EZEKIEL – CHAPTER 47

THE RIVER OF THE WATER OF LIFE FROM THE TEMPLE

Verses 1-12:

Verse 1 certifies that the Lord then led Ezekiel by vision to the door of the house of the Lord, the temple; There he beheld waters coming forth from beneath the threshold, below the foundation of the house, facing the east. The waters came from down under or beneath, from the right side of the house, at the south side of the brazen altar or altar of sacrifice, Psa 46:4; Joe 3:18; Zec 13:1; Zec 14:8. This appears to be a symbol of the river proceeding from the throne of the Lamb, as foretold, Rev 22:1; Even the desert places are to be made fruitful by this stream, Isa 35:1.

Verse 2 adds that Ezekiel was then led out by way of the north gate, to the outer gate, by the way that looketh eastward. From there he beheld waters flowing from the right side, flowing eastward into the brook Kedron, toward the Dead Sea, making a mighty flowing river, supplied by an artesian fountain of supernatural source, from the temple of Jerusalem.

Verse 3 reminds that the one showing these things to Ezekiel was the man that had the line (measuring reed) in his hand, as he. went on out from the temple area eastward. He measured a thousand cubits and led Ezekiel through the waters that were ankle deep, Eze 40:3; Zec 2:1; Rev 11:1; Rev 21:15.

Verse 4 continues the eastward measurements of the temple flowing waters. At one thousand further cubits away, the depth of the waters in Kedron, came to the knees; And at a third thousand cubits from the temple, the water reached to Ezekiel’s loins, almost deep enough to swim in.

Verse 5 certifies that afterward he measured a thousand and brought Ezekiel through the waters, protecting him from drowning; For it was risen and had become a river deep enough to swim in, and a river Ezekiel could not cross, except by Divine aid, as helped by the Divine measuring messenger of God, Heb 1:14.

Verse 6 certifies that the minister of God asked Ezekiel if he had seen what he had been shown, and received a real vision of future, Divine provision for his people, the people of God. Then he was brought back to the brink of the river for an enlargement of the vision revelation.

Verse 7 states that when Ezekiel returned to the river bank he beheld many trees on each bank of the river, growing, sustained by the ever-flowing waters, Psa 1:3; Rev 22:2. There was not one tree of life, as in Paradise, but many, Hebrews ch. 2; See also Isa 41:19; Isa 60:21; Isa 61:3; Psa 91:12.

Verse 8 explained that these waters with a fountain head from beneath the holy temple, flowing eastward through the deserts of Judea into the Dead Sea, would cause the Dead Sea waters to be healed or made clean and palatable, to grow fish again, by the will and purpose and power of God, 2Ki 2:19; 2Ki 2:22; Such had been typified in days of old, Isa 11:6; Isa 11:9; Zec 2:11; Rev 17:15.

Verse 9 certifies that, where the pure waters flow, the desert will be healed of its drought. And everything that lives or moves, wherever the waters flow, shall be caused to survive and produce. And there will be a very great multitude of fish, along the bank in this river, and in the Dead Sea which it fills, to heal her long cursed waters, Joh 5:25; Joh 6:63; Joh 14:6; Joh 14:19; 1Co 15:45.

Verse 10 certifies that so powerful shall be these artesian healing waters that wherever they flow, to the east and southeast, on the rivers and sea-ports, at En-gedi, even to En-eglaim, fishers shall industriously fish again and spread their nets. The fish will be of their kind. They shall be many, rapidly reproduced, even as the fish of the Great Sea, the Mediterranean, then known for its abounding supply of fish; See Mat 4:19; Mat 13:47; Num 34:6; Jos 23:4.

Verse 11 states, however, that the miry places and marshes about the Dead Sea will not be healed. They will be given to salt, to salt mines, as a perpetual reminder of death for the disobedient, Gen 19:26; Luk 17:32; Act 5:9-11.

Verse 12 asserts that along the river bank of that broad, clear flowing stream, trees for food will grow. Their leaves will never fade, wilt, or die, nor shall their fruit ever cease. The trees will bear fruit repeatedly, month by month, fruit of edible quality for food for men. And the leaves of the trees will be used for medicine or health purposes for the people. All this is possible, because of the water that flows from beneath the threshold or foundation of the Divine temple, the sanctuary of the Lord, Job 8:16; Psa 1:3; Jer 17:8; See also Rev 2:7; Rev 22:2; Rev 22:14; Mat 10:42.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

THE VISION OF A LIFE-GIVING RIVER

Eze 47:1-12

OUR last study in this Book compassed chapters 38 and 39. With chapter 40, according to the Scofield Reference Bible, we enter upon Part 7 of the Volume, the general theme,Israel in the Land during the Kingdom Age.

The vision with which this section opens was from the top of a high mountain that looked upon the frame of a city to the south, and Behold, there was a Man, whose appearance was like the appearance of brass, with a line of flax in His hand, and a measuring reed, and from that point measuring seems to be the chief element in the vision.

Walls are measured, buildings are measured, gates are measured, chambers are measured, porches are measured, gate entrances are measured, posts are measured, windows are measured, pavements are measured, inner courts are measured. Measure, measure, measure is the constant refrain, and the cubit is the basis thereof.

We may not have been accustomed so to think of God, and even yet we may imagine that measuring would be small business for God, who is not the county-scales man, and certainly not a calico or even silk yard-stick salesman, but let it be remembered that He is the author and arbiter of all measure.

Man can recognize measure but he cannot determine it or even change it, except by cheat. Short men are quite often dissatisfied with their measure, but that does not affect it. Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? (Mat 6:27).

Avaricious men may not want to give 60 lbs. to the bushel, or 36 inches to the yard, but that does not change it. A bushel is uncompromising and the yard is unyielding. It is God who determines measure and His measure is laid upon everything.

The astronomers are now debating whether the heavens are finite or infinite. They will never be able to decide that question by any knowledge at their command, for the very simple reason that they have no reed in hand with which to determine it.

There is but One, and He the One of this Book, who hath either an adequate reed or a competent knowledge for such a task; the One Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of His hand, and meted out heaven with the span, and comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance? (Isa 40:12).

Between the opening sentence of chapter 40 of Ezekiel and Eze 47:18 there are thirty-five Divine measurements recorded. God does nothing haphazard; God leaves nothing to chance.

It may seem to us a needless painstaking that every hair on every mans head is numbered, but would you not like to have your business on a basis of such intelligence? and would not I be happy if my library in its last word, involving as it does, millions upon millions of words, was thus well-known to me?

The critic who laughs at God for descending to the infinitesimal forgets that the Infinite does not need to descend to the least thing, nor ascend to the highest and greatest. They all are within the instant compass of His infinity. He knows! All things were made by Him; and without Him was not any thing made that was made.

But, the lines of measurement in this 47th chapter are falling where human interest is greatest, and are giving us information about that which is our chief concern, namely, the River of Life, for is it not written, Everything shall live whither the river cometh?

Leaving the measuring line aside for the moment, I invite you to the study of the life-giving stream being measured, and I have elected to arrange that study around the three phrases,The Temple Stream, The Soul of Civilization, and the Eternal Sustenance.

THE TEMPLE STREAM

Afterward He brought me again unto the door of the House; and, behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the House eastward: for the forefront of the house stood toward the east, and the waters came down from under from the right side of the House, at the south side of the altar.

Then brought He me out of the way of the gate northward, and led me about the way without unto the utter gate by the way that looketh eastward; and, behold, there ran out waters on the right side (Eze 47:1-2).

We have here, then, the origin of this river. It comes out of the Temple! How suggestive! Gods Temple has long been the seat and source of a life-giving stream. That justifies its existence; that approves the conduct of those men who invest their means in Gods Temple.

If I had not been fully persuaded that this temple would stand here as a fountain, or head-source, of the life-giving streamthe Gospel, flowing out from it continuously for years; yea, possibly for centuries, and, if the Lord should delay, for a Millennium even, I would never have pled with you to make the sacrifices required in its construction; and I would never have invested my life and a considerable proportion of my earnings, for years, in the same.

Solomon, till this hour uniformly accepted as the wisest of men, brought the comparatively poor people of his day to make such sacrifices as the world has never known beside to build the Temple in Jerusalem. That his judgment in this matter was neither the product of a selfish ambition, nor yet of a misguided enthusiasm, was proven when it came to pass, Solomon having finished the building, the Lord appeared and said, 1 have heard thy prayer and thy supplication, that thou hast made before Me: I have hallowed this House, which thou hast built, to put My Name there for ever; and Mine eyes and Mine heart shall be there perpetually (1Ki 9:3).

Where God is, there is the Fountain of Life! There may be temples that were not erected under His direction; there may be temples into which He has not been both officially and sincerely invited; there may be temples out of which the sins of patrons have driven the Most High. If so, that fact will be evidenced in the circumstances that from them will flow no life-giving streams.

That is what we mean by dead churches that is what we mean when we speak of impotent pulpits.

There may be as wide a difference between temples and temples as there is between the prayer room of the Christians house and the Blind Pig in the black cellar-room of a degraded tenement. For, in both instances, it is a question of the presence of God in one and the absence of God from the other.

Returning to the text we discover another suggestive truth.

The measuring reed reveals the rapid increase of this river in both width and depth.

And when the Man that had the line in His hand went forth eastward, He measured a thousand cubits, and He brought me through the waters; the waters were to the ankles.

Again He measured a thousand, and brought me through the waters; the waters were to the knees. Again He measured a thousand, and brought me through; the waters were to the loins.

Afterward He measured a thousand; and it was a river that I could not pass over: for the waters were risen, waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed over (Eze 47:3-5).

This our city is cut through its center by the Mississippi River, a beautiful stream whose crystal clear waters are such that even the muddy Missouri cannot fully befoul its color. Yonder in Northern Minnesota, nestling between the hills and fringed about with the tall, straight and graceful pines, lies Lake Itasca. It is a fountain head. Out from it flows continuously a comparatively small stream, but a stream which grows as it goes, until, far yonder, it flings its mighty volume of fresh waters into the great Gulf.

I bring you this parable from my own beautiful and beloved state to illustrate your pastors conception of what this particular temple, in which we worship today, ought to be and in fact is, to the world!

That small stream of the Gospel which it has been my privilege for thirty-five consecutive years to give forth from this pulpit is being constantly increased, until the rivulet originating in the pulpit is swelled into a river of life by reason of the contributing streams.

It would be an interesting procedure to take a row-boat, leave lake Itasca some Spring morning and paddle slowly to New Orleans, charting, as one went down, the creeks and rivers that join their waters with those of the great Mississippi.

But, when you had finished it, it would still remain only the Mississippi valley, and that belongs to the river; a valley that the scientists tell us was created by the river.

It has come to me recently that one of the obligations to this church, that I have but partially and poorly fulfilled, is to make it familiar with its own life-giving streams, and to call attention to the rivulets and even the rivers that have their rise in this temple of God.

A certain proportion of this membership (perhaps something like one-half of it), is fairly familiar with those features of our work which have their rise in this building.

Our Sunday School, splendidly organized, efficiently officered, marvelously equipped, is to this pulpit in volume what the Missouri is to the Mississippi,a tremendous contribution.

Our Sunday School missions, now half a dozen or so in numbers, are rivulets of ever-growing proportions. They also add to the stream.

Our varied Young People organizations, our clubs, our forum, our guild, our mission circles, lend, each of them, its swelling aid.

The Northwestern Bible and Missionary Training School, a natural child of the church, is proving itself a fountain of life whose parting streams flow into and refresh every continent of the earth.

In addition to the multiplied services of witness, song and sermon, that the resident student body contributes to this great metropolis and adjacent cities, our graduates hold hundreds of pastorates in America at this moment, and from the lips of the last man and by the living testimony of every woman of them, flow fountains of life.

Last summer, for four months, 152 of these under graduate students, through the 600 and 700 Daily Vacation Bible Schools they conducted, and the multiplied evangelistic appeals they made, reached something like 30,000 people and witnessed above 1,000 conversions.

Such work as the prominent Italian work in Buffalo, N. Y., a mission of wide influence, reaching hundreds of that nation; such work as the Chinese work in San Francisco where they are winning the Chinaman to Christ by equipping him to be an effective servant for Christ; other kindred Gospel Missions, such as Kelly carried on for years in Detroit; such as Francis Peterson is just now going to in Seattle; such as Hilda Blissly Gerig and her husband have made famous in Portland, Ore.; these and other mighty movements, too numerous to .mention, are all under the leadership and efficient direction of our graduates.

In Canada we have Mr. and Mrs. Jalmar Erickson; Alrick Olson, and Mr. and Mrs. Lewis Erickson;

In Africa we haveMaynard Caneday; Signe Johnson; Mr. and Mrs. Frank Shortridge; Mrs. Buyse; Mrs. Margaret Camp; Caroline Campbell; Theresa Gustafson; Martha Hiebert; Eva Jantz; Mr. and Mrs. Wm. Jantz; Mr. and Mrs. Victor Nelson; Mr. and Mrs. Ferdinand Rosenau; Dr. Glenn Tuttle; and Mr. and Mrs. Charles Whitaker;

In far-off China we have (Mrs. Anna Salquist supported by the Church), Susanna Anderson, Ruth Campbell, Irma Day, Gladys Lindholm, Mr. and Mrs. Paul Lindholm, Clara Nelson, and Jennie Wedicson:

In India we have Mrs. Jonas Alquist, Mr. and Mrs. Wm. Cook, Olga Johnson, Mary Laughlin, Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Smith, Mary C. Wall:

In JapanAnn Kludt:

In the Philippine IslandsBernice Hahn:

In South AmericaRalph Blackhall, Mr. and Mrs. Cornelius Klaassen, Mrs. Helen Brown Carder, Esther Carlson, Mr. and Mrs. Elmer Lange, William Shillingsburg, and Lydia Jacobson:

In France we are represented by Jacques Blocher. Their number is great and increasing annually.

Again we stop to exclaim What hath God wrought!

The river widens and deepens in its flow!

There is about the same comparison between this First Baptist Church of Minneapolis and the average church that there is between the Mississippi River and the pipe line of water that supplies the average Minneapolis home. The latter is an exclusive service, and the former a fountain of life, the streams from which reach and refresh many Continents.

But, there is in this Scripture another suggestion

The farthest reach of the river was a vivifying influence.

Every thing shall live whither the river cometh.

There is but a solitary agency known to the mind of man to which this symbol can clearly refer, and that is the Gospel of the Son of God. For what is the Gospel, save Christ?

Paul wrote to the Corinthians: For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified (1Co 2:2).

In Him was life; in Him is life, and consequently from Him we draw our lives, since He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life (1Jn 5:12).

The new theology of the day, of which Spurgeon long since said, it is not a theology, would have us believe that we can cultivate men into life and educate them into more abundant life; but the life of which they are speaking is that which is born of the flesh and the life to which this text refers is that born of the Spirit. The first life is even as a vapour that soon passeth away; the second is an endless waylife eternal. To be spiritually minded is life (Rom 8:6).

Ho! ye that pant for living streams,And pine away and die,Here you may quench your raging thirst With springs that never dry.

The happy gates of Gospel graceStand open night and day;Lord, we are come to seek supplies,And drive our wants away.

THE SOUL OF CIVILIZATION

Now when I had returned, behold, at the bank of the river were very many trees on the one side and on the other.

Then said He unto me, These waters issue out toward the east country, and go down into the desert, and go into the sea: which being brought forth into the sea, the waters shall be healed.

And it shall come to pass, that every thing that liveth, which moveth, whithersoever the rivers shall come, shall live: and there shall be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters shall come thither: for they shall be healed; and every thing shall live whither the river cometh (Eze 47:7-9).

There is here a very strange statement, and, on first mention, one might imagine that it was false to fact; but, just as other Scriptures, when carefully studied, illustrate scientific accuracy, so here!

We are told this stream goes down into the sea and being brought forth into the sea, the waters shall be healed.

At first blush the exact opposite would seem to be scientifically true, and that is that fresh waters running into the sea become salt and bitter; but, as a matter of fact, it is as they rise from the sea that they are sweetened.

The law of evaporation with which men are now familiar tells us plainly the sweetening process; the waters are lifted by this law into this atmosphere leaving all salt and bitterness behind and there, in the first heaven, are gathered into cloud-forms and when they fall back upon the earth, they are sweet, fresh and refreshing.

It is exactly so with the effects of the Gospel. As the sun in the heavens can lift the moisture out of salt seas, miasmic marshes, and stagnant, poisoned pools, and by the lifting purify it, so that it comes in rain-drops fresh and sweet from heaven to water and bless the earth, so the Son of Righteousness, rising with healing in His wings, lifts men out of the salt sea of sin, the miasmic marshes of immorality, the filthy and poisoned pools of gambling holes, blind pigs, and rooms of infamy, and so purifies them that they become desirable and refreshing members of society; changed themselves into new creatures indeed, and consequently capable of blessing those they formerly contaminated, and of elevating the society they once polluted.

You may take the individual who has thus been purified by the indwelling Spirit of God and send him back into the circles of sin and shame and he will keep his character when putridity presses against him on every side.

Have you ever heard of the Island Oahu of the Hawaiian Group? This island has, off its edges and down in the bottom of the sea, fresh water springs as has Maui, another of the group. Near to this last, in Hana, was a fortress occupied by soldiers in ancient times. Communication with the mainland was not feasible in times of siege, and it was expected by the enemy that they could surround these islands and soon compel the people to capitulate from lack of water. But the enemy was mistaken! Natives knew of these under-sea springs and they would dive down, fill their calabashes full of the fresh water, and bring it to the surface.

What those fresh water springs were to the besieged inhabitants of Oahu and Maui, the gospelized and witnessing Christian is to civilization. He is its life-sustaining element: he saves it.

Who can forget what God said to Abraham concerning Sodom? If there be ten men I will save it. Who can miss the meaning of Christs words to true disciples, Ye are the salt of the earth!

We do not belong to the company of those who believe that civilization marks daily progress and eventually will, by its own inherent forces, bring to the world a millennium of righteousness, peace and happiness.

Even those world studentsFroude, Taine, Bryce, Carlysle, Sir Henry Maine, J. E. Thorold Rogers, Professor Seeley, John Morley, and their modernistic successors,Spencer, Wellhausen, Wells, Van Loon, Coblentz, and their confreres, did not discover even in their multiplied philosophies, a definite upward march!

But, while we anticipate a radical change for the better,by the coming of the King of Glory,we are fully persuaded that that which keeps the semblance of civilization is civilization itself, that which holds back from civilization the Sodomic fires, is nothing other than the sweetened water the saint!

Still further,the increasing depth of this river symbolizes the advanced experiences of spiritual men and women. They walk in the River of Life shoe-deep at first; they walk in it knee-deep later, and eventually they swim in the same. In other words, they become immersed, and, with this deeper experience, are themselves enriched as the deeper river enriched the soil on either side.

It may not have occurred to us that there are other suggestive figures that relate to spiritual facts in this sounding of the depths of the River of Life!

There are men that never go more than shoe-deep; there are people that never think of wading deeper than the knees. Like the smaller fish they hug the shallows. The great leviathan, however, delights in the deeper depths, and the great ships plow the waves of the deeper sea with the safety and quietness that belongs to the deeps alone. When storms strike, it is the shore vessels that drive on the rocks and go down.

This also is a parable of life! There are plenty of people who never attain to safety because they never get beyond the shallows, and the same number never know spiritual satiety on that very account.

Do you remember the morning when Christ came down to the edge of Gennesaret and saw His disciples dragging their boat ashore, weary and exhausted after a fruitless night of fishing? And now washing their nets they were ready to give over the endeavor. In addressing Simon He said,

Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught.

And Simon answering said unto Him, Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at Thy word I will let down the net.

And when they had this done, they inclosed a great multitude of fishes: and their net brake.

And they beckoned unto their partners, which were in the other ship, that they should come and help them. And they came, and filled both the ships, so that they began to sink (Luk 5:4-7).

Oh, beloved, the trouble with most of us is that we are wading around the shallows; we have never launched out into the deep! We have never immersed ourselves in the sacred river of Gods will.

Let me briefly sketch what I mean:A few years ago two young women, sisters, studied in the Northwestern Bible and Missionary Training School,Ruth and Caroline Campbell. Ruth came to Northwestern without means. She worked her way by taking the position of a servant in a home. It was a home of wealth and before she had finished her course with us, they prized her so highly that they were paying her $15.00 per week for the comparatively small part of each day she could snatch from her studies.

Saving her money carefully, after she left us, she went to Washington, D. C. She secured a kindred position as servant, used her off-hours to study the capitol and its varied interests, and hoarded her money with a view to further education. At the end of the year she went to New York and took a medical course, still working her way.

All the while there was in her soul a deep conviction that God had commissioned her to China. About the time of her finishing the New York work, Mrs. Peabody back of the Baptist work in the Philippines, wrote to Miss Acomb, Dean of Women in the Northwestern, asking if she had a girl to recommend to the Philippines. The letter was answered, recommending Ruth Campbell.

A conference ensued. Mrs. Peabody was delighted with her and offered her the appointment. Ruth answered, If God closes every avenue to China and makes it clear that such is not His will for me, I will then accept the commission to the Philippines.

In a few days after this decision, the China Inland Mission Board accepted and commissioned her, and today she is on the field, in far western China, with Winifred Kopp, whose parents were formerly in this church.

She has launched out into the deep!

I do not mean by that that China or any other far-away country is necessarily the deep. Many a man and woman is in that country today as a missionary who is in the shallows, or at best, paddling in the shoals. But I mean that by faith Ruth immersed herself in the will of God. She swims in His will!

Caroline, her sister, was just as clear about a call to Africa, and so ardent was her desire to do what she believed to be the will of the Lord, that she taught school after graduating here, hoarded her money, to the last penny, bought her own outfit and went to Africa at her own expense.

These girls are not in the shallows. They are in the deep waters of Gods will!

Who doubts that the civilization of China is being sweetened by Ruths Christian life and teaching? Who doubts that the civilization of dark Africa is being brightened by Carolines contribution of a consistent life and efficient teaching?

But the end is not yet! There is still more in this chapter that demands thought, excites hope and inspires endeavor. I find here a suggestion of

THE ETERNAL SUSTENANCE

And by the river upon the bank thereof, on this side and on that side, shall grow all trees for meat, whose leaf shall not fade, neither shall the fruit thereof be consumed: it shall bring forth new fruit according to his months, because their waters they issued out of the sanctuary: and the fruit thereof shall be for meat, and the leaf thereof for medicine (Eze 47:12).

Those are marvelous trees! Only such trees can grow on the banks of the River of Life. Fruit trees, indeed, whose fruit is for meat and whose leaves are for medicine!

What is the suggestion? Three or four things, to say the least. First of all

The Tree of Life grows on the banks of the River of Life. How that harks back to the First Psalm,

Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.

But his delight is in the Law of the Lord; and in His Law doth he meditate day and night.

And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season: his leaf also shall not wither: and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper (Psa 1:1-3).

The rivers of this vicinity have a remarkable tendency to give life to willows. Their banks are lined by them; their courses are to be traced by them.

But, there is a stream that has an equally natural tendency to give growth to saint-hood, to godliness. Its course can be traced by the saved! You can go into Africa or India or the Isles of the Sea and when you see men who were cannibals a generation or two ago, now clothed, calmed, consistent in walk and conversation, you know that the River of the Water of Life has reached that place, and these are but prolific products of the same. Its existence accounts for them, and their presence locates the course of the stream itself.

A missionary party was traveling in the wilds of Soto Bulaland in So. Africa. Night was coming on; the supply of water had failed. The native servants insisted upon traveling further in the hope of finding water, but the missionary stubbornly insisted on striking his camp, and then bowing before God he asked, Lord, we thirst; show us where water is.

At that moment the natives ran in, reporting that the asses had run away. The missionary joined them and went in hot pursuit. Lo; they were as delighted as surprised to find that the asses had scented the water in the distance, and led them to a beautiful and abundant fountain of the same.

What a striking figure this River is! No life without water.

Life can long be sustained without food. Men have fasted 40 days again and again in recent times and claimed themselves cured of certain diseases by such a cleansing of the body as the fast produced; but they literally flooded themselves with water.

What opportunities of strength and health we miss by not drinking more deeply at that fountain of Life, the Water of the Word!

I have been thinking a lot of an effective illustration employed some years ago, by a friend, a man who had his up-bringing in Minneapolis.

The days upon which we have fallen are evil. The pulpit has descended to uncertain sounds; Modernism has so muddied up the stream of life that thousands of Christians are quitting the sanctuary, saying of the muddy stream flowing there, It is not fit to drink!

And that fact reminds me of Dr. Wm. Abernathys illustration.

He said, A stock man in the Blue Grass region of Kentucky, sold out his Kentucky ranch and purchased a larger one in Montana. On his new ranch was another spring and pool, but the soil under the same was mud rather than sand, and the cattle, getting hot, would go and stand in this pool knee-deep and stir up the mud to such an extent that it was unfit for drinking, and they were losing weight in consequence.

Something had to be done. So this ingenious ranch man threw a wire fence around the pool, leaving only a narrow opening to the water. Out over this water he built a platform large enough to hold a single animal. On the bottom of the platform he bored holes and when the animal would step on it it would sink down into the water just far enough for the water to gush up through the holes and fill the shallow trough that constituted the platform itself. Consequently, the animal would drink all he wanted and walk off, leaving it for the next to take his place and be filled and refreshed. That also is a parable!

There are churches, and we should thank God for them, where the fences are so constructed as to keep the cloven foot from coming in, and where the Waters of Life are not permitted to be befouled. Such churches insist that the clear stream of salvation shall remain open to every thirsty soul, so that he who will may come in and drink and live.

But this tree not only graced the banks of the River of Life; it bore saints food.

The fruit thereof shall he for meat;

Neither shall the fruit thereof he consumed.

One might imagine inharmony between these two statements. On the contrary they are in perfect accord when correctly interpreted. The fruit thereof shall be for meat, and the further suggestion is that it is so abundant that the whole of it shall never be consumed.

That is only another way of saying that God never runs short of supplies, and the saint need not suffer hunger.

Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall he filled (Mat 5:6).

There are sections of the country where rains seldom reach. There are plains and deserts where springs are seldom or never found. On that account the early American settlers lined the banks of the rivers, hugged the shores of creeks, built their log or mud houses near the springs.

Their descendants are not showing equal intelligence. Thousands of them on the drouth-cursed plains of Montana, Wyoming, and even the Dakotas have suffered untold hardships from lack of water; and ten thousand thousand others have dwelt in cities, and some of them in mansions, and though they were near enough to have walked to the House of God they have never tasted of the Water of Life, nor even seemed to wake up to the necessity of the same, and while they flourished in purse and person they perished in soul.

There are enough churches in Minneapolis and St. Paul, if the stream of Life flowed freely and clear from their altars, to provide refreshing drink for every soul within the limits of the same. But, alas, two things are taking place! In some of these sanctuaries the Stream is dried up, the fountain is closed; and in others of them it has been befouled and muddied by Modernism and made unfit to drink; and still far more serious tens of thousands of those who are dying in spirit from the lack of a draft from the God-given Stream, are ignorantly perishing without endeavor to reach the same.

It is a strange situation, and it justifies the modern prophet in playing the role of another Isaiah, namely lifting his voice in an eager cry to the groups that pass,

Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price (Isa 55:1).

Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which satisfieth not? hearken diligently unto Me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness (Isa 55:2).

This brings us to the last point.The leaves are for the medicine of the soul. Health of the soul is essential to happiness! I often wonder if those souls, on this earth, who are unhappy are in any instance perfectly healthy. I often question if suicides are all sick men,either sick in body or sick in mind? Oh, it is wonderful to be in health!!

We never appreciate physical health at its full, till we lose it for a while. Mine has been a favored portion. Ninety-one hundredths of my life time have known health, and yet those times, when for a day, a week, a month, (or a year, as in the instance of seven years ago,) when health was not my portion, how keenly, then, did I esteem what I had had, and how I pled to recover!

Here is the promise of health for the soul; and, in the promise itself, the anticipation, the prophecy, yea even the very pledge of eternal happiness!

The leaf thereof for medicine.

Go over to the Book of Revelation and learn what this means. Read of the Heavenly host. God Himself shall be with them; God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain (Rev 21:3-4).

Oh, what a prospect!

I do not know the meaning of the Scripture that follows in description of that city which shall be our blessed and eternal residence. I do not fully comprehend the relation that this passage in Rev 22:2 sustains to the one in Rev 21:4. But whether I understand it or not, I believe it means that God has made adequate provision for eternal health; not alone for eternal life, but for eternal health; for John saw

a pure River of Water of Life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.

In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the Tree of Life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded Her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations (Rev 22:1-2).

And there shall be no more curse (Rev 22:3).

Oh, glorious day; oh, ravishing prospect!! When one thinks upon it he is tempted to join with Samuel Rutherford who once shouted, Oh, time; run fast, run fast! bring to us our long-promised Lord; for love is tormented with delays!

Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley

THE VISION OF THE HOLY WATERS ISSUING FROM THE TEMPLE. (Chap. 47)

EXEGETICAL NOTES.Eze. 47:1. The house eastward. The house is the Temple itself; the waters issued from beneath the south-east corner and flowed along the south of the porch which projected into the inner court.

Eze. 47:2. There ran out waters on the right side. The waters flow eastwardtowards the Kedron, thence towards the Jordan, and so along the Ghor to the Dead Sea. The main point in the picture is the rapid augmentation from a petty stream into a mighty river, not by the influx of side-streams, but by its own self-supply from the sacred miraculous source in the Temple.Henderson.

Eze. 47:3. To the ankles. This may coincide with the step gained in the baptism of Cornelius (Acts 10) and the opening of the Church to the Gentiles.

Eze. 47:4. To the kneesloins. The mission of St Paul and Barnabas (Act. 13:1-4) is another marked epoch in the Churchs history; and the time of St Pauls martyrdom denotes an increase in the Gentile Church, which corresponds with the waters reaching to the loins.

Eze. 47:5. Waters to swim in. When under Constantine the Roman Empire had become Christian, the Church may be contemplated as the full river, to flow on throughout time to the final completion of Isaiahs prophecy, Eze. 11:9.Speakers Commentary.

Eze. 47:7. Very many trees. Trees were the natural consequence of abundance of water (Psa. 1:3; Rev. 22:2). The luxuriant fertility of the ground on the shore of the Dead Sea under the fresh springs of Engedi well illustrate this.

Eze. 47:8. Into the sea, the waters shall be healed. The Dead Sea, covering the guilty cities, Sodom and Gomorrah. In its bituminous waters no vegetable or animal life is said to be found. But now death is to give place to life in Judea and throughout the world, as symbolised by the healing of these death-pervaded waters (Joh. 4:14; Rev. 22:2-3).

Eze. 47:9. Whithersoever the rivers shall come. Heb., the two rivers. This new river is to come into the Dead Sea through the same plain as the Jordan. The Jordan always flowed, but now, when another river comes in and two rivers flow into the sea, the waters shall be healed. Hengstenberg interprets the two rivers as meaning strong river.

Eze. 47:10. From Engedi unto Eneglaim. Engedi, now Ain-Jidy, west of the Dead Sea, Davids place of refuge. En-eglaim, on the confines of Moab, near where the Jordan enters the Dead Sea. These limits comprise between them the whole Dead Sea. Their fish shall be according to their kinds. Jerome quotes an ancient theory that there are 153 kinds of fishes, all of which were taken by the apostles (Joh. 21:11), and not one remained uncaptured, signifying that both the noble and base-born, the rich and the poor, and every class, are being drawn out of the sea of the world to salvation.Fausset.

Eze. 47:11. Not be healed; given to salt. Those districts in which the salt-deposits proper were formerly found shall henceforth be waste places. The thought is thisOnly those who bar themselves against the gracious stream of Divine love and are unwilling to regain health are henceforth to be given over to the curse, continuing to exist as monuments thereof.Hvernick. What is given to salt is entirely forfeited to death.

Eze. 47:12. Shall grow all trees for meattrees of life-giving and life-restoring virtue shall bloom, similar in properties to and exceeding in number the tree of life in Eden (Rev. 2:7; Rev. 22:2; Rev. 22:14). Whose leaf shall not fadeexpressing not only the unfailing character of the heavenly medicine of the tree of life, but also that the graces of the believer, which are the leaves, and his deeds, which are the fruits that flow from those graces, are immortal (Psa. 1:3; Jer. 17:8; Mat. 10:42; 1Co. 15:58).

Eze. 47:13. This shall be the border. Substantially the same as Numbers 34; there the description begins with the south, here with the north. Joseph shall have two portionsaccording to the original promise of Jacob to Joseph (Gen. 48:5; Gen. 48:22; Jos. 14:4.) Josephs sons were given the birthright forfeited by Reuben, the first-born (1Ch. 5:5). The special mention of Josephs portions was to express that the twelve portions were to be exclusive of Levis land, which was to be provided out of the oblation.

Eze. 47:14. One as well as another. Ezekiel is speaking of tribes, not individuals. Each tribe is to have an equal breadth of land assigned to it.

Eze. 47:15. The way of Hethlon to Zedadon the north boundary of Canaan. Names of places in the actual northern border are given, not to mark exact geographical position, but to show that the original promise will be fulfilled.

Eze. 47:16. Hamathat the foot of Mount Hermon, on the Orontes. Berothahprobably the same as Berothai, a city in Syria conquered by David (2Sa. 8:8). Hazarhatticonthe middle Hazar, to distinguish it from Hazar-enan. HauranAuranitis, a tract in Syria, south of Damascus.

Eze. 47:18. Unto the east seathe Dead Sea.

Eze. 47:19. From Tamara village near the southern end of the Dead Sea. To Kadeshon the borders of the Wilderness of Sin, where the children of Israel strove with Moses. The river to the great sea. Literally, riverward to the great sea. By the river is meant a torrent-stream entering the Mediterranean near Rhinocolura, now El Arish. This is the river of Egypt mentioned in Num. 34:5.

Eze. 47:22. And to the strangers that sojourn among you. Here is quite a new feature in the distribution of the land. Not only the Israelites by descent, but those who join themselves to Israel by allegiance to the true God, shall have a right of inheritance. The difference which existed under the old covenant between Jew and Gentile is now at last done away (Rom. 10:12; Gal. 3:28; Col. 3:11).

HOMILETICS

THE RIVER OF THE WATER OF LIFE

(Eze. 47:1-12.)

I. Has its source in the Temple of God (Eze. 47:1-2). Not from the Temple as such, but from the presence and activity of Him whose glory filled theTemple. All the spiritual blessings that now enrich the world appear to issue from the Church of God, and so they do; but not from the Church as an organisation, but from Him who gives life, form, and stability to the organisation itself. This important fact is liable to be overlooked. Ezekiel had gone round the Temple repeatedly, prospecting, measuring, admiring, until his soul was filled with amazement at its colossal proportions and gorgeous ritual; but not till it was specially revealed to him did he see the waters issuing from under the threshold of the house, and became aware of their mysterious and Divine source. So we are apt to be so absorbed in contemplating the outward structure and vast movements of the Church as to lose sight for the time of the Divine power that gives vitality and meaning to the whole. It is a blessed moment for us when we are brought by the Spirit to the door of the houseand shown the secret of all this mighty energy. It is our wisdom frequently to wait in meditation and prayer at the threshold of Gods house, the fountain-head of all blessing, until our souls are penetrated with the thought that the excellency of the power in Temple-work is not of man, but of God. Then we can say with David, All my springs are in Thee (Psa. 87:7).

II. Widens and deepens in its progressive outflow (Eze. 47:3-5). Beginning as a small rill of water at the Temple threshold, the river, within a little more than a miles space, rapidly widens and deepens so as to be unfordable, and this not by the aid of contributary streams, but from itself. Here we see the miraculous character of the river and its evident ideal teaching, as a stream rising at the top of a mountain, feeding itself and so quickly augmenting, is at variance with all known natural laws. It is a type of the River of the Water of Life, flowing in Gospel channels, and spreading and deepening among the nations of the earth. What a suggestive study to trace the course of this river in its steady advances through the world! In many places the wilderness has been transformed into a garden of Eden. Our knowledge of Divine truth, like the waters of the Sanctuary, is shallow at first, but should grow in depth and preciousness with the years. So in our experience of spiritual things: there should be constant progress from grace to grace.

III. Imparts fertility and blessing wherever it flows (Eze. 47:6-12). This mystic river produced extraordinary effects. Wherever it circulated vegetation was quickened, trees remarkable for fruitfulness and medicinal properties sprang up on its banks, and the bituminous waters of the Dead Sea, cured of their deadly poison, swarmed with fish. Barrenness gives place to fertility and abundance, and the river-course is a scene of animation and increasing activity. So the Gospelthe River of the Water of Lifebrings life, health, beauty, and fruitfulness wherever it comes. Dead souls are quickened into life, diseased souls healed, feeble souls strengthened, and the spiritual life of believers is made more intense and productive. Like the fabled goddess whose pathway was beautified with flowers which sprang up wherever she set her feet, so the course of the Gospel river may be distinctly traced by the flowers and fruits of grace that adorn and enrich its banks.

LESSONS.

1. Christ is the source and His Word the channel of soul-refreshing life.

2. Wherever the Gospel spreads it produces life and fruitfulness.

3. True religion is progressive, and flourishes best by disseminatiny itself.

THE VISION OF THE WATERS

(Eze. 47:9.)

We take the holy waters to be the emblems of the Gospelthat wondrous scheme of mercy, perfected by the atonement of Christ, made vital by the everlasting Spirit and adapted to the salvation of the world.

I. The source of the holy waters. While through the Temple come to us the tidings of our peace, the blessing itself does not originate there, but is conveyed to it from a source invisible and afar. In Gods great provision for the restoration of the fallen race there are both instrumental and efficient agencies. He has appointed means, and a Divine and perpetual resident to infuse those means with life. They who love the river of the Temple are the likeliest, walking on its banks, to find its source issuing from the throne. While we thus appreciate the uses of the Temple as an instrumentality of blessing, and rejoice in the waters as they flow, we must remember always that they issue from the foundation of the house and have their springs in the everlasting hills; in other words, that God is the one source of life. Though the Saviour has ascended up on high, He has shed forth His Spirit. That Spirit lives on earth, the perpetuator of the Gospel impression, the inspirer of all thought that is holy, the great and living agent in the conversion of mankind. Men say the truth is power, but it is not, alone. It is feeble as the pliant osier or the bruised reed against the malignant enmity of evil. But let the Spirit animate it, and it shall overcome all hostility, and be brave and mighty to prevail.

II. The progress of the holy waters. You observe that in the context the progress of these waters is said to have been gradual and constant. The prophet saw them first reaching to the ankles, then to the knees, then to the loins, and then they became a river too deep to be forded, even a river to swim in. There was no ceasing in the flow, there was no ebbing of the waters; they flowed gradually and constantly in the ever-deepening stream. And this is only a description of the progress of the Gospel of Christ. Small and feeble in its beginningsthose trembling but earnest fishermen, its earliest preacherswith wealth and rank and patronage and power all arrayed against its progresswith Csars conspiring to strangle it, and armies marched out against its fugitive sonshow marvellous was its triumph! And though after the establishment of Christianity there was a seeming eclipse of faith, and corruptions blemished the comeliness of the bride of Christ, the gradual progress among the nations did not cease. One after another they received her teachings and submitted to her sway. Insensibly she moulded the institutions of society and stamped upon them her own image. Sanguinary codes were relaxed; unholy traffic terminated; cruelty had her arm paralysed and her sword blunted; fraud and lust and drunkenness became no longer things of glorying, but of shame; there was a gradual uplifting in the moral health, as if there flowed around the people the bracing air-waves of a purer atmosphere; and men wondered whence the healing came. The river had done it all: flowing on, now through the darkling brake, and now over the open plain; now fertilising the swards upon its banks; now rejoicing in the depth of its own channelimperceptible almost in the increasing volume of its waters to those who continually beheld it, and yet, to those that gazed only at intervals, seemed to have both widened and deepened every day. And it is rolling on still. Perhaps there never was an age of such quickened religious activity as the one in which we are privileged to live. There are two thoughts suggested by this gradual and constant progress of the Gospel. The first encourages our faith; the second reminds us of our responsibility. If we believe, with all the firmness of a settled conviction, that the Gospel is of God, we may rest in the assurance that it must and will prevail; and this hearty faith in its triumphant destiny will save us from the extremes of feelingfrom undue elation in seasons of unusual promise, and from unusual depression in seasons of peculiar languor. The other thought addresses itself solemnly to ourselves. It is quite impossible for us to live in times like ours, when not only the ordinary religious privileges exist and are enjoyed, but when there is so much of special unction with the Word, and such large and manifest workings of the Holy Ghost, without entailing an added amount of responsibility. Beware of attributing the Holy Spirits work to evil agency. That is marvellously like the sin that has no forgiveness. Beware of setting yourselves in an attitude of resistance to good influences. The waters wear the stones, but do not change their nature. Beware of delaying yourselves into hardness of heart. The waters petrify sometimes, and there are some moral petrifactions, alas! which cannot be broken even by the hammer of the Word.

III. The efficacy of the holy waters. How complete and how effectual the healing! Everything shall live whither the river cometh. And this is true of the Gospel. Not only can it reach every man, but each part of every man. Life for the understanding, that it may no longer be smitten by errorlife for the imagination, that its strange fires may be quenched and a purer flame be kindled in their steadlife for the memory, that it may no longer be haunted by the wraiths of ghostly sinslife for the affections, that they may revel in a pure attachment which is not idolatry, ever increasing and yet ever satisfiedlife for the whole nature, that it may not be dead in trespasses and sinslife for the destiny, that it may not even be sullied by the shadow of death, but exult in an ever-brightening inheritance through an eternal day. It shall flow into the desert, and love to God shall be implanted where was formerly enmity, and the whole nature shall be turned about to serve Him. It shall flow into the sea, and though the proud waves shall resist its entrance, it shall overcome their frantic waters and heal them of their plague. Some of you have seen, as I have, a very fine illustration of this, so far as earthly things can illustrate heavenly in natures bounteous kingdom. I stood last summer at the point of confluence, near the fair city of Geneva, where two great rivers meet but do not mingle. Here the Rhone, the arrowy Rhone, rapid and beautiful, pours on, its waters of that heavenly blue which it is almost worth a pilgrimage to see; there the Arve, turbid and muddy, partly from the glaciers from which it is so largely fed, and partly from the clayey soil which it upheaves in its impetnous path, brawls hoarsely in its passionate course; and for a long distance beyond the point of junction they roll side by side with no barrier between them but their own innate repulsions, each making now and then an encroachment upon the other, but beaten back again into its own domain. Like mighty rival forces of good and evil do they seem, and for a long time the issue is doubtful. But far down the long valley, if you look again, you find that the frantic Arve is mastered, and the Rhone has coloured the entire surface of the stream with its own emblematic and beautiful blue. I thought, as I gazed upon it, that it symbolised the long-protracted conflict between truth and error; but in meditating upon the flowing of these healing waters, and reading that they shall flow into the sea and heal it, the vision of the scene rose up before me, fresh and vivid as the facts of yesterday.W. Morley Punshon, D.D.

GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES

Eze. 47:1-12. The effect of the establishment of the mountain of the house of the Lord on the top of mountains, or of Christianity generally, is a great outpouring of the Holy Spirit signified by these waters. As they were not to be seen before the issue of the man with the measuring-line, they are to accompany the preaching of the Word by the ministers of Christ, and the operations of the Spirit shall become the more admirable and profound as they proceed in their spread over all the world, as is signified by their increasing depth. By them shall the evil influences of the world be healed and everlasting life conveyed to all that will receive them. Still, some shall harden even then under its influence, and become more rank and nauseous in sin than before, as is signified by the unhealed bays.MFarlan.

Issuing as this stream does from the threshold of the Temple, from the very foot of the throne of God, it must be, like all the special manifestations of God to His Church, itself of a spiritual nature, and only in its effects productive of outward material good. It is the efflux of that infinite fulness of life and blessing which is treasured up in His spiritual Temple, and continually pours itself forth as the operations of His grace proceed among men. It is emphatically a river of life. Wherever it is experienced, the barren soil of nature fructifies, the dead live again, the soul is replenished with joy and gladness. Instead of spending itself, like the streams of nature, as it advances through the moral deserts of the world, it multiplies and grows, until corruption is changed into incorruption, mortality is swallowed up of life, and the earth, which God had cursed for mans sin, is transformed into the inheritance of the saints in light.Fairbairn.

Eze. 47:1-5. Ezekiels Temple, with its ritual, ministers, and congregation, symbolises the presence of Jehovah in the midst of a loyal people. The waters are the blessings which flow from this source to animate and refresh all the inhabitants of the earth. The deepening of the waters in their course shows the continual deepening of spiritual life and multiplication of spiritual blessings in the growth of the Kingdom of God.Speakers Commentary.

In the Kingdom of God things proceed from little to great: in the kingdoms of the world often from great to little. Satan begins his things with lofty impetuosity, but finally they end in nothing and everything comes to disgrace.Hafenreffer.

Eze. 47:1-2. The Progress of Truth.

1. As it is Christ who makes known the things of the Temple, so He makes known some at one time, some at another.
2. The waters of the Gospel, the gifts and graces of the Spirit, flow from Zion.
3. These spiritual waters, although they flow from Zion, Christ is the fountain and original of them.
4. Sanctuary waters are not common but choice mercies; they are right-side mercies, south-side blessings.Greenhill.

Eze. 47:1. The Gradualness of Divine Revelation

1. Accommodated to our imperfect faculties.
2. Suited to our varying circumstances.
3. Educative in its process.
4. Enables us more clearly to grasp the meaning and grandeur of the truths unfolded.

Eze. 47:3-9. The Atheistic Idea. It is affirmed that Christianity is waning because of the advancement of science. The business of the scientist is with matter. There is something back of mattera force beneath life. No painter, there is no picture: no God, there is no nature. What doctrine has science demolished?

1. Has science done away with the Incarnation? The scientist knows that the sum of the history of nature is made up by the entrances at epochs of higher types of being. Are not all these appearances prophecies of the grand entrance of the Higher Being?

2. Has science done away with the Atonement? The law everywhere manifest is the dependence of one creature on another.

3. Has science done away with sin? Sin is as much a fact, a phenomenon of human life, as the circulation of the blood.

4. Where is Christianity waning? In Germany? Compare this century with the last. A short time ago thousands of students flocked to the great universities to hear the doctrines of Fichte, Hegel, Kant, and the Rationalists of Tubingen. Now scarcely a class of twenty can be collected for that purpose. In France? Compare this century with the times when a deluge of blood followed the blasphemies of Rousseau, DAlembert, Diderot, and Voltaire. In England? Compare the Britain of to-day with the Britain of yesterday, when Chubb, Hume, and Bolingbroke could sneer at the story of the Crosswhen the clergy were immoral. In America? Compare it with the time when the students in our colleges called themselves by the names of leading French atheists. Where will you find such a college to-day?

5. What is the motive-power of science? Compare the ages of faith and the ages of scepticism and see the results. How high has science lifted the shadows that rest on the human heart? It is only this blessed religion, this radiance from the throne of God, that can lighten the gloom.Homiletic Monthly.

Eze. 47:3-5. The Temple-River emblematic of Religion in the different stages of Human Life.

1. Childhood. The waters were to the ankles (Eze. 47:3). Religion may be shallow and yet genuine.

2. Youth. The waters were to the knees (Eze. 47:4). Still exposed to much of the world and its attractions, yet standing in the truth.

3. Manhood. The waters were to the loins (Eze. 47:4). In the midway of lifes struggle, but deepening in piety.

4. Old age. Waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed over (Eze. 47:5). A more prolonged and profound study of the truth revealing its unfathomable vastness and prompting the strongest veteran-swimmer to exclaim, Oh, the depth of the riches! (Rom. 11:33).

Holy Scripture and its revelations also resemble these sacred waters, in that whosoever searches into them will find some parts intelligible to all who sincerely desire to know them. Other parts require a deeper investigation; others a deeper still; and others are beyond our depth, and in respect to these, we can only adore the infinitude of Gods unsearchable wisdom, and humbly wait for His own time of revealing their now hidden meaning. The growth of grace in the individual soul, similarly, is a progressive work, beginning with but a small stream from the fountain-head, but sure to go on increasing until it is expanded into the boundless and unfathomable river of heavenly pleasures (Psa. 36:8).Fausset.

This vision may be applied

1. To the gradual discoveries of the plan of salvation.

(1.) In the patriarchal ages.
(2.) In the giving of the Law.
(3.) In the ministry of John the Baptist.
(4.) In the full manifestation of Christ by the Holy Ghost.
2. To the growth of a believer in the grace and knowledge of God.

(1.) The seed of the Kingdom.
(2.) The blade from that seed.
(3.) The ear out of that blade.
(4.) The full corn in that ear.
3. To the discoveries a penitent believer receives of the mercy of God in his salvation.

(1.) A little child, born of God, he begins to taste and feed on the heavenly food.
(2.) He grows up and increases in stature and strength, and becomes a young man.
(3.) He becomes matured in the Divine life, and has his spiritual senses exercised so as to become a father in Christ.
4. To the progress of Christianity.

(1.) A few poor fishermen.
(2.) Afterwards many Jews.
(3.) Then the Gentiles of Asia Minor and Greece.
(4.) The continent and isles of Europe.
(5.) Now spreading through Africa, Asia, and America, at present these waters are no longer a river, but an immense sea; and the Gospel-fishers are daily bringing multitudes of souls to God.A. Clarke.

The Spread of the Gospel.

1. Christ is the architect and measurer of all things belonging to His Church. 2. The motion of Sanctuary waters is not accidental, but according to Divine appointment.
3. The doctrine of the Gospel is never rightly understood unless taught by Christ.
4. The doctrine of the Gospel, the conversion of sinners, and the graces of the Spirit proceed gradually.
5. The Gospel has depths and mysteries no human understanding can comprehend.
6. Sanctuary waters afford comfort to the saints in their deepest distresses.Greenhill.

