiedemann directed the attention of scholars to two inscriptions, one in the Louvre and the other in the British Museum, both of which he considered to furnish proof of an occupation of Egypt by Nebuchadnezzar. The first was an Egyptian inscription of the reign of Hophra. It was written by an official of the highest rank, named “Nes-hor,” to whom was entrusted the responsible task of defending Egypt on its southern or Ethiopian frontier. According to Wiedemanns translation, it relates among other things an irruption of Asiatic bands (Syrians, people of the north, Asiatics), which penetrated as far as the first cataract, and did some damage to the temple of Chnum in Elephantine. There they were checked by Nes-hor, and afterwards they were crushed or repelled by Hophra himself. Now the most natural explanation of this incident, in connection with the circumstances of the time, would seem to be that Nebuchadnezzar, finding himself fully occupied for the present with the siege of Tyre, incited roving bands of Arabs and Syrians to plunder Egypt, and that they succeeded so far as to penetrate to the extreme south of the country. But a more recent examination of the text, by Maspero and Brugsch, reduces the incident to much smaller dimensions. They find that it refers to a mutiny of Egyptian mercenaries (Syrians, Ionians, and Bedouins) stationed on the southern frontier. The governor, Nes-hor, congratulates himself on a successful stratagem by which he got the rebels into a position where they were cut down by the kings troops. In any case it is evident that it falls very far short of a confirmation of Ezekiels prophecy. Not only is there no mention of Nebuchadnezzar or a regular Babylonian army, but the invaders or mutineers are actually said to have been annihilated by Hophra. It may be said, no doubt, that an Egyptian governor was likely to be silent about an event which cast discredit on his countrys arms, and would be tempted to magnify some temporary success into a decisive victory. But still the inscription must be taken for what it is worth, and the story it tells is certainly not the story of a Chaldean supremacy in the valley of the Nile. The only thing that suggests a connection between the two is the general probability that a campaign against Egypt must have been contemplated by Nebuchadnezzar about that time.
The second and more important document is a cuneiform fragment of the annals of Nebuchadnezzar. It is unfortunately in a very mutilated condition, and all that the Assyriologists have made out is that in the thirty-seventh year of his reign Nebuchadnezzar fought a battle with the king of Egypt. As the words of the inscription are those of Nebuchadnezzar himself, we may presume that the battle ended in a victory for him, and a few disconnected words in the latter part are thought to refer to the tribute or booty which he acquired. The thirty-seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar is the year 568 B.C., about two years after the date of Ezekiels last utterance against Egypt. The Egyptian king at this time was Amasis, whose name (only the last syllable of which is legible) is supposed to be that mentioned in the inscription. What the ulterior consequences of this victory were on Egyptian history, or how long the Babylonian domination lasted, we cannot at present say. These are questions on which we may reasonably look for further light from the researches of Assyriology. In the meantime it appears to be established beyond reasonable doubt that Nebuchadnezzar did attack Egypt, and the probable issue of his expedition was in accordance with Ezekiels last prediction: “Behold, I give to Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, the land of Egypt; and he shall spoil her spoil, and plunder her plunder, and it shall be the wages for his army”. {Eze 29:19} There can of course be no question of a fulfilment of the earlier prophecies in their literal terms. History knows nothing of a total captivity of the population of Egypt, or a blank of forty years in her annals when her land was untrodden by the foot of man or of beast. These are details belonging to the dramatic form in which the prophet clothed the spiritual lesson which it was necessary to impress on his countrymen-the inherent weakness of the Egyptian empire as a power based on material resources and rearing itself in opposition to the great ends of Gods kingdom. And it may well have been that for the illustration of that truth the humiliation that Egypt endured at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar was as effective as her total destruction would have been.