Eze. 47:5. There was no such natural course of waters in the place, nor is it imaginable that in three miles or thereabouts the waters should so rise; but it is emblematical, hath a deep mysterious meaning, and includes spiritual things and their wonderful growth from small beginnings, and these from the Temple.Pool.

This marks the rich and overflowing grace which God designs to shed down on the earth in the Gospel age and in the glory of the latter day; and it apprises believers that they should not remain in a loitering state, trampling the shallow waters of grace, but go on to a deeper baptism of the Spirit till they can swim in the abounding streams.Sutcliffe.

Representing the fathomless depth of the Scriptures, which is such that we may well do by it as the Romans did by a lake, the depth whereof they could not sound, and dedicated it to Victory: also the abundance of spiritual graces in the Church, the love of Christ which passeth all knowledge, and the over-abounding goodness of God. Speaking of this subject, Chrysostom said: I am like a man digging in a deep spring; I stand here, and the water rises upon me; I stand there, and still the water rises upon me. It is indeed a sea that has neither bank nor bottom.Trapp.

Eze. 47:6. Hast thou seen this? A Suggestive Question

1. As asked by the well-informed. He knows more than I do, or why the question?

2. As addressed to the anxious inquirer. This may meet my case.

3. As addressed to the thoughtless and indifferent. There is a world of knowledge hitherto closed to him.

4. Indicates there is much we miss for want of a keener insight into truth.

Eze. 47:7-10. Fishers in Gospel Waters.

1. The waters of the Gospel have their own course.

2. That people without the Gospel are like the Dead Sea (Eze. 47:8).

3. The waters of the Sanctuary have curing and quickening virtue (Eze. 47:8-9).

4. The preachers of the Gospel are fishers (Eze. 47:10).

5. These Gospel-fishers catch fish of all sorts (Eze. 47:10).Greenhill.

Eze. 47:8; Eze. 47:11. The Power of the Gospel

1. Seen in its penetrating the most unlikely places. The desertthe Dead Sea (Eze. 47:8).

2. Efficacious in giving life and healing to all who accept it. The waters shall be healed (Eze. 47:8).

3. Inefficacious where it is resisted and rejected. The miry places and marshes shall be given to salt (Eze. 47:11).

Eze. 47:8. Gods Sanctuary a well-spring of life for the Dead Sea of the world (Psa. 87:7). Gods thoughts of peace over the abysses of the worlds wretchedness. In other cases a clear and wholesome stream which flows into a muddy and putrid lake becomes corrupt: it is otherwise with the Gospel, which brings recovery and health to the earthly-minded heart. It is a power of God, but man will not let the power work.Lange.

Eze. 47:11. Those whom the Gospel waters of life do not reach, through their own indolence and carnality, shall be given over to everlasting barrenness; nor can any more awful punishment be imagined than that the sinner should be given up to the unrestricted and everlasting workings of his own sin, bitterness, and filthiness.Fausset.

The Hebrew language often expresses irremediable barrenness and unprofitableness by being given up to salt, salt being equivalent to barrenness in that language. When Abimelech destroyed Shechem he sowed the ground whereon it stood with salt, to denote that it should never be cultivated or inhabited again (Jdg. 9:45).

Unsound, rotten parts, neither sea nor yet sound ground, an emblem of hypocrites. Low land, sopped with the overflowings of unhealthful waters, neither fit to breed fish as the sea, nor bear trees as the land.Pool.

Eze. 47:9-12. Spiritual Influence

1. Vitalises all it touches (Eze. 47:9).

2. The active principle of fertility and plenty (Eze. 47:9-10; Eze. 47:12).

3. Cannot be resisted without disaster (Eze. 47:11).

4. Is ever flowing from the Divine Temple. Because they issued out of the sanctuary (Eze. 47:12).

5. Is both the food and medicine of the soul. The fruit shall be for meat, and the leaf for medicine (Eze. 47:12).

Eze. 47:10. The ministers of the Church are compared to fishers because of the contempt with which they are regarded by the rich and powerful of this world; because of their labour by day and night, in heat and cold; because of the fruitlessness of their labour at timesWe have caught nothing; because of the dangers they incur in stormy weather; because of their confidence, which, as in the case of the husbandman, must rest on God; because of the various kinds of implements they use. They rescue souls from the abyss.Starck.

Eze. 47:11-12. Moral Barrenness and Fruitfulness.

1. Those places and persons to which the waters of the Sanctuary come, or coming do not heal, are designed to barrenness and destruction (Eze. 47:11).

2. True Christians are fruitful (Eze. 47:12).

3. The cause of fruitfulness is the doctrine and grace of the Gospel (Eze. 47:12).

4. The holy examples of true saints are medicinal (Eze. 47:12).Greenhill.

Eze. 47:12. Never-ending Spring. The text a promise and picture of a neverfading spring. Goodness and spiritual beauty are eternal.

1. The everlasting youthfulness of a Christly soul.
2. The everlasting fruitfulness of a Christly soul.
3. The explanation of the glorious phenomenon is in thisBecause their waters issued out of the sanctuary. A sacred place, a pure sanctuary, a holy fountain where the soul may cleanse itself from the dust and stains of the world. Fruit for meat and leaves for medicine. A healthy inner life ensures a fruitful outer life. A Christly soul is always young and beautiful.Homiletic Monthly.

The blessed growth close by the river of life. Evergreen leaves, yet not leaves merely, but also fruit! Thus it is with life from Gods Sanctuary.Lange.

HOMILETICS

THE INHERITANCE OF THE GOOD

(Eze. 47:13-23.)

I. Is secured by Divine promise (Eze. 47:14). That promise was declared and ratified in the most solemn mannerConcerning the which I lifted up Mine hand. Though the inheritance is not in possession, and all appearances are against the realisation of the promise, yet it is enough that the promise is made. Israel is kingless and portionless, bereft of Temple and all its imposing ceremonials, fretting in slavery and sorrow, moaning in poverty and ruin, and with no prospect of immediate deliverance, yet the inheritance is sure, for God hath promised. The Divine Word is more valid than the best-authenticated legal document.

II. Is explicitly defined (Eze. 47:15-20). To show that it is no baseless hope, no Utopian dream, but a substantial, blessed reality. Its boundaries are clearly described and exactly measured to show that every inch of its frontiers is guarded with the presence and power of Jehovah, and to inspire an unwavering assurance of its realisation and enjoyment. The Lord deals in neither false measures nor false promises.

III. Is enjoyed by the obedient irrespective of nationality (Eze. 47:21-23). The distinction between Jew and Gentile is abolished. The inheritance is made free for all nations. Whoever fears God and works righteousness unites himself to the true Israel, the perfect Church of the Messiah, shall enjoy the same privileges as the faithful and obedient descendants of Abraham. Tribes, classes, nations, are absorbed and lost in the spiritual unity of an imperishable brotherhood. Christ is all and in all.

LESSONS.

1. The Divine promise never fails.

2. The faithful servants of Jehovah have a rich inheritance here and hereafter.

3. National strifes and jealousies will be unknown in the heavenly Kingdom.

GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES

Eze. 47:13-23. A people settled in the inheritance of their God is the proper result of the re-establishment of the covenant and the renewal of their souls after its principles of righteousness. There is no more reason for understanding this portion according to the letter than those which went before. The whole vision is of a piecea pictorial representation of the future things of Gods Kingdom under the image of the past, yet so altered and adjusted as to indicate the vast superiority of what was to come compared with what hitherto had been.Fairbairn.

The Heritage of the Faithful.

1. Here we have the great extent of the Church under Christ.
2. The state of Christians in the Church and all their spiritual blessings are of free grace.
3. The one and same inheritance belongs to the believing Jew and Gentile.Greenhill.

Eze. 47:13-14. The Divine Faithfulness

1. Is not impaired by the lapse of time, or by the fickleness of man.
2. Is solemnly declared. Concerning which I lifted up mine hand.
3. Seen in the kindness shown to succeeding generations. To give unto your fathers: this land shall fall unto you for inheritance.
4. Should elicit an exclusive and unwavering confidence.

Eze. 47:13. Who can define the boundaries of the Church, especially in the last days? But as here the boundaries of Canaan are defined, so the boundaries of the Church are faith and life in the Scriptures of the apostles and prophets, which accordingly no one is to overpass (Gal. 6:16). God gives to His children very differently; from him to whom a double portion has been given a corresponding return is required.Starck.

Eze. 47:22-23. The Impartiality of God

1. Seen in His equitable treatment of the faithful in all ages and nations.
2. Is continually promoting the spiritual unity of the human race.
3. Will be terribly evident in His punishment of the finally impenitent.

Eze. 47:22. It is not birth, but the new birth, that makes men children of God. Here under earthly figures the Jerusalem that is above with her children is typified, and the calling of the Gentiles from east and west and the utmost bounds of the earth is described. God here opens to all the holy gates of His Church, and prescribes to the Church herself the commandment of meekness, love, and brotherly kindness.Lange.

Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell

III. THE FUTURE LAND 47:1-48:35

In his last vision Ezekiel observes the blessing which the people of God would enjoy in the new Temple age. In that blessed land the tribes of Israel would have eternal possession. Here he discusses (1) the transformation of the promised land (Eze. 47:1-12); (2) the boundaries of the promised land (Eze. 47:13-21); (3) the place of aliens in the land (Eze. 47:22-23); (4) the apportionment of the land among the tribes (Eze. 48:1-35).

The Transformation of the Promised Land

47:112

TRANSLATION

(1) And he brought me back unto the door of the house; and, behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward; (for the forefront of the house was toward the east); and the waters came down from under, from the right side of the house, on the south of the altar. (2) Then he brought me out by the way of the gate northward, and led me round by the way without unto the outer gate, by the way of the gate that looks toward the east; and, behold, there ran out waters on the right side. (3) When the man went forth eastward with the line in his hand, he measured a thousand cubits, and he caused me to pass through the waters, waters that were to the ankles. (4) Again he measured a thousand, and caused me to pass through the waters, waters that were to the knees. Again he measured a thousand, and caused me to pass through the waters, waters that were to the loins. (5) Afterward he measured a thousand; and it was a river that I could not pass through; for the waters were risen, waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed through. (6) And he said unto me, Son of man, have you seen this? Then he brought me, and caused me to return to the bank of the river. (7) Now when I had returned, behold, upon the bank of the river were very many trees on the one side and on the other. (8) Then he said unto me, These waters issue forth toward the eastern region, and shall go down into the Arabah; and they shall go toward the sea; into the sea shall the waters go which were made to issue forth; and the waters shall be healed. (9) And it shall come to pass, that every living creature which swarms in every place where the rivers come, shall live; and there shall be a very great multitude of fish; for these waters are come thither, and the waters of the sea shall be healed, and every thing shall live wheresoever the river comes. (10) And it shall come to pass, that fishers shall stand by it: from En-gedi even unto Eneglaim shall be a place for the spreading of nets; their fish shall be after their kinds, as the fish of the great sea, exceeding many. (11) But the miry places thereof, and the marshes thereof, shall not be healed; they shall be given up to salt. (12) And by the river upon the bank thereof, on this side and on that side, shall grow every tree for food, whose leaf shall not wither, neither shall the fruit thereof fail: it shall bring forth new fruit every month, because the waters thereof issue out of the sanctuary; and the fruit thereof shall be for food, and the leaf thereof for healing.

COMMENTS

The angelic guide brought Ezekiel back to the inner court and the door of the house. There he saw a stream issuing forth from under the threshold of the house. The waters were flowing in a south-easterly direction, past the altar, out into the outer court (Eze. 47:1). Ezekiel was led out the north gate of the inner court (the nearer east gate was closed; cf. Eze. 44:2; Eze. 46:1), around the outside wall of the Temple complex to the east gate of the outer court. There he saw the waters trickling[539] forth (Eze. 47:2).

[539] The Hebrew word is found only here and its exact meaning is doubtful.

A thousand cubits east of the eastern gate Ezekiel was directed to wade into the waters. They were ankle deep (Eze. 47:3). At two thousand cubits the waters were knee deep; at three thousand cubits, waist deep (Eze. 47:4); at four thousand cubits (about a mile and a third) the waters were so deep that the prophet could not get across them without swimming (Eze. 47:5). By means of a rhetorical question the angelic guide underscored the amazing increase in the depth of the water. No mention is made of any tributaries, yet the river increased in volume as it descended eastward through the mountains toward the Dead Sea (Eze. 47:6).

Apparently the banks of the river were bare when Ezekiel tested the depth of the water. Now he observed a thick growth of trees shooting up on both banks of the river (Eze. 47:7). These were no ordinary trees. They would bear a new crop every month. Furthermore, the leaves of these trees had curative powers (Eze. 47:12).

The prophet is informed that the river of life flowed far beyond the range of vision to the Arabah[540] and the Dead Sea. The lifeless waters of that body of water would be healed, i.e., purified by the fresh flowing water of life (Eze. 47:8). Where previously no aquatic creatures could exist, swarms of fish would be found (Eze. 47:9). Commercial fishermen would flock to the shore of the once dead sea, and they would find the catch as abundant as that to which they were accustomed on the Great (Mediterranean) Sea. Along the shoreline of the Dead Sea they would spread their nets from En-gedi (mid-point on the western shore of the Dead Sea) to En-eglaim (exact location unknown; Eze. 47:10), But even though the waters of the sea would be healed, the marshy areas about the sea would remain in their former state so as to provide the people with salt (Eze. 47:11).

[540] Arabah is the technical name for the deep depression through which the Jordan river flows and in which the Dead Sea is situated.

Those who try to interpret the vision of the life-giving stream physically have completely missed the point of the passage. This is a clear instance of symbolism. Fertility and water are virtually interchangeable (See Psa. 46:4; Psa. 65:9; Isa. 33:20 f.). The sheer physical impossibility of a stream increasing in volume without aid of tributaries should be a clue to the symbolic import of the text. Furthermore, fruit trees which bear a new crop every month would be hard to interpret physically. The main point being made is that in the new age the Temple of God would be the source of life, healing and fruitfulness.

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

XLVII.

The first twelve verses of this chapter constitute what is generally known as the vision of the living waters; the latter part of the chapter, Eze. 47:13-23, more properly belongs with Ezekiel 48, and, with that, gives an account of the boundaries of the land, of its distribution among the tribes, and of the building of the holy city.

The ideal character of this vision of the waters is so plain upon its face that little need be said on this point. The stream is represented as issuing from the summit of a very high mountain (Eze. 40:2), and as constantly and rapidly increasing its volume, without the accession of tributaries, so that in a little more than a mile it becomes a river no longer fordable. The trees upon its banks, too, are evidently symbolical, and its effect upon the Dead Sea (as already said in the introductory note to Ezekiel 40-48) is such as could not naturally occur. Such imagery is common in prophecy. Joel (Joe. 3:18) says, All the rivers of Judah shall flow with waters, and a fountain shall come forth of the house of the LORD, and shall water the valley of Shittim. Zechariah (Zec. 14:8), Living waters shall go out from Jerusalem, half of them toward the former sea, and half of them toward the hinder sea; and finally, the description of the pure river of water of life in Rev. 22:1-3, is evidently founded upon this passage of Ezekiel. Passages in which water is used as the symbol of the influence of the Spirit are too numerous and familiar to need quotation. (Comp. Isa. 44:3; Eze. 36:25-27; Zec. 13:1, &c.)

Ezekiel, having in the previous chapters described the dwelling of the Lord among His people with characteristic minuteness of detail, now proceeds to set forth the blessings that flow from this presence.
(1) Door of the house.This is the entrance of the Temple itself; the waters come out from under its threshold, just as in Rev. 22:1 they proceed out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. The prophet, who had just been in the outer court (Eze. 46:21, &c.), is brought in to the door of the house that he may see the waters.

From the right side of the house.Although the waters issue directly from the threshold which was in the centre of the east front of the Temple, and their general course was due east, it was necessary that they should be deflected a little at the start to the south in order to pass the porch and the altar, as well as both the inner and outer gateways.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

1-12. These verses describe the mysterious supernatural stream flowing from underneath the sacred threshold of the temple (see note Eze 46:1-2), the waters of which turn the desert into a paradise and even sweeten the Dead Sea; a plain symbol of the power of a holy religion in the midst of a redeemed people. These living waters of blessing (compare Isa 8:6; Joe 3:18; Rev 22:1-2) “trickled forth” (Eze 47:2, R.V., margin) from under the threshold and passing eastward and a little south of the altar, which was directly in front of the temple porch (Eze 40:47), descended the mountain gathering volume as it went, though seemingly without tributaries, until within four thousand cubits (about one and one third miles) from its source it had become a mighty torrent which no one could cross (Eze 47:5). These waters plunge on into that deep depression in the Jordan valley which the Hebrews well called the “Arabah” (R.V., Eze 47:8), or “desert” no traveler has ever failed to be impressed with its wildness and awful desolation and everywhere the miraculous life-giving power of these waters is seen, for “along the bank of the river” (Eze 47:6) is “every sort of tree whose fruit is edible; their leaves shall not wither, nor their fruit fail; monthly they shall bear fresh fruit; for their waters issue from the sanctuary, and their fruit shall be for food, and their leaves for healing” (Eze 47:12; compare Eze 47:7 and Rev 22:2). And still continuing, these miraculous waters flow into the “sea of the Arabah” (Deu 3:17), the Dead Sea, and at their coming that strange lake, whose salty and sulphurous banks had been absolutely devoid of vegetation, and in which no fish could ever live, suddenly becomes as full of fish as the Mediterranean (Eze 47:10), and “every living creature” (R.V., Eze 47:9) which inhabits the sea begins to swarm in its waters. From the Oasis of En-gedi (on the middle of the west shore) even unto En-eglaim (probably situated at the extreme end of the sea) this most blistered and poisonous part of the world God’s “awful vale of judgment” (Gen 19:24-28) becomes full of beauty and fertility and life, the place most prized by fishermen. Only a few fens and marshes remain unhealed (Eze 47:11) in order that a supply of salt may still be obtained from them. “So there is nothing nothing so sunken, so useless, so doomed but by the grace of God it may be redeemed, lifted, and made rich with life.” (See G.A. Smith, Historical Geography, p. 511, etc.) Ezekiel’s prophecy has never been, nor can it ever be, fulfilled literally in Palestine, but in the course of providential history it has been more than fulfilled. “From the throne of God, yet also from the Church of God, the fertilizing stream has flowed. Derelict as that Church has been in its duty, cruel in its conscience, worldly in its lusts, superstitious in its fears, material and ritualistic in its conceptions of life, nevertheless through its gates has flowed the constantly deepening stream of the river of life. Whatever desert those waters have touched has bloomed; wherever that stream has come life has come; and on its banks have grown every sort of tree whose leaves have been for the healing of the nations.” Lyman Abbott. Natural symbols are constantly used by the prophet to image spiritual and natural conditions. (Compare, for example, Joe 2:30-31; Act 2:19-20.) An ancient Jewish Midrash on Exo 12:12, explains this passage according to the Messianic hope: “The Holy One will bring forth living waters from Jerusalem, and will cure with it all diseases, as it is said Eze 47:9, and shall make the trees bring forth fruit every month, Eze 47:12.”

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

1. Under the threshold at the south side of the altar “There was a fountain connected with the temple hill the waters of which fell into the valley east of the city and made their way toward the sea; and long ere this time the gentle waters of this ‘brook that flowed fast by the oracle of God’ had furnished symbols to the prophets (Isa 8:6). Such waters in the East are the source of every blessing to men.” Davidson. The main religious teaching is that man’s blessings flow from the sanctuary of Jehovah. The waters of life start from the dwelling place of the Author of life. The symbols by which this thought was expressed would have been quite intelligible to the heathen among whom the captives lived. According to Babylonian tradition the threshold of the palace of Beltis-Allat, the lioness-queen of the lower world and goddess of fertility, stood upon a spring which had the property of restoring to life all who bathed in it or drank of its waters (Trumbull, Threshold Covenant, p. 115, etc.).

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

‘And he brought me back to the door of the house, and behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward, for the forefront of the house was towards the east. And the waters came out from under, from the right side of the house, on the south of the altar.’

The heavenly visitant now brought Ezekiel to the door of the house. This was probably the door of the sanctuary itself. And from underneath its threshold issued out water moving towards the east gate, which was natural as the door faced east (thus not towards Jerusalem which was south). The water flowed from the right side of the threshold and past the south side of the altar as it made its way to the permanently closed east gate. It was at present but a streamlet, a day of small things. This was the path that Yahweh had taken in the reverse direction when His glory had returned to the house previously. It is clear that we are to see in this life from God as He now reaches out to His people with spiritual water, for to Israel waters spoke of life.

‘Waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward.’ Water is regularly a picture of spiritual life and growth, whether in terms of river or rain. ‘The righteous man’ is ‘like a tree planted by the streams of water,’ (Psa 1:3). The man who trusts in Yahweh is like ‘a tree planted by the waters, which spreads out its roots by the river,’ (Jer 17:8). The coming transforming and reviving work of the Spirit is likened to men being sprinkled with water and made clean (Eze 36:25-27), and to water being poured out on those who are thirsty, and streams on the dry ground (Isa 44:3). A Man is coming who will be a hiding place from the wind and a covert from the tempest, like rivers of water in a dry place (Isa 32:2). A fountain is to be opened for sin and uncleanness (Zec 13:1). Those who take refuge in God will drink of the river of His pleasures, for with Him is the fountain of life (Psa 36:8-9). There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place of the tabernacles of the Most High (Psa 46:4). The earth being filled with the knowledge of Yahweh is likened to the waters covering the sea (Isa 11:9).

‘From the right side of the house, on the south of the altar.’ Every Israelite knew that at the right side of the house had stood the seven branched golden lampstand (Exo 26:35; Exo 40:24). This primarily represented the presence of Yahweh as a light of divine perfection among His people, but it also represented the resulting witness of Israel and was later seen as a symbol of the witness and work of Zerubbabel and Joshua the high priest (Zechariah 4). But as God’s anointed ones they were fed from the golden lampstand, as God worked through His Spirit in the day of small things (Zec 4:10). Possibly this was seen by Zechariah as the first initial fulfilment of the flowing water from the south side of the sanctuary, from He Who is the light of the world.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Chapter Eze 47:1-12 The Rivers of Living Water.

The first twelve verses of this chapter deal with the vision of rivers of living water flowing from the temple, beginning as a small streamlet and multiplying as they flowed outwards. If anything proves that this is a heavenly temple it is this. Attempts have been made to literalise this but they can miss the point of the whole message and ignore the significance read into the incident in the New Testament (Joh 7:37-39; Rev 22:1-5). This is no vision of an earthly cascade, but of heavenly action active in blessing. Such a huge earthly cascade issuing continually month by month (Eze 47:12) from a real temple would soon sweep the temple away. Nor could such a cascade come from ‘the top of a very high mountain’ (Eze 40:2). But this is a heavenly river flowing from a heavenly sanctuary, which is an entirely different matter (see Eze 47:12 where it is stressed that the unique quality of the water is because it comes from the sanctuary).

So firstly we must recognise the source of this flow. It is from the sanctuary via the closed east gate of the heavenly temple (Eze 47:1). It has nothing therefore to do with Jerusalem, for this temple was specifically sited well away from Jerusalem (Eze 45:1-6). Its source is in God. Zec 14:8 tells us that ‘in that day living waters will go out from Jerusalem — and Yahweh will be king over all the earth’. If we see this as spiritual waters flowing from God the two can be equated but no literalist can compare the two. Literally speaking they are from different sites. However as spiritual flows they are both from God. This confirms that Zechariah is actually thinking of Jerusalem in the same way as Ezekiel is thinking of the heavenly temple.

It should be recognised that Ezekiel was fond of the metaphorical picture of things abounding through water, and did not feel it necessary to explain that he did not mean it literally. He says of Pharaoh, ‘the waters nourished him, the deep made him to grow’, and he likened Egypt to rivers and canals causing growth wherever they went (Eze 31:4), a similar picture to here. Pharaoh’s punishment was that he would be taken out of the waters and the rivers and thrown into the wilderness (Eze 29:3-5) and the result would be that those who were like trees by the waters would sink to the nether parts of the earth (Eze 31:14). Both Babylon and Egypt are seen as planting men by rivers of water so that they might be like the willow tree or the goodly vine (Eze 17:5; Eze 17:8). Israel too is said to have been like a vine, planted by the waters, fruitful and full of branches by reason of many waters, until she was replanted in the wilderness in a dry and thirsty land (Eze 19:10; Eze 19:13). And especially in Eze 36:25-26 Ezekiel pictures God as sprinkling His people with water so that they may be made clean and undergo spiritual transformation. Thus we have every reason to see these waters too as metaphorical and spiritual.

And secondly we must recognise its intention. It was to bring life wherever it went (Eze 47:9). To the ancients the primary power of water was to give life. Those who lived in Canaan knew what it was to watch all nature die in a waterless and very hot summer. And then the rains came, and almost immediately, like magic, the bushes came to life, greenery sprang from the ground, and the world came alive again. That was the life-giving power of water. In Babylonia Israel had also witnessed the power of the great rivers. Along their banks life always flourished, and water was taken from them by irrigation to bring life to drier areas. The wilderness blossomed like a rose. They knew that the coveted Garden of Eden had been fruitful because of the great river flowing through it that became four rivers and watered the world. So that was their dream for their everlasting homeland, a great and everflowing river that would bring life everywhere, and especially in men’s hearts.

This prophecy is the answer to their dreams and parallel to those great prophetic pronouncements which spoke of the coming of the Spirit in terms of heavenly rain producing life and fruitfulness (Isa 32:15; Isa 44:3-5; Joe 2:23-32), and is similar in thought to Psa 46:4; Psa 65:9; Isa 33:21.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

The New Temple ( Eze 40:1 to Eze 48:35 ).

The book of Ezekiel began with a vision of the glory of God and the coming of the heavenly chariot throne of God in order to speak directly to His people through Ezekiel (chapter 1). He then recorded the departure of God’s glory from Jerusalem and the Temple because of the sins of Israel (chapters 8 – 11). This was followed by the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. Now it ends with another vision, the return of God’s glory to the land and to His people (chapters 40 -48) depicted in the form of a heavenly temple established on the mountains of Israel to which the glory of God returns, resulting in the final restoration of ‘the city’ as ‘Yahweh is there’. Thus this part of the book follows both chronologically and logically from what has gone before.

Furthermore at the commencement of the book Ezekiel received his divine commission as a prophet (chapters 1 – 3), then he pronounced oracles of judgment against Judah and Jerusalem for their sins, declaring that Jerusalem must be destroyed (chapters 4 – 24). He followed this up with oracles of judgment against the foreign nations who had opposed Israel (chapters 25 – 32). Then on hearing of Jerusalem’s fall (Eze 33:21), the prophet proclaimed messages of hope for Israel, declaring that God would fulfil His promises to deliver and bless His people Israel, and would restore them to the land of their fathers and establish them in the land.

Yes, more, that they would be established there everlastingly under a new David, with an everlasting sanctuary set up in their midst (stressed twice – Eze 37:26; Eze 37:28) (chapters 34 – 39). And now he declares the presence of that new Temple, even now present in the land, invisible to all but him and yet nevertheless real in so much that it can be measured. It is ‘the icing on the cake’, the final touch to what has gone before (40-48). God is back in His land. For such an invisible presence, a glimpse of another world, present but unseen except by those with eyes to see, compare Gen 28:12; 2Ki 2:11-12; 2Ki 6:17; Zec 1:7-11. Indeed without that heavenly temple the glory could not return, for it had to be guarded from the eyes of man.

The heavenly temple can be compared directly with the heavenly throne with its accompanying heavenly escort which Ezekiel saw earlier (chapter 1). That too was the heavenly equivalent of the earthly ark of the covenant, and huge in comparison. So Ezekiel was very much aware of the heavenly realm and its presence in different ways on earth, for he was a man of spiritual vision.

But there is one remarkable fact that we should notice here, and that is that having been made aware of the destruction of Jerusalem, and looking forward to the restoration of Israel and its cities and the Satanic opposition they will face, and even speaking of the building of a new Temple, Ezekiel never once refers directly by name to Jerusalem in any way (in Eze 36:38 it is referred to in an illustration). This seems quite remarkable. It seems to me that this could only arise from a studied determination not to do so. He wants to take men’s eyes off Jerusalem.

Here was a man who was a priest, who had constantly revealed his awareness of the requirements of the cult, who had been almost totally absorbed with Jerusalem, who now looked forward to the restoration of the land and the people, and yet who ignored what was surely central in every Israelite’s thinking, the restoration of Jerusalem. Surely after his earlier prophecies against Jerusalem his ardent listeners must have asked him the question, again and again, what about Jerusalem? And yet he seemingly gave them no answer. Why?

It seems to me that there can only be two parallel answers to that question. The first is that Jerusalem had sinned so badly that as far as God and Ezekiel were concerned its restoration as the holy city was not in the long run to be desired or even considered. What was to be restored was the people and the land, which was his continual emphasis. Jerusalem was very secondary and not a vital part of that restoration. And secondly that in the final analysis the earthly Jerusalem was not important in the final purposes of God. Jerusalem had been superseded. His eternal sanctuary would be set up, but it would not be in the earthly Jerusalem (chapter 45 makes this clear). Rather it would be set up in such a way that it could more be compared to Jacob’s ladder, as providing access to and from the heavenlies (Gen 28:12) and a way to God, and yet be invisible to man. It is a vision of another world in its relationships with man (compare 2Ki 6:17). It was the beginnings of a more spiritual view of reality. And it would result in an eternal city, the city of ‘Yahweh is there’ (Eze 48:30-35).

Now that is not the view of Jerusalem and the temple of men like Nehemiah (Neh 1:4) and Daniel (Dan 9:2; Dan 9:16; Dan 9:19), but they were God-inspired politicians thinking of the nearer political and religious future not the everlasting kingdom. (Daniel does of course deal with the everlasting kingdom, but he never relates Jerusalem to it. He relates the everlasting kingdom to Heaven). Nor do the other prophets avoid mentioning Jerusalem, and they do see in ‘Jerusalem’ a place for the forwarding of the purposes of God (e.g. Isa 2:3; Isa 4:3-5; Isa 24:23; Isa 27:13; Isa 30:19; Isa 31:5; Isa 33:20-21; Isa 40:2; Isa 40:9; Isa 44:26-28; Isa 52:1-2; Isa 52:9; Isa 62:1-7; Isa 65:18-19; Isa 66:10-20; Jer 3:17-18; Jer 33:11-18; Joe 2:32; Joe 3:1; Joe 3:16-20; Oba 1:17-21; Mic 4:2-8; Zep 3:14-16; Zec 2:2-4; Zec 2:12; Zec 3:2; Zec 8:3-8; Zec 8:15; Zec 8:22; Zec 9:9-10; Zec 12:6 to Zec 13:1; Zec 14:11-21; Mal 3:4), although some of these verses too have the ‘new Jerusalem’ firmly in mind. And certainly God would in the short term encourage the building of a literal Temple in Jerusalem (Haggai and Zechariah). Thus all saw the literal Jerusalem as having at least a limited function in the forward going of God’s purposes, simply because it was central in the thinking of the people of Israel. Although how far is another question. However, Ezekiel’s vision went beyond that. It seems to be suggesting that in the major purposes of God the earthly Jerusalem was now of little significance. It was not even worthy of mention. It is now just ‘the city’.

Yet we find him here suddenly speaking of the presence of a new Temple in the land of Israel. But even here, although it is referred to under the anonymous phrase ‘the city’ (Eze 40:1), Jerusalem remains unmentioned by name. And the temple is not sited in Jerusalem. Jerusalem is simply a place called anonymously ‘the city’, whose future name, once it is redeemed and purified, is ‘Yahweh is there’ (Eze 48:35). What Ezekiel is far more concerned to demonstrate is that the glory of Yahweh, and His accessibility to His own, has returned to His people in a new heavenly Temple, which has replaced the old, and is established on a mysterious and anonymous mountain, rather than to stress His presence in an earthly Jerusalem. Indeed he will stress that this temple is outside the environs of Jerusalem (Eze 45:1-6).

This should then awaken us to the fact that Ezekiel is in fact here speaking of an everlasting sanctuary (Eze 37:26; Eze 37:28). This is no earthly Temple with earthly functions. There is no suggestion anywhere that it should be built, indeed  it was already there and could be measured. It is an everlasting heavenly Temple of which the earthly was, and will be, but a shadow.

It is true that a physical temple would be built, and they are specifically told that the altar described (but pointedly not directly ‘measured’) is to be made (Eze 43:18), for physical sacrifices would require a physical altar, and that will be the point of contact with the heavenly temple, but the important thing would be, not the physical temple, but the invisible heavenly temple, present in the land, of which the physical was but a representation. The ancients regularly saw their physical religious artefacts as in some way representing an invisible reality, and so it is here. A fuller picture of the heavenly temple is given throughout the Book of Revelation. And this temple was now ‘seen’ to be established in the land even before a physical temple was built. God had again taken possession of His land, and awaited the return of His people for the ongoing of His purposes.

But a further point, putting these verses firmly in its context, is that this will make them realise that once they have come through the trials brought on them by Gog and his forces, fortified by the presence of God in their midst, they will be able to enter the eternal rest promised them by God, for His heavenly, everlasting temple was here so that He could dwell among them in an everlasting sanctuary. This was thus putting in terms that they could understand the heavenly future that awaited His people. It was a fuller and more perfect sanctuary (Eze 37:26-28; Heb 9:11). And it had relevance from the beginning as the sign that God had returned to His land.

This section about the ‘heavenly’ temple can be split into five parts. The first is a brief introduction in terms of the vision that Ezekiel experienced (Eze 40:1-4). This is followed by a detailed description of the new temple complex with the lessons that it conveyed (Eze 40:5 to Eze 42:20), the return of Yahweh to His temple (Eze 43:1-9), the worship that would follow as a result of that temple (Eze 43:10 to Eze 46:24), and the accompanying changes that would take place with regard to His people as they ‘repossessed the land’ with the final establishment of a heavenly city (chapters 47-48), all expressed in terms of what they themselves were expecting, but improved on. To them ‘the land’ was the ultimate of their aspirations, a land in which Yahweh had promised them that they would dwell in safety and blessing for ever. So the promises were put in terms of that land to meet with their aspirations. But there are clear indications that something even more splendid was in mind as we shall see. The land could never finally give them the fullness of what God was promising them, and once the temple moved into Heaven, ‘the land’ would move there too.

But we should perhaps here, in fairness to other commentators, pause to recognise that there are actually a number of main views (with variations) with regard to these chapters, which we ought to all too briefly consider for the sake of completeness, so as to present a full picture. As we consider them readers must judge for themselves which one best fits all the facts, remembering what we have already seen in Ezekiel the details of a vision that reaches beyond the confines of an earthly land. We must recognise too that accepting one does not necessarily mean that we have to fully reject the others, for prophecy is not limited to a single event, but to the ongoing action and purposes of God. Nevertheless we cannot avoid the fact that one view must be predominant

1) Some have considered that what Ezekiel predicted was fulfilled when the exiles returned and re-established themselves in the land, rebuilding the physical temple and restoring the priesthood. However nothing that actually took place after the return from Babylon matches the full details of these predictions. Neither the temple built under Zerubbabel’s supervision, nor the temple erected by Herod the Great, bore any resemblance to what Ezekiel describes here. In fact, there has been no literal fulfilment of these predictions. And there does not seem to have been a desire for it. Thus this view disregards many of the main facts outlined and dismisses them as unimportant. It sees them as mainly misguided optimism or permissible exaggeration.

2) Others have interpreted this section spiritually. They have seen these predictions as fulfilled in a spiritual sense in the church, and certainly the New Testament to a certain extent confirms this view. Consider for example the use of the idea in chapter 47 in Joh 7:38. But many consider that this approach fails to explain the multitude of details given, such as the dimensions of the various rooms in the temple complex. They point out that Ezekiel’s guide was careful to make sure that the prophet recorded these details exactly (Eze 40:4). The reply would be that what they indicate symbolically is God’s detailed concern for His people. This view presupposes that the church supersedes the old Israel in God’s programme (as many believe that the New Testament teaches) and that many of God’s promises concerning a future for Israel find part of their actual fulfilment in the church as God’s temple and as the new Israel, symbolically rather than literally. There is certainly some truth in this position.

3) Still others believe that these chapters describe a yet future, eschatological temple and everlasting kingdom in line with Eze 37:24-28, and following 38-39, but that they again do so only symbolically. These interpreters believe that the measurements, for example, represent symbolic truth concerning the coming everlasting kingdom, including the dwelling of God among His people, the establishing of true and pure worship, and the reception by His people of all that He has promised them in fuller measure than they can ever have expected, but they do not look for a literal temple complex and the establishment of temple worship. Indeed they consider that such would be a backward step in the progress of God’s purposes.

It is claimed by those who disagree with them that this view also overlooks the amount of detail given, so much detail, they would claim, that one could almost use these chapters as general blueprints to build the structures in view. To this the reply is partly that the detail is in fact not sufficient to prepare efficient blueprints, and partly that they bear their own message. Indeed they argue that all the many attempts to make a reliable blueprint have failed. If taken literally, they argue, there are problems with the detail that cannot be surmounted. They are therefore far better seen as depictions of the concern of God for perfection for His people.

4) Still others also take this passage as a an apocalyptic prophecy but anticipate a literal fulfilment in the future. While they accept that some of the descriptions have symbolic significance as well as literal reality, and that some teach important spiritual lessons, and can also be applied to the eternal state, nevertheless, they argue, the revelation finally concerns details of a literal future temple to be built to these specifications, details of a system of worship and priesthood which will be literally established, and actual physical changes in the promised land, which will occur when a people identifying themselves specifically as Israel, not the church, dwell there securely (i.e. during what they call the Millennium).

Those who disagree with them point among other things to the impracticality of the plans for the temple, the impossibility of now establishing a genuine Zadokite priesthood, the contradiction of establishing a system of sacrifices when the New Testament points to a better sacrifice, made once for all, which has replaced all others, the discrepancies and difficulties with regard to the siting of the temple, and the unfeasability of dividing the land in the way described.

5) And finally there is the view that we are proposing here, that the Temple of Ezekiel was never intended to be built by man, but was rather a genuine and real presence of the heavenly temple which was from this time present invisibly on earth (invisible to all but Ezekiel, as the armies of God were present but invisible to all but Elisha –2Ki 6:17). It is saying that God has established Himself in His own invisible temple in the land ready to carry out His campaign into the future. This can then be seen as connected with the temple seen in Revelation in heaven, with the earthly temples to be built as but a shadow of the heavenly, and with the final temple in the everlasting kingdom. The strength of this position will appear throughout the commentary. Suffice to say at this point that there is nowhere in the chapters any suggestion that the temple should be built from the description presented (in complete contrast with the tabernacle – Exo 25:40). And this is even more emphatically so because instructions  are  given to build an altar for worship. Given Ezekiel’s visionary insight this fact in itself should make us hesitate in seeing this as any but a visionary temple already present in Israel at the time of measuring.

Whatever view we take we cannot deny that the New Testament does see God’s temple as being present on earth in His people (Eph 2:20-22; 1Co 3:16-17 ; 2Co 6:16; Rev 11:1), and that John in Revelation refers throughout to a temple in Heaven, and to a new Jerusalem, clearly related to some of the things described in these chapters. Furthermore his description of the eternal state, of life in ‘the new earth’ after the destruction of the present earth, is partly based on chapter 47-48 (Revelation 21-22). And we might see that as suggesting that once the Messiah had been rejected God’s heavenly temple was thought of as having deserted Israel, and as having gone up into Heaven where it was seen by John, although still being represented on earth, no longer by a building, but by His new people.

Bearing all this in mind we will now consider the text.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Israel’s Glorification Eze 35:1 to Eze 48:35 deals with the topic of Israel’s glorification. The description of the restored land of Israel and the new Temple and its worship (36-48) reveals a building and nation more majestic and beautiful that that found during the time of Solomon. These passages reveal the glorification that God has in planned for His people Israel. This glorification is different than what He has planned for the Church. The prophecies of this passage signify the fact that God has a much greater blessing in store for His people than any earthly kingdom in the past, even greater than Israel in its golden age of King Solomon. The future glories of the heavenly kingdom will far exceed the earthly. The Book of Jubilees (4.26-27) tells us that this Mount Zion will be sanctified in the new creation for a sanctification of the earth; through it will the earth be sanctified from all (its) guilt and its uncleanness throughout the generations of the world.

From these last chapters in the book of Ezekiel we know that the full restoration of Israel involves three key events that will take place in order to make their restoration complete and everlasting. These events will involve the restoration of Israel as a nation (36-37), the battle against Gog and its allies (38-39), and the restoration of the Temple and its worship (40-46) and its land (47-48).

Here is a proposed outline:

1. Judgment upon Edom Eze 35:1-15

2. The Restoration of Israel as a Nation Eze 36:1 to Eze 37:28

3. The Battle against Gog and its Allies Eze 38:1 to Eze 39:23

4. The Restoration of the Temple and its Worship and Land Eze 40:1 to Eze 48:35

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

The Restoration of the Land of Israel Eze 47:1 to Eze 48:35 deals primarily with the restoration of the land of Israel to the twelve tribes.

Eze 47:10  And it shall come to pass, that the fishers shall stand upon it from Engedi even unto Eneglaim; they shall be a place to spread forth nets; their fish shall be according to their kinds, as the fish of the great sea, exceeding many.

Eze 47:10 “they shall be a place to spread forth nets: their fish shall be according to their kinds, as the fish of the Great Sea, exceeding many” – Comments – Jimmy Swaggart says Eze 47:10 refers to the spread of the Gospel to many kinds of nations across the earth, with multitudes being saved. [48]

[48] Jimmy Swaggart, “Amazing Answers To Prayers,” in The Evangelist (Baton Rouge, Louisiana: Jimmy Swaggart Ministries, February 1988).

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

The Stream of Living Waters

v. 1. Afterward He brought me again unto the door of the house, from the outer court to the main portal of the Temple; and, behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward, symbolical of the divine blessings which flow from His Church; for the forefront of the house stood toward the east, the Temple facing in the same direction as had the Tabernacle and the Temple of Solomon, and the waters came down from under from the right side of the house, at the south side of the altar, welling up from below the center of the Sanctuary as its fountainhead.

v. 2. Then brought He me out of the way of the gate northward, for the portal on the east was locked, and led me about the way without unto the utter gate by the way that looketh eastward, so that Ezekiel might follow the course of the wonderful stream; and, behold, there ran out waters on the right side, before the southern half of the front.

v. 3. And when the Man that had the line in His hand went forth eastward, He measured a thousand cubits, namely, at this distance from the walls; and He brought me through the waters: the waters were to the ankles.

v. 4. Again He measured a thousand, namely, from the first place of crossing, and brought me through the waters: the waters were to the knees, being supplied and increased in this marvelous manner from the sacred miraculous source in the Temple. Again He measured a thousand and brought me through: the waters were to the loins, ever growing deeper.

v. 5. Afterward He measured a thousand, and it was a river, it had grown to the dimensions of a great stream, that I could not pass over, for the waters were risen, waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed over, like an impetuous mountain torrent, swollen by the spring rains, making swimming necessary if a person wanted to cross at all.

v. 6. And He said unto me, in order to impress upon the prophet every detail of the picture, Son of man, hast thou seen this? Then He brought me, and caused me to return, to the brink of the river, back to the bank of the stream which he had apparently attempted to wade.

v. 7. Now, when I had returned, his attention now being directed to the bank rather than to the stream, behold, at the bank of the river, lining it on either side, were very many trees on the one side and on the other.

v. 8. Then said He unto me, These waters issue out toward the east country, the term used designating the entire valley of the Jordan, and go down into the desert, a word used of the steppes of Southeastern Judea, and go into the sea, here the Dead Sea; which being brought forth into the sea, the waters shall be healed, its deadly saltness being relieved so that it could again be inhabited by fishes.

v. 9. And it shall come to pass that everything that liveth, which moveth, literally, “every living soul that creepeth,” which had the breath of life in itself, whithersoever the rivers shall come, shall live, on account of the fullness of life borne by them; and there shall be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters shall come thither, their freshness enabling the fishes to live and to multiply most abundantly, for they, the waters of the Dead Sea, shall be healed; and everything shall live whither the river cometh, being endowed with a miraculous vitality by coming into contact with it.

v. 10. And it shall come to pass that the fishers shall stand upon it from En-gedi, on its western shore, where David had once found refuge, even unto Eneglaim, on the eastern shore, in the confines of Moab; they shall be a place to spread forth nets; their fish shall be according to their kinds as the fish of the Great Sea, exceeding many.

v. 11. But the miry places thereof, the swamps formed by the natural recession of the waters, and the marshes thereof shall not be healed; they shall be given to salt, unfit for cultivation and for every living thing.

v. 12. And by the river upon the bank thereof, on this side and on that side, shall grow all trees for meat, springing lip and bearing the richest kind of food, whose leaf shall not fade, neither shall the fruit thereof be consumed; it shall bring forth new fruit according to his months, fruit maturing every month, because their waters they issued out of the Sanctuary, and were thus filled with marvelous life; and the fruit thereof shall be for meat and the leaf thereof for medicine, its foliage for healing. Without attempting to give an interpretation of every detail of this picture, its general meaning is clear. The miraculous river pictures the spread of the Gospel, the gaining of new members for the Church, the increase of divine blessings in the Messianic era. The trees represent the wonderful blessings given through the ministry of the Word. The fishermen of the Lord are busily engaged in bringing in the base-born and the noble, the rich and the poor, out of the sea of the world to the salvation earned by Jesus Christ. “Searching into the deep things of God, we find some easy to understand, others more difficult, others beyond our reach, of which we can only adore the depths. ” Where the stream of the Gospel flows, the putrid and poisonous waters of this world are cleansed, but the swamps and morasses of men’s hatred and enmity toward God are shut off, by their own fault, from His mercy. All this, and more, is indicated in Rev 22:1-6, where we also have a description of the final perfection of the Church of Christ.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

EXPOSITION

As the first part of Ezekiel’s vision (Ezekiel 40-43.) dealt with the temple, or “house,” and the second (Ezekiel 44-47.) with the ritual, or “worship,” so the third, which beans with the present chapter (Eze 47:1-23; Eze 48:1-35.), treats of the land, or “inheritance” setting forth first its relation to the temple (verses 1-12) and to outlying countries (verses 13-21), and secondly its division among the tribes, inclusive of the priests, Levites, sanctuary, prince, and city (Eze 48:1-23), with a statement of the dimensions and gates of the last (verses 24-35). The opening section of the present chapter (verses 1-12) is by Kliefoth and others connected with the second part as a conclusion, rather than with the third part as an introduction; but, taken either way, the passage has the same significance or nearly so. If read in continuation of the foregoing, it depicts the blessed consequences, in the shape of life and healing, which should flow to the land of Israel and its inhabitants from the erection in their midst of the sanctuary of Jehovah, and the observance by them of the holy ordinances of Jehovah’s religion. Viewed as a preface to what follows, it exhibits the transformation which the institution of such a culture would effect upon the land before proceeding to speak of its partition among the tribes. The prophet’s imagery in this paragraph may have taken as its point of departure the well-known fact that the waters of Shiloah (Isa 8:6; Psa 46:4) appeared to flow from under the temple hill, the Pool of Siloam having been fed from a spring welling up with intermittent action from beneath Ophel. To Isaiah “the waters of Shiloah that go softly,” had already been an emblem of the blessings to be enjoyed under Jehovah’s rule (Isa 8:6); to Joel (Joe 3:18) “a fountain,” coming forth from the house of the Lord and watering the valley of Shittim, or the Acacia valley, on the borders of Moab, on the other side of Jordan, where the Israelites halted and sinned (Num 25:1; Num 33:49), had symbolized the benefits that should be experienced by Israel in the Messianic era when Jehovah should permanently dwell in his holy mount of Zion; to Ezekiel, accordingly, the same figure naturally occurs as a means of exhibiting the life and healing, peace and prosperity, that should result to Israel from the erection upon her soil of Jehovah’s sanctuary and the institution among her people of Jehovah’s worship. Zechariah (Zec 13:1; Zec 14:8) and John (Rev 22:1, Rev 22:2) undoubtedly make use of the same image, which, it is even probable, they derived from Ezekiel (comp. Ecclesiasticus 24:30, 31, in which Wisdom is introduced as saying, “I also came out as a brook from a river, and as a conduit into a garden. I said, I will water my best garden, and will water abundantly my garden bed; and, lo, my brook became a river, and my river became a sea”).

Eze 47:1

Having completed his survey of the sacrificial kitchens in the outer court (Eze 46:19-24), the prophet was once more conducted by his guide to the door of the house, or of the temple in the strict sense, i.e. of the sanctuary. There he perceived that waters issued (literally, and behold waters issuing) from under the threshold of the house, i.e. of the temple porch (see Eze 40:48, Eze 40:49; and comp. Eze 9:3), eastward, the direction having been determined by the fact that the forefront of the house stood or was toward the east. He also noticed that the waters came down (or, descended)the temple having been situated on higher ground than the inner courtfrom under the threshold, from the right side of the houseliterally, from the shoulder (comp. Eze 40:18, Eze 40:40, Eze 40:41; Eze 41:2, Eze 41:26; Eze 46:1-24 :29) of the house, the right. The two clauses are not to be conjoined as by Hengstenberg, Ewald, and Smend, as if they meant, from underneath the right side of the house; but kept distinct, to indicate the different features which entered into the prophet’s picture. The first was that the waters issued forth from under the threshold of the house; the second, that they proceeded from the right side or shoulder of the house, i.e. from the corner where the south wall of the porch and the east wall of the temple joined (see Eze 41:1); the third, that the stream flowed on the south side of the altar, which stood exactly in front of the temple perch (see Eze 40:47), and would have obstructed the course of the waters had they issued forth from the perch doorway instead of from the comer above described.

Eze 47:2

As the prophet could not follow the stream’s course by passing through the east inner gate, which was shut on the six working days (Eze 46:1), or through the east outer gate, which was always shut (Eze 44:1), his conductor led him outside of the inner and outer courts by the north gates (literally, to the north (outer) gate), and brought him round by the way without unto the outer gate by the way that looketh eastward. This can only import that, on reaching the north outer gate, the prophet and his guide turned eastward and moved round to the east outer gate. The Revised Version reads, by the way of the gate that looketh toward the east; but as the east outer gate was the terminus ad quem of the prophet’s walk, it is better to translate, to the gate looking eastward. When the prophet had arrived thither, he once more beheld that there ran outliterally, trickled forth ( occurring here only in Scripture, and being derived from , “to drop down,” or “weep”)waters. Obviously these were the same as Ezekiel had already observed. On (literally, from) the right side; or, shoulder. This, again, signified the corner where the east wall of the temple and the south wall of the gate joined.

Eze 47:3

Having emerged from the corner of the east outer gate in drops, the stream, which had not swollen in its passage across the outer court and under the temple wall, speedily exhibited a miraculous increase in depth, and therefore in volume. Having advanced eastward along the course of the stream an accurately measured distance of a thousand cubits (about one-third of a mile), the prophet’s guide brought, or caused him to pass, through the waters, when he found that they were to the ankles; or, were waters of the ankles, as the Chaldee, Syriac, Vulgate, Keil, Kliefoth, Ewald, and Smend translate, rather than “water of the foot-soles,” as Gesenius and Havernick render, meaning,” water that hitherto had only been deep enough to wet the soles.” The , or “water of vanishing,” of the LXX,, is based on the idea of “failing,” “ceasing,” “coming to an end,” which appears to be the root-conception of (see Gen 47:15, Gen 47:16; Psa 77:9; Isa 16:4).

Eze 47:4

At a second and a third distance of a thousand cubits the same process was repeated when the waters were found to be first waters to the knees, and secondly waters to (or, of) the loins. The unusual expression, , instead , as in the similar expressions before and after, may have been chosen, Keil suggests, in order to avoid resemblance to the phrase, in Isa 36:12 (Keri)not a likely explanation. Havernick describes it simply as an instance of bold emphasis. Schroder breaks it up into two clauses, thus: “waters, to the knees they reach.” Smend changes into .

Eze 47:5

After a fourth distance of a thousand cubits, the waters had risen, or, lifted themselves up (comp. Job 8:11, in which the verb is used of a plant growing up), and become waters to swim inliterally, waters of swimming ( occurs only here; the noun only in Eze 32:6)a river that could not be passed over, on account of its depth. The word was applied either to a river that constantly flowed from a fountain, as the Amen, or to a winter torrent that springs up from rain or snow upon the mountains, and disappears in summer like the Kedron, which had seldom any water in it (see Robinson’s ‘Bibl. Res.,’ 1.402). That Ezekiel’s river broadened and deepened so suddenly, and apparently without receiving into it any tributaries, clearly pointed to miraculous action.

Eze 47:6

Then he caused me to return to the brink of the river. The difficulty lying in the word “return” has given rise to a variety of conjectures. Hengstenberg supposes the prophet had made trial of the river’s depth by wading in (perhaps up to the neck), and that the angel caused him to return from the stream to the bank According to Hitzig, the measuring had taken place at some distance from the stream, and the prophet, having come up to his guide from the bank after making trial of the water’s depth, was Once more conducted back to the river’s brink. Havernick conceives the sense to be that the prophet, having accompanied the angel to the point where the stream debouched into the Dead Sea was led back to the riverbank. All difficulty, however, vanishes if, either with Schroder we refer to a mental returning, as if the import were that the angel, having ascertained that the prophet had “seen” the river’s course, now told him to direct his attention to the bank, or, with Keil and Kliefoth, translate by “along” or “on” rather than “to.” As the prophet had been led along or on the river’s bank to see the increasing breadth and depth of the water, so was he now “caused to return” along or on the same bank to note the abundance of the foliage with which it was adorned.

Eze 47:7

Now when I had returned is by the best interpreters, after Gesenius, regarded as an incorrect form for (literally, in my returning), though Schroder adheres to the transitive sense of the verb, and translates,” when I had turned myself,” and Hitzig takes the suffix as a genitive of possession, and renders, “when he came back with me.” In any case, on the return journey the prophet observed that at (or, on) the bank (or, lip) of the river were very many trees on the one side and on the other. Hitzig supposes the trees had not been there when the prophet made the down journey, but sprang up when he had turned to his guide (Eze 47:6), and stood with his back to the river. Kliefoth’s conclusion is better, that the trees had been there all the while, but that the prophet’s attention had not been directed to them. The luxuriant foliage of this vision reappears in that of the Apocalyptic river (Rev 22:2).

Eze 47:8

Toward the east country ( ); literally, the east circle, in this case probably “the region about Jordan” (Jos 22:10, Jos 22:11), above the Dead Sea, where the valley or ghor widens out into a bread basin, equivalent to (Gen 13:10). The LXX. render, or , designing by this, however (presumably), only to Graecize the Hebrew word as they do with the term , desert, or, plain, which they translate by . The Arabah signified the low, sterile valley into which the Jordan runs near Jericho, in which are the Dead Sea (hence called “the sea of the Arabah,” Deu 3:17; Deu 4:49), and the brook Kedron, or “river of the Arabah” (Amo 6:14), and which extends as far south as the head of the Elanitic gulf. The whole region is described by Robinson (‘Bibl. Res.,’ 2.596) as one of extreme desolationa character which belonged to it in ancient times (Josephus, ‘Wars,’ 3.10. 7; 4.8. 2). The part of this Arabah into which the waters flowed was situated north of the sea, clearly not the Mediterranean, but the Dead Sea, “the sea of the Arabah,” as above stated, and the “eastern sea” as afterwards named (Eze 47:18), into which they ultimately flowed. The clause, which being brought forth into the sea, may either be connected with the proceeding words or formed into an independent sentence. Among those who adopt the former construction a variety of renderings prevails. The LXX. reads, “(And the water) comes to the sea ( ), to the sea of the pouring out,” i.e. the Dead Sea, into which the river debouches. With this Havernick agrees, rendering, “to the sea of that outflow.” Ewald reads, “into the sea of muddy waters,” meaning the Dead Sea. Kimchi, “into the sea where the waters are brought forth,” i.e. the ocean (the Mediterranean), whoso waters go forth to encompass the world. Hengstenberg, Kliefoth, Keil, and Currey, who adopt the latter construction, borrow from the antecedent clause, and translate, “To the sea (come or go) the waters that have been brought forth;” with which accords the Revised Version. The last words record the effect which should be produced by their entering into the sea. The waters shall be healed, i.e. rendered salubrious, from being hurtful (comp. Exo 15:23, Exo 15:25; 2Ki 2:22). The translation of the LXX; , is inaccurate. The unwholesome character of the Dead Sea is described by Tacitus: “Lucius immenso ambitu, specie maris sapore corruptior, gravitate odoris accolis pestifer, neque vento impellitar neque pisces ant suetas aquis volucres patitur“ (‘Hist.,’ 5.6). Yon Raumer writes, “The sea is celled Dead, because there is in it no green plant, no water-fowl in it, no fish, no shell. If the Jordan carry fish into it, they die.” “According to the testimony of all antiquity and of most modern travelers,” says Robinson (‘Bibl. Res.,’ 2.226), “there exists within the waters of the Dead Sea no living thing, no trace, indeed, of animal or vegetable life. Our own experience goes to confirm the truth of this testimony. We perceived no sign of life within the waters.”

Eze 47:9

The nature of the healing is next described as an impartation of such celebrity to the waters that everything that liveth, which movethbetter, every living creature which swarmeth (comp. Gen 1:20, Gen 1:21; Gen 7:21)whitherseover the rivers (literally, the two rivers) shall come, shall live. The meaning cannot be that everything which liveth and swarmeth in the sea whither the rivers come shall live, because the Dead Sea contains no fish (see above), but whithersoever the rivers come, there living and swarming creatures of every kind shall spring into existence, shall come to life and flourish. The dual form, , has been accounted for by Maurer, as having been selected on account of its resemblance to ; by Hvernick and Currey, as pointing to the junction of another river, the Kedron (Hvernick), the Jordan (Currey), with the temple-stream before the latter, should fall into the sea; by Kliefoth, as alluding to a division of the river waters after entering the sea; by Neumann and Schroder, as referring to the waters of the sea and the waters of the river, which should henceforth be united; and by Hengstenberg, with whom Keil and Plumptre agree, as a dual of intensification (as in Jer 1:1-19 :21), signifying “double river,” with allusion to its greatness, or the strength of its current. None of these interpretations is free from objection; though probably, in default of better, the last is best. Ewald changes the dual into , a singular with a suffix, while Hitzig makes of it a plural; but neither of these devices is satisfactory. As a further evidence that the waters of the sea should be healed by the inflowing into them of the waters of the river, it is stated that the sea should thereafter contain a very great multitude of fish (literally, and the fish will be very many), of which previously it contained none. The next clauses supply the reason of this abundance of fish, because these waters (of the river) shallor, are (Revised Version) come thither(into the waters of the sea), for (literally, and) they, the latter, shall be (or, are) healed, and everything shall live (or, connecting this with the foregoing clause, and everything shall be healed, and live) whithersoever the river comeththe river, namely, that proceedeth from the temple.

Eze 47:10

As another consequence of the inflowing of this river into the Dead Sea, it is stated that the fishers (rather, fishers, without the article) should stand upon its banks, from Engedi, even unto Englaim; there shall be a place to spread forth nets. The Revised Version more correctly renders, fishers shall stand by it; from Engedi even unto Eneglaim, shall be a place for the spreading of nets; or, more literally, a place of spreading, out for nets (comp. Eze 26:5). Engedi, , meaning “Fountain of the kid;” originally styled Hazezon-Tamar (2Ch 20:2), now called ‘Ain Jidy (Robinson,’ Bibl. Res.,’ 2.214), was situated in the middle of the west coast of the Dead Sea, and not at its southern extremity, as Jerome supposed. Englaim, , signifying “Fountain of two calves,” was located by Jerome, who cars it En Gallim, at the northern extremity of the Dead Sea, and is usually identified with the modern ‘Ain Feshkhah, or “Fountain of mist,” at the northern end of the west coast, where the ruins of houses and a small tower have been discovered (Robinson, ‘Bibl. Res.,’ 2.220). Ewald cites Isa 15:8 to show that Englaim was on the eastern shore of the Dead Sea, which, Smend notes, was given up by the prophet to the sons of the East.

Eze 47:11

The miry places thereof and the marshes thereof , “its pools and sloughs” (comp. Isa 30:14, where the term-signifies a reservoir for water, or cistern), were the low tracts of land upon the borders of the Dead Sea, which in the rainy season, when its waters overflowed, became covered with pools (see Robinson, ‘Bibl. Res.,’ 2.225). These, according to the prophet, should not be healed, obviously because the waters of the temple-river should not reach them, but should be given to salt. When the waters of the above-mentioned pools have been dried up or evaporated, they leave behind them a deposit of salt (see Robinson, ‘Bibl. Res.,’ 2.226), and Canon Driver, following Smend, conceives that the above-named miry places and marshes in the vicinity of the Dead Sea were to be allowed to remain as they were on account of the excellent salt which they furnished. (On the supposed (!) excellence of the salt derived from the Dead Sea, Thomson’s ‘Land and the Book,’ p. 616, may be consulted.) If this, however, were the correct import of the prophet’s words, then the clause would describe an additional blessing to be enjoyed by the land, viz. that the temple-river would not be permitted to spoil its “salt-pans;” but the manifest intention of the prophet was to indicate a limitation to the life-giving influence of the river, and to signify that places and persons unvisited by its healing stream would be abandoned to incurable destruction. “To give to salt” is in Scripture never expressive of blessing, but always of judgment (see Deu 29:23; Jdg 9:47; Psa 107:34; Jer 17:6; Zep 2:9).

Eze 47:12

The effect of the river upon the vegetation growing on its banks is the last feature added to the prophet’s picture. Already referred to in Eze 47:7, it is here developed at greater length. The “very many trees” of that verse become in this all trees, or every tree for meat, i.e. every sort of tree with edible fruit (comp. Le 19:23), whose leaf should not fade or wither, and whose fruit should not be consumed or finished, i.e. should not fail, but continue to bring forth new fruit, i.e; early or firstfruits, according to his (or, its) months; or, every month; the in being taken distributively, as in Isa 47:13 (compare , “every day,” in Eze 46:13). This remarkable productivity, the prophet saw, was due, not so much to the fact that the tree roots sucked up moisture from the stream, as to the circumstance that the waters which they drank up issued out of the sanctuary. To the same circumstance were owing the nutritive and medicinal properties of their fruit and leaves respectively. The picture in this verse is unmistakably based on Gen 2:9, and is as clearly reproduced by the Apocalyptic seer in Rev 22:2. On this whole vision the remarks of Thomson, in ‘The Land and the Book’, are worthy of being consulted.

Eze 47:13-23

The boundaries of the land, and the manner of its division.

Eze 47:13

Thus saith the Lord. The usual formula introducing a new Divine enactment (comp. Eze 43:18; Eze 44:9; Eze 45:9, Eze 45:18; Eze 46:1, Eze 46:16). This. is obviously a copyist’s error for , which the LXX; the Vulgate, and the Targum have substituted for it; the change seems demanded by the complete untranslatability of , and by the fact that recurs in Eze 47:15. The border, whereby ye shall inherit the land; or, divide the land for inheritance (Revised Version). The term , applied in Eze 43:13, Eze 43:17 to the border of the altar here signifies the boundary or limit of the land. (For the verb, comp. Num 32:18; Num 34:13; Isa 14:2.) According to the twelve tribes. This presupposed that at least representatives of the twelve tribes would return from exile; but it is doubtful if this can be proved from Scripture to have taken place, which once more shows that a literal interpretation of this temple-vision cannot be consistently carried through. Smend observes that the word commonly employed in the priest-cede to denote “tribes” is (Num 26:55; Num 30:1; Num 31:4; Num 33:54; Jos 14:1; Jos 21:1; Jos 22:14), which is never used by Ezekiel, who habitually selects, as here, the term (Eze 37:19; Eze 45:8; Eze 48:1), which also was not unknown to the priest-cede (Exo 39:14; Num 18:2; Jos 13:29; Jos 21:16; Jos 22:9, Jos 22:10, Jos 22:11, Jos 22:13). That is to say, if the priest-cede existed before Ezekiel, he had the choice of both terms, and selected shebhet; whereas if Ezekiel existed before the priest-cede, and prepared the way for it, the author of the latter rejected Ezekiel’s word shebhet, and adopted another perfectly unknown to the prophet. This fact appears to point to a dependence of Ezekiel on the priest-cede rather than of the priest-cede on Ezekiel. Joseph shall have two portions; rather, Joseph portions, as is not dual. Yet that two were intended is undoubted (see Gen 48:22; Jos 17:14, Jos 17:17).

Eze 47:14

Ye shall inherit it, one as well as another; literally, a man as his brotherthe customary Hebrew phrase for “equally” (see, however, 2Sa 11:25). The equal participants were to be tribes, not the families, as in the Mosaic distribution (Num 33:54). Had the earlier principle of allotment been indicated as that to be followed in the future, it would not have been possible to give the tribes equal portions, as some tribes would certainly have a larger number of families than others. Nevertheless, the division was to be equal among the tribes, which shows it was rather of an ideal than of an actual distribution the prophet was speaking. Then what they should divide amongst themselves was to be the land concerning which Jehovah had lifted up his handa peculiarly Ezekelian phrase (see Eze 20:5, Eze 20:6, Eze 20:15, Eze 20:23, Eze 20:28, Eze 20:42), signifying “to swear” (comp. Gen 14:22; Deu 33:1-29 :40)to give it unto their fathers (see Gen 12:7; Gen 18:8; Gen 26:3; Gen 28:13). That the land was not divided after this fashion among the tribes that returned from exile is one more attestation that the prophet’s directions were not intended to be literally carried out.

Eze 47:15

The north boundary. And this shall be the border of the land toward the north side. The Revised Version follows Kliefoth and Keil in detaching the last clause from the preceding words, and reading. This shall be the border of the land: on the north side. From the great sea, the Mediterranean, by the way of Hethlon, as men go to (or, unto the entering in of) Zedad. The former of these places (Chethlon), which is again mentioned in Eze 48:1, has not yet been identified, though Currey suggests for the “way,” “the defile between the ranges of Lebanus and Antilibanus, from the sea to Hamath.” The latter (Zedad) Wetstein and Robinson find in the city of Sadad (Sudud), east of the road leading from Damascus to Humo (Emesa), and therefore west of Hamath; but as Hamath in all probability lay to the east of Zedad, this opinion must be rejected.

Eze 47:16

The four names here mentioned belong to towns or places lying on the road to Zedad, and stretching from west to east. Hamath, called also Hamath the Great (Amo 6:2), situated on the Orontes, north of Hermon and Antilibanus (Jos 13:5; Jdg 3:3), was the capital of a kingdom to which also belonged Riblah (2Ki 23:33). Originally colonized by the Canaanites (Gen 10:18), it became in David’s time a flourishing kingdom under Toi, who formed an alliance with the Hebrew sore-reign against Hadadezer of Zoba (2Sa 8:9; 1Ch 18:9). It was subsequently conquered by the King of Assyria (2Ki 18:34). Winer thinks it never belonged to Israel; but Schurer cites 1Ki 9:19 and 2Ch 8:3, 2Ch 8:4 to show that at least in Solomon’s reign it was temporarily annexed to the empire of David’s son. In Ezekiel’s chart the territory of united Israel should extend, not to the town of Hamath, but to the southern boundary of the land of Hamath. Berothah was probably the same as Berothai (2Sa 8:8), afterwards called Chun (1Ch 18:8), if Chun is not a textual corruption. The town in question cannot be identified either with the modern Beirut on the Phoenician coast (Conder), since it must have lain west of Hamath, and therefore at a considerable distance from the sea; or with Birtha, the present day El-Bir, or Birah, on the east bank of the Euphrates, which is too far east; or with the Galilaean Berotha, near Kadesh (Josephus), as this is too far south; but must be sought for between Hamath and Damascus, and most likely close to the former. Sibraim, occurring here only, may, on the other hand, be assumed to have lain nearer Damascus, and may, perhaps, be identified with Ziphron (Num 34:9), though the site of this town cannot be where Wetstein placed it, at Zifran, north-east of Damascus, and on the road to Palmyra. Smend compares it with Sepharvaim (2Ki 17:24). Damascus was the well-known capital of Syria (Isa 7:8), and the principal emporium of commerce between East and West Asia (Eze 27:18). Its high antiquity is testified by both Scripture (Gen 14:15; Gen 15:2) and the cuneiform inscriptions, in which it appears as Dimaski and Dimaska. Hazar-hatticon; or, the middle Hazar, was probably so styled to distinguish it from Hazar-enan (verse 17). (On the import of Hatticon, see Exo 26:28 and 2Ki 20:4, in both of which places it signifies “the middle.”) The word Hazar (), “an enclosure,” or “place fenced off,” was employed to denote villages or townships, of which at least six are mentioned in Scripture (see Gesenius, ‘Lexicon,’ sub voce). Hauran, (LXX.), “Cave-land,” so called because of the number of its caverns, was most likely designed to designate “the whole tract of land between Damascus and the country of Gilead” (Keil).

Eze 47:17

The northern boundary is further defined as extending from the sea, i.e. the Mediterranean on the west, to Hazar-enan, or the “Village of fountains,” in the east, which village again is declared to have been the border, frontier city (Keil), at the border (Revised Version) of Damascus, and as having on the north northward the border or territory of Hamath. The final clause adds, And this is the north side, either understanding , with Gesenius, as equivalent to , ipse, “this same,” or with Hitzig and Smend, after the Syriac, substituting for it here and in Eze 47:18, Eze 47:19 as in Eze 47:20; though Hengstenberg and Keil prefer to regard as the customary sign of the accusative, and to supply some such thought as “ye see” (Hengstenberg), or “ye shall measure” (Keil), which Eze 47:18 shows was in the prophet’s mind. Compared with the ancient north boundary of Canaan (Num 34:7-9), this appointed by Ezekiel’s Torah for the new land shows a marked correspondence.

Eze 47:18

The east boundary. And the east side ye shall measure from Hauran, etc. The Revised Version, after Keil and Kliefoth, translates, And the east side, between Hauran and Damascus and Gilead, and the land of Israel, shall be (the) Jordan; from the (north) border unto the east sea shall ye measure. Smend offers as the correct rendering, The east side goes from between Hauran and Damascus, and from between Gilead and the land of Israel, along the Jordan, from the border unto the east sea. In any case, by this instruction, first the land of Israel was defined as the territory lying west of the Jordan, and secondly its boundary should extend from the last-named north border at its easternmost point, Hazar-enan, down the Jordan valley to the Dead Sea. The practical effect of this would be to cut off the lands which in the earlier division (Num 34:14, Num 34:15) had been assigned to Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh. Otherwise the boundary hero given corresponds with that traced in Numbers, though the latter is more minute. Hengstenberg, however, thinks the prophet cannot have intended to assert that the new Israel should not possess the land of Gilead as a frontier in the future as formerly, as in that case he would have been at variance, not only with preexisting Scripture (comp. Psa 60:7; Mic 7:14; Jer 1:19; Zec 10:10), but with subsequent history.

Eze 47:19

The south boundary. This should begin where the east boundary terminated, viz. at Tamar, “Palm tree.” Different from Hazezon-Tamar, or Engedi (Eze 47:10; 2Ch 20:2), which lay too far up the west side of the sea, Tamar can hardly be identified either with the Tamar of 1Ki 9:18 near Tadmor in the wilderness, or with the Thamara () of Eusebius between Hebron and Elath, supposed by Robinson to he Kurnub, six hours south of Milh, towards the pass of Es-Sufah, since this was too distant from the Dead Sea The most plausible conjecture is that Tamar was “a village near the southern end of the Dead Sea” (Currey). Proceeding westward, the southern boundary should reach to the waters of strife in Kadesh; better, to the waters of Meribotk Kadesh. These were in the Desert of Sin, near Kadesh-Barnea (Num 20:1-13), which, again, was on the road from Hebron to Egypt (Gen 16:14). The exact site, however, of Kadesh-Barnea is matter of dispute; Rowland and Keil find it in the spring ‘Ain Kades, at the north-west corner of the mountain-land of Azazimeh, which stretches on the south of Palestine from the south-south-west to the north-north-east, and forms the watershed Between the Mediterranean and the Arabah valley. Delitzsch and Conder seek it in the neighborhood of the Wady-el-Jemen, on the south-east side of the above watershed, and on the road from Mount Hot. Robinson (‘Bibl. Rea,’ 2.582) discovers it in ‘Ain-el-Weibeh, not far from Petra. A writer (Sin; Smend?) in Riehm (‘Handworterbuch des Biblischen Alterthums,’ art. “Kades”) pleads for a site on the west side of the Azazimeh plateau, and in the vicinity of the road by Shur to Egypt. Leaving Kadesh, the boundary should continue to the river, or, brook, of Egypt, and thence extend to the great sea, or Mediterranean. The punctuation of , which makes the word signify “lot,’ must be changed into , so as to mean “river,” since the reference manifestly is to the torrent of Egypt, the Wady-el-Arish, on the borders of Palestine and Egypt, which enters the Mediterranean near Rhinocorura (). In Num 34:5 it is called the river of Egypt. And this is the south side southward (see on Num 34:17). The correspondence between this line and that of the earlier chart (Num 34:4, Num 34:5) is once more apparent.

Eze 47:20

The western boundary. This, as in Num 34:6, should be the great sea from the border, i.e. the southern boundary last mentioned (Num 34:19), till a man come over against Hamath; literally, unto (the place which is) over against the coming to Hamath; i.e. till opposite the point (on the coast) at which one enters the territory of Hamath (comp. Jdg 19:10; Jdg 20:43).

Eze 47:21-23

The geographical boundaries of the land having been indicated, general directions are furnished as to the manner of its distribution.

(1) It should be partitioned among the tribes as tribes rather than among the families of Israel (see on Eze 47:13).

(2) The division of the territory should be made by lot. This is pointed to by the use of (from , “a smooth stone”), which signifies “to divide by lot.”

(3) The strangers who should sojourn amongst the tribes and beget children amongst them should inherit equally with Israelites who should be born in the country.

(4) The inheritance of the stranger should be assigned him in the tribe where he sojourned. Of these regulations the last two were an advance on the earlier Mosaic legislation with regard to “strangers,” or , who were to be treated with affectionate kindness (Exo 22:21; Exo 23:9; Le 19:34; Deu 1:16; Deu 24:14), admitted to offer sacrifice (Le Eze 17:8, Eze 17:10, Eze 17:13), and even allowed to partake of the Passover on submitting to circumcision (Exo 12:48), but on no account permitted to hold property in land (Le 25:47-55). But if the priest-code was later than Ezekiel, why should it have receded from the freer and more liberal spirit of Ezekiel? If progressive development can determine the relative ages of two documents, then Ezekiel, which accords equal rights to Jew and Gentile in the new Israel, and thus anticipates that breaking down of the middle wall of partition which has taken place under the gospel (Joh 10:16; Rom 2:10, Rom 2:11; Rom 9:24; Gal 3:8-14, Gal 3:28; Eph 2:14-16), should be posterior to the priest-code, which shows itself to be not yet emancipated from the trammels of Jewish exclusivism. At the same time, Ezekiel’s Torah does not grant equal rights with native-born Israelites to “strangers” indiscriminately, or only to those of them who should have families, as Hitzig suggests, in reward for their increasing the population, but to such of them as should permanently settle in the midst of Israel, and show this by begetting children, and in this manner “building houses” for themselves. Kliefoth justly cautions against concluding from the prophet’s statement that the time in which the prophet’s vision realizes itself will necessarily be one in which marrying and begetting children will take place; and with equal justice points out that the number of Israel, especially when swelled up by an influx of Gentiles, will be so great (comp. verse 10) as to render their settlement within the narrow boundaries of the land an impossibilityin this circumstance finding another indication that the prophet’s language was intended to be symbolically, not literally, interpreted.

NOTE.On the boundaries of the land. Smend thinks

(1) that in respect of the north boundary, Ezekiel and the priest-code contradict the older source of the Pentateuch, which does not permit the territory of Asher to extend so far north as Hamath (see Jos 19:24-31; and comp. Jdg 1:31);

(2) that never at any time did Israelites dwell so far north as at the entering in of Hamath;

(3) that this extension of the land northwards was intended as a compensation for the withdrawment of the territory east of the Jordan; and

(4) that in dividing among tribes rather than among families Ezekiel deviates from both the Jehovistic tradition and the priest-code.

But

(1) if the above-cited passages do not extend Asher‘s territory beyond Tyre, Gen 15:18, which critics assign to the Elohist, one of the authors of J.E; the so-called prophetical narrative of the Hexateuch, and Exo 23:31, which, according to the same authorities, formed part of the commonly styled book of the covenant, expressly mention the great river Euphrates as the north boundary of the land, while the same is recognized by the Deuteronomist (11:24; Exo 19:8).

(2) 1Ki 4:24; 1Ki 8:65; and 2Ki 14:25 show that in the time of Solomon the boundaries of the land reached as far north as Hamath.

(3) As it was not originally contemplated by the Mosaic distribution to take immediate possession of the east Jordan land (Num 34:10-12), and this was only granted to Reuben, Gad, and half Manasseh on their entreaty (Num 32:33-42), no ground existed why its withdrawal should be compensated for.

(4) If Ezekiers division of the land according to tribes rather than families shows that it existed prior to the priest-code, then the same argument should demonstrate its prior existence to J.E; which throughout as-stones the principle of division according to families.

(5) If Ezekiel preceded the priest-code, it will require some explanation to understand, first, why the author of the latter should have followed the comparatively uncertain Jehovistic tradition rather than the definite arrangements made by a prophet whom he regarded as practically the originator of his faith; and secondly, why he should have so materially altered that prophet’s land-boundaries and tribe-dispositions.

HOMILETICS.

Eze 47:1-5

The vision of the waters.

Hitherto most of Ezekiel’s representations of the happy age of the restoration have been given in somewhat prosaic details which could be realized in actual facts. But now he returns to his figurative style, and sets before us a narrative picture of the glorious future. He passes from the regulations of the priesthood and the government to a description of a fountain of water issuing from the temple in the most natural way, as though all these things were equally sure to happen in the course of time. But the prophet can scarcely have been anticipating a repetition of Moses’ miracle at the rock of Horeb, because his subsequent language would be absurd if we read it literally. It must be, therefore, that the prophecy is here symbolical. The blessings of the Messianic era are like waters flowing from under the threshold of the temple.

I. THE BLESSING OF THE WATERS. In a dry land streams of water are most highly valued. Their banks, fringed with green, tell a pleasing story of the life and fertility that they bring wherever they flow. The blessings of the gospel are like living waters.

1. Cleansing. God has opened a fountain for all uncleanness.

2. Life. Christ gives the water of life. Without his grace our souls are parched and perishing.

3. Refreshment. The water is continually flowing; it is no stagnant pool. The life which it first quickens is daily fed by its invigorating supplies. The good Shepherd leads his flock by the still waters for repeated cheering and refreshing.

4. Beauty. Where the water flows the land is green and fair. The beauty of holiness springs up by the channel of Christ’s grace.

5. Fruitfulness. There grow by the water fruit-bearing trees. Christian fruitfulness springs from the ever fresh supplies of Christ’s grace.

II. THE SOURCE OF THE WATERS.

1. From God. The stream issues from the temple where God visits the earth and has his typical dwelling. It is he who sends forth the life-giving flood. We have the gospel of the grace of God. From him, and him alone, comes our salvation.

2. By sacrifice. The stream is to flow from under the altar on which sacrifices are offered. God’s grace is given to us in Christ, and by means of his great atoning sacrifice. Christ especially claimed to give living waters (Joh 4:10). It is by his death that we live. From his cross the stream now flows for the healing of the nations.

3. Through worship. The temple had to be built, the altar set up, and the services duly conducted. We receive grace through faith when we yield our hearts and lives to Christ.

III. THE COURSE OF THE WATERS.

1. Outflowing. They rise in the temple; but they are not shut up in the sacred enclosure; they flow out for the good of the people. The gospel rose in Judaism, and passed out to the Gentile world. The grace of Christ is for the people generally, chiefly for those who thirst and faint for need of it.

2. Increasing. The small stream becomes a mighty river. “He giveth more grace.” The blessings of Christ increase with time. The more we know of him, and the longer we follow him, the more of his grace flows to us. The gospel widens its area as it flows down the ages. The tiny stream, represented by the upper room at Jerusalem, becomes the mighty river of Christendom. As the area of influence widens, the grace of Christ comes in ever more and more abundant supplies, so that there is enough for all.

Eze 47:8-11

Life and healing.

The stream that bursts from the temple rock is to flow through the dry ravines of the eastern wilderness until it reaches the Dead Sea, the desolate waters of which are to be miraculously healed by the coming of the life-bearing flood. Then fish shall swarm in the purified sea, “and everything shall live whither the river cometh.” This is a parable of the course of the gospel of Christ.

I. THE GRACE OF CHRIST FLOWS TO THE MOST DEAD AND DEGRADED PEOPLE. The Dead Sea may be taken to represent the world in its sin, or that portion of mankind that is most sunken and worthless. The temple waters were not confined to the bracing heights of Jerusalem. They could not contain themselves in those upland regions. Their quantity was so great that they could not but overflow and pour themselves down through the wilderness. Christ cannot keep his rich gifts for a few rare, saintly souls already safely gathered into the Church. They are for the world, chiefly for the world in its sin and desolation. The gathering flood cannot rest till it finds the low level of the Dead Sea. Christ can have no satisfaction till his gospel has reached the most sinful and fallen creatures in the world.

II. THE GRACE OF CHRIST BRINGS PURIFICATION AND HEALING.

1. Purification The Dead Sea is charged with salts; the stream is represented as washing these away, or in some manner transforming them. Some great cleansing is needed to purge the earthy mixture out of the hearts and lives of man. Christ brings waters in which the foulest may wash and be clean.

2. Healing. The strong brine of the Dead Sea is fatal to all life. If fish come down in the Jordan they must perish as soon as they reach the fatal lake. To the bather the waters are so pungent that they produce agonizing sensations in the eyes, and the taste of them is unendurable. Enclosed by the bluest of hills, steaming with tropical heat, the dull and heavy waters produce a scene of noxious beautylike the charm of the snake, like the fascination of sin. But the gospel brings healing to the poisoned sea of human life, as the temple flood was imagined to bring it to the Dead Sea.

III. THE PURIFICATION AND HEALING OF THE GRACE OF CHRIST BEAR FRUIT IN LIFE. The purged sea is to team with fish, and fishermen are to spread their nets on its now neglected shores. Before Christ comes men are dead in trespasses and sins. He brings life for the dead, and wherever his gospel goes it introduces this life to the world. Even intellectual, social, and political life are energized by Christianity. The strongest, keenest, freshest life of the world is found in Christendom. Those lands which were once Christian, and have since lost the religion of the Christ, have sunk back to semi-barbarism; e.g. North Africa. The best nourishment for the highest life of man in all its branches is found in the New Testament. When Christ is received, life is strong, rich, and fruitful.

Eze 47:12

Trees of life.

I. THE SITE ON WHICH THEY GROW. “By the river upon the bank, on this side and on that side” All the blessings of Christianity are drawn from its central stream in the grace of Christ. But that stream fertilizes its banks, like the Nile, and many trees overshadow its waters. As the dry wady is pleasantly broken by a thread of green just where the watercourse winds through it, so the dreary and spiritually fruitless waste of the sin-stricken world has the cheering presence in its midst of Christianity and the fruits of the love and work of Christ. We must be near the stream if we would reach the trees, and we must be near Christ if we would enjoy his blessing. The closer the trees stand to the refreshing flood the more freely wilt they grow and flourish, and the closer all our Christian work and various institutions are to Christ the Better will they thrive.

II. THE NUMBER AND VARIETY OF THEM. “All trees for meat,” etc.

1. They are numerous. Many Christian agencies cluster about the gospel of Christ. There is abundance of life and energy here. However many may seek for grace from Christ, there is enough for all.

2. They are of various kinds. Thus they are suited to different orders of minds, to different circumstances and needs, and to different good ends. There is a rich variety in the blessings of the gospel, like the variety of nature, in which many kinds and species contribute to the general well-being of the whole.

III. THEIR PERENNIAL FRESHNESS.

1. They are evergreen. Most earthly comforts fade and pass away in course of time. Human good things are subject to shifting seasons. The fickle, changeful, transient character of the comforts of this world should drive us to the everlasting refuge of the Rock of Ages and the never-fading freshness of the trees of life. God’s grace never fails. The blessings that spring from Christianity are independent of the fluctuations of outward life. It is possible to enjoy the green leaf in the garden of the Lord when all around is bare and desolate in wintry death.

2. Their fruit comes continuously. “It shall bring forth new fruit every month.”

(1) The fruit-season in the kingdom of heaven is all the year round. Here we are often made to distinguish between the time of seed-sowingwhich may be one of tearsand that of the joyous harvest. It is not so with the heavenly trees of life. They bear fruit in “the winter of our discontent.” There is never a time when we may not seek and find some comfort and satisfaction in Christ.

(2) These blessings come again and again as fresh gifts from God: New fruit. We are not to be satisfied with the grace of the past; grace comes anew to God’s people.

IV. THE GREAT SERVICE THEY RENDER.

1. They supply food. “The fruit thereof shall be for meat.” Thus God nourishes the interior life of his people with heavenly fruit. Excluded from the earthly Eden, they can eat of the better fruit of the unseen and spiritual paradise. Souls live on Christ, the heavenly Manna. His flesh is meat indeed.

2. They give medicine. “And the leaf thereof for medicine.” We need spiritual healing as well as feedinghealing from the bite of the serpent sin, from the crushing blow of adversity, from all that makes heart and soul sick. This too is provided in the grace of Christ the “good Physician.” Balm of Gilead may fail us, but the Divine Herbalist has decoctions from the leaves of the tree of life that cure all soul ailments.

Eze 47:13

Joseph’s double portion.

When the land was divided the tribes did not all share alike. Some had larger territories than others, and the descendants of Joseph had two tribal portions, being divided into two tribesEphraim and Manasseh.

I. THE BLESSINGS OF THE FATHER DESCEND TO THE CHILDREN. Joseph had proved himself the best as well as the greatest of the sons of Jacob. He had returned good for evil to his cruel, murderous brothers, and had been the means of bringing blessing to all his father’s household. He was now blessed in the blessing of his children. There is no better way of rewarding good parents than by prospering their children. We may see God’s favor descending in line from generation to generation of them that fear him.

II. JUSTICE IS NOT THE SAME AS EQUALITY. It might seem to be unjust to the rest of the tribes that Joseph’s descendants should be reckoned as two tribes. But it is not always right and fair to give exactly the same to every one. Equal partition may mean great wrong. Justice takes account of merit; some deserve more than others. It takes note of need; some require more than others. It has reference to capacity; some can use more than others. It is not just to reward the faithless as much as the faithful servant, nor to give to the giant as small a meal as to the dwarf, nor to entrust to the man of small mind as much responsibility as to one of large powers. Joseph’s tribes may have deserved, have needed, or have been capable of using, more territory than any of the other tribes. They were more numerous in population.

III. THERE IS NO INJUSTICE WHERE NO ONE IS WRONGED. Provision was made for the double share of Joseph by giving to one of his tribes the portion that would have fallen to the lot of Levi, who was provided for out of the sacrificial offerings and the sacred cities whose inheritance was the Lord. Thus when it is granted that sacrifices should be made and tithes paid for religious purposes, we may conclude that there was a portion to spare. The ten tribes were not robbed to give to Ephraim or Manasseh, No injustice was done to those laborers of our Lord’s parable who had toiled all day when the eleventh-hour laborers received equal wages; for the former had had full pay, all they had agreed for, and the heavier rate of the payment given to the latter was dependent only on the generosity of the master, who, having satisfied all due claims, had a right to do as he would with his own (Mat 20:15). Angels have no right to envy God’s grace to men, for angels have their due. We have no right to begrudge to any people whatever favor God may show them. He does not rob us.

IV. GOD PROVIDES FOR INDIVIDUALS, AND NOT MERELY FOR COMMUNITIES. Ephraim and Manasseh, the two tribes of Joseph, were equal in population to the other tribes, if not more numerous. Therefore, the individual members of these two tribes received no more than their brethren in other tribes. Caring for man and not for communities, God was fair in giving most land to the most populous branch of the family of Jacob. His blessings now are for separate souls.

V. GREAT TRUSTS BRING GREAT RESPONSIBILITIES. The man of five talents does his duty in getting five more, while he of two talents does his equally in getting but two more. With double territory the two tribes of Joseph were expected to furnish a proportionately large supply of men for the national defense. Much is expected of those to whom much has been given. Specially privileged Christian people may rest assured that specially important duties have been laid upon them.

Eze 47:21

The division of the land.

I. THE DIVISION WAS INTO SEPARATE ALLOTMENTS. The land of Israel was not held in common by the whole people. Certain dues were attached to it, and certain regulations governed the treatment of it by its owners. Thus it was forbidden for any one to make an absolute sale of his estate. On these conditions each family held its own land, like the peasant-proprietors of France and Belgium, God divides our lives out severally. Each must live his own separate life and discharge his individual duty while he receives his personal grace, we are to live in the community and for its benefit, bearing one another’s burdens and so fulfilling the law of Christ, but still each taking his own particular part in the common life of the whole.

II. THE DIVISION WAS CLEAR AND DEFINITE. There were exact confines, and it was a criminal offence for any one to remove his neighbor’s landmark (Deu 19:14). We ought to have no doubt as to our portion in life. Occasionally we may see a desolate, ruinous housepart of an estate in chancery, the ownership of which is disputed; on the other hand, we hear of claimants to estates who find it difficult to obtain what they urge is their own property. But in the region of personal religion each should see what is his portion and mission for the world.

III. THE DIVISION INCLUDED A PORTION FOR EVERY ISRAELITE. It was so carefully made that the most insignificant family should not be overlooked. There should be a share for every one in the produce of our great fruitful earth. Centers of population may be overcrowded, but the earth is not yet full. Folly and sin, tyranny, injustice, and robbery, keep many out of their fights. If all did their duty and had their dues there would be enough for all. This holds good also in the spiritual world. There is room in the kingdom of heaven for all. No one need fear that others will go in first and take the blessing, and so leave him behind too late to get any benefit from the Divine bountylike the impotent man at the pool of Bethesda (Joh 5:7). There is a portion in Christ’s redemption for every soul of man. It only remains for all to receive their inheritance, accepting it by faith and entering it with obedience to the Lord who is supreme over the whole.

IV. THE DIVISION WAS BY LOT. This expedient prevented all complaints of supposed injustice. The owner of a bit of bare hillside had no right to envy the fortunate possessor of a rich plot in the valley. But there was more than this object in view in the use of the lot, which was taken as part of the method of Divine government. “The lot is cast into the lap; but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord” (Pro 16:33). The people were thus to feel that God was to determine where each should settle, and to say, “He shall choose our inheritance for us” (Psa 47:4). We talk of the “lottery of life,” but we should remember that Providence obliterates chance. God orders our circumstances, and whether the lines have fallen to us in pleasant places and we have a goodly heritage, or we are left to poverty and hardship, our Father’s choice must be good.

Eze 47:22, Eze 47:23

The stranger’s portion.

We do wrong to the ancient Jewish Law and to the character of the Jews themselves when we regard a selfish exclusiveness as the marked feature of Old Testament times. A certain separateness was required to keep the people of God from the idolatry and immorality of their heathen neighbors, and none of the privileges of Israel could be enjoyed excepting on condition of entering into the covenant of Israelthe covenant which needed to be accepted and kept by the chosen people themselves in order that they might enjoy their privileges. But the bitter jealousy which was seen in the narrow Judaism of New Testament times is not encouraged by the Law, nor does it seem to have been indulged in by the Old Testament Israelites. It was the revenge of a persecuted sect turned against their powerful oppressors. A freer, happier, more generous spirit prevailed in the earlier Hebrew nation. The people were taught to cultivate national hospitality. Care for the stranger was repeatedly inculcated in their Law. Much more is it incumbent on Christians to manifest a brotherly spirit in welcoming strangers.

I. STRANGERS SHOULD RECEIVE A BROTHERLY WELCOME FROM CHRISTIAN PEOPLE. Hospitality is an Eastern habit; it should be a Christian grace.

1. In the church. Care should be taken to make strangers feel at home in our midst. The least aversion to having a stranger sitting by one’s side may cheek the beginning of a new course of life by repelling the seeker after truth from the means of enlightenment. The friendless, the poor, the timid, the penitent, should be received with especial kindness.

2. In the home. Christian people have not sufficiently regarded their Lord’s command to make guests of the poor who can offer no return (Luk 14:13).

3. In the world. A generous Christian spirit should open the heart to receive strangers. The miserably selfish isolation in which some people immure themselves is quite alien to the brotherly spirit of Jesus Christ.

II. STRANGERS ARE WELCOMED BY CHRIST INTO THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN.

1. Gentiles. Assuredly Christianity is not narrower than Judaism, under which even provision was made for a brotherly reception of proselytes. They who were strangers to the covenant of promise are now brought nigh by the blood of Christ. The wild olive branch is grafted in to the fruitful stock (Rom 11:17). Gentiles are freely admitted to the promised blessings of Abraham.

2. Heathen. Strangers to Christendom are invited into the kingdom of Christ. The heathen world is to receive the gospel. From China, from New Guinea, from Central Africa, the strangers press into the privileged kingdom.

3. Sinners. We have not to go to a distant continent to discover strangers to Christ. They may be found in a Christian landeven in a Christian Church! Every man who lives in sin is a stranger to Christ. But all sinners are invited to the Savior.

III. STRANGERS MUST BECOME TRUE CITIZENS IN ORDER TO ENJOY THE PRIVILEGES OF THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN. The stranger needed to adopt the Law, to be circumcised, and to become a Jew, if he was to have his portion in the land. People who are spiritually strangers now need a circumcision of heart (Deu 30:6) and a new birth to have the blessings of Christ. All may have the Christian blessedness, but all must first become Christians. There is a portion for every one in Christ’s kingdom; it now only rests with every one to qualify himself for his inheritance by penitence and faith in Jesus Christ.

HOMILIES BY J.R. THOMSON

Eze 47:1-12

The holy waters.

The beauty and even sublimity of this portion of Ezekiel’s prophecies must impress every reader of imagination and taste. Upon the suggestion of the waters of Siloam taking their rise from the temple rock, and the watercourse of the Kedron threading its way among the rocky deserts until it reaches the expanse of the Dead Sea, the poet-prophet describes a river which has its source in the sanctuary of Jehovah, and which broadens and deepens as it flows, until it becomes a stream of vastest blessing, diffusing health and life for the benefit of multitudes of men. Under this similitude Ezekiel pictures the spiritual blessings brought by God, through the channels of his grace and faithfulness, not to Israel alone, but to all mankind.

I. THE SOURCE OF THE HOLY WATERS. AS the rain comes down from heaven, filters in the soil, and wells up a living spring, so the blessings of the gospel have their fountain in the very mind and heart of God himself. But, as conveyed to men, they have a well-spring human and earthly. The student of human history, who looks beneath the surface of things, and seeks to understand the growth of thought and of morals, turns his attention to the Hebrew people, wondering that from them, as from a well-head of ethical and religious life, should flow blessings so priceless for the enrichment of humanity. Yet so it is; the temple at Jerusalem is the symbol of a Divine revelation. The justest and noblest ideas which have entered into the intellectual and spiritual life of man have very largely issued from Moses and the Hebrew prophets. How far Ezekiel entered into this truth may not be certain; yet since he was a cosmopolite, in relation with Babylon, Egypt, and Tyre, and knew well the mental and moral state of the nations of antiquity, it seems reasonable to believe that he had enough of the critical spirit to compare the debt of the world to the Hebrews as compared with the people that figure so vastly in secular history. He was certainly right in tracing to Israelitish sources the waters of life, fruitfulness, and healing which were to bring blessing to mankind.

II. THE WIDENING AND DEEPENING OF THE HOLY WATERS. It is here that Ezekiel passes from history to prophecy. Possessed by the Spirit of God, he was able to look into the future and behold the wonder yet to be. It is, indeed, marvelous that, in a period of national depression, when national extinction seemed to human foresight to be imminent, the prophet of the exile should have had so clear a perception of the reality of things, and so clear a foresight of the spiritual future of the world, which must in his apprehension have appeared bound up with the continuity of the history and religious life of Israel. The river, like the temple from which it proceeded, was the emblem of what was greater than itself. Christian commentators have taken pleasure in tracing Correspondences between the gradual increase of the stream and the growth of true and spiritual religion. Beginning with Judaism, the stream of truth and blessing widened and deepened into Christianity; and Christianity itself, commencing its course in the besom of Israel, soon came to include in its ever-widening flood, its ever-deepening volume of blessing, all the nations comprehended in the dominion of Rome. And following centuries have witnessed the constant broadening of the life-giving and beneficent stream, so that none can place a limit to the area which shall be fertilized and refreshed by the waters that first flowed from the courts of the temple at Jerusalem.

III. THE BENEFICENCE OF THE HOLY WATERS. Among the results of the presence of the waters of life may be observed the following.

1. Healing. The salt and bituminous waters of the Dead Sea are represented as being healed and restored to sweetness by this inflow of the sweet and wholesome waters issuing from the sanctuary. By this may be understood the power of pure and supernatural religion to heal the corruptions of sinful society. Certainly, as a matter of fact, not a little has been done in this direction in the course of the centuries, as the Church has taken possession, first of the Roman empire, and then of the nations of the North, and as, in these latter days, it has, with missionary zeal, penetrated the foulness of the remotest heathenism.

2. Life. And this in two several directions. The prophet saw very many trees on the banks of the river, and a very great multitude of fish in its translucent waters. Life, both vegetable and animal, life of every kind and order, is the result of the stream’s full and beneficent flow. Corresponding with this is the spiritual life which results from the benign and wholesome influence of true Christianity. The Lord Jesus came that men might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. Life of the spirit, the very life of God himselfsuch is the issue of the Divine interposition and provision.

3. Fruitfulness and abundance. The fishers spread their nets and draw up from the waters a great supply of fish; the husbandmen go forth into the gardens and vineyards by the river-side and gather great crops of fruit. The river of the water of life, like the streams of Damascus creating a green oasis in the Syrian desert, brings fertility, a wealth of blossom and of fruit, wherever it flows. Righteousness and holiness, patience and peace, devotion and hope,such are the harvest for which the world is indebted to the sweet waters of the Divine sanctuary.T.

Eze 47:12

The tree of life.

The river, which in his prophetic vision Ezekiel beholds, as it pursues its widening course from the temple rock eastwards towards the Arabah, is seen by him to be bordered with trees, clad with perennial foliage, and laden with luscious and nutritious fruits. And as the waters of life bring satisfaction and refreshment to the thirsting spirits of men, so do the trees supply them with leaves to heal their wounds and sicknesses, and with fruit to satisfy the hunger which the Dead Sea apples can only mock and leave unappeased.

I. THE SOURCE OF SALVATION. The fruitfulness of the trees which border the riverbanks is accounted for by the fresh and flowing waters which keep their roots for ever moist and nourished. The gospel is a Divine provision for human need; its suitableness and sufficiency are only to be explained by its heavenly origin in the infinite wisdom and the infinite love of God himself. Our Savior Christ, “for us men and for our salvation, came down from heaven.” The Holy Spirit who enlightens, quickens, and blesses, is the Gift of God, “proceeding from the Father and the Son.”

II. THE CHARACTER OF SALVATION. As represented in this exquisitely beautiful figure, salvation is twofold.

1. It includes healing for sin. As the leaves of certain trees were and are applied to the body for the healing of wounds and diseases, so the, gospel brings to sinful men the Divine remedy and cure.

2. It includes the supply of spiritual wants. It is an imperfect view of religion which confines it to a provision for pardon. Religion takes possession of the whole nature, and provides truth for the understanding, love for the heart, and power for the life. It is to the spiritual nature what food is to the bodysustenance, stimulus, and strength. As the strong man eats in order that he may be in health and vigorous life, in order that he may do his daily work, so does the good man partake of the fruit of God’s Word in order that he may be empowered to render true and effective service to his God.

III. THE ABUNDANCE OF SALVATION. The trees which grew by the river of life are represented as characterized by unwithering leaf and by unfailing fruit.

1. Salvation is afforded as God’s gift to innumerable applicants of every variety of character and from every land.

2. Salvation is provided for successive generations. There was a marvelous largeness of view in the Prophet Ezekiel; he contemplated not only the many nations of men, but the successive inhabitants of the earth, as benefited by the provision of Divine mercy. The perennial and inexhaustible trees of life afford to all mankind in every age the healing and the sustenance which they require. There is no limit to God’s bounty, as there is no limit to man’s need.T.

Eze 47:13-21

The inheritance of the children.

The prophet was locking forward to the restoration of his fellow-countrymen to the land given by God to their fathers. The temple and all that concerns its services and ministrations having been described, Ezekiel naturally turns in the next place to picture the repossessed and apportioned inheritances. There are difficulties in interpreting this passage relating to the territories given to the several tribes; but there can be no doubt that the prophet foretold the renewed occupation of the soil by the descendants of Abraham. It seems probable that all the while Ezekiel had in his mind the spiritual Israel of which the chosen people were the type. There is an inheritance for the whole Israel of God.

I. A DIVINELY APPOINTED INHERITANCE. Whatever are the possessions and privileges of God’s people, this is certain, that they are the gift of God’s goodness. What have we that we did not receive? All things are of God. If we as Christians have entered upon a heritage of knowledge, of liberty, of purity, of peace, this is because the Lord has dealt bountifully with us.

II. AN ESPECIAL INHERITANCE FOR EACH. In the settlement of the tribes in the Holy Land nothing was left to accident or to ambition; the lot of each tribe was marked out by Divine appointment. All Christians may appropriate the language of the psalmist, “The lines have fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage.” To one the great Head of the Church assigns an inheritance of conflict; to another, an inheritance of peace. One section of the Church is distinguished for its thinkers; another, for its workers. But each has his own ministry and responsibility, and it becomes each to be content and to refrain from envying the lot of another.

III. A SUFFICIENT INHERITANCE FOR ALL. Palestine, though comparatively a small country, was large enough to contain all the tribes. In the Church of Christ there is abundant accommodation and provision for all the members of that Church. “All things are yours, and ye are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.” There is no limitation to the Divine resources or to the Divine liberality.

IV. A PERPETUAL INHERITANCE. Israel retained possession of the laud of promise for generations, for centuries; but that possession, nevertheless, came to an end. In this respect, there is a contrast between the temporal and the spiritual inheritance. None of God’s people can ever be dispossessed from God’s favor, or deprived of the privileges which are secured to them by the faithful promises of God. Those promises have respect, not to time only, but to eternity. Theirs is an “inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away.”T.

Eze 47:22, Eze 47:23

The inheritance of the strangers.

It was certainly a provision of remarkable interest and liberality that is recorded in these verses. Considering the exclusive and clannish spirit which so largely distinguished the Hebrew people, we cannot but read with wonder as well as with gratification that aliens were permitted to partake with them the possession and enjoyment of the land of promise. Those of other blood, but of the same religion, who during the Captivity had cultivated the soil, were to be suffered to retain their inheritance equally with the returning exiles. Probably there was abundant room for all, for the numbers of the Israelites may well have been diminished during their exile. Strangers thus coalesced with the sons of Israel in the several tribes that went to make up the nation. In the same manner, upon a larger scale, an amalgamation of Jews and Gentiles took place in the constitution of the Israel of Godthe Church of Christ.

I. THE EQUAL INHERITANCE OF ALL CHRIST‘S PEOPLE IN CHRISTIAN PRIVILEGES IS NOT OWING TO NATURE, BUT IS THE ARRANGEMENT OF THE GRACE OF GOD.

II. THE EQUAL INHERITANCE INVOLVES A SIMILAR SPIRITUAL PREPARATION AND ADAPTATION.

III. THE EQUAL INHERITANCE ENTITLES ALL THE MEMBERS OF CHRIST‘S CHURCH TO EQUAL PRIVILEGES.

APPLICATION.

1. All distinctions of an hereditary, secular, and educational character are of little importance in the Christian community. Boasting is excluded where all is of grace, and where none has any claim of right.

2. Mutual consideration and forbearance should obtain within the boundaries of the Church. Every Christian has some especial office and gift; perhaps every Christian has some special infirmity and imperfection.

3. It is profitable and delightful to look forward to the perfect fulfillment of the Savior’s purpose and prayer, to anticipate the time when all shall be oneone flock under one Shepherd. The inheritance of all God’s people is known only by the common designation: “the inheritance of the saints in light.”T.

HOMILIES BY J.D. DAVIES

Eze 47:1-12

The river of salvation.

The prophet has advanced from step to step in his outline sketch of Israel’s destined glory. The temple is now complete. The throne is to be erected on a foundation of righteousness. The better order for sacrificial worship is instituted. The climax of blessing is almost reached. One great defect had been manifest in Israel’s past history. They lived for themselves. They were the exclusive favorites of Jehovah. This defect shall be remedied. Israel shall henceforth be a blessing to the world. From under the temple altar a stream of life is seen to flow, which deepens as it flows, and which shall irrigate and vitalize whatever is Barren in the land. From Israel, as from a center, gracious power shall go forth to penetrate with new life the human race. Such is the significance of the vision. Yet this structure of future hope rests upon a groundwork of fact. Within recent years it has been discovered that immense reservoirs of water exist under the identical spot where once the altar stood. Ezekiel borrowed the material of Iris vision from the physical features of the temple area, and from the formation of the country lying to the east. By a geographical necessity, this stream flowed (in Ezekiel’s day) down the valley of Jehoshaphat, along the valley of the Kedron, through land blasted with desolation, and found its way into the Dead Sea. With this raw material of fact the prophet weaves a gorgeous tapestry of prophecy. He foresees the glorious reality of Messiah’s day. He limos in outline the magnificent results of Calvary.. Pentecost, with its far-reaching consequences, was filling his heart with joy: hence he describes in glowing colors man’s regenerated state through the abounding grace of God.

I. MARK THE SOURCE OF THIS LIFEGIVING STREAM. “Behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward the waters came down from under from the fight side of the house, at the south side of the altar.” Here we have an early unfolding of God’s great plan of salvationan anticipation of the closing vision in John’s Apocalypse. There is vital instruction in every line. The stream had its rise under the altar, which altar is the emblem of the Saviors cross. Hence we learn that the stream of Divine mercy, the river of life to men, has its source in suffering rod sacrifice and death. Atoning death, the outburst of pent-up love, is the spring of life to the world. Such was the spectacle to the prophet s eye; this was revelation enough for the moment; yet there was a gracious fact further back. The real, invisible source of this salvation is in the heart of infinite love; but for wisest reasons the stream flows through the channel of the cross. Therefore, to the eye of man the most fitting spot whence this stream should seem to rise is the altar in the temple, where for ages God had been sought and his mercy had been found. The plural word “waters” signifies “abundance.” They gushed forth in copious plentifulness. The impression made upon the mind was the very opposite to stint or reluctance. It was a generous overflow, a glad relief from previous restraint. Such is the quality of God’s mercy to men. It leaps forth in generous abundance. There is no limit to his kindness. His love is equal to men’s largest needsequal to the salvation of the race. If God is the purveyor, there can be no lack. He gives with the heart of a Father and with the freeness of a King.

II. MARK THE RAPID GROWTH OF THE STREAM. At the distance of a thousand cubits from its source the waters reached only to a man’s ankles. Another like distance was measured, now they reached the knees; and soon the stream was a river to swim ina fiver that could not be forded. Impressive picture this of the development of God’s plan of redemption! In Eden there was only an obscure promise. Down to the days of Abraham the rill of experienced mercy reached only to the ankles. But it steadily grew in depth and fullness. It would be a waste of blessing if God should disclose his grace faster than man has capacity to receive. In Paul’s day the stream had swelled in volume, so that, having tried his sounding-line, he stood confounded, and could only exclaim, “Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!” Still the stream rolls on and increases in magnitude. At its banks every thirsty soul may drink and live. For six thousand years it has been flowing, and, instead of giving any sign of diminution, the volume still increases and shall increase. For this saving knowledge shall cover the earth as the natural water fills the caverns of ocean. So important did God conceive it to be that Ezekiel should know of this steady increase, that he caused him to test it by personal experiment. It did not suffice that Ezekiel looked upon this increasing volume with his eye; he must go into it, and have deepest knowledge of the fact. They who preach to others must have personal experience of the truth. Theory and tradition and speculation will not suffice for the instruction of men. The preacher sent from God must declare what he has “tasted and handled and felt of the good word of life.” Attention is summoned: “Son of man, hast thou seen this?”

III. MARK THE SALUTARY EFFECTS OF THIS STREAM. “Everything shall live whither the river cometh.” The prophet soon left the region of natural fact. There then a stream flowing out from under the temple; but its waters were not sweet; it did not grow in bulk as it proceeded; it did not bring fertility and life to the district. The country through which the Kedron flows is the most rocky and desolate to be found in Palestine. Although this little stream has been flowing for ages into the Dead Sea, it has not perceptibly alleviated its bitterness. Nauseous and pungent to the taste as ever is that water. Though beautiful to the eye as the Sea of Galilee, no animated life is on its shores; all verdure is wanting; and not the tiniest animalcula can live in its depths. It is the scene of silence and desolation. Pathetic emblem this of man’s moral barrenness!

1. Food is provided. To this natural spectacle what a contrast does Ezekiel’s picture present! This copious stream brings life and beauty to both its banks. Here grows every tree that can yield fruit. Here no scarcity can be found, for the trees bear in constant succession. As soon as one sort of fruit is exhausted another is purple with ripeness. No winter is here; it is perpetual summer. Such fruits may be enumerated:

(1) knowledge;

(2) repentance;

(3) pardon;

(4) peace;

(5) obedience;

(6) adoption;

(7) Divine communion;

(8) strength;

(9) purity;

(10) patience;

(11) hope;

(12) immortality.

Already the deserts of earth have blossomed; already these fruits of Paradise have been tasted. For long years the prophecy has ripened into fact.

2. Medicine. “The leaf thereof shall be for medicine.” The provision which God makes is always complete. Man is not only the subject of hunger, he is a victim of disease. He is racked with pain, torn with sorrows, tormented with a thousand cares. And as in nature the leaves and cells of plants contain medicine for every bodily disease; so in his kingdom of grace God has furnished remedies for all care and sorrow. “The leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.” And what else can these leaves be except the truths and promises of the gospel of Christ? Is it not a fact well attested that these words and pledges of Jehovah have alleviated the distress of many an anguished soul? acted as cooling balm to many a fevered heart? How many men, fettered with chains of despair, have broken them by virtue of the promise, “Him that cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out!” How many no tongue can tell. And like healing medicine to a thousand afflicted souls has bee,, the whispered assurance, I will never leave thee; and this, My grace is sufficient for thee.” “He has sent forth his word and healed them.”

3. There is perpetual virtue. Of these trees “the leaf shall not fade.” As a willow planted by the riverside is well-nigh always verdant, so the trees of righteousness were beauteous in immortal verdure because their roots were nourished by the river of God. Human nature (unvisited by God’s grace)is a desert more bald and sterile than the hill-country of Judaea. But wherever this crystal stream of mercy comes, lifeluxuriant, joyous life appears. The plants of holiness flourish”trees of the Lord, full of sap.” A thousand such deserts have already blossomed, and the prophecy is undergoing fulfillment before our eyes.

4. Abundant life is yet another effect. “There shall be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters shall come thither.” It is in keeping with the allegory that the prophet should speak only of fish as the kind of life generated by this stream. Yet as the result of this human life was sustained. Population increased, for men found useful occupation. The whole circumference of the Dead Sea became a scene of activitythe home of industry and plenty. Again we have a graphic sketch of the life-giving grace of our God. Wherever it has penetrated it has been life from the dead. Bodily life has been valued and prolonged. The curative art has developed. Domestic life has been enriched. All forms of intellectual life have unfolded. National life has been purified and organized. Population has grown. Best of all, the spiritual life in man has been awakened, and practical love to the human race has flourished. A moral revolution among mankind is in progress. The regeneration of society is proceeding.

5. Exceptional barrenness is incurable. “But the miry places thereof, and the marshes thereof, shall not be healed; they shall be given to salt.” There is a certain physical condition of barren land which no abundance of water will fertilize. So in the kingdom of grace resistance of Divine influence is possible. Among the chosen twelve there was a Judas. In the first Church avarice and hypocrisy wrought havoc of death. Some always “resist the Holy Ghost.” Some “count themselves unworthy of everlasting life.” To some in his day Jesus spake with pathetic sorrow, “Ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.”D.

Eze 47:13, Eze 47:14, Eze 47:22, Eze 47:23

Canaan a type of heaven.

To the Jews exiled in Chaldea restoration to Palestine seemed a lesser heaven. To regain their land, their ancestral estates, their temple, their priesthood, was the goal of present ambition, was a steppingstone to yet higher good. The prophetic pictures of Ezekiel were designed to tempt their thoughts to loftier soarings. A better thing than Canaan was in store for them, but as yet they could not appreciate it, therefore could not perceive it. So, by slow and patient steps, God leads us upward. We know but little as yet, realize little as yet, of our great inheritance. The soul is under bondage to the flesh. The eye is veiled with material things.

I. HEAVEN IS ASSIGNED AS THE INHERITANCE OF THE TRUE ISRAEL. It is an undoubted fact that the natural Israel is the type of the faithful in every land. It is a fact that the earthly Canaan is described in the New Testament as the type of the heavenly. “If we are Christ’s, then are we Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” “We are come,” says St. Paul, “to the heavenly Jerusalem.” To the eye of the exiled John the architecture of the heavenly city was formed of materials borrowed from the earthly Jerusalem. Hence we still “seek a country, that is, a heavenly.” It is provided for us by God; it is in course of preparation for our use. His house must be furnished with guests, and the guests are being prepared for the place. “The redeemed shall dwell there.” “The tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell among them.” “He is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has provided for them a city.”

II. THIS INHERITANCE GOD HAS SECURED BY OATH UNTO ALL THE HEIRS. The title-deed is signed and sealed. It is writ in lines of bloodthe blood of Christ.

“Signed when our Redeemer died,
Sealed when he was glorified.”

To all other guarantees God has added this, viz. his solemn oath. “Concerning the which I lifted up mine hand to give it.” As men will accept transference of property and testimony in general, done under the sanction of an oath, when they would not accept it as final and unalterable without the oath, so God has condescended to our infirmitiescondescends to act according to human customs. A single promise from him suffices; a single word is enough. When he created, a word was ample: “He spake, and it was done.” He said, “Let light be and light was!” So, in securing to us the inheritance of heaven, a word from him is full security. His promise is as good as his performance. Yet he stoops to employ human methods and human expedients in order to quell our doubts and satisfy our faith. Not a loophole for doubt is left. As firmly established as Jehovah’s throne is the gift: “Ye shall inherit it, one as well as another.” ‘Tis not a matter of purchase; it is his spontaneous gift. “I am Jehovah; therefore I change not.”

III. THIS INHERITANCE COMPRISES DISTINCT REWARDS FOR FAITHFUL SERVICE. “Joseph shall have two portions.” It would be a serious mistake to suppose that heaven contained equal measures of honor and of joy for all. In all likelihood there is greater diversity in eminence and in joy than on earth. From the lips of the unerring Judge the verdicts fall, “Be thou ruler over ten cities Be thou ruler over five cities.” The place of honor on Christ’s right hand shall be given to him “for whom it is prepared.” In proportion to fidelity here shall be reward there. Even Jesus Christ himself tastes a richer joy as the result of his suffering. “For the joy that was set before him he endured the cross;” “Therefore cloth my Father love me, because I lay down my life for the sheep.” For some there is in store “a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.”

IV. THE HEAVENLY INHERITANCE HAS A PLACE FOR SPIRITUAL AFFINITIES. The favored occupants still dwell according to their tribes. In St. John’s enumeration of the redeemed he reads the muster-roll of the tribes. Each tribe had its tale completeit numbered twelve thousand. To the same effect Jesus affirmed, “In my Father’s house are many mansions.” The demarcations made by family and social lines on earth will be obliterated; but instead, new associations, new affinities, will appear. The denizens will be drawn closer together, or less close, according to spiritual tastes and proclivities. “He that doeth the will of my Father in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother.” There will be emulation, and a measure of seemly rivalry, while envy and jealousy will be unknown.

V. THE HEAVENLY INHERITANCE WILL BE COMPREHENSIVE IN CITIZENSHIP. “Ye shall divide it by lot for an inheritance unto you, and to the strangers that sojourn among you they shall be unto you as born in the country.” The old spirit of exclusiveness shall cease. Earthly nationality is an accident, which possesses in itself no excellence. Concerning Greek, or Barbarian, or Hebrew, “God is no respecter of persons.” In Christ Jesus “neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but simply a new creature.” The distinction in God’s kingdom is character. Demarcation is between the excellent and the vile. He who has in his breast the faith of Abraham will receive a welcome, while he who inherits only Abraham’s blood will be excluded. No matter in what clime a man is born, no matter what the color of his skin, if he chooses God to be his God and Sovereign and Friend, he shall find a place among the citizens; he shall obtain a lot among one of the tribes. “Wherefore,” saith God, “separate yourselves from the evil, and be ye clean, and I will receive you:! will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.” The simple term of citizenship is a “new birth.” “Except ye be converted, and become as a little child “such is the condition to Jew and Gentile alike”ye cannot enter the kingdom of God.” “Without holiness no man shall see the Lord.” There is world-wide comprehensiveness, coupled with self-imposed exclusiveness.D.

HOMILIES BY W. CLARKSON

Eze 47:1-12

The river of life.

In this noble vision we have a prophecy of that great redeeming power which Jesus Christ should introduce to the world, and we have some insight given us of its triumphs in the far future. Of this wonderful river we have to inquire into

I. ITS DIVINE SOURCE. The river flowed “from under the threshold of the house”from the very dwelling-place of Jehovah. The river of life has its source in the Divine, in God himself, in his fatherly yearning, in his boundless pity, in his redeeming purpose. The heavens themselves pour down the rains, which feed the springs, which make the rivers of earth; but from above the clouds, from one whom “the heaven of heavens cannot contain,” comes that river of life which a wasted and despoiled world is waiting to receive. It is a Divine mind alone that could conceive, a Divine heart alone that-could produce, such a benevolent force as this.

II. ITS SPIRITUAL CHARACTER. The river of the gospel of Christ is the river of Divine truth. The kingdom of God is to be established by purely moral and spiritual agencies. When violence is used to promote it, there is a miserable departure from its essential spirit, and there is a serious injury done to its final triumph. For it wins by other and better means. And as water is itself composed of two elements, so the truth of God in the gospel of Christ is twofold. It includes the truth we most want to know concerning ourselvesour nature, our character, our position before God, our possibilities in the present and in the future; and also the truth we most want to know concerning Godhis character and disposition, his purpose of mercy, his supreme act of self-denying love, his overtures of grace, his summons to eternal life.

III. ITS TWO SOVEREIGN VIRTUES.

1. That of renewal. All kinds of fish live in its waters (Eze 47:9, Eze 47:10); many trees grow and thrive on its banks, nourished by its streams (Eze 47:7); “everything lives whither the river cometh” (Eze 47:9).

2. That of cleansing. Such are the virtues of this river that, flowing into the Dead Sea, it sweetens even its salt waters and cleanses them of their bitterness, so that fish once more live therein: “Its waters are healed” (Eze 47:8). Such is the gracious and beneficent action of the truth of the gospel of Christ.

(1) It is the source of new life; it revives and it sustains. It finds men and communities in spiritual death, and it imparts a new and blessed life; before it comes is a dreary moral waste, after its waters have begun to flow there is beauty and fertility. Peoples that seemed wholly lost to wisdom and to righteousness are regained; homes that appeared hopelessly darkened with sin and shame are made light with its beams of truth and grace; hearts that were desolate and deathful are filled with peace and joy and immortal hope. Everything lives where this blessed river comes.

(2) It is the one great cleansing power. Into the darkest and foulest places it enters, and it brings with it sweetness and purity; corruption cannot live where its waters pass, but disappears before them. This is true, not only of the hearts and the homes of men, but of districts, of cities, of countries.

IV. ITS GLORIOUS ABUNDANCE. (Eze 47:3-5.) Once a small stream, it is now a broad, deep river, whose course nothing can check, whose waters are inexhaustibly full, whose beneficence nothing can measure. It has come down these many centuries, it has girdled the whole earth, it will flow on and on until all the nations have been renewed.

1. Have we partaken of its life-giving waters?

2. Are we gaining therefrom the healing and the growth they will yield?C.

Eze 47:12

The double service – meat and medicine.

So nourishing should be the waters of this (allegorical) river that the trees which they fed upon its banks should produce a never-failing fruit and an unfading leaf, “and the fruit thereof should be for meat, and the leaf thereof for medicine.” The gospel of Jesus Christ perfectly fulfils the prophecy; its properties and provisions are such that it supplies ample food (or meat) for the sustenance, and all healing (or medicine) for the recovery of the human soul. Taking the latter first, as being first required, we have

I. THE RESTORING VIRTUE OF THE GOSPEL. The leaf of the tree of life is “for medicine,” or “for bruises and sores” (marginal reading).

1. How great is the need for such medicine as this in “a bruised and sore” world like ours! On every hand are men and women who are chafed with the worries of life, who are perplexed with its problems, who are smitten and are sore by reason of its varied persecutions, who are worn and wearied with its excessive toils, who are badly wounded by its heavier sorrows, by crushing loss, by darkening disappointment, by saddening bereavement, by disabling sickness, by cruel disloyalty. And beyond these there are those who are stung with shame, who have been awakened to a sense of their guilt before God, and are filled with a holy shame, a compunction which is the first step to true blessedness, but which “for the present” is grievous and distressing to the soul.

2. How invaluable is the remedy which this tree of life provides! To such wounded hearts comes the healing Savior; he comes

(1) with tender sympathy, offering himself as the Divine Friend, who is “touched with the feeling of our infirmities;”

(2) with the comfort of his own example, as our Leader, “whose way was much rougher and darker than ours,” and who asks us whether “it is not enough for the disciple to be as his Lord;

(3) with his Divine aid, ready, at our appeal, to revive us by his indwelling Spirit and grant us such sustaining grace that, instead of groaning under the blow, we can even glory in bearing it for him (2Co 12:9);

(4) with his gracious promises, offering pardon, peace, eternal life, to every penitent and believing heart; thus is he the Divine Healer of the bruised and bleeding hearts of men.

II. THE NOURISHING POWER WHICH IT POSSESSES. “The fruit thereof shall be for meat [or, ‘food’].” When health has been restored, when the medicine of the leaf has done its work, then there needs to be sustenance in order that the recovered strength may be maintained. Shall we not find the nourishment where we found the healing? The gospel of Christ meets this our need by providing:

1. Divine truth. All that truth concerning the nature, character, will, purpose, of God our Father and our Savior which we have revealed to us in the Word of God, and more particularly in the teaching of his Son, who came forth from him and was one with him. All that truth also which relates to our spiritual nature, to our duty, to our privilege, to our prospects.

2. Christian fellowship. For the society of the holy is a sustaining power that builds up and makes strong in faith and purity.

3. The action of the Spirit of God. We are “strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man.” Such ample and such fitting food as this makes strong for testimony, for endurance, for energetic action, for growth unto the full stature of Christian manhood, for readiness for the heavenly kingdom.C.

Eze 47:13, Eze 47:14

(with Eze 44:28)

The threefold inheritance.

“Ye shall divide the land for inheritance;” “Ye shall inherit it, one as well as another;” “I am their Inheritance I am their Possession.” These passages speak of two kinds of inheritance, and there is a third which remained to be revealed, and still remains to be possessed.

I. THE MATERIAL INHERITANCE. According to the prophetic vision the land of Israel was to be fairly divided among the different tribes. The prospect here held out is the possession of the soilthat soil which has within it the power of great material enrichment. Land we call “real property,” as distinguished from that about which there is a measure of insecurity or fluctuation. Those who own the soil own that which cannot be taken away, and which, though its market value may rise and fall, and though it may be greatly enriched by diligence or impoverished by recklessness, still has the possibility and the promise of produce and provision. Land, therefore, may well stand as the representation and type of all material inheritance. God gives to us here a certain heritage of this order; not, indeed, “one as another” in the sense of equality, for there is very great inequality. The inequality cannot be said to be due to Divine arrangement; it is rather the bitter consequence of all forms of sin and folly. God has given us a large, ample, fruitful, beautiful world for our earthly home. And if we were but actuated by the spirit of justice and of kindness, though there might not be anything like the absolute equality of which some men dream, yet would there be a goodly heritage for every child of manenough for the comfort of every home, for the training of every mind; enough to satisfy, to beautify, to gladden. But there is a better heritage than this.

II. THE SPIRITUAL INHERITANCE. The Levites were not to have any land for their share; God himself and his servicethis was to be their “Inheritance,” this their “Possession” (Eze 44:28). What was true in their case is surely far more true in ours. To us to whom God has revealed himself in Jesus Christ a spiritual well-being is offered which does indeed constitute a noble heritage. “God has provided some better thing for us” (Heb 11:40). For us there is not the tangible mountain, the visible fire, the audible trumpet, but an inheritance which eye cannot see, nor car hear, nor could the heart of man conceive (see Heb 12:18 with 1Co 2:9); for us there is a redeeming God, an Almighty Savior, a Divine Comforter, a holy and elevating service, a heavenly home. In this last particular we have a third heritage, compared with which any partition of the soil was small indeed.

III. THE HEAVENLY INHERITANCE. There are those who pass through so great “a fight of afflictions” that even with all the boundless blessings and invaluable treasures which are “in Christ Jesus,” life may seem of little worth; for these, as indeed for us all, there is the fair prospect of “an exceeding and eternal weight of glory”of such glories that the sufferings of time are “not worthy to be compared” with them; the near presence of Christ; a home of perfect love and rest; reunion with the holy and the true; a sphere of untiring, elevating service; a life of growing blessedness.C.

Eze 47:22, Eze 47:23

Jew and Gentile.

The introduction of this passage is an indication of the figurative and spiritual character of the whole prophetic utterance. The ideal community, the kingdom of Christ, was to be one that would attract those that were without and that should welcome all that came; it should be a welcome home to the “stranger;” there the ancient “people of God” should find their inheritance; and thither those who had been his wandering and distant children should resort. Thus we gain the idea of

I. THE ATTRACTIVENESS OF THE KINGDOM. As the Gentiles are here imagined as crossing the Jordan to sojourn within the borders of Israel, so we are to expect that men will come from beyond the pale of the Christian Church to find a home within its gates.

1. It ought to be far more attractive than it has been made. The discord, the envy, the strife among its members; the lamentable inconsistencies in the lives of too many of its professors; and the grave unwisdom with which its teachers have propounded their theories as if they were of the essence and substance of its truth; these have been repelling enough.

2. Yet, on the other hand, the gospel of Christ has been a great attractive power.

(1) The repose which it offers to the human mind, presenting to it one Divine and holy Creator and Sustainer of all things and beings;

(2) the rest which it offers to the human heart, tendering to it full and immediate restoration to a Divine Father’s love;

(3) the enlargement which it offers to human life, making it a sacred and noble thing even in obscurity and poverty;

(4) the high and glorious hope it holds out to the human soul, speaking of a heavenly future;all this may well prove, as it does prove, attractive

(a) to those of other faiths which have no such doctrine to preach, no such glad tidings to convey;

(b) to those of no faith at all, and to whom this world proves to be insufficient for lasting joy.

II. THE WELCOME ON WHICH ALL COMERS MAY COUNT.

1. Christ welcomes them to his kingdom. There is no doubt at all as to the certainty or the cordiality of that welcome. Even the son that has gone into the very far country and done sad dishonor to the Father’s Name is received back with every manifestation of parental joy (Luk 15:1-32.). Jesus Christ is not only the Approachable One, from whom no sincere seeker need shrink; he is the One that seeks, that comes to our own door, that stands and knocks and waits for entrance there (Rev 3:20).

2. All his true disciples welcome them. There may be found communities bearing the Christian name, whose gates are too narrow to receive many a true follower of Christ; but all those in whom the Spirit of Jesus Christ is dwelling, and who do not misrepresent their Master, will gladly welcome every “stranger” that comes to “sojourn” or to settle in the kingdom; they will encourage him to enter; they will give him the right hand of fellowship, they will find him a post in the vineyard of the Lord; they will make him to know and feel that in entering “Israel” he has come to his true home, that he is “as the home-born.”C.

Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary

Eze 47:1. Behold, waters issued out There was a large quantity of water for the uses of the temple, conveyed in pipes under ground from the fountain of Etam. From these waters the prophet draws his similitude of the salubrious waters, which increased as they flowed, till they reached the borders of Israel; hereby not obscurely prefiguring that salvation which was to flow forth from Jerusalem to all the children of Abraham by faith. So it is elsewhere foretold, a law shall go forth from Sion; and ye that are athirst, come to the waters, &c. Waters first flow towards the south of the temple, then to the east; which was the first course of the gospel, before it was disseminated widely among the Gentiles. Houbigant.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

(2) The Holy Land and the Holy City (Ezekiel 47, 48).

Ch. 47. 1 And he brought me back to the opening of the house, and, behold, waters issued from below the threshold of the house eastward: for the front [the face] of the house is toward the east, and the waters came down 2 from under, from the right side of the house, south of the altar. And he brought me forth the way of the north gate, and made me go round the way without to the outer gate, the way of the eastward-looking [gate]; and, behold,3 waters came purling out from the right side. When the man went forth to the east, there was a measuring-line in his hand. And he measured a thousand cubits, and made me pass through in the waterwaters to the ankles 4 And he measured a thousand, and made me pass through in the waterwaters to the knees [they reached]. And he measured a thousand, and made me pass 5 throughwaters to the loins. And he measured a thousanda river [was it then] which I could not pass through, because the waters rose up, waters of swimming, a river that could not be waded. 6And he said unto me, Hast thou seen, son of man ? And he led me, and brought me back to the bank 7 of the river. When I returned, behold, on the bank of the river very many 8 trees, on this side and on that. And he said unto me, These waters, going out as they do to the east boundary, then flow down over the steppe, and come to the sea, brought forth [they come] to the sea, and the waters are healed. 9 And it cometh to pass that every living thing which shall creep, whithersoever the double stream shall come, shall live; and very many fish are there, for these waters come thither, and they shall be healed; and everything 10 liveth to which the river cometh. And it cometh to pass that fishers shall stand on it [shall place themselves over it], from En-gedi even unto En-eglaim there shall be a spreading-place for nets; as to their kind, their fishes shall be as 11 the fishes of the great sea, very many. Its mire [its swamps] and its pools [holes], 12 these shall not be healed; they are given to salt. And [yet] on the river there shall rise up, on its bank, on this side and on that, every kind of tree for food; its leaf [foliage] shall not fade, nor its fruit cease; according to its months it bears first-fruits, for its waters flow forth from the sanctuary; and its fruit is for food and its leaf [foliage] for healing. 13Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: The territory itself, the land which ye shall take to you for an inheritance, 14 [shall be] for the twelve tribes of Israel; for Joseph [two] portions. And ye inherit it, every one as his brother, which I lifted up My hand to give to 15 your fathers; and [so] this land falleth to you for inheritance. And this is the border of the land on the north side, from the great sea on the way to Hethlon, to come to Zedad; 16Hamath, Berothah, Sibraim, which is between the border of Damascus and the border of Hamath; Hazar the middle, which is on the border of Hauran. 17And the border from the sea is from Hazar-Enon, the border of Damascus, and [in the] north northward there is the border 18 of Hamath; and [this] as the north side. And as to the east side, from between Hauran, and Damascus, and Gilead, and the land of Israel, is the Jordan; from the border ye shall measure to the east sea; and [this] as 19 the east side. And as to the south side, to the right; from Tamar to the waters of Meriboth-Kadesh is the inheritance [to the river] to the great sea; and 20 [this] as the side to the right southward. And with respect to the west side, the great sea from the border to over against the way to Hamath; this is the 21 west side. And ye divide this land for you according to the tribes of Israel. 22 And it cometh to pass that ye shall allot [divide] it as an inheritance to you and to the strangers sojourning in your midst, who have begotten children in your midst; and they are to you as the native among the children of Israel; 23 with you shall they share in the inheritance among the tribes of Israel. And it cometh to pass, that in the tribe with which the stranger sojourns, there shall ye give him his inheritance. Sentence of the Lord Jehovah.

Eze 47:1. Sept.: . … .

Eze 47:2. … Vulg.: aqu redundantes

Eze 47:3. . . … . … . Vulg.: et traduxit me per aquam

Eze 47:4. . … …

Eze 47:5. , . … … . Another reading: , Syr., Arabs.)

Eze 47:6. Sept.: (7) . .

Eze 47:8. … . . . Vulg.: qu egrediuntur ad tumulos sabuli orientalis ad plana deserti, intrabunt mare et exibunt(Another reading: , Syr., Chald., Arabs, in hexaplis Origenes.)

Eze 47:9. . . . . . . . . . . .

Eze 47:10. , . Vulg.: plurim species erunt piscium ejus, sicut(Another reading: .)

Eze 47:11. . . . . Vulg.: In littoribus autem in salinas dabuntur. (Another reading: , et in redditibus suis. Sept., Syr.)

Eze 47:12. , . . . . . Vulg.: afferet primitiva

Eze 47:13. , . . . . Vulg.: Hic est terminus in quo possidebitis terram in quia Joseph duplicem funiculum habet. (Another reading: , .)

Eze 47:15. . . , .

Eze 47:16. , , . . . . , . , Vulg.: et confinium Emath, domus Tichon qu est

Eze 47:17. . . (Another reading: .)

Eze 47:18. . . . . . Vulg. de medio Auran Jordanis disterminans ad mare orientale; metiemini etiam plagam(Another reading: , etiam, Eze 47:19.)

Eze 47:19. . . , Vulg.: Plaga autem australis meridiana aquas contradictions Cades, et torrens usque(Another reading: , Vulg., Syr., Chald.)

Eze 47:20. . , . , , Vulg.: a confinio per directum, donec venias(Another reading: .)

Eze 47:22. Sept: . . . . . . Vulg.: vobiscum divident possessionem

Eze 47:23. . . . .

EXEGETICAL REMARKS

As the entrance of the glory of the God of Israel (Ezekiel 43, 44) forms the centre for the first section of this closing vision of the glory of Jehovahs kingdom, namely, for the temple and its service, so the waters of life from the temple give the key-note for the second section,the holy land and the holy city,and at the same time furnish the interpretation of the second and there by of the first section.

Eze 47:1-12. The Waters of Life.1

ADDITIONAL NOTE

[It is necessary to take the first part of this chapter apart from the second, which relates to a different subject, the new division of the land, and which ought to have formed part of Ezekiel 48. The vision contained in the first twelve verses of this chapter is a thing by itself, although it stands in close connection with what precedes, and springs naturally out of it. The prophet has been exhibiting, by means of a variety of detailed representations, the blessed results to the Lords people of His re-occupying His temple. The way now stands open to them for a free and elevating communion with the Lord; and the work proceeds, on their part, by the regular employment of all spiritual privileges and the faithful discharge of holy ministrations. God is duly glorified in His people, and His people are blessed in the enjoyment of His gracious presence and the benefit of His fatherly administration. But what is to be the nature of the kingdom in this new form, in respect to the world without? Is it to be of a restrictive or expansive character? Is the good it discloses and provides for a regenerated people to be confined, as of old, to a select spot, or is it to spread forth and communicate itself abroad for the salvation of the world at large? In an earlier prophecy (Ezekiel 17), when speaking of the future Head of the divine kingdom under the image of a little twig, plucked from the top of a cedar in Lebanon, and planted upon a lofty mountain in Israel, the prophet had represented this not only as growing and taking root there, but as winning the regard of all the trees of the field, and gathering under its ample foliage beasts of every kind and birds of every wing. The kingdom of God, as thus exhibited, seemed to carry a benign and diffusive aspect toward the entire world. And should it be otherwise now, when presented under the different but more detailed and variegated form of a spiritual house, with the living God Himself for the glorious Inhabitant, and a royal priesthood for its ministering servants? No; it is for humanity, mankind as a whole, that God was thus seen dwelling with men; and though everything presents itself, according to the relations then existing, as connected with a local habitation and circumscribed bounds, yet the good in store was to be confined within no such narrow limits; it was to flow forth with healthful and restorative energy, even upon the waste and dead places of the earth, and invest them with the freshness of life and beauty.

This fine idea is presented by the prophet under a pleasing natural image. He is brought back by the angel from the outer court, where he was standing, to the door of the temple on the east; and there he sees a stream of water gushing from beneath the threshold, and running in the direction of south-east, so as to pass the altar on the south. He is then brought outside by the north gate, and carried round to where the waters appeared beyond the temple-grounds, that he might witness the measurements that were to be made of them, and the genial effects they produced.Fairbairns Ezekiel, pp. 489491.W. F.]

The bringing back of the prophet in Eze 47:1 is explained from the circumstance that he had tarried (Eze 46:21) in the outer court; latterly, at the sacrificial kitchens for the people. The opening of the house is the temple gate, where the entrance into the holy place of the temple opens. stands first by itself, both times parallel to each other, to describe the very first impression, namely, that the waters (Hv.: in particular, living spring water is often in Scripture a symbol of the divine blessings, Isa 41:17 sq., Eze 44:3) came forth from below, and so did not pour down from the heavens, but issued from the depth of the sacred foundation upon the mountain; and this is without doubt to be thought of in connection with the filling of the house with the glory of Johovah (Ezekiel 43, 46). What Tacitus observes (Hist. v. 12) about a never-drying fountain, whole mountains hollowed out below the surface, and ponds and cisterns for keeping the rain water; or when Robinson does not doubt that there is in the rock an artificial well at a depth of some 80 feet below the Haram,all this serves for understanding the prophet only by way of contrast;he means and intends to describe nothing of the kind. [W. Kraft (Topographie von Jerusalem) thinks that the prophetic contrast refers to the spring known only to the priests as hidden, and whose water served only for the outward cleansing of the people.]The that follows subjoins the more exact definition of the first , as: below the threshold of the door of the temple, without a , so that we have to seek the fountain-head not at this threshold, but farther in in the house.The reason for saying eastward is the eastern position of the temple front; the waters which issued from below the house flowed toward the place where the glory of the Eternal had entered the house. Even Hitzigs dictum, which makes to mean: in the east, does not destroy the very expressive causal nexus of the two sections of these concluding chapters of Ezekiel; but W. Neumann acutely observes: The circumstance that the water flows east appears significant to the seer, and yet again, on the other hand, natural; for, says he, the front of the house is toward the east. According to Eze 47:12, the spring is the bearer of the mysteries of the sanctuary, and consequently the means of bearing along its ideal substance; and to this the [properly: the constantly changing multiform aspects or manifestations of the soul through the exterior, the complex unity of which we call the countenance, Stier] corresponds; because the soul of the temple looks to the east, the gushing stream flows in the same direction.This already indicates the farther course of the water as to its direction immediately after its gushing forth under the threshold of the door of the temple. But before treating of this direction, mention is again made of this so characteristic gushing forth. While, however, after the first , to avoid repeating the before , it is merely said: , there now follows after the second the more exact statement: , from the shoulder of the house, i.e. the right one. means here neither: in the south = beneath (Jdg 7:8), which is sufficiently expressed by , nor: downwards (Hitzig), which is sufficiently expressed by What is meant to be described is a stream of water flowing from the temple, not one conducted into the temple; hence the brook Etham cannot be supposed, from which Lightfoot brings the water by means of subterranean channels for washing the victims and cleansing the house. (Comp. also the combination of Judah Leo in Lundius, die alten jd. Heiligth.) Dereser infers from that the fountain fell into the earth on the south side of the altar of burnt-offering in the court of the priests, and flowed on under it until it reappeared outside of the courts of the temple. is employed to accord both with Eze 47:8, and also in general with, the view current in Israel, according to which that which tends towards the abode of the Highest ascends, and hence that which comes out from it will descend. Keil: because the temple lay higher than the inner court.. After the repeatedly marked eastern direction, there can be no doubt which right side is meant; a person looking to the east has the south on his right, as also plainly indicates. This has its signification in reference to the altar of burnt-offering, which stood before the porch of the temple (Eze 40:47): , the right (south) side of the house, the south part of the east side. The fact that the water issued from the south end of the threshold, Hengst. explains from the circumstance that the altar of burnt-offering lay immediately before the east door of the sanctuary; the water must therefore issue not from the middle of the threshold, if it was not to meet with an immediate hindrance; it must first come forth where the altar no longer stood in the way. This is quite natural. Neumann speaks of the prominence given to the right side as the side of good fortune and power. He says: If even in the feasts of the Bedouins the cupbearer must hand the cup to the drinker from the right, to prevent complaint of want of respect, how could that which was here commanded by a heavenly hand for healing (Eze 47:8) come from another quarter? [Klief.: But the temple had two thresholds, one before the flight of steps at the door of the fore-porch, and one at the west end of the porch, before the temple gate. If, then, Eze 47:1 speaks in the outset of the door of the temple, that shows us that we have to understand the latter threshold. If the temple is the body, and its fore-porch the head, then its right shoulder is in the angle which the south wall of the temple porch forms with the east wall of the temple. The threshold of the door of the temple abutted with its south end on this corner, and thence under the threshold the fountain gushed out and ran down into the inner court.] The water, says Hv., comes from the sanctuary; that is to say, it is the fulness of blessing which is poured out over the community from the new manifestation of God. Without this going before, the people cannot serve the Lord in the new manner; and the service of God, again, is itself a grace and a gift from Him. If the fountain proceeding from God is simply a testimony to His revelation of Himself, then it cannot be a mere material fountain.

Eze 47:2. In the court, surrounded with buildings and walls, Ezekiel cannot descry the farther course of the waters. For this he is brought forth through the north gate, for the outer east gate is always shut, and to go out through the south gate the prophet would be obliged to cross over the waters. [Neumann infers, from comparing Eze 40:35; Eze 44:4, that the guide had a preference for the north gate (but see Eze 46:9), and seeks the reason in the significance of the north in the prophecies.] He proceeds on the outside along the wall of the outer court, the way to the east gate, as the outer gate is more exactly designated. [Neumann erroneously, because against the prophets uniform mode of expression, refers the epithet eastward-looking to the way.] The thrice repeated thus emphasizes and depicts the circuit which Ezekiel had to take, because the aim of the prophets goingthe regaining a view of the watersis the main matter. Whether the waters flowed forth over or under the courts is not expressly stated; at all events they ran under the surrounding walls, and doubtless under the stone pavement of the outer court.resumes verbally, when the waters were seen again, the of Eze 47:1, so that the without the article occasions no difficulty whatever; no other waters can be imagined than those which the prophet had seen before. (Piel particip. of ) only in this passage, thus a unique and not less pictorial expression. Ges.: to trickle; and Umbreit adduces its affinity with , so that he gets weeping waters, which would portray such an insignificant commencement of the issue as does not harmonize with Eze 47:1. How can that be thought of as trickling here which has already flowed through the courts? The affinity of the expression with , to pour out, likewise observed by Gesenius, would lead to a signification such as: to gush out. Hitzig goes back to , a word which does not exist; and Meier to , to burst forth (?). Hengst thinks of a bottle, and supposes a gurgling, like the sound which the emptying bottle makes, which, however, does not correspond to the character of fulness and livingness which, according to him, the waters in themselves must have; he translates, indeed: gushed out. Neumann assumes a radical signification: to break up, to set free; hence: , to break forth. To translate it with Keil: to purl, very probably comes nearest the figure. ; Hitzig: not the south side of the whole temple-circuit, but: the southern half of the east front; Neum.: on the beholders right hand, when he has come out here from the north; Hengst.: the right side is here also the south-east, the south side of the east gate, where the water comes forth only because it has taken its rise oh the south-east side of the temple; Klief.: the angle which the eastern outer gate formed with the wall of the outer court is meant. At all events this is meant to be expressed, that the waters which Ezekiel here saw again were the waters which came from the sanctuary.

Eze 47:3. Hengstenberg translates: When the man went forth to the east with the measuringline in his hand, he measured a thousand cubits, etc. Ezekiels guide is, in distinction from Eze 47:2 (), now considered by himself(). He had (Eze 40:3 : )from , according to Gesenius: to twist; according to Meier: to bring togetherin his hand, which is remarked because of what follows, where not merely the farther course of the waters, but still more their peculiarities during the course, are set forth. Following the waters in an eastern direction, the man measured a thousand cubits. give the experience of the prophet, whom the man makes to wade in the water from one bank to the other; hence it is not appositional to , but an independent clause, the meaning of which many attempts have been made to distort, when yet it must contain a statement corresponding to the following increments. Kimchi, making use of Gen 47:15, interprets it: water of vanishing = little water. The dual form: , certainly does not refer to an abstraction, but, as uniformly, denotes things paired naturally or artificially; in the connection here, without doubt, a corporeal duality, but not, as Genesius: foot-soles (shallow water which only wets the soles); against which Hitzig justly observes that the water reached to the foot-soles in the very beginning. is not exactly the same as , that is, extension, flat of the hand, and hence also flat of the foot, foot-sole, but rather suggests , a garment extended so as to reach to the ankles. [Neumann thinks that waters of the foot-soles probably were waters of only the depth of the sandals, which the prophet had put off(!) in the court of the priests, and again put on; and that, in conformity with the phrase: , we cave to think of the two ends, the two lower extremities of the body, that is, the feet: waters of the extremities were waters which scarcely covered the feet.], measured by the measure, which was a cubit-measure.

Eze 47:4. After the second measuring of a thousand cubits, i. e. of distance along the course of the waters, the result of the waters becoming always deeper is , an ungrammatical form, so much the more striking, as we have the stat. constr. before and after. See Hitzigs explanation, which, however, is a mere conjecture, while the supposition of a separate clause (waters, to the knee they reach) is easier, and at the same time more emphatic. After a third measuring, we have waters to the loins. But after the fourth measuring of another thousand cubits, i. e. in all, at a distance of four thousand cubits, it is

Eze 47:5a river! looks like an exclamation of Ezekiels surprise on seeing what reminds him of the impetuous rush of a mountain torrent. The going through, hitherto possible, is no longer so, for the waters , swelled, grew in height (Job 8:11; Job 10:16; comp. also Exo 15:1) to , in which swimming was possible, yea, necessary, if one were to cross from bank to bankto a river which cannot be waded. The prophet describes the increasing volume of water by the two parallel clauses: waters of swimming, a river that could not be waded.

The question in Eze 47:6 indicates the halting-place in the vision, whereby what had been already seen, that is, the out-flow and on-flow of the waters in gradually increasing strength, is, in passing over to what follows, marked off as a thing apart by itself. Yet it is specially the continuous increase of the waters to which the prophets attention is called. Keil: A natural brook cannot in so short distances have increased so mightily, unless brooks fell into it on all sides, which was not the case here. Hengst.: The Messianic salvation crescit eundo, while the streams of worldly enterprise dry up after a brief courseare streams whose waters lie (Isa 58:11; Job 6:15 sq.). Comp. the supplement through the person of the Mediator of salvation in Eze 17:22-23; and in the New Testament, the parables of the mustard seed and the leaven. The same progress which is exhibited in its efficacy among the nations shows itself also in the life of individuals, making them become great out of small, fathers in God out of children. Neum. calls attention to the Messianic element in the designation: son of man, and observes that the seer was thereby reminded that his vision was for mankind, that this swelling stream flowed on to the days of the completion of the human race. The taken by itself may be a mere recording here of what had taken place before,a wading in to the neck (Isa 8:8), as Hengst. expresses it,in order to get the knowledge indicated in Eze 47:5; or, according to others, it is to be taken in conjunction with , as defining it more exactly: he brought me back to come up again out of the water., to the bank (up to the bank), etc. Neumann, Kliefoth, and Keil understand it thus: And he made me go, namely, away from the last-mentioned place, and brought me back to the bank of the river (Ewald, too, in his last edition: and made me go and return on the bank of the stream). According to this, the prophet was led on the bank, in order to learn the depth of the waters,but he was rather led through three times, and hence the fourth time probably just in and out again!and brought back to the bank, to see that it was covered with trees. It seems, however, to agree better with the end intended, to understand as stating the purpose; for, as Hengst. says, the attention is now to be turned to the bank, to observe it, and not as hitherto the waters in their bed. [Hitzig makes the guide measure at a distance from the water, and the prophet, after his last vain attempt, come to the guide; whereupon the latter put his question to the prophet, and returned with him to the bank of the river, and during the time that Ezekiels back was turned to the river, its bank became adorned with trees. Hv.: from the end, from the point where the river flows into the Dead Sea(!), the prophet returned once more to its bank.]

Eze 47:7. , literally: when I turned myself back. Hitzig disputes the transitive signification of the verb, but indisputably the objective suffix is attached to the infinitive; whereas Hitzig takes the suffix as genitive of possession: when he came back with me. On the return of the prophet ( seems to comprehend the of Eze 47:6)who would probably have followed the course of the water still farther had it depended on him, but is obliged to return to the edge of the bank, just because he has to notice the bank of the river, and that (as Eze 47:8 shows) as far back as the sanctuarythat is realized which was intended with a , as in Eze 47:1-2; it is the third stage in the vision. How much the matter treated of refers to the brink of the river, the repeated mention of it shows. But the fact that so long as the beholder followed the measurer, he saw nothing of the trees oh the bank, arises from the nature of the process in the vision. The looking forward gave Ezekiel the knowledge of the progressive fulness and depth of the waters; not until he looks back does he come to knowwith a view to what followsthe fertilizing, enlivening effect of these waters. , as the words: very many, show, is collective (Gen 1:11 sq., Eze 2:9), and in accordance with Eze 47:12 is to be understood of fruit-bearing trees. (The phrase: on the brink of the river, indicates the cause. It has been said that Ezekiel interchanges and ; but when the bringing of the prophet out of the water and on to the bank was referred to, was employed in Eze 47:6; here, where the reference is to the trees growing on and overshadowing the bank, we have simply .) But it confuses the meaning of the waters when Hengst. finds here the need of salvation denoted by hungering as well as by thirsting. Nothing has been said of this in connection with the waters. It is not the case that life or salvation is here represented in the shape of the fruit-tree, as before by the water(for which Hengst. compares Isa 55:1 sq.).It cannot with strictness be said that the trees have here no independent import, but come into account only for their fruit, for there is not the slightest mention here of their fruit. It would be better, with Hitzig, to call to mind Eze 36:35, and to think of the restoration, cultivation, and fertilization of the land in general, as a blessed dwelling-place for Israel. The trees are not very great, but very many,not one tree, as in Eze 17:22 sq.; Dan 4:7 [10] sq. That this stream here depends on the four streams watering the garden of Eden (Genesis 2), and this forest on the tree of life, is a gratuitous assertion. Nothing is said of the immortality-giving power of the trees, and the waters no more bear fish of paradise on their waves than do the rivers in Psa 1:3 (Neum.).

Eze 47:8. Corresponding to the twofold direction of the prophets observation, the interpretation, which now begins, tells us regarding the course of the waters and the effects they shall produce. Had the prophet desired to follow the water farther, this desire would have been met by the saying: these waters go out; in other words, as they come out from the sanctuary, Eze 47:1-2 (, Eze 47:1), i.e. take their departure thence, so their progress is directed out toward, to (), etc.The statement: , is no such general determination of the region in which the waters are to prove themselves effectual as Hengstenberg supposes. At any rate, what is thereby designated is notas the exegesis of the Fathers, following the Sept., delighted to maintain, in view of Jesus residence there of Jos 20:7;, the of Isa. 8:23 [Isa 9:1]; the northern district in the tribe of Naphtali, called in 2Ki 15:29the later Galilee. On the contrary, expressly distinguishes it from that Galilee. The very word , the feminine formation from , evidently denotes with the article a definite district; there were several , Jos 13:2 (Joel 4:4 [Joe 3:9]), Jos 22:10 sq. Derived as it is from , to break off, to roll off, a section, something bounded off, is to be understood; and because it is here in the east, the border-land there, lying opposite the centre of the land, would be meant, as distinguished from every other border district.After the statement of the direction ( ), there follows the account of the course of the waters, as also it is said in the outset in Eze 47:1 () that the waters, namely, came down () flowed down, , that is, over., defined by the article, is to be interpreted by the context. From the intransitive , to be contracted, hence to be arid, dry, heath, wilderness, steppe is meant.Geographically, the Arabah is the whole valley of the Jordan, extending even beyond the Dead Sea; comp. our Comment. on Deuteronomy 1.; but in accordance with the previous definition, we find ourselves in that part of the Ghor which lies above the Dead Sea.After and , we have now , the coming to the goal. How much stress is laid upon this goal, as that which is to be defined in respect to the course of the waters, is shown by the repetition of after . As the Dead Sea is called in Deu 3:17; Deu 4:49, , so in Eze 47:18 of our chapter it is designated the east sea; and thus we cannot with other expositors understand here the western, the Mediterranean Sea, which, moreover, is distinguished in Eze 47:10 as the great sea. If the Arabah, the of Josephus, which he names , is an unhealthy plain full of salt clay, then this is only the fitting introduction to the Dead Sea, with its well-known peculiarity. (particip. Hoph.) has, following the Sept., been translated: into the sea of the mouths, inasmuch as the Jordan falls into it, and, according to Gadow (in the Journal of the German Oriented Society, 1848, 1 p. 61), forms a slimy delta. [Ewald: into the sea, into the sea of the muddy waters; , muddy, foul !] The comparison of Zec 14:8 and the dual form in Eze 47:9 have led others to suppose a dividing of the waters, so that refers one time to the east, but afterwards also to the west. The prophet, says Umbreit, sets out first and specially from the Dead Sea; he does not, however, confine himself to it, but makes the waters flow also into the great west and world sea. For the sea of the wilderness appears, indeed, as the most fitting symbol of the death of sin (the Lord hath no pleasure in the death of the sinner, but that he should turn and live); but until now there is no water altogether healthy, and for this very reason there is a flowing forth of the fountain of life still farther into the world of sin and of death. [According to the Midrashim, the river divides itself into twelve waters, which flow to the twelve tribes; it is even said to flow on so far as to Calabria and into Barbary.] It only remains that, in accordance with the stress laid upon the issuing forth of the waters in question in Eze 47:1-2, and again in Eze 47:12, we understand the expression: brought forth, used of the waters on their way to the sea, as an emphasizing again of the fact that they proceeded from the temple, and that this is done just here in order to pass on to the purpose effected by them when they have reached their goal. (Hengst.: reference to the higher hand, which executes, according to deliberate counsel, the plan of salvation. Neum.: waters that well forth from the threshold of the temple, that come to the Dead Sea. Not only that, but, moreover, having arrived at the Dead Sea, they are brought forth; thus the sanctuary of the blessing expressly connects itself with the doomed domain of the curse.)The waters of which it is said that they are healed are self-evidently (2Ki 2:22) the waters of the Dead Sea, as is shown also by what follows. The spiritual signification of the waters is now told to the prophet: healing of the dead, which accordingly means only sick unto death, is the aim of their being brought forth from the sanctuary to the Dead Sea, to the east boundary; that is, we might say, from Israel into the world, which is thereby auspiciously symbolized as in the east, consequently with a reference to the rising of the Sun of Righteousness (Mal. 3:20 [Eze 4:2]). [Grotius explains in this way, that the waters flowing in continue wholesome, notwithstanding their flowing through.] The character of the water of the Dead Sea has already been correspondingly described by Diodorus: . Comp. Tacitus, Hist. v. 6. Jerome calls it mare amarissimum, quod Grce , id est, stagnum bituminis vocatur. Comp. von Schubert (Reise in d. Morgenl. 3 p. 85), who remarks on the deceptive appearance for thirsty persons of the clear and pure water. Comp. moreover, von Raumers Palstina, p. 61 sq.; Robinsons Physical Geography of the Holy Land, p. 209 sq. [Hengst.: The wilderness is in Scripture a figure of ungodliness (?), and so a fitting emblem of the world estranged from God and excluded from His kingdom, Psa 107:5. In Joel, the valley of the acacias, the tree of the wilderness, corresponds to the Arabah here. Comp. also Isa 35:6. As a symbol of the corrupt world lying in wickedness (1Jn 5:19), the Dead Sea is the more appropriate, as it owes its origin to a judgment on the corrupt world, and the spiritual eye discerns under its waves the figure of Sodom and Gomorrah (Ezekiel 16).]

The transition is now made to the effects of the waters flowing to the Dead Sea. Very impressively Eze 47:9 begins first of all with the prophetic (Neum.: it has then come to pass, then the fact lies open to observation): what manifests itself in consequence of the healing of the water, in reference to the water itself, as an effect of the healing waters of the sanctuary.But what of ? Is there, then, any living thing in the Dead Sea? There is not, although Prince Pckler asserts that he ate there fishes taken living from the Dead Sea. The Jordan carries in some, or they voluntarily accompany its waves (von Schubert), but they must soon pay with their life for their love of travel, because they die in the salt brine, or because this brine thrusts out their light bodies to the shore. A fish seen by Robinson, and said to have been caught in the Dead Sea, was found near the mouth of the Jordan, and dying in a state of exhaustion. Neither fishes nor snails live in this very salt lake (von Schubert). Some herons, Gadow relates, sought the little fishes washed into the sea, that died instantly in the sharp lye; I myself observed some wrestling with death. Sea fishes which Marshal Marmont at Alexandria cast into water taken from the Dead Sea, died in two or three minutes. Thus living things can only be spoken of in respect to the Dead Sea as things that were alive and then died there, or that live but must die when they come thither. But the mode of expression employed is rather a prophetic anticipation, picturing as it does in the healed water, in contrast to the death dominating it, life already preserved,life, too, which, through , significantly alludes to Gen 7:21; Gen 8:17 (death and preservation), and Gen 1:21 (creation). Quite as readily could a contrast to the Jordan carrying the living to death in the Dead Sea be found in the following words: everything whithersoever the double stream shall come shall live. Hitzig: which creeps in every place to which rivers (, pointed as plural) come. (Ewald: .) Keil: which swarms wherever the brook comes.. What is the meaning of the dual, where hitherto we have always had ? Keil thinks the best solution is that of Hengstenberg, who, referring to Jer 1:2, explains two rivers as equivalent to strong river, remarking that the doubled often stands for the distinguished (Job 11:6; Isa 61:7). He might have known that already Umbreit translates it: two rivers, and in doing so refers to the fulness of the water. The aualis emphaticus, too, of Stier (Lehrgeb. p. 218) comes to the same thing, as he also cites for it Jeremiah 1. The original waters () have grown in Eze 47:5 to a ; may they not now, when they have mixed with the waters of the Dead Sea, when and the healed have been expressly named side by side in Eze 47:8, be very appropriately (not indeed as Maurer: because of the similarity with ) expressed succinctly by the dual form , and by indefinitely, because of their rushing streams sweeping away death and opening up the way to life? Thus, as Neum.: We see it at once, the result of the flowing in is manifest in the sea itself; the river is not lost in it, but neither does the river swallow up the sea; it impenetrates it with its living power, and wherever the eye follows these united streams, it beholds the swarming newly produced life, etc. Klief.: When the waters of the river shall come into the waters of the sea, they will divide themselves, etc., to retain life and to enjoy life, in pregnant contrast to the dying of which this sea is suggestive. Keil: to revive, to come to life. [Hitzig, too, remarks on the masculine construction of ( and ), so that appears as a substantive in the genitive dependent on . Neum.: Thus everything, that in the power of life bears in itself the germ of life, shall unfold this germ; the view which underlies is not that of the feminine, of what is upheld by the Spirit, but of what breathes independently.]The description of this life accords with the nature of the water, the healthy vital power of which finds expression in its fulness and the multitude of its fishes. But we have first everything that creeps and moves quickly, , said of every kind of animal mobility (Neum.), in order primarily to give pictorial expression to life in general in the all-sided manifold swarm. The following clause adds the more special: and there are very many (a collective, expressing at the same time the most different kinds), a feminine form of , which, from , to become thick, denotes first of all, as here too in accordance with the context, the strong large sea-fish, and then fish in general. (Umbr.: to live and multiply most abundantly.)The cause of this, which was formerly incorporated in the general description, is now taken by itself, in order to explain the special case of the fishes: for these waters come thither and they shall be healed, i.e., as this repetition from Eze 47:8 clearly shows, the waters of the Dead Sea, to which also points.But the description reaches its full height of expression of life with the clause: and everything liveth, etc. First, everything, etc.; then, the many fishes of various kinds in particularin other words, the Dead Sea in its piscine life; finally, the whole Dead Sea as such. Hence formerly , whereas the two following times ; as also the preceding (imperf. Niphal) is illustrated by , and therefore also we have , from Eze 47:5 sq., in antithesis to the waters of the Dead Sea. The Dead Sea has become a sea of life (Neum.). [Ewald: every one that draws water out of it. Calmet: every land, however unfruitful, provided only the river waters it, shall be at once made most fruitful. Dereser: all the regions of the Dead Sea, to which the water penetrates, shall swarm with fish.]

Eze 47:10. again. [Out of death there arises, by the omnipotence and grace of God, a rich life. The new community is numerous, innumerable as the fishes of the sea, Hv.] Because not only the life of the sea, but the (Dead) Sea itself as alive is exemplified in the abundance of fish, this abundance is described partly as to the employment it occasions, and partly as to the numerous kinds of fish. In the former respect, (Qeri: , they have placed themselves, one sees them standing), fishers place themselves over it (the river, not the Dead Sea, but also not the whole length of the river on its banks, but where the Dead Sea touches it, because the filling of it with fish-life is the subject in hand). With this agrees also the statement as to locality given: , which has given occasion to so many disquisitions. These must be two points lying near each other, as the same expression: and , and not less the difference, which is simply that between a kid and two calves, seems designed to show. Hengst. thinks that perhaps is a dual, such as that in Eze 47:9 : the double calf in parallelism with the kid. He supposes the fountains are named after the finders, the calf had distinguished itself by the discovery (!). Seriously, however, En-gedi (kids fountain, which reminds Sepp of the ibex, seldom pursued here by a hunter) is Ain-Didi, on the west bank of the Dead Sea, the southmost point inhabited by the Israelites, with an Egyptian climate and Egyptian products; and regarding En-eglaim (two-calves fountain), Jerome says that it is situated at the beginning of the Dead Sea, where the Jordan flows in, that is, northward. Since the death of living things occurs at the entrance into the Dead Sea, we feel certain that this is the right place. Hengst. finds En-gedi obliquely over against the Eglaim mentioned in Isa 15:8; for, as obviously the whole compass of the sea is intended, En-eglaim is to be looked for on the east side. Ewald: the whole present stretch along the Dead Sea. Neum. disregards any geographical basis: Two fountains () flow now into the Dead Sea, both of them living and full of fish, into the dark depths of death; but in those days of salvation, a river of life shall flow from the one to the other. No longer shall there be only small and quickly-dying fishes moving here and there before the mouths of the fountains; the whole intervening water, now waste and dead, shall then become alive, and swarm with the fishes of the great sea, [Ewald: a casting-place for nets] is distinguished by Neumann from in Eze 26:5; Eze 26:14. Gesenius holds both forms to have the same signification: place of spreading out. In order, however, to suppose the act of spreading out, we must with Neumann take the fishers as a spreading out of the nets; they will be quite absorbed in that occupation, will be nothing else; and this is not so inadmissible as Kliefoth supposes; while Rosenmllers interpretation of the , as referring to the places, that they shall be places for spreading out the nets, can quite well be extracted out of the phrase: from En-gedi even unto, etc., although it is not so obvious., whether for the take, or, after the take, for drying, which, however, is done as fresh preparation for new labour, for a new take. [Hengst.: The question is not of fishers who will arrange after their kind the fish caught, but only of those who catch fish of different kinds.] By the nets is characterized not only the fulness, but also the manifoldness, the various kinds of fishes that may be or are caught., as to the kind (collective), intentionally (as Raphe shows) without Mappiq, means at bottom the same as with : in respect to their kind; care is always taken to express the variety of kinds corresponding to the here and in Eze 47:9. Life is depicted with far more significance not by multitudes alone, but by the variegated mixture of the most different kinds, which are commingled together (Neum.).Allusion to the account of creation (comp. also Eze 47:9): the new community, a similar creation of Gods (Hv.)., not: of the healed of the sea, nor of the of Eze 47:9, nor of the banks between En-gedi and En-eglaim, but of the fishers, or the nets.The comparison with the fishes of the great sea, said to be very many, is connected, as Hitzig observes, with the : there shall live in it the many kinds of fish of the great sea, and many of each kind,as the fishes, sq., is proverbial for thisand not merely the few kinds of small fresh-water fish. The fish of the Mediterranean thus compared are, moreover, conceived of as living, so that this too shows that the Mediterranean cannot have been spoken of previously. [Hengst.: The sea is a symbol of the world; accordingly men appear as the living creatures in the sea, as the fishes (Rev 8:9). Hitherto there were only dead fishes, only unspiritual, unsaved men. Thus the meaning of the fishers cannot be doubtful: the fishes are the men who have attained to life through the Messianic salvation; the fishers are the messengers of this salvation, who gather those who are quickened into the kingdom of God, introduce them into the fellowship of the Church, Luk 5:11; Mat 13:47, etc.]

Eze 47:11. (Qeri: ) is singular; the plural of the Qeri appears to be put because of the following plural, . Gesenius: , incorrectly written for . is a moist place. Rashi: marais (marsh). One might perhaps make the distinction to be what is turned into swamp by the natural recession of the sea from the bank, and the artificially constructed salt-pits (Zep 2:9). These form the exception from the rule of healing and quickening; they are the places in which the healing waters produce no effect. We have just observed the fishers placing themselves from one fountain to the other, that the life of the sea may become conspicuous through them; but here in the pools is death (Neum.). The waters even which the river brought to them, thinks Hitzig, would become corrupt, if left standing along with the whole mass of water without any fresh inflow. J. D. Michaelis: Palestine would lose much were it to lose this salt, got without labour, and were the Dead Sea to become quite fresh; hence this gift of nature is to remain. Hitzigs view and reasons, even if satisfactory for the , are certainly not so for the ; which clause, moreover, is not to be explained on the ground of utility (as is done by Michaelis), it is the expression of a judgment. Those districts, says Hvernick, in which the salt-deposits proper were formerly found, shall also henceforth be such waste places. The thought is this: only those who bar themselves against the gracious stream of divine love, and are unwilling to regain health, are henceforth to be given over to the curse, continuing to exist as monuments thereof (Zec 14:17). Around the sea of death there lingers on a death which abides: this is the second death, the death unto death. What is given to salt is entirely forfeited to death. Klief.: They shall be made into salt. Hengst.: The salt comes into consideration here not as seasoning, as frequently, but as the foe of fertility, life, and prosperity (Job 39:6). A contrast to deliverance from the corrosive power of the salt, which would be effected by the waters from the sanctuary were access afforded to them; they remain given over to salt: he that believeth not the Son of God shall not see life, etc., Joh 3:36.In Eze 47:12, that of which the seer obtained merely a general view in Eze 47:7 is now more exactly particularized to him, as the conclusion of the entire section. After the contrast (Eze 47:11) to the healing effect of the waters of the sanctuary (Eze 47:8), there comes in what follows something antithetical, and therefore parallel to Eze 47:9 sq.: the quickening effects as regards the banks of the river, and so back to the source of the waters, form a parallel to the quickening effects as regards the goal, in relation to the Dead Sea. In fine, viewed forward or backward, they are the waters of life; as on the one hand they sustain life, so on the other they produce fruit., as the waters since Eze 47:5, on their way to the Dead Sea, and considered in contrast thereto (Eze 47:9), have been designated, so that the reference is to their course from their coming out of the temple walls.The description: on the river, is amplified thus: on its bank on both sides. The rising up forms also, no doubt, an antithetical pendant to the former deepening and deepening and descending of the waters., what is edible (Hengst.: all fruit-bearing trees; Hitzig: every tree of edible fruit). Klief.: they shall bear edible fruits of all sorts. Their described quality, however, is not this alone, that they are trees of food, and hence yield foodnot wild, acid, hard fruit; but an abiding freshness of life and vigour distinguishes this growth of trees (which is elsewhere expressed by ever-flowing, never-failing waters), both as to the leaf (, Psa 1:3, to fade, to fall off, cognate with ) and the fruit (). In respect to the latter it is said: according to its months, that is, as these change (Hitzig: distributively), , said of the first commencement, of the first of a thing; hence , the first-fruits, signify, according to Hitzig, that the trees produce fresh fruit every month; and this, according to Hengst., indicates the uninterrupted enjoyment of salvation; or the fruit is as eagerly desired and hailed with as much joy as early first-fruits, or generally as superior fruit, which can claim, as it were, the right of the first-born (Deu 21:16). Comp. Rev 22:2. Neum.: The thought in fact is: what used to delight the heart every year, will henceforth be furnished every month. According to Horapollo, the palm puts forth a new branch with every new moon. The month is looked on as the property of the trees, because the change of the moon always enables them to put forth in similar change the life welling up in them. We are not to compare here the enchanted gardens of Alcinous (Odyss. vii. 114 sq.). The reason assigned, too, which makes the leading thought the active principle of the effects, accords with the closing character of the verse: its (not: the streams, as Neumann, but: the trees, this forests) waters, namely, the waters proceeding from the sanctuary. Hitzig: from the dwelling-place of Him who is the Author of all life and fertility. Neum.: a deep disclosure regarding what the temple of his God was to the prophet. With Him is the fountain of life, and in His light we see light, Psa 36:10 [9]. But this is just the sanctuary; because its source is holy, therefore the flood of the river produces fruitful germs. And is not moral purity, but sublime, transcendent purity, which sheds its enlightening beams over all the dark places of the earth. Hence the lofty praise of the seraphim in Isa 6:3.As formerly the fishes were for the nets of the fishers, so now the fruit of the trees is for food, etc. (Qeri: , which is unnecessary), for is not necessarily the fruit of each and every tree, but can be taken collectively with the plural. As we have here a reference to paradise and the first creation (Gen 2:9), so we have also to redemption, the future salvation, in the phrase and its (the forests) leaf, Hitzig: for medicine; on which he remarks: doubtless for external application, since the leaf is laid upon wounds as soft and cooling, apart from its special healing virtue; is derived from . In this too, the thought of mending and of healing is united and conjoined in this closing clause, so that in this sense medicine is by no means a very unsuitable disharmony in these figures of perfection, as Neumann says, whose thoughts run on the blessed salvation enlivened by a sweet life of rapture, and on adorning life with fragrant chaplets. This last would as mere ornament be altogether out of place here. Hengst.: Salvation must present itself for the terribly sick heathen world, above all, in the form of saving grace. Besides the nourishing fruits, therefore, are named also the healing leaves. Hv.: The trees are trees of life, with allusion at the same time to Psalms 1; the figure of the fishes refers to the extent, the greatness of the community; and this figure of the trees to its nature, in so far as the divine grace transforms it into truly living members, who themselves bear rich fruit, and thereby become a means of life and recovery to others also. [Philippson says of the entire section: This description answers to no fountain actually existing in Jerusalem, and contains suppositions which no actually existing fountain could fulfil. Hence it belongs to the realm of those prophetic intuitions of the future land, in which this land appeared, altered in its nature, endowed with the most glorious fertility and wonderful virtues. We have to consider this section as a poetical resting-point of the prophet, in which, between dry narration and representation, the prophets enraptured soul expatiated on the prospects of his people. According to this, the hope of the Jews of the present should finally be sthetics.]

Eze 47:13-23. The Fixing of the Boundaries in the Holy Land

Hengstenberg, in accordance with his view of the concluding portion of Ezekiel, makes the prophet return from the distant Messianic future, the prospect into which, according to him, suddenly opened in Eze 47:1-12, to the lower salvation, the temple and city of the future, which formed the presupposition of the higher salvation. According to Hitzig, the previous section forms the transition to this, inasmuch as in that section Ezekiel first of all, following the course of the river, turns himself away from the temple and the idea of the Terumah; in other words, it still remains to treat of the land itself from which that Terumah was selected. It would be an entire break in these closing chapters, which hang so closely together, were Eze 47:1-12 an insertion of essentially different character, meaning, and signification from that which precedes them, and that which follows them. But if Eze 47:1-12 are decidedly symbolical, and their contents specially Messianic, then we have in them the key for everything in these chapters, both what precedes and what follows, not merely the transition to what follows. Then the temple is a symbol of the new revelation of God among Israel in their own land; then the partly indicated, partly instituted worship as to acts, persons, and times, symbolizes the future worshipping in spirit and in truth; then the blessing, which abolishes even the Dead Sea in its character of curse, cannot leave the Holy Land untouched, but only with the fixing of its boundaries and the division of the enclosed territory among the tribes (Ezekiel 48) will the theocracy of the future he complete. We cannot say, with Ewald, that the whole book might have been perfectly well concluded with the last great figure in Eze 47:1-12. Ewald himself is compelled to admit that the position of the sanctuary and its immediate environs in Eze 47:1-8 is not yet explained with sufficient clearness; but what still follows finds its explanation less by reference to this, than by the fact that in Eze 45:1 the division of the land by inheritance is presupposed, without our having up to this point heard anything regarding it, except the prophecy of the return of Israel into their again reviving land (Eze 34:25 sq., Eze 36:8 sq., Eze 37:21 sq.). Only by what follows from Eze 47:13 to the end of the book do the people of God attain to rest, as the glory of God came to its rest by its re-entrance into the sanctuary (Ezekiel 43). In the sense of such a connection, comp. Rev 21:3 : , ; the sanctuary with its environs still continues in Ezekiel 48. the main point of view. Not merely, as Hv. says, does the whole representation take its departure from the sanctuary, and so naturally also returns thither, but the close of Ezekiels book is intended to depict the glory of God by the glory of His kingdom (Introd. 5). Thus neither the incidental presupposition of the division of the land by inheritance, nor the oblation to be set apart as defined in Ezekiel 45., nor, in particular, the citywhich, it is true, is to belong to Israel as a whole (Eze 45:6)can suffice; but all Israel must in their tribes colonize the land, in order, after everything has been bounded off externally and internally, to see the glory of Jehovah in the sanctuary, as the foundation of the glory of Israel in their own land, brought to full expression. Hence, as Hvernick observes, this impresses also upon the whole land a new aspect, a more glorified conformation.

Eze 47:13. A solemn introduction marks off the following section (comp. Eze 46:1; Eze 46:16). , Gesenius: unquestionably a false reading for (as Eze 47:15). So read also the Sept., Vulg., Chald., and fourteen manuscripts. This is easy to say, also easy to imagine, but the analogy of for , after Eze 25:7 (which see), cannot be applied here. Although we can hardly say, with Hengstenberg, that it would almost seem as if Ezekiel wished to tease scribes and critics, and to put them to the test (!!), still, the propagation of such a clerical error as for in Eze 47:13 is so much the more difficult to imagine, as the matter is really different in Eze 47:15, where we have , from what it is here. Hengst. makes to be of similar import with in Pro 17:22, which word, occurring only there, signifies, according to him, the inwards! He translates thus: (this is) the inside of the border, and observes on it: The stem is or ; cognate is , middle (in Chald. ), , valley, as the interior enclosed by mountains. All this might be allowed; but that , people, is the interior, the centre, in antithesis to individuals as the periphery, is so far from correct, that the direct opposite would be nearer the mark. The stem signifies: to draw together; and hence (people) and (body) refer to connection. A signification such as: body, suits the of Pro 17:22 in its parallelism there with , and a similar signification would be the suitable one here in Ezekiel. For the question in Eze 47:13 is not concerning in the sense of border, as in Eze 47:15, but concerning the territory itself, whose borders are first defined in Eze 47:15 sq. Eze 47:13-14, introductory to the fixing of the boundaries, and Eze 47:22-23, which conclude it, give us to understand that the division of the land among the twelve tribes of Israel is the dominating design; only with reference to this, that is to say, preparatively, are the boundaries of the land to be treated of. explains sufficiently; is accusative. is, according to Hitzig, distributive, and denotes the point of view which is to obtain in the division of the land, since all Israel, the re-united people of God, shall return to their land (Ezekiel 37.); from which point of view, also, the curt = Joseph shall receive of it (plural) inheritances (measured off portions of land), is directly explained, without our needing, with Ewald, to punctuate dual , although two portions are meant, in accordance with the ancient prophetic injunction of Jacob, the patriarch of the tribes (Gen 48:5). The more exact determination is so much the more presupposed as understood; as Levi is to have no other portion of land except that in the sacred Terumah, the tribes can only be made twelve in number when (as always) the tribe of Joseph is counted and treated as two, Ephraim and Manasseh (Klief.). Comp. Jos 17:14 sq. [The Sept. translate the nom. pr. .] Already Eusebius has observed in the Prp. ev., that Plato, too, divides his ideal state into twelve parts, and the capital likewise.

After the determination concerning the point of view of the number twelve for the division of the land, as it has been in Eze 47:13 first stated generally, and then specialized in Joseph, Eze 47:14 lays down the second principle for the division of the land: into equal parts. What was said regarding Joseph is not in contradiction with this principle, as Hitzig maintains, for, as Keil justly replies, the words: ye inherit it, , only affirm that of the twelve tribes which Israel numbers in relation to , the one shall receive as much as the other. Comp. the opposite principle in Num 26:54; Num 33:54; and comp. Eze 48:1 sq. There is no reason for supposing that signifies: inasmuch as, or: because. Comp. Eze 20:28; Eze 20:42.The symbolical character of these introductory regulations, which the very norm of the symbolical number twelve leaves scarcely questionable, must be beyond all question, unless the principle of equality in division here laid down should go on the strange supposition that each tribe would comprehend the same number of individual members, or, in contrast to the first division of the land, the new division, with all its appearance of justice, should yet in fact and reality be practically unjust, namely, because treating the more populous tribe exactly as the weaker. This Philippson also admits, when he remarks that this would be more contradictory to the Mosaic law than all the other deviations of the prophet taken together; but he gets over the difficulty by saying that only the same direction from east to west is given for the tribal portions, and that the equal division among the individual Israelites is spoken of. Bunsen, on the contrary, maintains the ideal nature of the plan. The number twelve of the tribes of Israel expresses the whole of the people, but it does so according to their idea, and thus in a spiritual manner; but still more does the equal share of each tribe in the common inheritance make the land of promise become a symbol of something else than the earthly Canaan. (Comp. 2Pe 1:1; Psa 37:11; Psa 37:29.) The seed now has come to whom the land was promised by Jehovah (Gen 12:7; Gen 17:8; Gal 3:7; Gal 3:16).

Eze 47:15. We have here the fixing of the boundaries, which (as in Numbers 34., Joshua 15) is done with reference to the four cardinal points; but here, instead of south, west, north, and east, the order is north, east, south, west, just as also in Ezekiel 48. the several tribes follow from north to south. Hengst. explains the difference from this circumstance, that in ancient times Israel came from the south into the land; here, on the contrary, the return is from the land of the north. Klief.: We must so understand this deviation that the Holy Land will in that future be indeed the same as the old Holy Land, but yet in a certain sense opposed to the old, the counterpart of the old Canaan..After that has preceded with Eze 47:13-14, it can now be said with of the boundaries proper: .The north boundary begins from the Mediterranean Sea (as in Num 34:7 sq.), hence in the west, and proceeds on the way to Hethlon, to come to Zedad (, of the direction whither). Since or with locale helps also to determine the boundary in Num 34:8, doubtless on the north-east, as the antithesis to the point of departure on the west naturally suggests, so certainly no other Zedad is to be thought of. Robinson holds it to be Sudud, four hours from Hasia, on the west entrance of the wilderness, east of the road which leads from Damascus to Emesa; Keil declares himself against this. Hethlon is unknown. Gesenius places it in Syria of Damascus.

Eze 47:16. A more detailed account, by means of several other places, of the north boundary as compared with the other boundaries.Hamath, of which Keil says: not the city on the Orontes, but the kingdom whose south border forms the north border of Canaan; while Gesenius takes it for this important Syrian city (Epiphania), and compares Num 13:21; Num 34:8. Hitzig denies that here at the beginning the land of the city could be meant, and therefore, appealing to the Sept., he takes it as a gloss (from Eze 48:1) to Zedad, the word before it. is, according to Gesenius = (2Sa 8:8), a city in the kingdom of Aram-Zobah; is it perhaps the seaport of Berytus in Phnicia? (identical with in Num 34:9?) is further defined by the clause: which is between, etc., without thereby becoming clearer.The closer definition: which is on, or: toward the border of Hauran (), brings the middle Hazer ( , middle court) into relation with the transjordanic Auranitis, without, however, defining the latter more exactly.

Eze 47:17 states the north border for the third time, says Klief. (without, however, being able to solve the difficulty of the double Hamath in Eze 47:16), but so that it, after Eze 47:16 has named the series of Israelitish border places, defines the boundary by border places outside of Israel. His view is, that Damascus and Hamath are the boundaries on the north, in this way, that the north-east Damascene border place opposite the north-east Israelitish border place, Zedad, is Hazar-Enon, while on the north side the land of Hamath extends itself.The point of departure from the Mediterranean Sea is once more repeated; hence this must be the most western point of the north border. (), fountain court (Num 34:9), Keil sets down as the fountain of Lebweh in the Beca, on the watershed between the Orontes and Leontes. The calling of Hazar-Enon the border from the sea, indicates that it forms the most eastern boundary-point for the north border drawn from the sea, as it is added: the border of Damascus, that is: the border place from Damascus, or: on the border, etc. (Hengst.), or: toward the border, etc. , according to Hengst., denotes first the north border, to which all the places named belong, and then northward gives the special in the general; for the north border Was no straight line, but had its more northern and less northern points; the most northern was Hamath. Hv.: The repetition strengthens the conception: northward and northward. , doubtless as accusative, with: looks to, or: measures off, understood. Hvernick finds the boundary-line drawn here with still greater exactness than in Numbers 34, partly to indicate the still sharper and more definite fixing of the limits of the new Canaan than of the old, and partly to express here too the thought that the new community shall obtain the fullest possible possession of the promised land. However unknown the various places named may be, thus much seems certain, that the only design of the many names is to draw the boundary with full sufficiency.

Eze 47:18 defines as the east border briefly the Jordan, agreeing in this with Num 34:10 sq., only with different local colouring. Hauran, Damascus, and Gilead are put on the east, and the land of Israel on the west side. Keil makes the remarkable sequence: Hauran, Damascus, Gilead, to have arisen through regard to the Jordan, which does not reach so far as Damascus; if it had, the sequence must have been Damascus, Hauran, Gilead. While Klief. insists on this, that Numbers 34 gives in addition the district east of the Jordan conceded to the transjordanic tribes, whereas, according to the statement here, the Holy Land of the future shall no longer have any portion not fully incorporated; Hengst., on the contrary, maintains the continuance of the frontier land, referring for this to Psalms 40.; Mic 7:14; Jer 1:19; Zec 10:10 : also in Num 32:30; Num 33:51; Jos 22:9, the, land of Canaan lying west of Jordan is in the same way set over against, e.g., Gilead.The border from which they are to measure is the above-defined north border. The east sea is the Dead Sea, in distinction from the west, the Mediterranean Sea.

Eze 47:19. The south border. The nearer definition of the direction by marks only the transition to the place where the determination of the southern boundary begins. Tamar, says Hengst., does not occur elsewhere in the Old Testament; it is, according to him, to be sought for in the extreme south-east, at the end of the Dead Sea. Robinsons conjecture in favour of Thamara, that is, Kurnub, lies open to many objections. On the other hand, the waters of Meriboth-Kadesh, that is, the waters of strife, are those known of old. Hengst. observes: Only instead of the singular in Num 27:14, the plural Meriboth is put, to point to this, that the strife there involves in it a whole fulness of rebelliousness,a solemn nota bene for those who, like their fathers, were still to the present day a house of rebelliousness. These waters of Kadesh (Numbers 20) in the wilderness of Zin were near Kadesh Barnea (Num 34:4)., accented as inheritance, is retained by Hengstenberg: the inheritance (reaches) to the great sea, who cites for this the oldest translators, Sept., Jonathan, and the Syriac. The possession here (according to him) corresponds to the border of the land in the case of the first two sides. On the other hand, already Hvernick (Vulg.) thinks of the river of Egypt, the Wady el Arish, which appears throughout in the Old Testament as the extreme south-western boundary of Palestine; also Num 34:5 is (in his view) decisive for this acceptation, and consequently for a change of the punctuation into . Comp. Jos 15:4. Hitzig: in the direction of the river to the great sea; and for this he urges in addition that is also called simply , that is, , with the omission of the genitive.The Mediterranean Sea is given as boundary-point on the south-west.

Eze 47:20. The west border, with which the fixing of the boundaries concludes. As it is formed by the Mediterranean Sea, only the terminating points south and north have to be noticed. In the former respect stands , that is, from the south border defined in Eze 47:19; in the latter, , that is, to over against the place where one comes into the territory of Hamath, which was set down in Eze 47:17 as the north boundary; comp. Num 34:6. Klief. further observes: The Philistine coast district is here, as with Moses, included in the Holy Land; the fact that it was not conquered by the Israelites happened against the will of God: the Holy Land of the future shall be the real, entire, full Holy Land.

Eze 47:21. A concluding clause referring back to Eze 47:13, as well as preparing for Eze 47:22 sq.

Eze 47:22. Like a codicil to a will; Ewald: and with the genuine prophetic innovation, that the protected should have quite as many rights as the ancient sons of the soil. , comp. Eze 47:9-10.Hv.: The prophets perspective extends itself beyond the borders of Israel to those of the Gentile nations. Israel arrived at the goal of its development forms at the same time a fresh point of connection for the Gentiles. He who connects himself with the true, perfect Church, enjoys the same privileges and blessings as Israel itself. That which the Old Testament contains in the weak type in relation to strangers passes here into complete fulfilment. Hitzig: The prophet draws here the inference from Lev 19:34; the limitation and exception in Deu 23:3-4 is here omitted. For this he gives as reasons: inasmuch as residence in a strange land could even weaken an exclusive disposition, and the lessening of the population of Israel made them wish for and favour the accession of strangers. Hengst., on the contrary, holds that what is here said does not primarily refer to strangers in general, but to those who have begotten children in your midst, hence to those who have been naturalized in Israel in the times of affliction, as similarly Abarbanel. Hengst. urges against the hosts of the heathen, the boundaries of the land confined between the Jordan and the Mediterranean. (Might we not imagine we perceived here the rationalismus vulgaris?) The question, too, concerns only the strangers already naturalized in Israel. He says: the exception which the Ammonites and Moabites make (Deuteronomy 13) in regard to the reception of born heathen into the community of God serves only to confirm the rule. Already, in the state in which Moses found the people, there was a considerable foreign element, the whole posterity of the servants who went down to Egypt with Jacob. A fresh accession took place in Egypt at the time of the exodus (Exo 12:38; Num 11:4). In 1Ch 2:34-35 we have an example that these Egyptian strangers were considered in the partition of the land, and, indeed, in the territory of the tribe to which they had attached themselves. Further, Moses gives in Num 10:29 sq. the friendly invitation to his Midianitish brother-in-law to share with his tribe the lot of Israel. Hobab, says Knobel, shall accordingly have a share in the land. Hobab consented, and we find his race afterward in the Hebrew land. Comp. Jdg 1:16; Jdg 4:11; Jeremiah 35. Only apparently at variance with Ezekiel is the conduct of Ezra toward the heathen wives (Ezr 9:10), and that of Nehemiah (Ezekiel 13.) toward the heathen men who had settled among the Israelites. Ezekiel speaks of those who had attached themselves to Israel by inward inclination at a time when it had no form nor comeliness, and when there was nothing in it to desire but the true God; Ezra and Nehemiah are zealous against the attempt to give heathendom equal rights in the midst of Israel, and to break down the partition-wall so necessary in the pre-Christian times. Both the attraction which Ezekiel commends, and the repulsion for which Ezra and Nehemiah are zealous, arise rather from the same principle; it is the true God who here binds and there severs.Hitzig remarks on the clause: who have begotten children, etc., that for their sake the fathers received a landed possession, but the childless proselyte did not. Keil understands it of permanent settlement in Israel, in contrast to temporary or transitory residence there. Here too there is, analogous to Isa 56:3 sq., attached to the promise a condition, the idea of which is already involved in Deu 23:7-8 (that Edomites and Egyptians shall only in the third generation enter into the congregation of the Lord). This involves the close, firm, and faithful attaching of oneself to the congregation, whereby one has to the utmost removed and excluded himself from the national communion of heathens. Comp. also Lev 25:45. Certainly not testifying to an already very prevalent custom, but in a prophetic mode of expression, Eze 47:23 adds again a . The more general sense of this specializing Hvernick expresses to the following effect: Heathendom forms no new church alongside of Israel, no proper tribe alongside of the twelve families of Israel. It is absorbed into Israel as Gods holy ordinance, which continues unalterable, as an ensign for the Gentiles, into the one true Church, which has existed from the beginning and shall exist for ever. Very rightly does Kliefoth point out the connection of our prophetic passage with the prediction in Eze 36:36; Eze 37:9; Eze 37:28; only he wrongly adduces Eze 44:9, which compare. There shall henceforth be no distinction between the members of Gods people born of the seed of Abraham and those born of the Gentiles.

HOMILETIC HINTS

On Ch. 47

Eze 47:1 sq. Before his view stands a paradise of the nation returned to God, from whom the fountain of life flows forth in richest effusion, filling the land and all waters with healing virtues,behold in this the word of God in its vigour of heavenly life, destroying disease and death! (Umbreit.)From the restored temple issues finally salvation for the whole world (Hengst.).For this is the most intrinsic characteristic of these waters, that they spread through the world the consecration of the most holy place (Neum.).The waters of life in their significance, whence they come, and whither they flow.Water, which makes the unfruitful land fruitful, and affords refreshing drink to the thirsty, is in Scripture a figure of the blessing and salvation which already in paradise are represented as a watering of the ground (Gen 13:10). Comp. in Isa 12:3 the wells of salvation, and in Isa 44:3 the Spirit as the blessing, for the root of disease is sin (Hengst.).In the Church of the New Covenant there is a river of living water, the rich gifts of the Holy Ghost, which flow out into it. Only we must come and taste this water, that we may be made whole, Joh 7:37 sq.(Tb. Bib.)The watering of Canaan implies a great spiritual fruitfulness (Lampe).The gospel is no invention of man, but an outflow from God in Christ (Starck).The Eastern and the Western Church.The water is the fatherly kindness and compassion of God, out of whose treasury innumerable benefits flow to us. The water turns at once to the altar of Christ, because we behold in Christ the love of God, and from Him flow upon mankind the spiritual streams of blessing which are to quicken and give health to the world, Joh 13:10; Joh 4:10 (Heim-Hoff.).By this water is signified the preaching of the gospel, which offers to us grace and the forgiveness of sins in Christ. Water cleanses so do Gods word and grace (John 13), of which baptism is the symbol. Also the course of the gospel, as the course of these waters, no one can stop (Lavater).It is the water of life, which Oriental mysticism in vain seeks for in other places (Umbreit).

Eze 47:2. The kingdom of God cometh not with outward show (Luk 17:20); at first it has even an insignificant appearance, but soon it grows and increases mightily (Mat 13:31-32) (W.).That the waters at first flow out so gently is meant to intimate how entirely different is the process in the kingdom of grace from that in the course of worldly things. For whatever glorious or great thing takes place in the kingdoms of the world creates great wonder and surprise in its very beginning; but the kingdom of God cometh not so (Luk 17:20). In the kingdom of God, things proceed from little to great: in the kingdoms of the world, often from great to little; Satan, as Luther says, begins his things with lofty impetuosity, but finally they end in nothing, and everything comes to disgrace (Hafenreffer).At first it appeared an insignificant work, with a few disciples in Judea; then it was preached in Samaria, and soon after in the whole world (Lavater).

Eze 47:3 sq. Faith has always to do with the water here, namely, because it is constantly occupied with consideration of the word of God (Starck).No one has learned so much, that there is not more to learn still. Christianity is prefigured in the water through which Ezekiel was brought. Experience teaches that the longer Christians exercise themselves in godliness, the less value they set on themselves; they confess finally that they cannot reach the bottom: they can depend upon nothing that is theirs, but must submit themselves simply and solely to the grace and mercy of God (Scriver).To him that hath shall be given, that he may have abundance.The mysteries of the gospel are like a deep river, which finally becomes so deep that one cannot sound it, Eph 3:18 (Tb. Bib.).When reason cannot fathom the divine mysteries because of their depth, the faith which trusts to the truth and wisdom of God, as it were, swims across, Luk 1:34 sq. (Starck).We find here a twofold figure; the one is the four measurements of a thousand cubits each, the other is the four depths of the waters. The one refers to the exceeding great extension of the kingdom of Christ toward all the four quarters of the globe; the other to the different degrees in the measure of the Spirit to which the nations called to the kingdom of Christ shall gradually attain, etc. (Meyer.)The four world-kingdoms in Daniel are like a shadow of the four great epochs in space and time, through which the waters of life diffuse their fulness over the world, gradually transforming it until its peace shall become as a river, and its righteousness as the waves of the sea (Isa. 47:18); until the earth shall be full of the knowledge of Jehovah as the waters cover the sea, Isa 11:9 (Neum.).So the books, too, of the Holy Scriptures are, as to their contents, like these waters, of dissimilar depth. Some come only to the ankles, others to the knees, or even to the loins, and some are altogether unfathomable, like these last nine chapters of our prophet (Pfeiffer).At first the word of God seems to us like water which reaches only to the ankles; one thinks it is not so deep, one will easily wade through. But when a man reflects diligently with heartfelt prayer, then his understanding is more and more opened in the divine illumination; then it already reaches his kneeshe acquires a far higher esteem for it (Psa 119:129). When he advances farther, he gets always deeper into the hidden wisdom, and Holy Writ is to him a water which comes to his loins; he is so captivated therewith, that he finds in it his highest satisfaction, and forgets over it everything else in the world. Finally, it becomes a water over which he must swim; he cannot fathom the mysteries (Glassius).The river of life, which is at first small, always grows in volume, because the grace and knowledge of Christ should always increase in us; and the divine love and mercy should appear to us always greater, more glorious, and more worthy of admiration, the more attentively we consider them. For who can comprehend their height and depth? Who is so void of understanding as not to be astonished, when he considers that the God of immortality interests Himself in poor mortal man, yea, in the sinner, who so often rises up against Him and breaks His word, imparts to him heavenly treasures, makes him immortal and a partaker of the divine nature? Of this spiritual blessing more and more is always imparted to believers. Here we have sprinkling, cleansing, the taking away of the heart of stone, and the impartation of the new heart, and the anointing with the Holy Ghost. In such measure does the water of life increase (Heim-Hoff.).Friends of missions behold here a glorious emblem of missions, particularly of the most blessed missionary activity proceeding from Israel (Richter).

Eze 47:6. In this life we see darkly and through means of the word, hereafter face to face, 1Co 13:12 (Starck).

Eze 47:7. The gospel makes fruitful trees on all sides.How wholesome, how fruitful is the living water of the gospel, and of the gifts of the Spirit which it gives us! They restore health, they bring forth fruits of blessedness which endure unto eternity, Joh 4:14 (Tb. Bib.).Blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord (Jer 17:7 sq.).Believers are trees planted by the rivers of water (Psalms 1); they flourish to the glory of God (Isaiah 61), and produce rich and ripe fruit (Psa 92:13 sq.) (Starke).

Eze 47:8. First urbi, and then orbi, holds good of the Messiah.Salvation is of the Jews, but it is a salvation for the world.Covered with loose pebbles and wild rifted rocks, furrowed by dry torrent-beds, enclosed and obscured at the sides by lofty chains of mountains, the Arabah exhibits only here and there traces of fertility in the growth of herbs and plants, where fountains and streams flow down from the mountains; it is the evening gloom of the wilderness-night, the land in which is the darkness of evening (Isa 24:11; Jer 2:6). The steppe a world in the bonds of death, where the mystery moulders below in silence, and shoots up in roses of the grave (Neum.).Gods sanctuary a well-spring of life for the Dead Sea of the world (Psa 87:7).The Dead Sea in the darkness of nature, in the light of the promise.Gods thoughts of peace over the abysses of the worlds wretchedness.Judgment and grace.The world is a desert and a Dead Sea.Oh the greatness of the grace of God, which desires not the death of the sinner, but his healing! (Starck.)By conversion we lose our former salt.In other cases a clear and wholesome stream, which flows into a muddy and putrid lake like this, becomes corrupt; it is otherwise with the gospel, which brings recovery and health to the earthly-minded heart (Starke).The gospel is a word of life to them who believe in it (Joh 6:68); and its spiritual rivers are living waters to them who drink thereof (Joh 4:10) (Tb. Bib.).It is a power of God, but man will not let the power work, Heb 4:2 (Starke).

Eze 47:9. The sea, the restlessly swelling depth, an emblem of disquiet (Isa 57:20), unfruitful (Isa 23:3), boiling up with violent impetuosity (Job 7:12; Psa 46:4 [3]), even in its most glorious aspect only darkling night, like phosphorescent gleams around a corrupt tree, awakening a painful desire and longing for launching forth on distant voyages (Deu 30:13), and down even to the shady abyss (Lam 2:13), unfathomable and dark, the most natural expression of the dark and destructive power of death (Jer 51:42; Mic 7:19), its harshness increased by the flood supersaturated with salt, etc. (Neum.).In the Dead Sea of the world there arises just such a gladsome swarm of those who have become partakers of life from God, as formerly of ordinary fishes in the natural sea at the creation. The salvation is for all, without distinction of nation, rank, or age (Hengst.).From death into life, from the service of sin into the glorious liberty of the children of God, come rich and poor, young and old, bond and free, Jews and Greeks, who receive into them the law of the spirit of life. For whosoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved (Heim-Hoff.).The fishes in the water and the drops in a river are innumerable; so also the multitude of believers shall be amazing, Isa 60:7 (Starke).The two rivers are the two Testaments, the two sacraments (Starck).

Eze 47:10. The ministers of the Church are compared to fishers, because of the contempt with which they are regarded by the rich and powerful of this world; because of their labour by day and by night, in heat and in cold; because of the fruitlessness of their labour at times, when they say with Peter, We have caught nothing; because, too, of the dangers they incur in stormy weather; because of their confidence, which, as in the case of the husbandman, must rest on God; because of the various kinds of implements which they use, nets, hooks, etc., preaching, inviting, admonishing, etc. And they rescue souls from the abyss (Starck).Nets and fishers everywhere, this is the appearance which the world in Christ presents.The world is the sea, the fishes are the men; so long as the fishes swim freely hither and thither at their own will, they profit no one, but when caught they are profitable. In the same May, so long as men walk according to their own lusts and pleasures, they are of no real use either to God or their neighbour; but when they are caught or converted by the gospel net, then they are profitable to God and their neighbour, Phm 1:11 (Starke).

Eze 47:11. In the Dead Sea of the world the marshes and swamps are originally of the same nature as the main sea; the only difference is, that they shut themselves off from the healing waters, which flow from the sanctuary. Comp. the saying: Ye would not, and the drawing of the Father (Joh 6:44), which comes to meet the longing of the soul. It is, however, sufficient punishment for the world that lieth in wickedness that it continues as it is (Hengst.).The mud-puddles probably indicate separatist, self-contained parties, which do not receive those streams of salvation, and consequently cannot be healed. To these belong Gogs adherents, Ezekiel 38. (Richter.)Such, too, are those who entrench themselves against the truth and craftily wrest the Scriptures throughout; people of this kind are not easily brought to the knowledge of the truth (Berl. Bib.).Over the figures of light there comes once more a dark shadow. Yea, nothing can rescue from death that which is his own (Isa 26:14). All transformation is only the fruit of a ripening, during which there is constant need of being put in mind of the day of wrath, which comes on the earth, as here on Israel (Neum.).He who will not have Christ wills to have eternal death.No salvation out of Christ.The eyes of God regard him who opposes Christ as a morass, because he prefers the wilderness of sin to eternal salvation, Joh 3:19 (Starck).He who, in case of conversion, still seeks to retain bypaths and bosom sins, is not upright before God. Divided allegiance is of no avail here, Mat 6:24 (Starke).The ungodly, who despise Gods word, or do not persevere in the path of life, remain dry and unfruitful. Blessed, on the contrary, is the godly man who meditates on the law of the Lord day and night (Psalms 1). He is always flourishing, always alike; he walks in the ways of the Lord, and edifies and elevates others (Heim-Hoff.).

Eze 47:12. The blessed growth close by the river of life.Evergreen leaves, yet not leaves merely, but also fruit! Thus it is with life from Gods sanctuary.Hypocrisy and true piety.The never-fading of the leaves implies the perseverance of believers in temptations, in persecutions, in death (Starck).The works of believers, which in other respects are done even by unbelievers, are fragrant of faith and love, and are therefore fitted for converting the heathen (Berl. Bib.).Would that all men knew how well it is with him who is included in the number of Christians, of true members of Jesus! Then one always goes onward (and never backward) in his happiness; he is in the path of life, and always receives grace for grace (Rothe).Healing and sanctification.A pleasant figure of the blessing imparted to mankind from the dwelling among us of the Godman. His word flows forth from Him, swelling through all lands with ever-increasing power, and always more and more disclosing its fulness. He who holds to it and is rooted in it brings forth fruit continually, and it has power to quicken even what has long been lifeless, and to turn the curse into a blessing. In Christ we have this as a matter of daily experience; Ezekiel in vision saw it in the future; his prophecies have respect to us (Diedrich).

Eze 47:13 sq. In the community of God every one has his place and his share according to his gifts, 1Co 12:28 (Tb. Bib.).Who can define the boundaries of the Church, especially in the last days? But as here the boundaries of Canaan are defined, so the boundaries of the Church are faith and life in the Scriptures of the apostles and prophets, which accordingly no one is to overpass, Gal 6:16 (Starke).The Church of God has her boundaries within and without. The inheritance of the saints in light (1Jn 3:1 sq.).God gives to His children very differently; from him to whom a double portion has been given, a corresponding return is required (Starck).In the New Covenant the same grace is offered to all men. God is not a respecter of persons. It is one and the same Christ, one Spirit for all, Gal 3:26 (Starck).

Eze 47:22 sq. Oh what comfort it is that the Gentiles are no longer to be strangers and foreigners from the promise, but citizens, and of the household of God! Eph 2:19 (Starke).It is not birth, but the new birth, that makes men children of God (Starck).Here, under earthly figures, the Jerusalem that is above, with her children, is typified, and the calling of the Gentiles from east and west and the utmost bounds of the earth is described; for many shall come from the east and from the west, and sit down to eat with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of God, Ps. 47:10 [Psa 47:9](Heim-Hoff.).God here opens to all the holy gates of His Church, and prescribes to the Church herself the commandment of meekness, love, and brotherly kindness (Hafenreffer).Those who were formerly strangers shall then be heirs of the whole world. In Christ, in faith, in the New Covenant, the alien disappears. Those who were aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and far off, and they who are nigh, are made one; the two are made one new man, Eph 2:12. For he who is in Christ is through faith Abrahams seed, and an heir and possessor of his promise, Gal 3:28-29. The incorporation of believers into Christ makes a complete unity, and a new spiritual body, consisting of all true members without distinction, for in the new creation all members prosper alike before God, etc. (Berl. Bib.)Right and title in the faith.

Footnotes:

[1]W. Neumann: The Waters of Life. An Exegetical Disquisition on Eze 47:1-12. Berlin, 1848. Somewhat hyperbolical, but written with intelligent and hearty appreciation, in the spirit of the language and faith of the prophets of Israel.

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

CONTENTS

We have here the continuation of the same subject, but in a vision somewhat clearer to be understood. The Waters issuing from under the threshold of the House; the account of fishermen; and of trees growing on the banks of the river.

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

If we compare scripture with scripture, (and, which God the Holy Ghost commands, 1Co 2:13 ) we shall take the most effectual method of arriving to the proper apprehension of what is here said, looking up to the Great Author of his holy word, to make it profitable. Now it was among the promises of Jehovah, that the last day dispensation of grace should be distinguished by the Lord’s pouring out his spirit, like water, and dews, and showers, upon the mown grass. Several of the Prophets were directed to speak of the Holy Ghost coming upon his people in this manner. Isa 44:3-4 ; Joe 2:28 . And Zechariah, as if in confirmation of what Ezekiel had before said, declared that living waters should go out from Jerusalem. Zec 14:8 . And the beloved Apostle John, as if in clearer terms to give a comment upon this vision of Ezekiel, speaks of a river, and water of like, proceeding out of the throne of God and the Lamb. Rev 22:1 . I stay not to remark many beauties in allusion to the day of gospel grace, which this scripture abounds with; but certain it is, that the manner of expression which Ezekiel hath made use of, becomes truly significant. The Prophet did not see from whence these waters arose; the spring was hidden; so are our lives hid with Christ in God. Col 3:3 . John explains the source, when he saith, from the throne of God and the Lamb: meaning from all the Persons of the Godhead; in, and through the Lamb. For God the Father is a fountain. Jer 2:13 . God the Son, is a fountain. Son 4:15 . God the Spirit, is a fountain. Joh 7:37-39 . And all pour their rich mercies like a river, through the mediation of the God-man Christ Jesus. Joh 14:6 . And is there not a great beauty also, in the thought suggested by the door of the house, and the right side? Jesus calls himself by the name of the door to his sheepfold. Joh 10:9 . And we know whose side it was that was pierced, when forthwith came there out blood and water. Joh 19:34 . And as all these things were seen by the Prophet, in his vision concerning Jerusalem, from whence the waters issued: so Jesus first sent forth his Gospel, after his redemption work was finished, from that beloved city. Luk 24:47 . Concerning the swelling of those waters; they form a most beautiful type or figure, of the glorious spreading of the Gospel. Jesus’s cause must increase, must run and be glorified, and be a blessing through the earth. Such will be the latter day glory. Psa 72:8-17 . Some have thought that the Prophet’s path, as marked in these waters, first reaching to the ankles, then to the knees, then to the loins, and afterwards to an ocean, to swim in; is meant to show the progress of grace, and our knowledge in the divine life.

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Eze 47:5

I tell you, sirs, you must not trust your own apprehensions nor judgments of the mercy of God; you do not know how He can cause it to abound: that which seems to be short and shrunk up to you, He can draw out and cause to abound exceedingly…. This therefore is a wonderful thing, and shall be wondered at to all eternity, that the river of mercy, that at first did seem to be but ancle-deep, should so rise and rise that at last it became ‘waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed over’.

Bunyan.

References. XLVII. 5. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xviii. No. 1054. XLVII. 6, 12. H. Scott Holland, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lxxi. 1907, p. 337; see also Church Times, vol. lvii. 1907, p. 655. XLVII. 8. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxxi. No. 1852.

Eze 47:9

In his famous Glasgow speech on Reform in 1866, John Bright closed by applying this passage, or reminiscences of it, to the great cause for which he pled. ‘We believe in a Supreme Ruler of the Universe. We believe in His omnipotence; we believe and we humbly trust in His mercy. We know that the strongest argument which is used against that belief by those who reject it, is an argument drawn from the misery and the helplessness and the darkness of so many of our race, even in countries which call themselves civilized and Christian. Is not that the fact? If I believed that this misery and this helplessness and this darkness could not be touched or transformed, I myself should be driven to admit the almost overwhelming force of that argument; but I am convinced that just laws and an enlightened administration of them would change the face of the country. I believe that ignorance and suffering might be lessened to an incalculable extent, and that many an Eden, beauteous in flowers and rich in fruit, might be raised up in the waste wilderness which spreads before us…. That is our faith, that is our purpose, that is our cry let us try the nation.’

Eze 47:9

Who is it that can live by grace? even none but those whose temper and constitution is suited to grace. Hence, as the grace of God is compared to a river, so those that live by grace are compared to fish; for that, as water is that element in which the fish liveth, so grace is that which is the life of the saint Art thou a fish, man? Art thou a fish? Canst thou live in the water? Canst thou live always, and nowhere else but in the water? Is grace thy proper element.

Bunyan.

Reference. XLVII. 9. C. H. Parkhurst, A Little Lower than the Angels, p. 25.

Eze 47:12

We have been severely enough taught (if we were willing to learn) that our civilization, considered as a splendid material fabric, is helplessly in peril without the spiritual police of sentiments or ideal feelings. And it is this invisible police, which we had need, as a community, strive to maintain in efficient force.

George Eliot, Essays of Theophrastus Such.

There is not a secular reform in the whole development of modern civilization which (if it is more than mechanical) has not drawn its inspiration from a religious principle. Infirmaries for the body have sprung out of pity to the soul; schools for the latter that free way may be opened to the spirit; sanitary laws, that the Diviner elements of human nature may not become incredible and hopeless from their foul environment Nay what impulse would even science itself have had, if sustained only by the material utilities? what inspiring zeal, but for that secret wonder which feels the universe to be sacred, and is a virtual thirst for God?

Martineau.

Eze 47:12

Part of the poetical works of Young, those of Watts, and of Cowper, have placed them among the permanent benefactors of mankind; as owing to them there is a popular poetry which has imparted, and is destined to impart, the best sentiments to innumerable minds. Works of great poetical genius that should be thus faithful to true religion, might be regarded as trees by the side of that ‘river of the water of life,’ having in their fruit and foliage a virtue to contribute to ‘the healing of the nations’.

John Foster, On the Aversion of Men of Taste to Evangelical Religion, chap. Ix.

Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson

Curious Things In Life

Eze 47

This chapter is a chapter of measurement. Everything is meted out, as it were, by so many cubits and inches. So we read, “he measured,” “again he measured,” and “again he measured,” and in the fifth verse, “afterward he measured.” It was a man who represented God. Thus the Lord shows us how everything is measured out. There is so much, and there is no more. You may measure it over and over again, sometimes with suspicion and unbelief, but it all comes to the same total. Everything is staked out, marked down, appointed. The voice is very dogmatic: “This is the north side” ( Eze 47:17 ); “This is the east side” ( Eze 47:18 ); “This is the south side” ( Eze 47:19 ); “This is the west side” ( Eze 47:20 ). “So shall ye divide.” Everything is done for us in grand totals. Within the main boundaries we do a great deal of detail, and so foolish are we and so easily imposed upon that sometimes we think we fix the main boundaries themselves. If we could but know that everything birth, death, riches, poverty is marked out, and that we live within positive bounds, we might make a great deal more of our strength, and we might spend to greater advantage the solicitudes which are now wasted upon impossibilities. Am I a whale, that thou hast set a watch over me? Am I a sea, that thou hast written round about my foaming billows, Hitherto, but no further? We see this illustrated every day, and yet every day we doubt it or deny it, and the day following we go out as if we had learned nothing. We have added some lamps to the thoroughfares, but we have not extended the horizon one ten thousandth part of an inch in all the ages of human history. No, we are committed to detailed work, comparatively small interior work, but with the four points and the great outline of history we have simply nothing to do. God is the Measurer, and all things are meted out. What, then, is the suggestion of wisdom? Surely it is, Lord, teach me where I am bounded, and how I am limited, and help me with patience and eager expectancy to do my little day’s work with all industriousness and heart-loyalty, knowing that that servant shall be blessed who shall be found working steadily at his humble lot whenever his Lord cometh. By following out this doctrine of measurement we shall get rid of a great deal of fret and worry and excitement, and we shall be able to welcome weird-looking guests into the house, and say, For God’s sake you are welcome, though we do not know you, and we do not like you at first; the Lord sent you this way; and presently that weird face will become beauteous as the face of a child-angel.

How curious is life, and from certain points how utterly unmanageable I From other points of view, how beauteous is life, how well-proportioned, and how easily handled if we would only keep our own hands off it, and let God do what he will! Look at your own industry and endeavour in the market-place, and in all the pursuits of business. What a curious law it is that in order to do a few things we must do many. In order to get six people to read what you have written you must probably address six thousand persons. If you knew beforehand the six who would read you would send direct intimation to them; and there would be an end of your trouble and expense; but you do not know them, and so to get at the six you must address the six thousand. There must be some moral and educational intent in all this; we must be illustrating some great doctrine or policy of Heaven. It is God’s own way; even the Lord, if we may say so reverently, is put to this selfsame trouble. He preaches the gospel to the whole world, and probably only one man replies. Here are mysteries we cannot solve; we can touch them at their remotest points, but on their innermost meaning we cannot dwell with ease, for we cannot comprehend the unspeakable and illimitable significance This one thing we know, that all tends in an educational direction. The things you do without any positive or profitable result are really profitable to you in another way. Your disappointments are your educators, as well as your satisfactions. You are taught patience, your ambition is limited if not rebuked; you say again and again, We must do a thousand things by way of endeavour in order to accomplish half a dozen things by way of positive and literal success. It is better that man is not omniscient; he would soon lose his omniscience, he would become proud of it. We cannot have one divine attribute only; we must have such a combination and interrelation of attributes as shall keep a balance, so that no man shall be top heavy, no man shall be overborne with one attribute that puts all his other attributes and features to shame. In unity is rest, in harmony is real progress. So we must be balanced on this side and on that; the thousand must be measured out. If there be a thousand and one, and a thousand, there will be loss of equipoise, and all such loss means unsteadiness, uncertainty, dissatisfaction. What money you could have saved if you had known how to go immediately and directly to the persons who wanted you! But you had to go up and down the world soliciting, trying, asking, appealing, wondering, and after many a snub and many a sneer and many a contempt meant to be cruel you did here and there light upon one who said, We have been waiting for you, we give you welcome. Why were you sent to all the inhospitable doors? To be taught, to be humbled, to be refined by chastening.

What a curious thing it is that though we know that only one can find the prize yet we all go out to seek for it! We are accustomed to the illustration of a treasure being lost in the darkness and on the broad thoroughfare. A thousand men get to know that a purse has been lost. It was only a purse, only one individual could find it and take it, and yet all the thousand are looking round and groping about for it. Do you not know that only one person can get that? You know it, but something says to you, Perhaps you are the one person. Could we just have that amount of faith in the Christian Church we should have a revival of godliness. Here is salvation; let us suppose that only one man can get it: who knows who that one man is? “Strive to enter in at the strait gate.” Even suppose we knew that only one man in all the congregation could realise the Saviour’s presence, and all the advantages of the Saviour’s Cross, so long as we did not know who that one man was, should we not arise and strive mightily and cry loudly? Then who knows how human passion, the excited, ennobled pathos of the soul, might even move God himself to some unheard-of benevolence?

What is the meaning of all this? Even such apparently trifling circumstances as the possible finding of lost treasure should teach us some religious lesson. What if the Lord should say at last, when we say, “Master, we understood that many were called, but few were chosen; we understood that a certain number of persons were elect, and that the number could not be increased,” what if he should say to us, “How do you know that you were excluded? and if you did not know that you were excluded, why did you not search and strive and try mightily? You were the man I saw seeking for the lost purse: thou wicked and slothful servant, out of thine own mouth I condemn thee.” We had better seek and strive and work and pray vehemently and wait patiently, for, who can tell, it may be the meanest of us that is elected to some princedom in heaven. Never was earnestness disappointed, never did earnestness find the door shut. The earnest, the vehement in heart take the kingdom of heaven by force. God is willing, so to say, to be stormed by a besieging heart. It may be you might succeed; you cannot be sure that you are excluded even if we admit the doctrine of election in its most literal and even cruel form; unless you have a writing from heaven signed by God, who says, “You are excluded from my love,” you ought to try: and no man tries in vain who tries with his whole heart.

A still more extraordinary thing is this, and curious in its way, that although we know we may at any moment die our plans are laid as if we were going to live for ever. That, I repeat, is a circumstance so extraordinary as to be charged with religious suggestiveness. Ask any man how long he will live, and he will tell you he does not know. Ask him if he may this very day die, and he will say, Certainly, this very day I may cease to live upon the earth. Now examine his plans his plans of business, his plans of home, his plans of education and you will not find one of them limited to the day. And the most curious part of it is that the man cannot help it. He could not be bound by the sunrising and the sunsetting. He will tell you plaintively that he may never live to see the sunset, yet his whole life is set in plans that shall endure for years and ages. Why build this fine house? You may never live to see the roof put on. The man cannot help building it; that is not in his disposal. He was told to build it, and build it he must. If he had been told in plain terms, he might have resented the commandment, but there are many ways of telling men what to do without speaking the commandment in so many cold and measurable words: there is a pressure that is not speech. Can we for a moment imagine that there is nothing religiously suggestive in this action? Do we not contradict our own atheism and our own theories of annihilation by it? On paper we write ourselves down as annihilationists; we die like dogs, and there is an end of us. We do not live like dogs how strange that in the hour and article of death our whole nature should be transformed, and that we who were men planning for immortality are content to go into the kennel and sigh out our last breath and be lost! It cannot be. There is something within the heart that says, No, this is not right; there may be mystery about it, and there may be perversion about it, but we are not the creatures of a day: so far as the body is concerned, we may go any moment, and yet even the body says, Work for tomorrow; build for posterity; write for the unborn ages; breathe out your poetry; if it be not understood now there shall come up a generation by-and-by that shall say no such singer ever charmed its imagination or delighted its heart. Yet we say posterity has done nothing for us. Why, it is posterity that inspires us.

We are not so much indebted to our ancestors as we are to the unborn ages. We feel they are coming, we are their housekeeper, we are preparing for them; we are saying, not in words, but in actions, The unborn must be prepared for they must not come like starvelings into the world, we must get ready for them; we must get the library, and the fire, and all the house appointments duly arranged to receive the oncoming ages. Yet there are fools that tell us that they will do nothing for posterity because posterity has done nothing for them a blank, palpable, absurd fallacy. The present is drawn upon by the future. I have no doubt about the immortality of man. Man now is immortal every day he lives; that is to say, he is immortal by some sign of his thought or action or plan or purpose. He never says, To-night at six o’clock I may be a dead man, therefore I will draw my lines accordingly. He says, To-night at six o’clock I may be a dead man, but the world will not be dead; the individual may go, but the race will remain; man dies, but humanity abides; and my last act, if it be my last act, upon earth, shall be an act of generous contribution to the progress of the total world. Do not stifle these voices. You need not give them any theological accent of any narrow or sectarian kind, yet you should not neglect their broadest moral suggestions. Instead of trying to make things less you should endeavour to make things greater; and in this spirit you will find that everything in life suggests the larger life. For that larger life, O my soul, prepare thyself. Such preparation comes by industry of every kind. In all labour there is profit. Even in the things you have done without result you have found some advantage to the soul if you have laboured faithfully. And as for that larger life, we know not what it is, it is enough to know meantime that it is larger. God is always enlarging and ennobling the outlook of man.

We might also notice as a curious thing in all this measurement, that when we have done our best there comes a point when we must simply leave results. We cannot follow our own labour beyond a certain point. The agriculturist has done what he can in the field; now, he says, I must wait. Can you not be more active in the field? No. Why do you not go into this ploughed and sown field every day and do something to show your activity? He says, I cannot, I must wait, I cannot hasten the sun or the processes of nature. So with the training of your children; all you can do is to show them a noble example. You can be chivalrous in the midst of your family, you can give them the best education in your power, you can encourage all that is good and beautiful in their nature, and then you must wait. You may have heartache, heartbreak, sorrow upon sorrow, tears may be your meat night and day, whilst you are continually mocked by the very presences that ought to have been your bodyguard and your loyalest allies and helpers in life; but having done a certain amount of work you simply now must wait, leave it, read the writing, Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further. And so with business. You can apparently be driving your business with tremendous energy which ends in nothing. Really a quiet industry may often do more than a vehement impotence. You can be industrious, faithful, honourable, generous, and having done all you can, not as an atheist, but as a believer in God, you must say, Now, Lord, the harvest is in thine hands: I have done what I can in my poor little field; thou knowest that I have spared no energy and no thought: now let the harvest be as thou wilt; if I come back in the autumn and find this field sterile, the day of harvest a day of sorrow, help me to say, Thy will be done: I will leave it all now; I have tried to be a faithful and honest servant; and then if the harvest be golden, abundant, and far beyond the resources of our accommodation, to God’s name be the praise; he always surprises us by the infinity, the boundlessness of his gifts. If tor a moment he disappoint us, and we say, “There is nothing,” he comes and says, “For a small moment I have forsaken thee; I put all the field back that thou mightest learn how to pray some deeper, tenderer prayer; thou hast done it well, poor chastised soul: now with everlasting mercies will I gather thee.” The disappointments are momentary, they act as foils to the eternal radiance of love.

There must be a point of trust in our life. We find it in business, we find it in investment, we find it in friendship. There comes a point when all we can do is to confide: and if we be disappointed in consequence of treachery, remember it is better to be wronged than to wrong; it is better to be betrayed than to be the betrayer. You act the gentleman, let others do what they may; you act the Christian, and let us in the sum-total of things find out who was right and who was wrong. Then consider that life is a plan. It is not a cloud; it could be more perfectly illustrated by geometry than by cloud and mist or vapour. It has its four points, its main boundaries, its architectural shape; its elevation imposing, and all its appointments detailed with scrupulous care towards the education and spiritual comfort of the inhabitant, Work on that plan, and all will be right. Ask for the plan every morning; go into the little office, and have a look at the paper. Here is the great skeleton-building with all its anatomy of scaffolding and planking: what is that little house or wooden shed outside? That is where the plan is kept. Why do men go in there now and then? To look at the plan. Can they not carry the plan in their heads? Not well. Can they not make the plan as they go on? No. Architecture is not conjecture. It is settled, designed; every little part mapped out, and put down and set to scale. And art thou, poor fool, building a life-house without a plan? The only man who has ever grasped life in all its bearings and relationships and issues is the Son of God.

You can hew away at this old book called the Bible as much as you please, you cannot get away from this living and all-dominating fact, that no man known to history has so laid hold of life in all its depth and length and breadth and height, in all its pain, tragedy, agony, destiny, in all its discipline, education, and culture, with such grasp, such clearness, and such wisdom as it has been realised and provided for by the Christ of God. There are other religions, and many of them fine, fantastic speculation, beautiful, cloudy, rainbow-like dreaming; but for culture of the soul, for discipline of the will, for stirring the whole nature into benevolent impulse towards other men, Christianity stands alone. To that Christ I ask my fellow-men; to that Christ I would go every day and say, Lord Jesus, what is the next thing to be done? and tell me how to do it, and never leave me one moment to myself: measure out the thousand cubits; tell me which is the north side, the south side, the west side, the east side; and if it comes to a great fight, show me how to stand, how to move, how to stretch: Lord, be with me all the time, till “the hurly-burly’s done,” till “the battle’s fought and won.” Given a young man who goes out to make his own fortune and his own destiny, and you have an image of folly: given a young soul who says, As everything else is meted out, measured, adjusted, and balanced, mayhap my poor little life is treated in the same way; I will go to the divine Measurer, and he will tell me within what lines to work, where to stop and how to live and in that young soul you have an image of Wisdom.

The Life-giving River

Eze 47:9

The river would have been of small consequence to us but for this declaration. Ezekiel is not describing poetically a river which he saw in vision or in dream. The poet may deal only in words, but the poet-prophet deals in realities. The river means something; it means beauty and fruitfulness and issues a thousandfold. The whole story of the river is told in these words “Every thing shall live whither the river cometh.” In the earlier part of the verse we have the same thought “It shall come to pass, that every thing that liveth, which moveth, whithersoever the rivers shall come, shall live.” We do not need to spiritualise this river, for it spiritualises itself. The river is Christian life, Christian revelation. It is the revelation of Christ; it is the dispensation of the Spirit; it is the outflow from heaven of all blessing and truth and goodness. No other interpretation would fit the occasion; small poetical annotations would not rise to the dignity of the central thought. Here is a divine outflow, making for itself a channel everywhere, and wherever the channel is the banks are full of green trees, and the trees are fruit trees, and the leaves are medicinal, and the whole vision is a glimpse of heaven. We might profitably commit the first twelve verses of this chapter to memory. Teach your children such recitations. They will outlive the comic song, the foolish and impossible romance, the pile of words that ends in evaporation. Fill the memory of your child with such words as these, and they will come up in old age a rich and imperishable inheritance.

Ponder the words. “Afterward he brought me again unto the door of the house.” The heathen have a proverb that we might as Christians well copy. The heathen proverb says, “Follow the gods wherever they lead.” Have we exceeded that thought? Is not heathenism a rebuke to us in this matter? Have all the great thoughts of the human mind not been anticipated? Is not antiquity the really modern thought and modern literature? It is like going back, not to ten miles farther down the stream that would be nothing; it is like going back to the well-head. You like to go back to the spring, the fountain, and the origin of the uncommon water. Who has not, who has entered upon the danger and enterprise of exploration at all, desired to find the sources of the Nile? No man has been content to go twenty miles down the river and say he has come to that point and means to stand there. Twenty miles is nothing, fifty miles is a mockery; that is not going back to antiquity. You must find the source, the fountain, or you have found nothing, and all your journeying is a fool’s enterprise. Who is this anonymous “he” who is always bringing men to new visions, and undreamed-of rivers, and revelations that glow and shine like summer skies? Who is that other person? Has he no name? Did he not sign on our roll of signatures? We cannot get rid of him; he finishes the experiment, or he begins it, or he interrupts it in the middle. There is a ghostly quantity or force always having its own way. We cannot explain it. Why did you pray so long? You cannot tell. Why did your thoughts fix themselves in one tremendous centralisation upon a point? We cannot tell; tomorrow we shall know. There is a Ghost in the world. You may vote out God, and you may vote out all the theological terms, and come down to the plain vulgar word ghost; but there it is. When you come to the full comprehension thereof you will return to the old words and say they are best God, Father, Sovereignty, Providence. Some men have to go a long way round to get at their theology, but if they are honest men they will come to it at the last, and we shall find that antiquity is the present day, and the present day is a poor experiment that may end in nothing.

What saw the prophet? “waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward.” Who knows what water is? Yet how we reject it! The universe could not live a day without water. It could live a little whilst the water was sinking down, but when the water really went out of it the universe itself would collapse. Christ is water; Christ is commonplace; Christ flows and trickles; Christ is not a measured wine, he is an unmeasured and immeasurable river, now a torrent, now a stream of silver, now a river that a lamb might gambol in, so shallow; and now a river so deep that navies might rock themselves in its abundance of water. There was a man who had a line in his hand, and he went forth eastward to measure a thousand cubits. Who is this man who is always measuring the world? He cannot lay that line down. Is the world growing, shrinking? Why this eternal measurement? Plato said, God is always measuring the world. We find these waters in Joel and in Zechariah and in the Apocalypse, and we find this measuring man everywhere. The earth is mapped in heaven. Heaven’s map will be the final geography. We may meet in military committees for the purpose of redistributing geographical areas, but the map of the old sinning earth is kept in the archives of heaven. One day, we shall see, the desert shall be marked out as gardenland, and stony places shall glow with flowers. What a marvellous river was this! The man “measures a thousand cubits,” and “the waters were to the ankles” hardly more than a pool: yonder a little bird was sitting at the brink, farther on a lamb was lapping its daily portion, a little farther on and green grass was waving above the little stream. It was a beauteous lake, hardly more than a mirror, laughing at the blue heavens, and doubling them. And then there was a second measure, another thousand cubits, and “the waters were to the knees”; another thousand, and “the waters were to the loins”; another thousand, and there “was a river,” a river “to swim in.” The waters never broke, they increased; at last they demanded a sea. The river must find the sea, or make one. All this motion means a grand finale. This increase means ultimate benediction. This is the way of the gospel in the world: first very little, then more, then still more, and then the mightiest and grandest of all objects. O Saviour of the world, what is thy kingdom like? It is like a grain of mustard-seed. So small? Yes, so small in itself, but when it is grown it is a cathedral for birds to sing in. Oh tell us more, thou gentle One! to what is the kingdom of heaven like? It is like unto leaven which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal until the whole was leavened. We think that God should reveal himself in some tremendous exposure or declaration. God will not work after this manner; the path of the just is as the shining light which shineth more and more unto the perfect day. The year has its springtime; life has its infancy; the river reaches to the ankles at first, but at the last it cannot be passed over. Here is the law of progress, beneficent, continuous, and consummating increase.

Then said the anonymous one, “Son of man,” literally, Adam, “hast thou seen this?” then be wise: in the little see the great; in the seed see the harvest; in hints see consummations. This is the very gift of God, the intellectual miracle, the spiritual coronation of man, namely, that he shall see in beginnings the meanings of endings, that he shall see in the first chapter and the first verse of Genesis the meaning of the Apocalypse. That is the difference between the literalist and the prophet. The literalist gets no further on; the prophet is at the end when he is beginning. His soul burns with heaven.

Beautiful is this imagery, but not so beautiful as the reality. Sometimes history has to lag after symbolism. In the case of Christian missions or the propagation of the truths of the Cross, history shakes off the brightest symbolism as being inadequate to express the glorious realities. We are to judge of the river, fairly, clearly, by the life which it brings. The Lord is always willing to submit himself to practical tests. If Christ cannot give life, disbelieve him. Do not talk about his beautiful expression, his tender poetic strain, his gracious voice, his manifold appearances; but put the testing, crucial question, What does it total up to? and if the answer be other than life, let him be crucified; he is the prince of mocking poetasters, he is not the Son of God. Even when Christianity is willing to be judged in this way it by so much establishes a great claim upon the confidence of man. Christianity does not say, Examine my metaphysics, consider me as a philosophy, compare me as an effort in thinking with all the other religions in creation: Christianity says, Judge me by my fruit, see what I do, and if I do not make the dead live, then I am going forth on false pretences. Is it true that wherever Christianity has gone the spiritual idea, the true conception of God, the right view of the Cross of Christ is it true that wherever this has gone life has gone? We hold it to be true upon every ground, and we undertake to prove its truth not by tropes but by figures statistical and by facts human, palpable, and accessible. He would not enter upon any very perilous experiment who undertook to prove that the Christian idea by that involving the whole work and function of Christ has done more for the commerce of the world than any other force. Christianity has turned over more money than any other thought of man. Christianity has kept more workpeople, paid more wages, patronised more art, than any other religion, or any other conception of the human mind. The highest artists could not have lived without the religious genius and the religious fact. This is true in sculpture, in oil, in music, in architecture, in literature, in poetry. Take out of the world all the cathedrals, all the churches, chapels, religious houses; take away all the monuments that Christianity has erected; take away all the pictures that represent religious or Christian subjects; burn all the oratorios and all the music that derives its sublimity from Christian inspiration; take away all the books that have been printed, all the engravings that have been published, representing Christian thought and Christian history; go into the nursery and into the drawing-room and into the studio, and take out of them everything that the Christian thought has done, and then, viewed commercially, you have inflicted the greatest possible loss upon the civilised world. “Every thing shall live whither the river cometh”: plenty of business, plenty of work, clearing forests, building cities, exchanging merchandise; the seas alive with vessels, and the desert encroached upon for more city-room.

This religion of Christ is a great business thought. It is the principal factor in civilisation of an active kind. There has been civilisation without it, there is civilisation today that ignores Christianity; but what a languid civilisation, what a self-enjoying and self-destroying civilisation! How wanting in pathos, in pity, in care for others; how exclusive, how selfish, how little! We do not call that civilisation from the point of view of the Cross. When Christianity uses the term civilisation it means to use it in its deepest and most inclusive senses. So judged, Christianity keeps the widest market-place in the world, circulates most money, keeps the world alive. Not the less truly so that some who carry on the merchandise of the world do not know under what inspiration they are working. Who cares for atmosphere? Who cares to go into subtle questions about spiritual relationships, spiritual movements for operating upon the mind and heart? Who knows the mystery of dreams that have ended in temples and in civilisation? Yet there must be a sanctuary in which all these things are adjusted, regulated, and directed to certain positive issues.

Or, leaving the commercial thought altogether and looking at moral progress, only those who have not studied the history of missions can be wanting in sensitiveness on this point. If men would read the Acts of the Apostles published yesterday they would see that the Acts of the Apostles in the New Testament is being continued in many a glowing supplement. How many people have heard, from a missionary point of view, of New Guinea? It was a heathen country, given over to all manner of debasement and corruption and foulness and cruelty. To-day it blossoms as the rose. Why? Because the gospel has been instituted there, preached there, received there; and men who once would have devoured you are now inquiring about the very highest possibilities of thought and destiny. In the name of justice, find the cause of this transformation, and acknowledge it. Did a band of purely scientific persons go over there and colonise? Not they. Was New Guinea transformed by a little brigade of botanists? Never. Who went first? The man who always goes first the Christian. Then crowds follow, and the crowds that follow are apt to think they made the highway on which they travel. Not a stone of it did they lay. Have you heard of Madagascar and the islands of the Pacific of any missionary field at all? The missionary has gone and found it given over to all manner of evil, all manner of cruelty, and he has left it a comparative paradise. The question ought to be asked, What did it? and the answer is, The river came, the river brought life with it. It may seem to be a simple thing to say, but it contains a whole philosophy of civilisation, that the river does not come to the city, the city comes to the river. What a gracious thing it was for the Thames to come to London! The Thames never did come to London; the Thames made London. We as a city are built on the Thames. Rome stands on the Tiber. How kind of Rome to receive the Tiber! How very condescending of London to make way for the Thames to roll through almost her very centre! The river did not come. Where water is men go. Build a magnificent palace, anywhere, and then find out at the end there is no water in the neighbourhood: now you may sell your palace to any fool who will buy it. What is wanting? The river. Has a river anything to do with building? Everything. No water, no life; no river, no home. Yet how many persons act as if they thought London had brought the river, and act as if they thought that they were the creditors of religion, and not debtors to it! The truth is, men do not go back to facts; they do not force themselves back to first principles and starting-points; they accept civilisation as it is without tracing it to its fount and origin. Has the river brought life to your house? Wherever it has come it has brought life, has tamed ferocious nature, has made the feeble strong, has made the sick at heart hopeful and glad. Has the river come into your soul? If so, you are a new man. You live now; your thought is quicker, more sensitive, larger, tenderer; now you think about other people, and when you put on all your wrappages you wonder if you could not find room for poor shivering poverty under one corner of your gaiety; when you make a feast you are, at all events, now disposed to give the leavings to the poor: by-and-by you will reverse the arrangement and let the poor sit down first. “Every thing shall live whither the river cometh” honesty and beauty, and all holy purpose, and all generous thought and effort; everything shall live: the domestic animals on your hearthstone, your horse in the stable, your man in the loft. When you are converted the poorest beggar that knocks at your door will know it.

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

XIX

THE FINAL CONDITION OF THE REDEEMED

Ezekiel 40-48

The date of this prophecy as given in Eze 40:1 is about 572 B.C., thirteen years after his last prophecy before this one and fourteen years after the fall of the city of Jerusalem. Thus, there is an interval of thirteen years between the last writing of Ezekiel before this and this one.

As to what Ezekiel was doing during the thirteen years between his last prophecy and this one, we have no record whatever. Perhaps after he had prophesied the restoration of Israel and the glorious messianic age as found in Ezekiel 36-37, Ezekiel was thinking and pondering in his mind over the messianic kingdom. He was thinking of what it would be like, what would be its constitution, what would be its temple, what would be its temple service, what would be the relation between the king and the priesthood and what would be the condition of the people.

After those long years of thinking and pondering in his own mind, at last the vision broke upon him. A great many visions have come to God’s prophets and God’s servants along the line that they had been thinking and meditating. Thus the vision broke upon Ezekiel, and he saw in this vision the final condition of the restored and redeemed people of Israel. He does not picture any method of salvation in these chapters because he conceives of the people as enjoying salvation; they are in a condition of salvation, saved forever. It is the kingdom of God that he has in mind, the kingdom of God set up on earth with its center in Jerusalem and existing in all its glory, blessedness, and beauty. We call it the millennium, for to Ezekiel it was the millennial period of the world’s history.

This picture is cast in the Jewish mold. The best place to the Jew on this earth was in Palestine, his own land. There was death and burial and all the various incidents of life in this blessed age. There were families, there was a city of a certain size, a tabernacle of a certain size, and buildings, and chambers; there was a priesthood, there were sacrifices, there was to be a Prince of the line of David, the messianic Prince. All these things were to comprise the glorious messianic age, was all cast in the Jewish mold, and not to be taken as literal.

Now, in these chapters Ezekiel gives the religious side of the kingdom of Israel. He deals very little with anything but the religious phase. He touches on the geographical side of the country, a little on the civil side of affairs, but puts the emphasis almost entirely upon the religious and ecclesiastical. To Ezekiel religion was the foundation of a nation, for the foundations of national existence and the great informing principles in all national life from the beginning of history to the present time, have been the religious conceptions of the people.

Ezekiel, in vision, was brought by the hand of God into the land of Israel, and set down upon a very high mountain, whereon was, as it were, the frame of a city. Placed upon this high mountain Ezekiel opens his eyes in vision and sees a man, who appears to him as a man of brass. This is an angelic and supernatural being. He has a line of flax in his hand, also a measuring reed, and stands at the gate of this great structure.

Eze 40:1-4 gives the introductory remarks of Ezekiel showing how this vision occurred. He was standing facing the west and also facing the east gate of the great sanctuary. Before him lay an enclosure, a tabernacle, 500 cubits square, measuring probably 800 feet or about 250 yards square. This enclosure was surrounded by a wall six cubits high and six cubits broad, or thick. Right before him was a gate, the east gate, approached by seven steps. The gate itself was really a large building, twenty-five cubits broad altogether and fifty cubits long, reaching into the court of the temple. Inside that gate was the outer court. That outer court was 150 cubits from the outer wall to the inner wall, and one hundred cubits from the inside entrance of the gate to the next gate on the inner wall. This outer court ran around three sides of the enclosure and on these three sides were the pavements and chambers round about on the walls.

He then approached the inner court and that had a gate facing east just the same size as the gate on the outer court, approached by eight steps showing the gradations up into the holy place. Right in front of the gate which was the same size as the other gate, was a square place of 100 cubits and in the center of that was the altar for the burnt offerings. Right behind the gate approached by ten steps was the temple building itself. There was the porch, there the holy place behind it, and the most holy place behind that, and chambers around on three sides. There was a space of five cubits on either side of this temple building and chambers twenty cubits wide on the outside of that space. The raised pavement on which the temple stood was exactly 100 cubits square and reached back to the wall that surrounded the inner court. To the north of the outer court was a gate exactly the same as that of the east gate; to the south, a gate exactly the same as the one Ezekiel entered; on the west there was no gate at all. To the inner court there was a gate to the north and a gate to the south, exactly like the one to the east which Ezekiel entered.

A more detailed description of the temple with its parts is found in Eze 40:5-16 . There he describes the outer gate by which he approaches, ascending seven steps. The outer gate has a threshold, and the entrance into the outer court has on either side three lodges or guard chambers, intended for sentinels who abode there and watched the multitudes that thronged the gates into the temple courts. This entire gate was twenty-five cubits wide by fifty cubits long, reaching fifty cubits into the outer court minus the breadth of the wall.

In Eze 40:17-19 he describes the outer court just inside that gate. That outer court is altogether 150 cubits wide minus the wall and reaches around three sides. It is covered with a pavement and around on these three sides next the wall are chambers, large rooms. What these were for he does not tell us; doubtless they were intended for service in connection with the temple worship.

In Eze 40:20-23 we have described the north gate which is exactly the same as the one on the east which he entered. In Eze 40:24-27 he describes the south gate which is exactly the same as the east and the north gate.

In Eze 40:28-37 he describes the inner court. He enters the gate of the inner court by an approach of eight steps, passes through that fifty cubits deep into the inner court. There is & south gate and a north gate exactly the same, all facing the great altar in the center of the court 100 cubits square in the temple area itself.

In Eze 40:38-43 he describes the tables that are on either side of the north gate that enters into the inner court. Outside in the outer court are four tables for killing the sacrifices and washing them; inside are four tables for the sacrifices, and there are other large stone tables upon which they would lay the instruments for slaying their sacrifices. It was the law of Leviticus that the sacrifices were to be slain north of the altar, so all these tables and instruments are at the north gate which approaches the inner court north of the great altar.

Now in the inner court we have on either side of that court which is about 250 cubits square counting the thickness of the walls on the north side and on the south side, large chambers. These chambers were for the use of the priests in their ministrations. Those on the north were for the use of those who helped the priests in their services; the south for the sons of Zadok who were the leaders among the priests. In Eze 40:38-49 , he approaches the temple itself and the porch facing the temple building; ten steps brings him up on to the raised platform which is exactly 100 cubits square and which contains all the great temple buildings.

In Eze 41:1-14 , he describes the porch, gives the measurements, then the dimensions of the tabernacle which is forty cubits long and twenty cubits wide; then the holy of holies which is exactly twenty cubits square. Ezekiel does not go into the holy of holies; only the messenger goes in and brings out the measurements and tells them to Ezekiel. The walls are six cubits thick; then there are little chambers on either side, and there are walls five cubits thick beyond them. The lower chambers are four Cubits wide, the next, five; the next, six, just the same as those of Solomon’s Temple. All around on either side of that Temple with its chambers, which was nearly forty cubits wide altogether, was an open space of five cubits, and outside of that, again on this pavement of ten cubits, along the two sides were buildings used as chambers for the priests.

In Eze 41:15-26 he describes the inside of the temple proper. It is made of wood, beautifully carved wood, cherubim carved as was Solomon’s Temple; palm trees carved and engraved upon the wood also, and only one altar, no table of shewbread, no golden candlestick, no ark of the covenant, no laws written on tables of stone; they were written on the tables of the heart now and there is no need for an ark of the covenant or for these other things, only an altar representing the prayers and worship of the people. There are doors into the holy place and folding doors into the most holy place. We do not read that Solomon made any doors between those apartments.

Now in Eze 42:1-14 , the other buildings that are inside this inner court are described. This inner court, as we have said, is about 250 cubits square; 100 cubits are taken up by the altar, 100 for the temple buildings and chambers, then there are fifty cubits on either side along the north and south sides. Now these are described in the section we have just mentioned. They are chambers, and one row is three stories high, extending along 100 cubits on the north side of the temple buildings, and south side also a row 100 cubits long. These are for the priests, in which they store their garments, and in which they dress that they may appear before the people in the outer court and perform the services in the inner court.

In Eze 42:15-20 , we have the measurements of the outer wall and the whole area of the buildings. Here he gives the general measurements. Now note that he says 500 reeds. A reed is six cubits. Thus he gives the general measurements such as I have described. Thus far he has been describing the temple and we readily see it is impossible to give all the details.

In Eze 43:1-12 we enter upon a new theme: the vision of the entrance of Jehovah into this house, this temple, to abide forever. Notice that Ezekiel says in the latter part of verse Eze 43:3 : “The visions were like the vision that I saw by the river Chebar.” The same magnificent picture of the four cherubim appears here now right at the gate of the temple and Jehovah thus enters into the temple by the east gate, there to abide forever. Note what he says to Ezekiel as he enters, verses Eze 43:6-7 : “And I heard one speaking unto me out of the house; and a man stood by me. And he said unto me, Son of man, this is the place of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet, where I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel forever. And my holy name shall the house of Israel no more defile.” Thus he goes on to describe the new and blessed condition of Israel and how they are purified from all their sins. Then in Eze 43:10-12 Ezekiel shows to the people this vision of the great temple that they are to have, and he says that they shall be ashamed of their iniquities when they see and learn the pattern. It is a perfect temple, perfect equipment, divinely measured and symbolizes the relation of Jehovah to his people.

Now in Eze 43:13-17 he describes the altar of burnt offerings in the center of that 100 cubits square in the court. Bight in front of the east, north, and south gates: that altar has a base eighteen cubits square and one cubit thick, resting upon the solid earth; then another place above that sixteen cubits square, and another one fourteen cubits square, and the uppermost one twelve cubits square with four projections, or horns, one at each corner. So the altar stands high and is twelve cubits, or about twenty feet, square.

In Eze 43:18-27 he describes the sacrifices and the ceremonies relating to the altar. The sacrifices and ceremonies are to be performed by the sons of Zadok and they are to cleanse the altar and purify it and make it ready for the sacrifices of God.

In Eze 44:1-3 , he says that the east gate was to be kept forever shut, because through that gate Jehovah had entered and he had entered to remain forever, and therefore the gate by which he had entered must be closed forever, and no being in heaven nor on earth should pass through it.

In Eze 44:4-14 , we have the subordinate position of the Levites. The Levites previous to the exile had become idolatrous, almost to a man; they had gone after the worship of idols (but many of the priestly families had remained faithful to Jehovah) and because of that Ezekiel says that the Levites should not serve in the temple, but should be degraded to a secondary position and only the sons of Zadok could minister in the inner court.

In Eze 44:15-30 , Ezekiel gives the precepts and the rules regarding the priests. These priests were of the sons of Zadok. Doubtless, Ezekiel himself belonged to that line. They alone were to go into the inner court; the people were allowed in the outer courts, but only the priests in the inner court. They were to have linen garments and everything was to be so pure and so clean that they were not allowed to wear any garments that would hold perspiration; not one drop of perspiration was allowed to remain in their clothing; they were to be scrupulously clean. Their beards were not to be shaved; they were not to drink any wine while performing the services; they were to marry only a certain class of women, the widow of a priest or a virgin of the house of Israel; they were to teach the people, and they were to be the judges in all cases of the law. The priests were to judge between the litigants. They were to have no possessions, verse Eze 44:28 : “I am their inheritance; and ye shall give them no possessions in Israel; I am their possession.” They were to have all the first-fruits of the land and certain other material resources.

In Eze 45:1-8 , we have the portion of land assigned to the priests. In almost the center of this land of Israel, a space 25,000 cubits wide extending from the Mediterranean Sea to the river Jordan was set apart for the prince and the priests and the city and the temple. In the center of that was a section 25,000 cubits long and 25,000 cubits wide divided thus: 10,000 cubits of the northern part was for the Levites, 10,000 cubits in the center, for the priests and in the center of that was this section we have just described; south of that, 5,000 cubits wide and 25,000 cubits long was the city area and in the center of that was the city itself, about two miles square; lands on either side also about two miles square; the whole section was about eight miles square. The Levites had a section about two by eight miles; the priests had a section about two by eight miles, and the city, a little more than two by eight. At each end of this section reaching to the Mediterranean Sea on the west side, and to the Jordan on the east, was the portion of the prince, or royal family, the messianic king.

In Eze 45:9-17 we have the ordinances for the prince. He was strictly commanded to be just and square in his dealings, and strange to say, the prince received the tithes from all the people of Israel, and he supplied the priests with all their sacrifices, and sustained them out of what the people brought to him. The prince was a very important personage. He was really the Messiah, the messianic King.

In Eze 45:18-25 we have the ordinances for cleansing the temple, for the atonement, for the Passover, and the various offerings, for which see the text.

In Eze 46:1-15 , we have the ordinances for the feasts. They are going to have sacrifices, feasts, pilgrimages, in this blessed messianic age, according to Ezekiel, and he lays down rules for the feasts of the new moon, the sabbath, the Passover, and all other appointed feasts. It is to be the Levitical system carried out to perfection all through the ages. But remember that this is only the Jewish mold into which these blessed events are cast.

In Eze 46:16-18 , Ezekiel says that a prince cannot forfeit permanently his inheritance. If he does deed it to any member of another noble family, it reverts back to the royal family in time. Thus these two portions of land are reserved to the line of David forever.

In Eze 46:19-24 we have described the kitchens for the priests. They are to have kitchens in the temple, and in the far northwest corner of the inner court, and the far southwest corner of this inner court are great buildings that serve as kitchens where the priests are to boil their meat for these services in the temple; then in the same corners of the outer court are large buildings where they are going to boil the meat and sacrifices for the people. The Levites are to do this, as they are not allowed in the inner court.

In Eze 47:1-12 Ezekiel describes a stream which issues from the temple and flows down to the inner court and outer court and out by the east gate through which Ezekiel had entered and through which Jehovah had entered, and which is forever closed, down across the land toward the valley of the Jordan and the Dead Sea. Many have preached from that chapter on “The River of Life.” It ran through that desert land, and coursed down to the awful wilderness surrounding the Dead Sea, making everything green and the trees bore their fruit every month, the analogue of John’s vision of the River of Life flowing through the great city of God. Then it flows through those deserts and into the Dead Sea healing the water which became alive with fishes and everything the river touches lives. It flows down into the barren deserts, the dead seas of life, the worthless places, and heals them. There are certain portions by that Dead Sea that Ezekiel says were given to salt, the marshes. These were not healed but were given to salt as they needed the salt in the east for their sacrifices and their food, that was a hot climate. Thus closes the vision of Ezekiel of the land of Israel. The land is rich and verdant, teeming with life and fruitage; it is the blessed messianic age. (See the author’s sermon on “The River of Life.”)

Eze 47:13-23 describe the boundaries of the Holy Land and the privilege of strangers attaching themselves to the tribes. The boundaries of the Holy Land we cannot exactly fix but they extend west to the Mediterranean Sea; to about the entering in of Hamath for the northern boundary; the eastern boundary is the valley of Jordan down through the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea; the southern boundary is by way of Kadeshbarnea and to the brook of Egypt. That is Ezekiel’s Holy Land.

In Eze 48:1-7 , he tells what tribes are going to live north of the oblation. This tract of land, 25,000 cubits wide and reaching from the Mediterranean to the Jordan, is the oblation; the tribes that are to live north of the oblation we find in verses 1-7. To the far north is Dan; south of him is Asher, reaching from the Mediterranean to the Jordan Valley; the same for Napthali, and a similar section for Manasseh, Ephraim, Reuben, and Judah, bordering on the oblation which was the center and contained the portion for the Levites, temple, city, and prince. Why he has them in that order we cannot tell.

In Eze 48:8-22 we have the oblation itself and its divisions again described: 25,000 cubits wide, reaching from the Mediterranean to the Jordan and in the center of that square, 10,000 to the north for the Levites, 10,000 for the priests and in the center of that, the temple; then a section, 5,000 wide to the south for the city. We see by this that Ezekiel does not think that the temple should be in the city, and he separated them by a distance of about three miles. The city is about two miles square. It has land on either side of it which is to support the people. Ezekiel makes no provision for the growth of the city, nor for the increase of the Levites, nor for the priests; there they are and they are going to abide forever.

In Eze 48:23-29 , he gives the tribes south of the city, and the first one is Benjamin. Ezekiel puts Judah north and Benjamin south, while before, they had always been the reverse. Below that is Simeon, then Issachar, then Zebulun, and Gad; previously they had been closer together.

Then Eze 48:30-35 tell of the gates of the city. There are three on each of the four sides. This is the analogue of John’s magnificent vision of the holy city “on the east three gates, on the north three gates, and on the south three gates, and on the west three gates.” He goes on to show which tribes shall enter in by these several gates: three tribes on one side, etc., grouping Ephraim and Manasseh under the name of Joseph. He closes by saying, Eze 48:35 , “And the name of the city from that day shall be Jehovah-shammah,” Jehovah is there, that is, all this land is to be sanctified by the presence of Jehovah, from Dan in the far north to Gad in the far south. As one approaches the oblation, it is to be more holy; the domain of the priests and the sanctuary, still more holy. The outer court, the inner court, the temple platform, the holy place, then the most holy of all.

That is Ezekiel’s picture of the great messianic age. He believed that all the people that inhabited this land were people who had a new heart and a right spirit, who had the old stony heart taken out of them and a heart of flesh given them; that God’s laws were written in their hearts and on their minds; that they walked in his statutes and in his law; converted people, regenerated people, living in bliss upon the earth.

Will this ever be literally fulfilled? Can it be possible that when Jesus Christ comes this will be fulfilled as Ezekiel pictures it? Our pre-millennialist brethren believe that this will be literally fulfilled. They believe that Christianity must revert back to Judaism with Jerusalem as its center. To me it is unthinkable that our gospel with its worldwide vision and mission can become so cabbined, cribbed, coffined, and confined that it will be shut up to Palestine and to Judaism. That would be an unthinkable anticlimax.

QUESTIONS

1. What was the date of the writing of this prophecy?

2. What was Ezekiel doing during the thirteen years between his last prophecy before this and this one and what the bearing on this last prophecy?

3. Give a bird’s eye view of the temple as Been by Ezekiel.

4. Give a more detailed description of the temple with its parts.

5. Describe Jehovah’s entrance into this temple and give its significance.

6. Describe the altar of burnt offerings and the sacrifices to be offered thereon.

7. What is the ordinance regarding the east gate and why?

8. What the ordinance respecting the position of the Levites and why?

9. What ordinances regarding the priests?

10. What provisions were made for the priests?

11. What are the ordinances regarding the prince and what special provision for the people by the prince?

12. What are the ordinances for cleansing the temple, etc.?

13. What are the ordinances for the feasts?

14. What are the ordinances for the inheritance of the prince?

15. What is the special provision for the work of the priests and Levites?

16. Describe Ezekiel’s “River of Life” and give its significance.

17. Give the boundaries of Ezekiel’s holy land.

18. What are tribes are to be north of the oblation?

19. Describe the oblation itself.

20. What are the tribes south of the oblation?

21. Describe the gates of the city and give the position of the tribes.

22. What do you say of the fulfilment of this magnificent prophetic picture by Ezekiel?

Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible

Eze 47:1 Afterward he brought me again unto the door of the house; and, behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward: for the forefront of the house [stood toward] the east, and the waters came down from under from the right side of the house, at the south [side] of the altar.

Ver. 1. Afterward he brought. ] Christus mystagogus me duxit. Y , Follow God whithersoever he leadeth thee; this was an ancient rule among the heathens. Christo ducente et docente.

And, behold, waters issued out, ] i.e., The gospel of grace, and the gifts of the Holy Ghost thereby conveyed into the hearts of believers, and poured out upon the world by the death of Christ. The prophet seems to allude to those waters, which by conduits were conveyed to the altar to wash away the blood of the sacrifices and filth of the temple, which else would have been very offensive and noisome. See the like in Zec 14:8 , where the eastern and western Churches also are pointed out. See Rev 22:1 .

From under the threshold. ] Quod gloria Dei dudum triverat. a Christ is that door, Joh 10:7 and fountain of living water. Jer 2:13 Isa 12:3 ; Isa 55:1 And from the temple at Jerusalem flowed forth the waters of saving truth to all nations; and first eastward, not Romeward, though the faith of the Romans was not long after spoken of throughout the whole world. Rom 1:8

a Oecolamp.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Ezekiel Chapter 47

We now come to a highly characteristic feature of the coming age, in connection with the sanctuary of Jehovah, waters that issue with healing power, and this with increasing volume.

Joel, as is well known, had already predicted that “a fountain shall come forth of the house of Jehovah, and shall water the valley of Shittim.” (Joe 3:18 ) The prediction does suppose exuberance of earthly blessing, as the token of God’s favour and delight in goodness to the creature. The valley of the acacias does not forbid but confirm this. For it is no question whether the waters could flow thither on the other side Jordan, some seven miles or more beyond the Dead Sea, as nature now is. “That day” will be subject to no such conditions. Nature bowed to the Creator when He came to be a man and die and rise again; nature will bow correspondingly when He executes judgment on the quick at His coming again in His kingdom. It is just because it affords such an example of dryness that God takes that valley, and declares it shall be watered then, it is because the east sea is one proverbially of death, that it shall be made to abound in life. Blessing will spread to the ends of the earth, and from this centre – the house of Jehovah. What ought to be shall then be without fail, even on this earth, in spite of its hitherto sad continuity of failure; and this because Jehovah-Jesus reigns in virtue of His cross.

After our prophet, Zechariah declares that half of the living waters should go to the hinder sea or the Mediterranean, and half to the former or eastern sea, thus adding very materially to what Joel had predicted; and this should be alike in summer as in winter. For its source was higher than the creature supplies.

Ezekiel, between these two prophets, will tell us of the manner and effects of these waters, which point to an energy altogether different from man’s or nature’s so evidently that Henderson is obliged here to depart from his previous interpretation. So far as the temple and its ordinances are concerned, he owns their literality. Here he gives this up, because there was nothing left for the Jews to do in bringing about the realization of the vision. But this is in every way erroneous; for (1) the Jews could do as little to bringing back the visible display of Jehovah’s glory as in causing healing waters to flow from the temple, and yet the return of the cherubim is the grandest feature in all this vision from first to last; and (2) we have already seen that, in what might be thought more within the compass of the Jews, a vast deal of the description, and even ritual, wholly differs from what existed among the remnant who returned to the land from Babylon. It would be hard to point out a single particular of agreement between their history and the prophecy.

The only just conclusion then is that the vision, as a whole and in all its parts, belongs to the future, and supposes the kingdom to be set up over Israel, restored once more, and planted for ever in their land. In this point of view the words of the translator referred to may be cited, though they need correction: – “Having left the temple, the seat of the divine residence, and the source whence blessings were to flow to the restored Hebrew nation, the prophet is carried in vision southward into the regions of the Dead Sea, which had been noted for everything that was forbidden and noxious in its aspect – the very embodiment of barrenness and desolation. These were now to be converted into fertility and beauty. As in their previous condition they were strikingly symbolical of the spiritually unproductive and abhorrent character of idolatrous Israel, so they were now to serve as images of the renewed state of things when God should bring back His people, and, according to His promises, bless them, by conferring upon them abundantly the rich tokens of His regard. Instead of a barren wilderness, they should now become as the garden of Eden. By the copious effusions of the influences of His Holy Spirit He would restore His church to spiritual life, and render her instrumental in diffusing blessings to the world around.”

The intelligent reader will see, not only the confusion of the Jew with the church, but also the mistake of supposing that this vision regards Israel’s blessing. It is distinctly the divine blessing which will change the familiar, yet awful, scene of death outside into life and fruitfulness, though flowing out from the house of Jehovah. But, whatever may be the effusion of the Holy Ghost which accompanies it, there is no solid ground to question that this part of the vision is just as literal as what precedes and follows. All is really homogeneous.

“And he brought me back unto the door of the house; and, behold, waters issued from under the threshold of the house eastward; for the front of the house [was toward] the east, and the waters came down from under the right side of the house, at the south of the altar. And he brought me out of the way of the gate northward, and led me about the way without unto the utter gate by the way that looketh eastward; and, behold, there ran out waters on the right side. And when the man that had the line in his hand went forth eastward, he measured a thousand cubits, and he brought me through the waters; the waters were to the ankles. Again he measured a thousand, and brought me through the waters; the waters were to the knees. Again he measured a thousand, and brought me through; the waters were to the loins. Afterward he measured a thousand; and it was a river that I could not pass over: for the waters were risen, waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed over.” (Vers. 1-5) The remarkable fact here seen is the striking increase of the waters, without the least hint, but rather to the exclusion, of the thought of accession from tributary streams as in ordinary nature. It is an astonishing manifestation of God’s gracious power: all gushes forth from His house, yet the waters deepen rapidly, instead of growing shallower, as they recede from their source – to the ankles, to the knees, to the loins, and, lastly, till they are a river to swim in that could not be passed over.

“And he said unto me, Son of man, hast thou seen [this]? Then he brought me, and caused me to return to the brink of the river. Now when I had returned, behold, at the bank of the river were very many trees on the one side and on the other. Then said he unto me, These waters issue out toward the east country, and go down into the desert, and go into the sea; which being brought forth into the sea, the waters shall be healed. And it shall come to pass, that everything that liveth, which moveth, whithersoever the rivers shall come, shall live: and there shall be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters shall come thither: for they shall be healed; and everything shall live whither the river cometh. And it shall come to pass, that the fishers shall stand upon it from En-gedi even unto En-eglaim; they shall be a place to spread forth nets; their fish shall be according to their kinds, as the fish of the great sea, exceeding many. But the miry places thereof and the marshes thereof shall not be healed; they shall be given to salt. And by the river upon the bank thereof, on this side and on that side, shall grow all trees for meat, whose leaf shall not fade, neither shall the fruit thereof be consumed: it shall bring forth new fruit according to his months, because their waters they issued out of the sanctuary; and the fruit thereof shall be for meat, and the leaf thereof for medicine.” (Vers. 6-12) The effects appear at once: very many trees on both sides the stream, and there, where death had so long reigned, fish in the greatest abundance, so that fishers should spread their nets from end to end of what had once been the lake of Asphaltitis. Still it is in time, not yet the perfection of eternity any more than its condition, for there is still sea (cf Rev 21 ), and its swamps and its lagoons are not to be healed, whatever may be the ample exhibition of animal and vegetable life within and around; but there is marked exception here, as verse 11 shows, even if we accept the view that these unhealed waters are reserved or destined for the production of salt. Lovely is the picture of God’s bountiful provision in verse 12, though here too we may note the supply of leaves for medicine. It is an earthly scene.

It may be remarked here how singularly some of the ancient versions (the Greek, Syriac, and Arabic) have mistaken the plain and certain meaning of verse 8. All three have blundered alike in making ‘Arabah’ mean Galilee, the Septuagint and the Arabic adding also the error of translating ‘Lo’aroboh’ as Arabia, the Syriac as the north, or north-east instead of the plain or valley of the Jordan. The Targum of Jonathan has avoided these mistakes.

The rest of the chapter is occupied with the arrangement of Israel according to their future place in the land; and here Henderson cannot but return to “the literal Canaan and the literal tribes,” as alone meeting the demand of the unbiassed expositor. The counsels of God stand. Joseph, whatever the dark history of his sons meanwhile, must have his portion; the title of flesh failed, Reuben forfeited his birthright; but not the original gift of grace. So the prophet begins the distribution. “Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, This shall be the border, whereby ye shall inherit the land according to the twelve tribes of Israel: Joseph shall have two portions. And ye shall inherit it, one as well as another: concerning the which I lifted up mine hand to give it unto your fathers: and this land shall fall unto you for inheritance. And this shall be the border of the land toward the north side, from the great sea, the way of Hethlon, as men go to Zedad; Hamath, Berothah, Sibraim, which is between the border of Damascus and the border of Hamath; Hazar-hatticon, which is by the coast of Hauran. And the border from the sea shall be Hazar-enan, the border of Damascus, and the north northward, and the border of Hamath. And this is the north side. And the east side ye shall measure from Hauran, and from Damascus, and from Gilead, and from the land of Israel by Jordan, from the border unto the east sea. And this is the east side. And the south side southward, from Tamar even to the waters of strife in Kadesh, the river to the great sea. And this is the south side southward. The west side also shall be the great sea from the border, till a man come over against Hamath. This is the west side. So shall ye divide this land unto you according to the tribes of Israel.” (Vers. 18-21) Did any fear that the territory might fail for Israel gathered in, every one from all lands? They need not, for in that day the earth shall yield its increase, and the abundance of the sea shall be turned to Zion, and the riches of the nations without measure. The nation and the kingdom that will not serve Jerusalem shall perish. Kings shall be her nursing-fathers, and princesses her nursing mothers.

But so little ground is there for anxiety, that the land will suffice not only for the tribes of Israel but for the strangers that may sojourn and have begotten children there. “And it shall come to pass that ye shall divide it by lot for an inheritance unto you, and to the strangers that sojourn among you, which shall beget children among you: and they shall be unto you as born in the country among the children of Israel; they shall have inheritance with you among the tribes of Israel. And it shall come to pass, that in what tribe the stranger sojourneth, there shall ye give him his inheritance, saith the Lord Jehovah.” (Vers. 22, 23) Who can doubt that such largeness of heart and liberality of hand are absolutely new to Israel?

On every side the evidence is complete that it is not of the past and accomplished we here read, but of the bright future of God for Israel in their land, when there will be a welcome for the stranger truly divine to an inheritance in any tribe whatsoever. So will it be with the Jew in that day, happy contrast with all that has ever been! He will learn it of God when he bows to Jesus, and himself blessed be a blessing. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, such shall they give to the praise of His mercy which endures for ever.

Fuente: William Kelly Major Works (New Testament)

Ezekiel

THE RIVER OF LIFE

Eze 47:1 .

Unlike most great cities, Jerusalem was not situated on a great river. True, the inconsiderable waters of Siloam-’which flow softly’ because they were so inconsiderable-rose from a crevice in the Temple rock, and beneath that rock stretched the valley of the Kedron, dry and bleached in the summer, and a rainy torrent during the rainy seasons; but that was all. So, many of the prophets, who looked forward to the better times to come, laid their finger upon that one defect, and prophesied that it should be cured. Thus we read in a psalm: ‘There is a river, the divisions whereof make glad the City of our God.’ Faith saw what sense saw not. Again, Isaiah says: ‘There’-that is to say, in the new Jerusalem-’the glorious Lord shall be unto us a place of broad rivers and streams.’ And so, this prophet casts his anticipations of the abundant outpouring of blessing that shall come when God in very deed dwells among men, into this figure of a river pouring out from beneath the Temple-door, and spreading life and fertility wherever its waters come. I need not remind you how our Lord Himself uses the same figure, and modifies it, by saying that whosoever believeth on Him, ‘out of him shall flow rivers of living waters’; or how, in the very last words of the Apocalyptic seer, we hear again the music of the ripples of the great stream, ‘the river of the water of life proceeding out of the Throne of God and of the Lamb.’ So then, all through Scripture, we may say that we hear the murmur of the stream, and can catch the line of verdure upon its banks. My object now is not only to deal with the words that I have read as a starting-point, but rather to seek to draw out the wonderful significance of this great prophetic parable.

I. I notice, first, the source from which the river conies.

I have already anticipated that in pointing out that it flows from the very Temple itself. The Prophet sees it coming out of the house-that is to say, the Sanctuary. It flows across the outer court of the house, passes the altar, comes out under the threshold, and then pours itself down on to the plain beneath. This is the symbolical dress of the thought that all spiritual blessings, and every conceivable form of human good, take their rise in the fact of God’s dwelling with men. From beneath the Temple threshold comes the water of life; and wherever it is true that in any heart-or in any community-God dwells, there will be heard the tinkling of its ripples, and freshness and fertility will come from the stream. The dwelling of God with a man, like the dwelling of God in humanity in the Incarnation of His own dear Son, is, as it were, the opening of the fountain that it may pour out into the world. So, if we desire to have the blessings that are possible for us, we must comply with the conditions, and let God dwell in our hearts, and make them His temples; and then from beneath the threshold of that temple, too, will pour out, according to Christ’s own promise, rivers of living water which will be first for ourselves to drink of and be blessed by, and then will refresh and gladden others.

Another thought connected with this source of the river of life is that all the blessings which, massed together, are included in that one word ‘salvation’-which is a kind of nebula made up of many unresolved stars-take their rise from nothing else than the deep heart of God Himself. This river rose in the House of the Lord, and amidst the mysteries of the Divine Presence; it took its rise, one might say, from beneath the Mercy-seat where the brooding Cherubim sat in silence and poured itself into a world that had not asked for it, that did not expect it, that in many of its members did not desire it and would not have it. The river that rose in the secret place of God symbolises for us the great thought which is put into plainer words by the last of the apostles when he says, ‘We love Him because He first loved us.’ All the blessings of salvation rise from the unmotived, self-impelled, self-fed divine love and purpose. Nothing moves Him to communicate Himself but His own delight in giving Himself to His poor creatures; and it is all of grace that it might be all through faith.

Still further, another thought that may be suggested in connection with the source of this river is, that that which is to bless the world must necessarily take its rise above the world. Ezekiel has sketched, in the last portion of his prophecy, an entirely ideal topography of the Holy Land. He has swept away mountains and valleys, and levelled all out into a great plain, in the midst of which rises the mountain of the Lord’s House, far higher than the Temple hill. In reality, opposite it rose the Mount of Olives, and between the two there was the deep gorge of the Valley of the Kedron. The Prophet smooths it all out into one great plain, and high above all towers the Temple-mount, and from it there rushes down on to the low levels the fertilising, life-giving flood.

That imaginary geography tells us this, that what is to bless the world must come from above the world. There needs a waterfall to generate electricity; the power which is to come into humanity and deal with its miseries must have its source high above the objects of its energy and its compassion, and in proportion to the height from which it falls will be the force of its impact and its power to generate the quickening impulse. All merely human efforts at social reform, rivers that do not rise in the Temple, are like the rivers in Mongolia, that run for a few miles and then get sucked up by the hot sands and are lost and nobody sees them any more. Only the perennial stream, that comes out from beneath the Temple threshold, can sustain itself in the desert, to say nothing of transforming the desert into a Garden of Eden. So moral and social and intellectual and political reformers may well go to Ezekiel, and learn that the ‘river of the water of life,’ which is to heal the barren and refresh the thirsty land, must come from below the Temple threshold.

II. Note the rapid increase of the stream.

The Prophet describes how his companion, the interpreter, measured down the stream a thousand cubits-about a quarter of a mile-and the waters were ankle-deep another thousand, making half a mile from the start, and the water was knee-deep. Another thousand-or three-quarters of a mile-and the water was waist-deep; another thousand-about a mile in all-and the water was unfordable, ‘waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed over.’ Where did the increase come from? There were no tributaries. We do not hear of any side-stream flowing into the main body. Where did the increase come from? It came from the abundant welling-up in the sanctuary. The fountain was the mother of the river-that is to say, God’s ideal for the world, for the Church, for the individual Christian, is rapid increase in their experience of the depth and the force of the stream of blessings which together make up salvation. So we come to a very sharp testing question. Will anybody tell me that the rate at which Christianity has grown for these nineteen centuries corresponds with Ezekiel’s vision-which is God’s ideal? Will any Christian man say, ‘My own growth in grace, and increase in the depth and fulness of the flow of the river through my spirit and my life correspond to that ideal’? A mile from the source the river is unfordable. How many miles from the source of our first experience do we stand? How many of us, instead of having ‘a river that could not be passed over, waters to swim in,’ have but a poor and all but stagnant feeble trickle, as shallow as or shallower than it was at first?

I was speaking a minute ago about Mongolian rivers. Australian rivers are more like some men’s lives. A chain of ponds in the dry season-nay! not even a chain, but a series, with no connecting channel of water between them. That is like a great many Christian people; they have isolated times when they feel the voice of Christ’s love, and yield themselves to the powers of the world to come, and then there are long intervals, when they feel neither the one nor the other. But the picture that ought to be realised by each of us is God’s ideal, which there is power in the gospel to make real in the case of every one of us, the rapid and continuous increase in the depth and in the scour of ‘the river of the water of life,’ that flows through our lives. Luther used to say, ‘If you want to clean out a dunghill, turn the Elbe into it.’ If you desire to have your hearts cleansed of all their foulness, turn the river into it. But it needs to be a progressively deepening river, or there will be no scour in the feeble trickle, and we shall not be a bit the holier or the purer for our potential and imperfect Christianity.

III. Lastly, note the effects of the stream.

These are threefold: fertility, healing, life. Fertility. In the East one condition of fertility is water. Irrigate the desert, and you make it a garden. Break down the aqueduct, and you make the granary of the world into a waste. The traveller as he goes along can tell where there is a stream of water, by the verdure along its banks. You travel along a plateau, and it is all baked and barren. You plunge into a w, and immediately the ground is clothed with under-growth and shrubs, and the birds of the air sing among the branches. And so, says Ezekiel, wherever the river comes there springs up, as if by magic, fair trees ‘on the banks thereof, whose leaf shall not fade, neither shall the fruit thereof be consumed.’

Fertility comes second, the reception of the fertilising agent comes first. It is wasted time to tinker at our characters unless we have begun with getting into our hearts the grace of God, and the new spirit that will be wrought out by diligent effort into all beauty of life and character. Ezekiel seems to be copying the first psalm, or vice versa, the Psalmist is copying Ezekiel. At any rate, there is a verbal similarity between them, in that both dwell upon the unfading leaf of the tree that grows planted by rivers of water. And our text goes further, and speaks about perennial fruitfulness month by month, all the year round. In some tropical countries you will find blossoms, buds in their earliest stage, and ripened fruit all hanging upon one laden branch. Such ought to be the Christian life-continuously fruitful because dependent upon continual drawing into itself, by means of its roots and suckers, of the water of life by which we are fructified.

There is yet another effect of the waters-healing. As we said, Ezekiel takes great liberties with the geography of the Holy Land, levelling it all, so his stream makes nothing of the Mount of Olives, but flows due east until it comes to the smitten gorge of the Jordan, and then turns south, down into the dull, leaden waters of the Dead Sea, which it heals. We all know how these are charged with poison. Dip up a glassful anywhere, and you find it full of deleterious matter. They are the symbol of humanity, with the sin that is in solution all through it. No chemist can eliminate it, but there is One who can. ‘He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.’ The pure river of the water of life will cast out from humanity the malignant components that are there, and will sweeten it all. Ay, all, and yet not all, for very solemnly the Prophet’s optimism pauses, and he says that the salt marshes by the side of the sea are not healed. They are by the side of it. The healing is perfectly available for them, but they are not healed. It is possible for men to reject the influences that make for the destruction of sin and the establishment of righteousness. And although the waters are healed, there still remain the obstinate marshes with the white crystals efflorescing on their surface, and bringing salt and barrenness. You can put away the healing and remain tainted with the poison.

And then the last thought is the life-giving influence of the river. Everything lived whithersoever it went. Contrast Christendom with heathendom. Admit all the hollowness and mere nominal Christianity of large tracts of life in so-called Christian countries, and yet why is it that on the one side you find stagnation and death, and on the other side mental and manifold activity and progressiveness? I believe that the difference between ‘the people that sit in darkness’ and ‘the people that walk in the light is that one has the light and the other has not, and activity befits the light as torpor befits the darkness.

But there is a far deeper truth than that in the figure, a truth that I would fain lay upon the hearts of all my hearers, that unless we our own selves have this water of life which comes from the Sanctuary and is brought to us by Jesus Christ, ‘we are dead in trespasses and sins.’ The only true life is in Christ. ‘If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink. He that believeth on Me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water.’

Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren

NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Eze 47:1-2

1Then he brought me back to the door of the house; and behold, water was flowing from under the threshold of the house toward the east, for the house faced east. And the water was flowing down from under, from the right side of the house, from south of the altar. 2He brought me out by way of the north gate and led me around on the outside to the outer gate by way of the gate that faces east. And behold, water was trickling from the south side.

Eze 47:1 water was flowing For desert people water was a sign of God’s blessing and presence (i.e., Joe 3:18). The eschatological sense is present in Zec 13:1; Zec 14:8. It is used by John in Rev 22:1; Rev 22:17. The covenant promises of Deuteronomy 27-30 have become a reality!

This is metaphorical (cf. Psa 46:4; Psa 65:9) and not meant to be taken literally. It conveys

1. original creation

2. Eden

3. covenant promises

Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley

door = entrance.

behold. Figure of speech Asterismos. App-6.

came down = were coming down. Compare Joe 3:18; and see Isa 12:3; Isa 44:3. Zec 14:8. Rev 22:1.

from under = from beneath. Referring to the perennial source which has supplied the fountain of Gihon. See App-68.

right side: i.e. the south side. Compare Eze 47:2.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

Chapter 47

Now in chapter 47 we find this river that comes forth from this east gate.

Afterward he brought me again unto the door of the house; and, behold, the waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward: for the forefront of the house stood toward the east, and the waters came down from under the right side of the house, at the south side of the altar ( Eze 47:1 ).

Now here from the house of God this temple house, a spring of water bubbles out and begins to flow toward the east. This is also described or spoken of in Zechariah and it certainly has its counterpart in Revelation chapter 22, that stream in heaven of which many of the aspects of this are similar to the one there. Now it comes out from the throne there of the temple from the south part of the east side. And he took him out the north gate because the east gate was only for the prince.

and he measured a thousand cubits, and he brought me through the water; and it was ankle deep. So he measured another thousand, and he brought me through the water; and the water was up to my knees. And again he measured a thousand cubits; and he brought me through the waters; and they were to my loins. And after he measured another thousand; it was a river that I could not pass over: for the waters were so high they were waters to swim in, a river that you could not just walk across ( Eze 47:3-5 ).

So here is an interesting thing, this river that begins here at the temple and begins to flow eastward from the temple towards the Jordan valley. It increases as it goes. So at a thousand cubit, or two thousand feet away approximately, it’s only ankle deep. By the time you get almost two-thirds of a mile away, three-quarters of a mile away, it’s knee deep. You go another two thousand feet and it’s waist deep. Go another thousand feet and it’s over your head. And so this great river coming forth from the area of Jerusalem originating there at the temple, but yet picking up from other sources begins to flow probably through the valley that is created when the Mount of Olives splits in the middle. And flows on down to the Jordan plain.

And he said to me, Son of man, did you see that? And then he brought me, and caused me to return to the bank of the river. Now when I had returned, behold, the bank of the river there were very many trees on either side. And he said unto me, These waters issue out toward the east country, they go down to the desert, and they go into the sea: which being brought forth into the sea, the waters shall be healed. And it shall come to pass, that every thing that lives, which moves, whithersoever the rivers shall come, shall live: and there shall be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters shall come thither: for they shall be healed; and every thing shall live whither the water comes. And it shall come to pass, that the fishers shall stand upon it from Engedi even unto Eneglaim; and they shall be a place to spread forth the nets; their fish shall be according to their kinds, all of the kinds of the fish, even as you find in the Mediterranean, just a great variety of fish ( Eze 47:6-10 ).

So the interesting thing about this new river that will flow into the Dead Sea originating there at the temple in Jerusalem will bring a healing to the waters of the Dead Sea so that the Dead Sea will no longer be a dead sea, but the waters will support all kinds of fish and it’ll be a great fishing spa. So you might want to go down there and open up a worm stand or something and you can be a successful man in the Kingdom Age. Because they’ll be fishing all the way from Engedi on down to Eneglaim.

Now, there are certain portions of the miry areas and the marshes of the Dead Sea that will remain salty. But for the main body of the Dead Sea, the waters will be healed.

And on these trees, their fruit shall be for the meat of the people, their leaf will not fade, neither will the fruit thereof [run out or] be consumed: it shall bring forth new fruit according to his months, because their waters they issued out of the sanctuary: and the fruit thereof will be for meat, and the leaf thereof for medicine ( Eze 47:12 ).

So these will be very interesting trees that each month will have a different kind of a fruit. They’ll bear fruit year round, which will be a very life-sustaining type of a food. It’ll be a very helpful fruit, sustain your life. Good protein, it’ll be for meat. But the leaves will be used for healing, for their medicinal value. So these trees…

Now, in Revelation, you get the river that flows from the throne of God there, and again you find the trees on either side bringing forth the fruit. And so there, you know… of course, God is able, you say, “Well, I don’t know of any tree like that.” Of course you don’t. God hasn’t developed it yet. But He will develop it there in the Kingdom Age, and what’s so hard for God to create an interesting fruit tree that has very nutritious fruit and bears all year long? Man, you’ll want some of those in your garden. And the leaves will be good for medicinal purposes and the same things are described as along this river in heaven that is pure as crystal flowing from the throne of God in heaven. So read this along with Rev 22:1-21 and you’ll find the correlations that are there.

Now, even as the tabernacle in the wilderness was built as a model in heaven, so this probably again is a model of the heavenly things. And this river is more or less a model of that river flowing from the throne of God in heaven described in Rev 22:1-21 .

“

Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary

Eze 47:1-12

Eze 47:1

Here is the vision of the great river flowing from beneath the Temple itself toward the east, a river expanding and broadening, ever deeper and deeper, all the way through the desert even to the sea; and whithersoever the waters of that mighty river shall come, “Everything that liveth, which moveth, shall live; and there shall be a great multitude of fish.” (Eze 47:9). The location and boundaries of the Holy Land into which the Twelve Tribes will be located are given.

Eze 47:1-12

Afterward he brought me again unto the door of the house; and, behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward: for the forefront of the house stood toward the east, and the waters came down from under from the right side of the house, at the south side of the altar. Then brought he me out of the way of the gate northward, and led me about the way without unto the utter gate by the way that looketh eastward; and, behold, there ran out waters on the right side. And when the man that had the line in his hand went forth eastward, he measured a thousand cubits, and he brought me through the waters; the waters were to the ankles. Again he measured a thousand, and brought me through the waters; the waters were to the knees. Again he measured a thousand, and brought me through; the waters were to the loins. Afterward he measured a thousand; and it was a river that I could not pass over: for the waters were risen, waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed over. And he said unto me, Son of man, hast thou seen this? Then he brought me, and caused me to return to the brink of the river. Now when I had returned, behold, at the bank of the river were very many trees on the one side and on the other. Then said he unto me, These waters issue out toward the east country, and go down into the desert, and go into the sea: which being brought forth into the sea, the waters shall be healed. And it shall come to pass, that every thing that liveth, which moveth, whithersoever the rivers shall come, shall live: and there shall be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters shall come thither: for they shall be healed; and every thing shall live whither the river cometh. And it shall come to pass, that the fishers shall stand upon it from Engedi even unto Eneglaim; they shall be a place to spread forth nets; their fish shall be according to their kinds, as the fish of the great sea, exceeding many. But the miry places thereof and the marishes thereof shall not be healed; they shall be given to salt. And by the river upon the bank thereof, on this side and on that side, shall grow all trees for meat, whose leaf shall not fade, neither shall the fruit thereof be consumed: it shall bring forth new fruit according to his months, because their waters they issued out of the sanctuary: and the fruit thereof shall be for meat, and the leaf thereof for medicine.

The River Out of the Temple (Eze 47:1-12)

We have now reached the concluding two chapters of the book of Ezekiel. In commenting on the end of the book, one commentator notes:

“There are but few of the prophets of the Old Testament who have left a more valuable treasure to the Church of God than Ezekiel. It is true that he is in several places obscure; but there is a great proportion of the work that is in the highest degree edifying; and several portions that for the depth of the salvation predicted, and the accuracy and minuteness of the description, have nothing equal to them in the Old Testament Scriptures.”

Chapter 47 begins with a description of a great river flowing out of the temple that was described in the preceding chapters. Ezekiel is brought to the door of the holy place in the temple and sees a stream of water that flows into the inner court area, south of the altar. The prophet is then taken out of the inner court by way of the north gate into the outer court. He is taken to the eastern outer gate and sees the water coming out of that gate at its southern side. From there the water flows down to the Dead Sea.

Flowing rivers are found elsewhere in the Scriptures:

1. In Zec 14:8 there are two rivers, one flowing east and the other west.

2. Joe 3:18 speaks of one river that waters the valley of Shittim, which is on the eastern bank of the Jordan.

Each of these prophecies about rivers is speaking about the same thing — a coming blessedness for the people of God as the goodness of God pours forth from his throne. The book of Ezekiel ends with a beautiful description of the goodness of God toward his people. This river gets deeper and wider the farther Ezekiel gets from the city. The water begins as a trickle. The Hebrew word used here means “drop by drop.” The water is ankle-deep a 1000 cubits farther downstream. The Hebrew is “water of ankles.” So strange did this phrase appear to the translators of the Septuagint that they translated it as “water of remission,” which caused many early Christian commentators to see here the water of baptism. Continuing to move along at distances of 1000 cubits, the water is up to his knees, then up to his waist, and then too deep and wide to cross. The Charismatics use these verses as support for their arguments that the power of the Spirit comes in “waves.” Some argue that these waves come every 1000 years. One immediate problem with this view is that there aren’t any “waves” in Ezekiel 47.

What does this deepening depict? There are a number of theories: a) Some say that it depicts the fact that the more we know and experience the goodness and mercy of God, the more we realize its depth and width. (1) (Eph 3:17-19) “that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height –19 to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” b) Others say it depicts the blessings of God that began with the patriarchs, then went to the Israelites, and finally to the whole world — increasing at each step. c) Others say it depicts the word, which begins as a seed in the heart of a believer and then grows into a fruitful tree.

Everywhere this river reaches, it heals. The barren areas thrive and the Dead Sea becomes a sea of life when the river of God reaches it. The Dead Sea’s stagnant waters become fresh and swarming with fish. Is any sin so bad that it cannot be cleansed by God’s healing power? God’s healing power can turn the Dead Sea into the Living Sea! Along the side of this river are trees that bring forth fruit each month of the year. The fruit of these trees is used for food, and the leaves provide healing. Why each month? Twelve is the number symbolizing God’s people! This flowing river of goodness is for the people of God. The number twelve is a symbol for the people of God. In the Old Testament, there were the 12 tribes of Israel, and in the New Testament there were the 12 apostles. In Revelation 7 when God wants to emphasize that he is speaking about ALL of his people, he uses the number 144,000, which is 12 times 12 times 1000!

Numbers in the bible often have special significance, but we must not take this too far. Numbers can be made to symbolize anything if one is willing to work hard enough. For example, I can prove that Hitler was the anti-Christ and that William Shakespeare wrote the Bible.

(1) Let A = 100, B = 101, C = 102, etc. and note that 107 (H) + 108 (I) + 119 (T) + 111 (L) + 104 (E) + 117 (R) = 666!

How old was William Shakespeare in 1611 when the King James version was written? 46. The 46th word in Psalms 46 is shake. The 46th word from the end of Psalms 46 is spear.

No tributaries are mentioned because they would be inconsistent with the message that these blessings all come from one true source. The swamps retain their saltiness. Why? Perhaps because of the need for salt in the priestly activities. (Eze 43:24). Another commentator says that the swamps depict the “incorrigibly inpenitent who cannot be healed.” (Rev 22:11) “he who is filthy, let him be filthy still.”

John uses these same symbols in Rev 22:1-3.

“And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. 2 In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river, was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. 3 And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His servants shall serve Him.”

In this chapter, a river flows from the midst of a city. John also sees trees, and twelve fruits, and healing leaves. We have to be careful to remember our rule that identity of symbol does not necessarily imply identity of subject, but I think the link between Revelation 22 and Ezekiel 47 is very clear in this instance. The two chapters follow different judgments — but the message following each judgment is the same: God has a plan to abundantly bless His people.

Rev 22:3 says that the throne of God will be in “it.” Was is that “it”? It is the New Jerusalem described in Revelation 21. What is that “New Jerusalem”? It must be Heaven, right? Because that is where the throne of God is. But, the Bible also views God as ruling from his church. (Eze 43:7; Psa 2:6) Indeed, as we have seen, God dwells with us in His church. The church fits the name of this city very well — the New Jerusalem. The old Jerusalem was once the dwelling place for God’s people. The church is the new dwelling place for God’s people. Rev 21:2 tells us that this New Jerusalem is the bride of the Lamb, coming down out of Heaven, prepared as a bride for her husband. And what group is pictured in the Bible as the bride of Christ? The church! (1) (Eph 5:25) “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her.”

This city is holy. This city provides healing to the surrounding nations who are drawn to this city by the light that it casts into the world. This city is the church. (Isa 2:2-4) “Now it shall come to pass in the latter days That the mountain of the LORD’s house Shall be established on the top of the mountains, And shall be exalted above the hills; And all nations shall flow to it. 3 Many people shall come and say, “Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, To the house of the God of Jacob; He will teach us His ways, And we shall walk in His paths.” For out of Zion shall go forth the law, And the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. 4 He shall judge between the nations, And rebuke many people; They shall beat their swords into plowshares, And their spears into pruning hooks; Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, Neither shall they learn war anymore.”

But the events in Revelation aren’t going to happen for a long time. Right? Well, that is not what the book of Revelation says:

(Rev 1:1) “The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants — things which must shortly take place.”

(Rev 1:3) “Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written in it; for the time is near.”

(Rev 22:6) “Then he said to me, “These words are faithful and true.” And the Lord God of the holy prophets sent His angel to show His servants the things which must shortly take place.”

(Rev 22:10) “And he said to me, ‘Do not seal the words of the prophecy of this book, for the time is at hand.'”

In Dan 8:26 Daniel was told to seal up his vision because it wouldn’t happen for a long time. John was told not to seal up his message. How long did it take for Daniel’s message to be fulfilled? About 400 years. Water in the Bible often represents God’s abundant blessings. In fact, “Blessing, fertility, and water are almost interchangeable in the Old Testament.”

(Psa 46:4) “There is a river whose streams shall make glad the city of God, The holy place of the tabernacle of the Most High.”

(Psa 65:9) “You visit the earth and water it, You greatly enrich it; The river of God is full of water; You provide their grain, For so You have prepared it.”

(Psa 36:8) “They are abundantly satisfied with the fullness of Your house, And You give them drink from the river of Your pleasures. 9 For with You is the fountain of life; In Your light we see light.”

(Hab 2:14) “For the earth will be filled With the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, As the waters cover the sea.”

The Garden of the Lord: (Isa 51:3) “For the LORD will comfort Zion, He will comfort all her waste places; He will make her wilderness like Eden, And her desert like the garden of the LORD; Joy and gladness will be found in it, Thanksgiving and the voice of melody.”

(Joe 3:18) “And it will come to pass in that day that the mountains shall drip with new wine, the hills shall flow with milk, and all the brooks of Judah shall be flooded with water; A fountain shall flow from the house of the LORD and water the Valley of Acacias.”

And when were the prophecies of Joel fulfilled? Peter quotes Joel 2 in Acts 2 and said that it was being fulfilled on the Day of Pentecost when the church was established.

The Jewish Feast of the Tabernacles

The Jewish feast of the Tabernacles is described in Lev 23:39-43. It came on the 15th day of the seventh month, which was typically around the end of September or early October. The Feast was primarily agricultural and celebrated the gathering of the harvest. In Joh 7:37 it is referred to as “The Feast.” The Rabbies said that “he who has not seen Jerusalem during the Feast of Tabernacles does not know what rejoicing means.”

3. One of the most important rituals on this day was the pouring of water in the temple. A specially appointed priest was sent to the Pool of Siloam with a golden pitcher to bring water from the pool. This was poured by the high priest into a basin at the foot of the altar amidst the blasting of trumpets and the singing of the Hallel (Psalms 113-118). The significance of this pouring was twofold. First, it was a symbolic and ritual prayer for abundant rain. Second, it looked toward the outpouring of God’s spirit upon all nations as mentioned in Joe 2:28 (“I will pour out my spirit on all flesh”) and which Peter in Acts 2 says was fulfilled during the first century.

Part of the closing words of Psalms 118 are “Save now, I beseech thee, O Lord: O Lord, I beseech thee, send now prosperity.” As with the other feasts, this feast looks forward to the coming Messiah.

It was at the end of such a celebration that Jesus announced that he was the real source of living water. (Joh 7:37-38) On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. 38 “He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” Jesus stood up and said that he was the answer to their prayers! Those who were looking for the river of God’s blessings did not need to keep looking. They had found it. Jesus is the source of living water!

(Zec 14:8) “And in that day it shall be that living waters shall flow from Jerusalem, Half of them toward the eastern sea and half of them toward the western sea; In both summer and winter it shall occur.”

(Joh 4:13-14) Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”

Is this flowing river literal or figurative?

McGuiggan begins his comments on this section by saying: “It seems to me that a man will literalize all this only when he has sold himself to literalizing.” Another commentator writes: “To attempt to take this literally, as some have done, is to miss completely the point which is being made. … No amount of water divining will confirm Ezekiel 47.”

First, there is no such source of water in the Temple. Indeed, when the Assyrians threatened to invade Palestine, King Hezekiah ordered workmen to dig a tunnel through nearly 2000 feet of solid rock from the Pool of Siloam to the spring outside the walls of the city to provide fresh water during the siege. The temple’s water came from the Great Bronze Sea, which was a large bronze bowl that stood in the court of Solomon’s temple. That source of water was located on the southeast side of the temple (1Ki 7:39). (The river in Ezekiel 47 begins south of the altar.)

There is no literal source of water that could produce the river described by Ezekiel. If after reading this chapter, you are looking forward to a fishing trip to the Dead Sea, I would suggest you go back and read it again — you have missed something important! McGuiggan: “This is worth spending time on to build up our hearts rather than to spend time figuring out how we can get such a literal river to flow in the manner this one flows.”

What then does it symbolize?

Let’s review the clues:

a) The water flows from the temple. God is the source.

b) The water starts small and deepens and widens as it flows.

c) The water purifies and cleanses what it touches. It brings life.

d) The water yields a great harvest of fish.

e) The water produces trees with fruit and healing for the nations.

Each of these statements is true of the church and its proclamation of the gospel. God is the source of the church and the gospel. It is His church — not our church. It is His word that sets men free — not our word. The church began as a mustard seed on the day of Pentecost when God’s spirit was poured out as Joel had prophesied.

Mat 13:31-32 Another parable He put forth to them, saying: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field, 32 “which indeed is the least of all the seeds; but when it is grown it is greater than the herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches.”

The gospel purifies, cleanses, and brings life and the gospel yields a great harvest of fish.

Mat 13:47-48 Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet that was cast into the sea and gathered some of every kind, 48 “which, when it was full, they drew to shore; and they sat down and gathered the good into vessels, but threw the bad away.

The gospel produces trees giving food and healing to the nations.

Psa 1:1-3 Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, Nor stands in the path of sinners, Nor sits in the seat of the scornful; 2 But his delight is in the law of the LORD, And in His law he meditates day and night. 3 He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, That brings forth its fruit in its season, Whose leaf also shall not wither; And whatever he does shall prosper.

Finally, I think we would miss an important point if we failed to notice the great importance of water in the Scriptures. When God first began to order his creation, he moved upon the face of the waters. When mankind’s sin became too great, God cleansed the earth with water. When the Israelites escaped from Egypt, God put a wall of water between their former bondage and their promised land. God put water between the priests and the Holy Place in the temple. Before they could enter they were required to wash themselves with water. God put water between sickness and health in the case of Naaman, who was healed only after he obeyed God and washed himself in the Jordan river. Jesus put water between blindness and sight when he put clay on a blind man’s eyes and told him to wash in the Pool of Siloam. God put water between sin and salvation. It is at the point of baptism that our sins are washed away. (Act 22:16)

Anyone who is surprised that God put water between spiritual death and spiritual life just hasn’t been paying attention. It would have been surprising if He had not done so!

Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary

Again Ezekiel was taken to the door of the house, and there beheld the wonderful symbolic river. Its source was the sanctuary. It proceeded under the threshold, and past the altar, and outward in an eastward course, a steadily growing stream. A thousand cubits beyond the place of its emergence it was ankle deep, a thousand farther it reached the knees, a thousand farther the loins were covered, and a thousand farther it became, in the stately language of the prophet, “a river that I could not pass through; for the waters were risen, waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed through.”

Having observed this growth, the prophet was taken back to the brink of the river, and then in language full of poetic beauty he described its effect. Trees were seen growing on either bank. The angel told him that the waters went down into the Arabah, and ultimately into the sea, and that its waters would be healed by the inflow of the river of life. The inclusive statement of the effect is stated in the words, “Everything shall live whithersoever the river goeth.”

Following the vision of the river, the prophet received instructions concerning the new division of the land, the possessions of the tribes running from east to west. The country thus divided would belong to the tribes of Israel, and any stranger dwelling therein was to ‘have an inheritance in the land in common with the children of Israel.

Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible

Chapter Forty-Seven

The Life-Giving River

And he brought me back unto the door of the house; and, behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward (for the forefront of the house was toward the east); and the waters came down from under, from the right side of the house, on the south of the altar. Then he brought me out by the way of the gate northward, and led me round by the way without unto the outer gate, by the way of the gate that looketh toward the east; and, behold, there ran out waters on the right side-vers. 1, 2.

Back of all our meditations upon these last chapters of Ezekiel, from 40 to 48, the question has been kept ever in mind, Are we to take this vision literally as indicating something which will be fulfilled to the letter in millennial days, or are we to understand it as symbolic of wondrous blessing which God has in store for His ancient people and for the world, but which He has presented in this form in order that the poor finite minds of His people may get some conception of the wondrous things reserved for them which are utterly beyond human imagination? We cannot help contrasting and comparing the closing chapters of the Apocalypse with what we have here. In considering this vision of the river our attention necessarily will be directed to that pure river of water of life proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb, which John saw in vision as he found himself in spirit on a great and high mountain beholding the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven. We are told definitely in the first verse of the Revelation that God sent and signified these things to His servant John; and we have observed that the word signified really means symbolized. There are very few indeed who would attempt to literalize the great visions of this remarkable book. No one expects to see a sevenfold-sealed roll in heaven broken by one who has the appearance of a lamb. The roll we know is the title-deed to this world, and the Lamb is the Man Christ Jesus seated on the throne of God. Neither do we expect an actual savage brute with seven heads and ten horns to come bodily up from the bottomless pit and dominate the world.

We see in this vision the symbol of human government in its last degenerate and atheistic condition; and so when it comes to the vision of the heavenly city we understand that God is using symbols of wondrous beauty and glory to set forth the magnificence and marvelous character of the eternal home of the saints. The river there is clearly the Holy Spirits testimony to the risen Christ, which brings refreshment and blessing everywhere it goes; and we see on either side of the river the tree of life with its marvelous fruits, speaking of the message of the gospel which brings spiritual healing to all who receive it.

Now as we consider Ezekiels vision it would seem to be but slavish adherence to literality which would deny the symbolic character of much that is here unfolded. For many, the river in this chapter is a literal stream which will break forth from underneath the temple in millennial days and will divide into two parts, according to Joe 3:18 and Zec 14:8; thus linking the Mediterranean Sea with the Dead Sea and giving the city of Jerusalem itself a water-harbor. All this may indeed be true, but that this passage in Ezekiel refers to the same thing does not seem to the present writer either to be reasonable or in accordance with what we learn elsewhere in Scripture. What is the river that proceeds from under the threshold of the sanctuary of Jehovah? Can it be other than that same glorious stream which we have mentioned already, as brought before us in the twenty-second chapter of the Revelation? Of such a river Scripture speaks in many places. Wherever God rests we find a river flowing. There was one in Eden, a literal river flowing forth from the garden and dividing into four great streams; but elsewhere we find the river spoken of in a spiritual sense. In Psa 36:8 we read, Thou shall make them drink of the river of Thy pleasures; and in Psa 46:4 we are told, There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God. Observe, this is not a prophecy of some literal river to break forth from the floor of the temple in the future, but at the time the Psalmist wrote, it was a blessed fact, and it is a fact still, that there is such a river of refreshment of which all may drink who are willing to stoop down in repentance and receive that which God so graciously offers. This accords with what we have in the New Testament, Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely (Rev 22:17). Our blessed Lord, using the same figure, said, If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink. He that be-lieveth on Me, as the scripture hath said, from within him shall flow rivers of living water (Joh 7:37-38). He has promised to bless and refresh the dry places like a river (Psa 105:41); and Isaiah twice speaks of peace as a river (48:18; 66:12); while both the Psalmist and Jeremiah tell us of the righteous man who is like a tree planted by the rivers of water (Psa 1:3; Jer 17:8). Speaking prophetically of our Lord Jesus Christ, Isaiah says, A man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land (32:2). A man shall beas rivers-what a remarkable picture! But when we realize that this river speaks of life and refreshment we at once see that all this is centered in our Lord Jesus who gives life and rest of heart and conscience to all who come to Him and drink.

There are numerous passages to which we might turn, but these are sufficient to show how frequently the Holy Scriptures use the symbol of a river as referring to the grace of God in Christ ministered to the soul in the power of the Holy Spirit.

Whether, therefore, Ezekiels vision of a river will be fulfilled literally or not we do not know. Of this we may be sure: it does speak to us today of that same glorious river which is brought before us in so many other places in the Word of God.

The prophet was led by his guide to the door of the house, and he beheld water issuing from under the threshold of the house toward the east. He had seen nothing like this before; though in vision he had been led through that court. It is as though now all is seen as completed, and God has found His rest in the sanctuary ; His glory has filled the house, and waters spread forth for the refreshment and blessing of His people.

These waters are pictured as running down from the court through the outer gate that looks toward the east and descending on the right side, going on down to the Jordan valley.

When the man went forth eastward with the line in his hand, he measured a thousand cubits, and he caused me to pass through the waters, waters that were to the ankles. Again he measured a thousand, and caused me to pass through the waters, waters that were to the knees. Again he measured a thousand, and caused me to pass through the waters, waters that were to the loins. Afterward he measured a thousand; and it was a river that I could not pass through; for the waters were risen, waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed through-vers. 3-5.

There is something here that is absolutely inexplicable if we think of a literal river. Rivers widen and deepen as the volume of water increases through tributaries pouring into them; but of such tributaries we have no mention here, and yet this river becomes deeper and broader the farther it flows from its source. Is not this true of the river of Gods grace? How small the apparent beginnings on Pentecost when the glory of God filled all the place where the disciples were sitting, and immediately the testimony to the risen Christ began, and the river has been flowing on ever since until it has become a mighty stream encompassing the whole world.

Ezekiels guide measured a thousand cubits-that is, fifteen hundred feet, and he caused the prophet to enter into the waters: they were up to his ankles. May this not suggest the very beginning of a life in fellowship with God? If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit (Gal 5:25). The feet were in the river, and the waters covered them. But the guide measured another thousand cubits and caused Ezekiel to pass through the waters, and they were up to his knees. Who will think it fanciful if we say that the waters up to the knees suggest praying in the Holy Spirit? But the guide measured another thousand and caused the prophet to pass through the waters, and now they were up to his loins, suggesting the complete control of every fleshly lust in the power of the Spirit of God. He measured another thousand, and that which had begun as a small stream was a river so that Ezekiel could not pass through, for the waters were risen, waters to swim in. Surely this is to live in the fulness of the Spirit to which every child of God should aspire.

And he said unto me, Son of man, hast thou seen this? Then he brought me, and caused me to return to the bank of the river. Now when I had returned, behold, upon the bank of the river were very many trees on the one side and on the other. Then said he unto me, These waters issue forth toward the eastern region, and shall go down into the Arab ah; and they shall go toward the sea; into the sea shall the waters go which were made to issue forth; and the waters shall be healed. And it shall come to pass, that every living creature which swarmeth, in every place whither the rivers come, shall live; and there shall be a very great multitude of fish; for these waters are come thither, and the waters of the sea shall be healed, and everything shall live whithersoever the river cometh. And it shall come to pass, that fishers shall stand by it: from En-gedi even unto En-eglaim shall be a place for the spreading of nets; their fish shall be after their kinds, as the fish of the great sea, exceeding many. But the miry places thereof, and the marshes thereof, shall not be healed; they shall be given up to salt. And by the river upon the bank thereof, on this side and on that side, shall grow every tree for food, whose leaf shall not wither, neither shall the fruit thereof fail: it shall bring forth new fruit every month, because the waters thereof issue out of the sanctuary; and the fruit thereof shall be for food, and the leaf thereof for healing-vers. 6-12.

Having brought the prophet back in vision to the bank of the river, the guide bade him to consider what he had seen and experienced. Then as Ezekiel continued to gaze he saw that upon the bank of the river many trees appeared on both sides. The guide explained that these waters issued forth toward the eastern region and should go down unto the Arabah-that is, the plain of the Jordan, and thence on to the Dead Sea-that sea which for four millennia has become more and more salty as time has gone by, and yet ever receiving millions of gallons of fresh water from the Jordan; but because of no outlet its brininess has increased rather than diminished, so that no fish can live in it. But as Ezekiel looked he saw that when the waters of this river poured into the sea they brought life and healing; a multitude of living things swarmed into the sea and great schools of fish were seen where before there had been only death and desolation, and all this because these waters are come thither. We are told that, everything shall live whithersoever the river cometh; and because of this fishers shall stand by it, from the north and to the southern extremity of what had been a sea of death, spreading their nets, taking fish of every kind, furnishing abundant food for untold thousands of people. The miry places and the marshes were not to be healed but given up to salt. This is not yet the eternal condition; it speaks of millennial blessing, for salt tells of the preservative power of righteousness. Not until the eternal state do we read, There was no more sea.

The beauty of the picture stirs the heart as we read of trees for food whose leaf shall not wither, neither shall the fruit thereof fail. It shall bring forth new fruit every month, as in the case of the tree of life as seen in the Apocalypse. Who can measure the blessing that will come to this world and to mankind as a whole because of the stream of testimony that shall yet flow forth from the throne of Jehovah, when set up on earth!

The remaining part of the chapter might have been better linked with chapter 48 to which it is really an introduction.

Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: This shall be the border, whereby ye shall divide the land for inheritance according to the twelve tribes of Israel: Joseph shall have two portions. And ye shall inherit it, one as well as another; for I sware to give it unto your fathers: and this land shall fall unto you for inheritance. And this shall be the border of the land: On the north side, from the great sea, by the way of Hethlon, unto the entrance of Zedad; Hamath, Berothah, Sibraim, which is between the border of Damascus and the border of Hamath; Hazerhatticon, which is by the border of Hauran. And the border from the sea, shall be Hazarenon at the border of Damascus; and on the north northward is the border of Hamath. This is the north side. And the east side, between Hauran and Damascus and Gilead and the land of Israel, shall be the Jordan; from the north border, unto the east sea shall ye measure. This is the east side. And the south side southward shall be from Tamar as far as the waters of Meriboth-kadesh, to the brook of Egypt, unto the great sea. This is the south side southward. And the west side shall be the great sea, from the south border as far as over against the entrance of Hamath. This is the west side. So shall ye divide this land unto you according to the tribes of Israel. And it shall come to pass, that ye shall divide it by lot for an inheritance unto you and to the strangers that sojourn among you, who shall beget children among you; and they shall be unto you as the home-born among the children of Israel; they shall have inheritance with you among the tribes of Israel. And it shall come to pass, that in what tribe the stranger sojourneth, there shall ye give him his inheritance, saith the Lord Jehovah-vers. 13-23.

One can mark out these boundaries by the aid of an Atlas as the pencil moves on from city to city and district to district. It speaks of an enlarged Canaan where there will be abundant room for all who desire to dwell there in millennial days. It is to be divided among the twelve tribes, many of which though lost to mans vision are still known to God; but the strangers will be welcomed and will be permitted to share in the inheritance which God is to give to Israel in that day.

Fuente: Commentaries on the New Testament and Prophets

Eze 47:9

We take the holy waters mentioned in the text to be the emblems of that wondrous scheme of mercy, perfected by the atonement of Christ, made vital by the Ever-present Spirit, and adapted to the salvation of the world.

I. Notice the source of the waters. There is said to have been a very copious fountain on the west side of Jerusalem. The prudent Hezekiah, foreseeing that in a time of siege, an enemy might cut off its streams, conducted them by a secret aqueduct into the city. It may be, that there was some subtle connection of thought between this fountain and the vision which floated before the senses of Ezekiel, as there was a stream from this same fountain into the temple, and from the foundations of the holy house the holy waters sprang. Be this as it may, the truth is significantly told, that while through the temple come to us the tidings of our peace, the blessing itself does not originate there, but is conveyed to it from a source invisible and afar.

II. Notice the progress of the waters, thus flowing from the foundations of the temple. In the context the progress of these waters is said to have been gradual and constant. And this is only a description of the progress of the Gospel of Christ. There are two thoughts suggested by this gradual and constant progress of the Gospel. The first encourages our faith; the second reminds us of our responsibility.

III. Notice the efficacy of these waters. The places to which they flowed are striking. They did not wend their course to spots that were only slightly defective and easily healed. They flowed “into the desert and into the sea”-“into the desert” amidst whose endless sands no streams had flowed before; “into the sea,” the Dead Sea in whose sad and sluggish waters nothing which had breath could live. Thus their mission was both to supply that which was lacking, and to cleanse that which was impure. And this is true of the Gospel of Christ. There is no desert of worldiness which the Gospel cannot turn into a garden; there is no Dead Sea of error which the Gospel cannot purge of its pollution, and change into a receptacle of life.

W. Morley Punshon, Sermons, 2nd series, p. 155.

Eze 47:9

Notice:-

I. The spring of this life-giving river. It had its spring out of sight; the fountain head was invisible, but it proceeded out of the sanctuary of God. Its waters flowed by the altar of sacrifice; they touched it; they crossed its shadow; they got permission, as it were, to go on their way from the altar. How pointedly this tells of the Holy Spirit, the river of the water of eternal life, proceeding out of the throne of God! It is God’s own essence, communicated to us men over the cross of Jesus, for His name’s sake.

II. The size of the river. In its growing tide we have symbolised the gift of the Holy Spirit (1) to the patriarchs; (2) to the pious Israelites, such as Joshua and Caleb and the seven thousand who had not bowed the knee to the image of Baal, and especially to the prophets: (3) during the ministry of Christ; (4) on the Day of Pentecost.

III. The service of the river. “Everything shall live whither the river cometh.” It shall come into hearts hard as the nether millstone, and soften them; unto families poor as beggars, and enrich them; unto neighbourhoods that have been desert, and cause them to rejoice and blossom as the rose; unto natures which have been unprofitable, and make them plenteously to bring forth the fruit of good works.

J. Bolton, Family Treasury, Dec. 1863, p. 307.

Consider:-

I. The bearing of the Gospel on men’s social condition. (1) It is capable of the clearest proof that Christianity is the only thing that has given purity and loveliness to the household. The Lord Jesus has revolutionised, if not created, family life. (2) The religion of Jesus has promoted kindness between man and man.

II. Consider the influence of the Gospel upon civil liberty. The Bible contains no treatise on civil government, but its principles lay the axe to the root of every form of despotism. Jesus has taught us not only to assert freedom of conscience for ourselves, but to respect and defend its exercise by others.

III. Look at the department of literature, and you will see how, when the river of the Gospel has flowed into a nation, it has quickened that also into richer growth. Avowedly religious writers, of course, have been indebted to it for their all; but even those who have had no directly spiritual aim have been largely beholden to its quickening power.

IV. Look at the influence of Christianity upon science. Physical sciences have made the greatest progress in countries where Protestant Christianity has taken the strongest hold. In standing up for liberty of conscience and of opinion for themselves, the witnesses for religious truth have won also for science the right to hold and teach its own deductions and beliefs. The Gospel teaches men to follow truth at every hazard, and every new triumph of science will in the end give a new impulse to spiritual religion.

V. From the day when Paul was carried in a corn-ship from Malta to Puteoli, commerce and Christianity have been mutual helpers. Sometimes the trader has gone before the missionary, but wherever the missionary has settled and succeeded, he has by his very success given an impulse to commerce.

W. M. Taylor, Christian World Pulpit, vol. x., p. 273.

References: Eze 47:9.-W. Guest. Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiii., p. 184. Eze 47:11.-Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Ecclesiastes to Malachi, p. 294. Eze 47:12.-J. G. Rogers, Christian World Pulpit, vol. ix., p. 120, and vol. xxix., p. 168; J. P. Gledstone, Ibid., vol. xix., p. 327. Eze 48:35.-J. Keble, Sermons for Various Occasions, p. 256.

Fuente: The Sermon Bible

III. THE VISION CONCERNING THE LAND (47-48)

CHAPTER 4 7

1. The waters of healing from the temple (Eze 47:1-12)

2. Borders of the land (Eze 47:13-21)

3. Concerning the stranger in the land (Eze 47:22-23)

Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)

the door: Eze 41:2, Eze 41:23-26

waters issued: Solomon’s temple and the second temple were doubtless well supplied with water, probably conveyed there by means of pipes; but these waters flowed from the temple, not as a common sewer, but as a fertilizing river. A fountain producing abundance of water was not in the temple, and could not be there on the top of such a hill; and consequently these waters, as well as those spoken of by Joel and Zechariah, must be understood figuratively and typically. These waters doubtless were an emblem of the “gospel preached with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven;” and their gradual rise beautifully represents it progress, from small beginnings to an immensely large increase; and the latter part of the representation may relate to the times when it shall fill the earth, and produce the most extensive and important effects on the state of making in every nation. Psa 46:4, Isa 30:25, Isa 55:1, Jer 2:13, Joe 3:18, Zec 13:1, Zec 14:8, Joh 7:37-39, Rev 22:1, Rev 22:17

from under the threshold: Eze 47:12, Isa 2:3

Reciprocal: Jos 2:5 – of shutting 2Ki 5:12 – better 2Ki 5:14 – went he down Psa 110:2 – out Isa 35:6 – for Isa 41:18 – General Isa 51:5 – my salvation Eze 40:6 – threshold Mic 5:7 – as a dew Zec 14:4 – half of the Mat 13:32 – the least Luk 13:19 – and it Joh 4:10 – living Joh 7:38 – out Rev 22:2 – the midst

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

THE RIVER OF LIFE

Eze 47:1-11

To Ezekiel the river meant the blessings of Messiahs reign. The last page of the Apocalypse tells of the river of water of life that proceeds from the throne of God and of the Lamb. We have fuller knowledge of Ezekiels vision than he had.

I. The first point to note is the source of the river.It flowed out from beneath the Temple gate. It is from His presence that all blessings for a thirsty, sin-blasted humanity are to flow. We can take a further, wonderful step than Ezekiel, and see that God is not only the source of all good, but is Himself the true and only Good. The river is not only the blessings, whether material or spiritual, which God in Christ gives, but it is Himself imparted to and dwelling in us. Jesus spoke of rivers of living water, and St. John comments: This spake He of the Spirit which they that believe on Him should receive. As truly as a river must flow, so truly is it Gods nature to communicate Himself.

II. We note, next, the rapid deepening of the stream.A thousand cubits is about fifteen hundred feet. At that distance from the point of issue it was up to the ankles; by the second thousand it was to the knees; by the third, to the loins; by the fourth, it was too deep and broad to be forded. And no tributaries had fallen into it to account for the increase. The river was self-fed, and grew as it flowed, because the mighty energy within the Temple pulsed more strongly the longer it continuedfit type of that unwearying impulse of love which communicates Himself to men and is its own motive; fit type of the inexhaustible fullness which gives and still is full, and for ever operates unspent. The blessings which Christ gives increase by reception and use. The growth of the Christian life should be, and so far as Jesus is received will be, continuous and swift. If our Christian life is as shallow and with as little weight in it to-day as long years ago, the fault is ours. Alas! that so many should resemble rather the streams in Tartary, that creep shallowly and languidly through a few miles, and then dry up in the thirsty sands, evaporated by fierce heat. Ezekiel thought that the river would run quick, and deepen visibly as it ran. What would he have said if he had been told that, nineteen centuries after Messiah had come, the majority of mankind would never have heard of Him? Is the Spirit of the Lord straitened? Are these His doings?

III. Next, we have the effects of the river described in lovely imagery, tinged with local colour.Every one knows that in Palestine, as in all countries as near the equator, water will turn desert into garden. And so Ezekiel was but lifting familiar physical facts into a higher region when he saw that whithersoever the river cometh there comes fertility along both banks of every wady in the sun-stricken wilderness where tamarisks and other vegetation thrive, and the traveller steps down out of the scorching heat and brown desolation into cool green shadow, and treads on grass. But the river brings with it other forms of lifea very great multitude of fish. And that, too, is true to Nature, for travellers tell us how, when the rain comes, depressions in the ground that had been baked clay for months swarm with aquatic life. But the river does more than that, for it fills the Dead Sea, where few creatures live, with fish as many and great as in the Mediterranean itself. It heals the heavy, sulphurous waters, and they are filled with living things.

The river brings life. In the highest sense of the word, life that is true. For it is only they in whom Christ lives that truly live at all. Physical vitality, and even vigorous mental activity, may exist, and their possessor be, in the view of God, dead while he liveth.

Everything shall live whithersover the river comethlet the quickening effects of the entrance of the Gospel into the Dead Sea of stagnant and rotting heathendom be our comment on that jubilant prophecy. Similarly, the river brings fertility. Trees overhang it, and their roots draw up the vivifying treasure; therefore their leaves know no autumn decay, and they bear fruit every month. Everything needed for sustenance and for cleansing springs up where the river of God flows.

IV. But there is one sullen, unreceptive spot even in the prophets vision.There are miry places and marshes lying close by the healed waters, still glistening white, like the alkali plains, with the caked salt on their surface, a ghastly contrast to the lush fertility around and the sweet waters in the sea. So long as mans will is free, some will refuse the sparkling benediction, and the sad old record will have to be repeatedsome believed and some believed not. It is of no avail that we have lived on the rivers bank as we do unless we have obeyed the invitation of Him Who is Himself, in a very profound sense, the RiverCome unto Me and drink. We may perish with thirst within hearing of the lap of its ripples and be given over to salt, though within arms length of what would heal and vivify and refertilise us.

Illustrations

(1) This chapter must have been in our Saviours mind when He spoke of the rivers of water which should flow from the believing soul. As the Scripture hath said, perhaps refers to this portion of Scripture. It is therefore to be interpreted primarily of the influence of the restored people of God, when from Jerusalem shall issue those streams of blessing and saving power which shall influence the entire world of humanity. What shall the restoring of Israel be but life from the dead for the teeming myriads of the globe? Surely the chosen people are now learning the languages of all the world, that some day they may speak them as the missionaries of the Cross. But if this is the primary significance of the word, it is equally clear from our Saviours quotation that each individual who receives the gift of Pentecost may see a reflection of the possibilities of his own life.

(2) Ezekiels vision of Messianic times is singularly different from that of the second part of Isaiah, with its grand poetic imagery. Instead of lofty eloquence and sublime figure, we have prosaic details, like an architects specifications of the measurements of the Temple, and a land surveyors report of the extent of territory. Milton and Defoe are not more unlike in the quality of their imagination than these two prophets. But the substance of their visions is the same.

(SECOND OUTLINE)

EZEKIELS VISION

I. Ezekiels vision describes the blessings which would come to the world through the Lords dwelling with His people.While the primary reference is to the restoration of the Jewish people, it is in Christianity that the full beauty is realised. It is interesting to trace through the Scriptures the figure of water as a symbol of spiritual blessing. In the beginning of Genesis we have mans first home pictured as a garden. There was a river that watered the garden, and flowed thence in four streams to carry the blessing out into the world. In the garden were all kinds of trees, bearing their fruits in their season. We know the sad story of the ruin which came upon this fair garden life. Man was driven out into an inhospitable world, amid briers and thorns. Sin always brings curseit makes deserts out of gardens.

II. It is not a mere literary accident that in the last chapter of the Bible we find another picture wondrously like that of Eden.We see here a pure river of the water of life, pouring out from under the throne of God and of the Lamb. Again we see the garden beautyon the banks of the river the tree of life bearing twelve manner of fruits and yielding fruit every month. Thus the circle is complete. This illustrates the work of redemption in this worldbringing men back again to the lost paradise. Between the lost Eden and the restored paradise stands the Cross of Christ, the symbol of redemption.

III. From the Cross and broken grave poured forth a river of the water of life.Into all the world it flowed, carrying on its streams fertility, fruit, beauty, and good.

That is what our subject pictures. From under the throne of God the waters pour. Deeper and wider do the streams grow as they roll on until they are rivers to swim in. On the banks fruit trees grow. Into the desert the waters are carried. They even heal and sweeten the bitterness of the Dead Sea.

Illustrations

(1) There is a beautiful legend of the Valley of Chambra, which illustrates the origin of the river of the water of life. The valley is supplied with water from a great spring which bursts out on the hillside. The people tell this story of the origin of the spring: Once, long ago, the valley suffered from a great drought. Every tree, plant, and flower withered, and the people were famishing with thirst. Appeal was made to the oracle, and they were told that if the Princess Rene would give her life as a sacrifice, water would issue from her grave. Her answer was, I am ready. She was buried alive, and from her grave there burst out a spring like a river in volume. Its waters poured down into the valley, carrying drink to man and beast and bird, and refreshing to the root of every tree, plant, and flower. This is only a heathen legend, but it is a beautiful parable of the work of Jesus Christ.

(2) There is an oriental legend of a fountain with this marvellous qualitythat wherever even a few drops only of its water fell a new spring burst up. A traveller had only to carry some of this water with him, and he could traverse any desert, causing a new fountain to open wherever he wished it.

(3) The scene of the vision was the Temple hill. The waters represented the blessings of religion. The Temple was a type of the Incarnation. God dwelt in the holy of holies, in the Shekinah. By and by Jesus came, the Son of God, and then God dwelt in Him, not a symbol merely of the Divine glory in the dark room, but God Himself in a perfect human life. We know what rivers of blessing have flowed forth from Jesus Christ. Think of the influence of His words. Wherever they have gone they have carried life, strength, cheer, and comfort. They have told the story of the love and mercy of God in all lands, and have made millions of lives richer and better. Think of the influence of the life of Christ. He lived His short years as no other man had lived before. There was no sin in Him. It was really God living among men, the Divine truth, purity, righteousness, and love lived out in common human ways. There was love in the world beforemother-love, friend-love, but never such love as was seen in Jesus. He loved His enemies. He had no resentments, no bitterness in His heart. The more he was wronged the sweeter was His spirit. No one before had ever cared much for the poor, for broken lives, or for the fallen; Jesus showed a deep and sincere interest in all these classes. He had compassion upon the ignorant and those who were out of the way. Thus He lived out the love of God in a world where love was intensely hungered for. At last He made loves supreme sacrifice, giving His life. Ever since that day the influence of Christs life has been flowing over the world like a river broad and deep.

Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary

Eze 47:1-2. The entire book of Ezekiel was written after he was taken to Babylon at the time of Jehoiachins captivity. The first half of the book consists to a great extent of chastisement of Israel for the many corruptions committed by the nation. The next half is an extended prediction of the release of Israel from Babylonian captivity and the rebuilding and restitution of the ordinances of the Lord that will have gone down in national ruins. The whole document ia a mingling of literal and figurative passages and intended to encourage the unfortunate people not to lose heart because of their sad state of affairs. Many popular commentators think that the last chapters are a prediction of things to come in the age after the judgment day. Evidently this is because of the similarity of the figures used to the ones in Revelation 21, 22. There is a striking resemblance between the figures hut that Is because all of the grand provisions of God for the children of men require the finest of pictures to represent them to the human understanding. As to how far the following portions of this book should be regarded In tlie light of the present or the eternal ages, I now insist that the reader again consult the ket at the beginning of chapter 40, The present verse begins the ideal picture with the waters that issued from the house of the Lord. I do not understand that any special significance is to be attached to the directions of the flow of these waters, because so many directions and places are mentioned. It would Indicate the general greatness of the favor of God whatever that is.

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

Section 6 (Eze 47:1-12).

The victory over curse

Brought back to the door of the House the prophet sees waters issue from under its threshold. They flow from the House on the right side, that is, the south, because the prophet stands facing east, or looking toward the altar, so that the south is on his right hand. On the south of the altar he sees the stream flowing eastward. The two east gates being closed he is brought out of the north gate, and led around outside the wall of the outer court to the east gate, and there the water was flowing out on the right side.

The stream is then four times measured at successive points of 1,000 cubits, so that at 4,000 cubits the depth was too great for a man to pass through.

The prophet now traverses the banks of this river, and finds both banks clothed with a luxuriant growth of trees of fadeless leaf and never-failing fruit, supplying medicine and food.

The easterly direction is again noticed (ver. 8), and in addition Ezekiel is told that the river flows into the Dead Sea, healing its waters so that they teem with life, for “everything shall live whither the river cometh.” Its waters are waters of life issuing from the Sanctuary of the living God. Only the marshes and pools are not healed; they are reserved as a means of supplying salt.

This whole picture is one that inspires the mind and heart with, the bright anticipation of that blessedness of life which will characterize the Millennial earth. Then creation will bear witness to the power and glory of God in a way man has never known since the fall. But let us range a little through the fields of Scripture, for the lesson of these life-giving waters. This symbol of the river meets us at the beginning in the Garden, and we find it again in the glory-scene which closes the inspired volume. Between these far distant points the references are numerous, teaching us lessons of blessing from God and fellowship with Him.

We go to Eden. There are its four rivers. It will repay us, however to consider a little the whole setting of the wonderful second chapter of Genesis. It furnishes us with features of the Millennial age, which, as the porch to the House, introduces the eternal state, but which being this bears the character of that to which it thus belongs. These visions of Ezekiel, if not giving us the seventh day in the dispensational order, certainly refer to the sixth, and that leads into the sabbath-keeping which remains to the people of God. In the order of creation the sixth day has witnessed the completion of God’s work. Suitably it closes with the Head of all set in the place of Lordship over the new scene of blessing. In this we have a type of our blessed Lord, God’s Man, to whom all has been subjected, and who will bring all into subjection to Himself. In beautiful sequence to this the seventh day comes in -the day of God’s rest. The eternal rest will result from the work of subjugation accomplished by the Second Man, and so He is called “the Father of Eternity” (Isa 9:6, New Trans.). Of that final rest this first sabbath of the re-fashioned, re-furnished earth is a type. Notice that from this day is omitted the formula constantly repeated on the previous days, “Evening was, and morning was.” Is it not as though God would have us understand that in His thought this day should have no end? Blessed be God, that final day will endure eternally. Precious, too, it is to note that on this day God is not occupied with work, or the work done, but with the day. He blesses it, and sanctifies it. Blessed intimation that the eternal day shall have the blessing of God resting upon it with no element of disturbance to intrude.

Three things are mentioned. First, God ended His work -the dawning of the seventh day brought with it the end of His labor. Second, God rested; this is what the day brought in for Him -rest. Third, God blessed and sanctified it. The blessing of the day can alone consist in the delight and satisfaction of God concerning the accomplished work which thus makes rest possible. It is sanctified, in that it is set apart to the enjoyment of this delight and satisfaction. Who shall say what the men sure of these things is to be in that sabbath-keeping of God into which His people shall enter with Him?

Apart from redemption we know man could never enter into and enjoy God’s rest. This finds illustration in Israel, who as the one nation brought into relation to God on the ground of redemption, is commanded to observe the seventh day -the sabbath, the observance of which is associated with the thought of redemption as typified in the sacrificial system, and by means of priesthood-relation between God and the redeemed. All this finds its fulfilment, both as to redemption and priesthood, in the Lord Jesus. Thus the true and final rest of God, of which Israel’s sabbath was a type, is now sure of fulfilment, and secured for God’s redeemed people.

A new subject begins in ver. 4 of Gen 2:1-25, that of the relationships in which the new head of creation is placed, in all of which we see him to be a figure of Christ. We see Him here as Heir of all and Ruler over all, with His consort, the Church, of whom the woman is a type; yet may we not also see here a picture of the Son of Man and His kingdom? Following what is plainly introductory, showing how God has acted in view of man, we get the account of the garden -its location and planting, then the river and its parts (of special interest to us now); and finally man’s place, service and privileges in the garden. Many details might profitably engage our attention, but we must confine ourselves to noting that the garden is located “eastward in Eden.” Eden means delight; and the east suggests the glory of God. Here too is “every tree pleasant to the sight and good for food” -fullest ministry to satisfy and refresh. In the midst of this the river and its four branches fill an important place. Does it not suggest the ministry of the Spirit from whom alone rivers of living water can flow, and that in a universal character, for all the creation (the four parts), such as shall mark that day to which this whole scene points, including that of Ezekiel’s vision, as we have seen? Indeed, Israel can look forward to blessings of the Spirit such as never yet enjoyed. God will put His Spirit within them (Eze 36:27), and pour it out upon them collectively (Isa 44:3), when their time of trial and desolation is over (Isa 32:15), never to return (Eze 39:29). Nor will this blessing be confined to Israel, as Joel plainly predicts, telling us also the time when the outpouring of the Spirit will take place. It will be after God has interposed on behalf of His people, overthrowing the aggressive power of the north, and restoring its fruitfulness to the land. If Eden’s rivers then speak of the Spirit and His ministry, let us see what we may learn from a study of them. Should they not teach us the character of His ministry? That we know has for its subject Christ and His things, so this is what comes before us.

Pison, “increase,” is first; it compasses the land of Havilah, “anguish,” or “travail,” where the gold is which is good. Gold is the symbol of God’s glory. Increase for eternity has been accomplished by Christ through the encompassment of the land of anguish -the birth-pains of the new creation of which He is the Beginning. There, nevertheless, has been found in all its wealth the glory of God. And if faith now can say, “And the gold of that land is good,” how much more in the eternal day! It is added, “There is bdellium and the onyx-stone.” The Hebrew word for bdellium means “in trouble,” and that for onyx-stone, “their recompense.” Here perchance we get a hint of faith’s connection with the sufferings of Christ and the glories which follow. It is given to those who find their increase through the anguish of Christ, not only to believe but to suffer for Him; but to suffer leads to being glorified with Him, and so there is both the trouble and the recompense. Both of them bring us in their way into a knowledge of the glory of God.

The second Edenic river is Gihon, “the bringer-forth.” It surrounds the whole land of Cush, “terror,” or “black.” Christ is our Deliverer from the land of our terror and blackness. God in His mercy thus brings out of darkness into marvelous light. If in the first river we read the lesson of the cross from the Godward side -God glorified in Christ -here in the second the enemy is in view. But he is a smitten enemy, all his power has been encompassed, he is annulled, captivity led captive, and now nothing can separate God’s redeemed people from His love in Christ Jesus, their Bringer-forth. Thus we can speak of being delivered from the authority of darkness and translated into the kingdom of the Son of His love. To this end Christ first entered the land of terror and blackness, and came forth as the firstborn from among the dead. Those who believe share in His triumph.

Hiddekel, the third, means “thorn of God.” It “goeth in front of Assyria,” “a footstep,” or “to go forward,” and in front lies the thorn of God -the thorn is the significant sign of the curse, which God Himself must bring in because of sin. How man in his every forward move as independent of God, following the inclination of his own will, guided by his own wisdom, meets with the thorn in such a path. Blight falls in some form upon even his greatest and highest achievements, for close by the gourd under which he seeks rest and in which he greatly rejoices, there is the worm which causes it to wither. Then the sultry east wind blows, and man faints. The thorn of God is there. To this creation is subject, and groans. But, thank God, there is deliverance. There is One who has worn the crown of thorn, but who is now crowned with glory and honor. Into His hand all power and judgment has been committed. He has made peace by the blood of the cross. He will remove the blight of sin from creation, and as the Sun of Righteousness chase away all the shadows of its long night, and under His wings of healing grace and power gather all things together in one. Viewing the lesson here from another angle, we may say that because sin and man’s ruin brought in the curse, it must be borne, the judgment involved be fully endured, if God’s purposes are to go forward to ultimate success. Christ has accomplished the needed work and all is assured. Then it is no wonder that in the fourth place we have Euphrates, “fruitfulness.” This is the grand result which shall be made good throughout the length and breadth of the universe.

Are not the features of this picture again before us in Ezekiel? From the house filled with God’s glory the river flows out, past the altar of sacrifice where the work of judgment has been accomplished, down to the sea of death, removing its curse, bringing fruitfulness and life where barrenness and death had reigned, for the Deliverer has come out of Zion, and creation sings its Hallelujah. At 4,000 cubits the waters are to swim in -4x10x10x10, the creature brought into the power and blessing of the full manifestation of the divine order as it relates to God and man (the threefold ten).*

{*In the concluding section of Gen 2:1-25, do we not get a type of all the redeemed creation ranged under the headship of Christ? First we have the counsel of God (ver. 18), then all the animal creation is brought to Adam and he gives them their names. All creation comes into relation to its head, Adam, the figure of Him who was to come, God’s Man, the appointed Heir of all things, and the One who as Last Adam is set far above all principality and power and every name named. Notice there are three families mentioned; the cattle, the fowl of the heaven, and the beast of the field. May not this speak to us first of Israel, of whom in the prophets, the domesticated animal is the type; then of heavenly powers; and finally the Gentile nations, of whom the beasts of the field are used in a typical way in Scripture. Lastly we have the man’s special helpmeet, suggesting the Church, the Bride of Christ.}

These suggestions may help us to see how important a place the rivers fill in instruction as to the blessings of God. But let us go on. We read of the Israelites after the Red Sea crossing, “They came to Elim; and twelve springs of water were there, and severity palm trees; and they encamped there by the waters.” By the way we must pass the bitter waters of Marah -sorrow and trial which the cut down tree cast in makes sweet, but rest is found at Elim where the waters flow, bringing forth abundant fruit and shade realized under the government of God (12=4×3), fully manifest in creative goodness meeting creature weakness, which as realized and bringing us into dependence upon God assures the creature’s fullest blessing. Again in this we have the testimony (2) given to God’s mastery over evil, the victory of good (6), through His manifest power to bless (12=6×2). Such waters are sweet and unfailing in the joy and provision they supply.

Twice the waters flow from the smitten rock, bringing life and refreshment to Israel’s host. On the first occasion the lesson is plainly that of the Cross, by which alone all spiritual blessing is realized. The second time when Moses was told to take the rod of Aaron that budded and speak to the rock, we get a beautiful type of the resources of Christ in resurrection priesthood, through the exercise of which the living waters flow -flow, as we may say, from the throne upon which He sits. No second smiting was needed. In this Moses erred. The one Sacrifice suffices, and in the power of its abiding efficacy, and of life out of death, the waters now flow down from the Sanctuary where He is enthroned. These are still waters beside which He leads, and where the green pastures of blessed ministry and fellowship are found for those who know the Lord to be their Shepherd. Ho will be so known to Israel, and among the nations in that day to which Ezekiel refers.

Then as the Shepherd of Israel He will feed His flock (Isa 40:11 : Eze 37:24), for they will no longer refuse “the waters of Shiloah which flow softly” (Isa 8:6). Of that day no more beautiful description than that of Isa 35:1-10 could be given. “The wilderness and the dry land shall be gladdened; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. . . for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and torrents in the desert” (“plain,” or Arabah, the same word as in Eze 47:8). It is then that “judgment shall roll down as waters, and righteousness as an overflowing stream” (Amo 5:24). Jerusalem shall be a quiet habitation, for there “the mighty Jehovah will be for us a place of rivers” (Isa 33:21, New Trans.).

These and other passages in the prophets show how the symbol of water is used to express the fulness of blessing and fellowship with God. It is also used of God Himself. Jehovah charges His people with having forsaken Him, “the fountain of living waters” (Jer 13:1-27; Jer 17:13). And the figure in this connection finds beautiful application in the words of the prophet, “Blessed is the man that confideth in Jehovah, and whose confidence Jehovah is. For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out its roots by the stream, and he shall not see when heat cometh, but his leaf shall be green; and in the year of drought he shall not be careful, neither shall he cease to yield fruit” (Jer 17:7-8).

In relation to the blessing and glory of the days toward which Ezekiel looks we read, “The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall shepherd them, and shall lead them to fountains of waters of life, and God shall wipe away every tear from their eyes” (Rev 7:17; Rev 21:6; see Notes). Indeed the last passage mentioned gives almost the last gospel invitation in the Book of God, and this may well remind us of how this figure of living water is used to express the precious fulness and permanence of God’s grace in His Son (Joh 4:1-54), while he who receives from His hand this gift of God becomes a vessel from which shall flow “rivers of living water.” “This He said concerning the Spirit, which they that believe on Him were about to receive” (Joh 7:37-39). Thus we have life from God in the blessed fulness of His grace and in the power of the Holy Spirit presented to us under this figure of water. Truly, it issues out of the Sanctuary, yea, it is the outflow of God, of Christ, of the Spirit. These divine Persons are the Fountains from whence such waters flow, and of whose very being they partake bringing the recipient into the fulness of God. However true it is that only the blessing and glory of Christianity, and so of what is heavenly, fully express the preciousness of this figure, it is also true that the coming age of earth’s jubilee will enjoy, in the divinely granted measure, like blessing and fellowship in the power of the Spirit and His ministry as then poured out (Joe 2:28-29; Isa 44:3; Eze 18:31; Eze 37:1; Eze 37:14; Eze 39:29).

We must not forget that water is also a figure of the Word of God. So the Lord uses it in Joh 3:1-36 (see Notes, pp. 492 -494), in Joh 13:1-38, where it is indispensable for communion. In the laver of the Tabernacle we read the lesson of its important relation to all priestly activity (Exodus, Notes, p. 240).

This general testimony of Scripture helps us to see the significance and importance of the river which flows from the Sanctuary in Ezekiel’s vision. These thoughts find confirmation as we consider the results of it reaching the Dead Sea -figure as that is of utter barrenness, death, and judgment. The inflow of these living waters so changes all, that life and fruitfulness fill the place of curse and death. Only the stream flowing out from the glory of God, by way of the altar of sacrifice, can transform the wilderness into a garden, overcoming the havoc wrought by sin. Within the limits of the purpose of God “there is nothing -nothing too sunken, too useless, too doomed -but by the grace of God it may be redeemed, lifted and made rich with life.” The chief of sinners has been saved, and he is now in glory. Certainly Israel, new-born and blessed with the outflowing stream of life in the Spirit’s power will be as different in her moral and spiritual condition from that’ of her past history as will be the future physical change of the Dead Sea and its surroundings compared with that of its present existing state.*

{*See Appendix.}

Yet the past must be remembered, the work of judgment must not be forgotten: and this will serve its own purpose. “But its marshes and its pools shall not be healed; they shall be given up to salt” -the witness of the inflexible righteousness and Changeless holiness of the divine nature, acting in both preservative and sanctifying power. Doubtless from this source of supply will come, as of old, the salt used in the temple service.* God’s grace is seasoned with salt -the preservative energy of the divine will.

{*”The salt of the Dead Sea was anciently much in request for use in the temple service. It was preferred before all other kinds for its reputed effect in hastening the combustion of the sacrifice, while it diminished the unpleasant smell of the burning flesh. Its deliquescent character (due to the chlorides of alkaline earths it contains) is also noticed in the Talmud” -(Smith’s Bible Dictionary).}

Fuente: Grant’s Numerical Bible Notes and Commentary

Eze 47:1. He brought me again to the door of the house The door of the temple, described Eze 41:2. And behold, waters issued from under the threshold eastward Ezekiel had repeatedly walked round the house, and had surveyed the doors of it, but had not discovered this stream of water springing from under its threshold till now. Thus God makes known his mind and will to his people, not all at once, but by degrees. Dr. Lightfoot tells us, that there was a large quantity of water conveyed in pipes under ground from the fountain of Etam, for the uses of the temple; and some commentators seem disposed to interpret this part of Ezekiels vision, of that water. Others think he only alludes to it, or draws his similitude from it, but is to be mystically understood. Whether he allude to any such conduit, or stream of water, or not, that the waters here spoken of are to be understood mystically, will hardly be doubted by any that consider what is stated concerning their direction and course, their continual increase, and salubrious effects; circumstances all utterly inapplicable to the water said to be brought in pipes for the uses of the temple. The fore-front of the house stood toward the east, and the waters came down from under the right side of the house, and proceeded eastward They did not therefore come to the temple, as if intended for the purposes of washing the sacrifices, carrying off the filth, and keeping every part clean and wholesome; but they issued from it, and proceeded to refresh and fertilize other places. The prophecy of Zec 14:8, that living waters should go forth from Jerusalem, half of them toward the former sea, and half toward the hinder sea; and St. Johns vision (Rev 22:1) of a pure river of water of life, proceeding out of the throne of God and the Lamb, elucidate this part of Ezekiels vision, and direct us in the application of it. It is undoubtedly to be understood of the gospel of Christ, which went forth from Jerusalem, and spread itself into the countries around; and of the gifts and graces of the Holy Ghost which accompanied it, and by virtue of which it diffused its influence far and wide, and produced the most blessed effects. Thus Isaiah foretold that out of Zion should go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem, Isa 2:3. At Jerusalem it was that the Spirit was poured out upon the apostles, enduing them with the gift of tongues, that they might carry these waters to all nations; and in the temple first they stood and preached the words of this life. But this temple of Ezekiel was not so much designed to be an emblem of the material temple, built after the return of the Jews from Babylon, or of the Jewish Church, which had its principal seat there, as of the Christian Church, the temple built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, of which Jesus Christ is at once the foundation and chief corner-stone; nay, and also its threshold and door of entrance: and from him springs the well, and from him proceed the rivers of living water, which refresh and comfort the souls of true believers, and render them fruitful to the praise and glory of God: see Joh 4:10; Joh 4:14; Joh 7:38-39. Through these waters, the places, which had before been a mere wilderness, are made like Eden; and what had been a dry and barren desert, becomes like the garden of the Lord; joy and gladness are found therein, thanksgiving and the voice of melody, Isa 51:3; Isa 30:25, where see the notes.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Eze 47:16. Hamath, a city commanding the passage of mount Lebanon, and the north-west boundary of the Israelites. 1Ch 13:5.

REFLECTIONS.

The jews rejoiced more when they poured water on the sacrifices, than when they poured wine; because water designated the Holy Spirit in all his plenitude of grace. We now come to the richer sources of the sanctuary of God, to sources of glory and beauty to the saints, and of life and verdure to the barrenest parts of the earth. The sanctuary and city of the jews, with the division of their land, is here taken both literally and spiritually; and spiritually we must take this fountain, though it is sincerely believed that God will work many marvellous changes in nature for the good of man in the glory of the latter day. There was however no such river opened when Ezra presided over the people, and no gentile had then a lot among the Israelites, as in Eze 47:22. Ezra expelled the sons of the priests, because they could not prove their legitimate descent: Ezr 2:62; Ezr 2:64. Our Saviour seems most evidently to allude to those waters when he says, that a river of living water should flow from the belly of every believer. Joh 7:38-39. Every believer is the temple of the living God, and grace opens the fountain of life in his soul. Our Saviour likewise assured the woman of Samaria that he could give her living water. Joh 4:10.

We may here remark, that this river proceeded from the foundation of the house; it burst out at the threshold, and also at the sides, and circumscribed the altar as an island. St. John also was shown the river of the water of life, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. Here the Holy Spirit, in all the manifold operations of justifying and sanctifying grace, is shadowed forth, as already remarked concerning the river which maketh glad the city of God; to which the reader is referred in the note on Psa 46:4.

This river marvellously encreased. Ezekiel was directed to ford it at regular distances. First, it reached to the ancles; secondly, to the knees; thirdly, to the middle; but when he had reached about a mile and a quarter from the threshold of the temple, the river was no longer fordable: he could swim in the abundant waters. This assuredly marks the rich and overflowing grace which God designs to shed down on the earth in the gospel age, and in the glory of the latter day; and it apprizes believers that they should not remain in a loitering state, trampling the shallow waters of grace; but go on to a deeper baptism of the spirit, till they can swim in the abounding streams of grace. The soul groaning after purity and perfection longs to be filled with the Spirit; yea, plunged in the Godheads deepest sea, and lost in thine immensity.

This river flowed with a constant as well as an encreasing stream. Zechariah remarks, that it was alike in summer and winter: Zec 14:8. The heavenly Zion is as the fountain of the whole earth: it is not subject to periodical droughts and rains, as natural rivers are, but flows with a stream constant as the Fathers love, and copious as redeeming grace. Hence they that are planted in the house of the Lord, shall flourish in the courts of our God: they shall grow and not wither, they shall bring forth fruit in old age.

The virtues of these waters counteracted the bituminous qualities of the sea of Sodom, called the dead sea, because the waters killed the fish. It is not improbable, but some natural changes will take place in the glory of the latter day. When the wickedness of man shall diminish, it is not an improbable conjecture that God will diminish the afflictions of man, will remove many impediments of agriculture, cause the earth to bring forth her full encrease, and make the desert as the garden of the Lord. But of the spiritual waters we ought to speak with more decision. They heal, when flowing with a full torrent, all the bitter waters of the human heart, which are fostered, like Sodom, with pride, idleness, and fulness of bread. They shed a vivifying influence on all around, and make the barrenest heart as the Eden of the Lord. Zechariah on this subject, has enlarged on Ezekiel. He saw the living waters not only flow towards Sodom, but another stream taking a western course to the Mediterranean sea: most happy image of the glorious gospel of the blessed God, going forth in every direction, and richly accompanied with the sanctifying graces of the Holy Spirit, that all nations might be healed of discord, wickedness, and war. This is surely the fountain of life opened from above, and chasing darkness, death and the curse, far away from the earth for a thousand sabbatic years.

These healing and vivifying waters communicated perpetual fertility to an infinitude of trees, which adorned both the shores. As a month is the usual season of any kind of ripe fruits, so these trees, having their nature ranimated, were always budding, blooming, and bearing fruit. No hungry man could come seeking fruit, and finding none. Christ is indeed this tree of life, growing on either side of the river, and also in the city of God. By his leaves, or the adorning of his virtues, our concupiscence is healed; and by the fruit of his redeeming love, our souls are nourished with the health of eternal life. Happy is the age, happy the heart which shall see this paradise opened from above.

Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Ezekiel 47, 48. The Holy Land, its Beauty, Boundaries, and Divisions.

Now that the Temple and its worship, which are indispensable to the welfare of the land, have been described, Ezekiel directs his parting glance to the land itself, introducing his description with a beautiful and suggestive picture, particularly refreshing after the long stretch of minute ceremonial detail, of the life-giving stream that flowed from the heart of the sanctuary. The clearness and keenness with which the prophets imagination is working, comes out in the frequent repetition of the word Behold.

Eze 47:1-12. The River of Life.From under the threshold of the Temple the prophet, led by his supernatural guide, is startled to see water trickling out and flowing past the altar eastwards, growing deeper and stronger as it flows, in the direction of the Dead Sea, into which it finally falls. On the banks of the river were trees both fair and fruitful, which yielded food for the hungry, and healing for the sick; to all the desert region through which it flowed it brought beauty and life, and the life which it brought to the waters of the Dead Sea was abundantly evidenced by the shoals of fish, which recalled the teeming life of the great (Mediterranean) sea. The eyes of the prophets faith can see even the fishermen with their boats and nets, all the way from Engedi on the middle of its western shores to Eneglaim on the north. Only the salt swamps and marshes in the neighbourhood of the sea would remain unaffected, in order that salt in the future might be as abundant as now. This splendid imagination vividly suggests the beneficent and life-giving influences that will stream forth from the Church of God upon the sick and famished souls of a dead and arid world. (In Eze 47:8, into the sea, etc. should read into the salt waters.)

Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible

47:1 Afterward he brought me again to the door of the house; and, behold, {a} waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward: for the front of the house [stood toward] the east, and the waters came down from under from the right side of the house, at the south [side] of the altar.

(a) By which are meant the spiritual graces that would be given to the Church under the kingdom of Christ.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

The temple river 47:1-12

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

Ezekiel’s guide, who appears to have been his original guide in this vision (Eze 47:3), brought him back to the main entrance to the temple proper. Ezekiel saw water flowing to the east from under the temple threshold. It apparently flowed to the south of the stairs on the right side of the temple as one faces east.

The Letter of Aristias, dated about 100 B.C., contains reference to a spring on the temple mount inside the enclosure of the temple area. [Note: Cooke, pp. 517-18.] There may already be a natural water source at this site.

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

RENEWAL AND ALLOTMENT OF THE LAND

Eze 47:1-23; Eze 48:1-35

IN the first part of the forty-seventh chapter the visionary form of the revelation, which had been interrupted by the important series of communications on which we have been so long engaged, is again resumed. The prophet, once more under the direction of his angelic guide, sees a stream of water issuing from the Temple buildings and flowing eastward into the Dead Sea. Afterwards he receives another series of directions relating to the boundaries of the land and its division among the twelve tribes. With this the vision and the book find their appropriate close.

I.

The Temple stream, to which Ezekiels attention is now for the first time directed, is a symbol of the miraculous transformation which the land of Canaan is to undergo in order to fit it for the habitation of Jehovahs ransomed people. Anticipations of a renewal of the face of nature are a common feature of Messianic prophecy. They have their roots in the religious interpretation of the possession of the land as the chief token of the Divine blessing on the nation. In the vicissitudes of agricultural or pastoral life the Israelite read the reflection of Jehovahs attitude towards Himself and His people: fertile seasons and luxuriant harvests were the sign of His favour; drought and famine were the proof that He was offended. Even at the best of times, however, the condition of Palestine left much to be desired from the husbandmans point of view, especially in the kingdom of Judah. Nature was often stern and unpropitious, the cultivation of the soil was always attended with hardship and uncertainty, large tracts of the country were given over to irreclaimable barrenness. There was always a vision of better things possible, and in the last days the prophets cherished the expectation that that vision would be realised. When all causes of offence are removed from Israel and Jehovah smiles on His people, the land will blossom into supernatural fertility, the ploughman overtaking the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that soweth seed, the mountains dropping new wine and the hills melting. {Amo 9:13} Such idyllic pictures of universal plenty and comfort abound in the writings of the prophets, and are not wanting in the pages of Ezekiel. We have already had one in the description of the blessings of the Messianic kingdom; and we shall see that in this closing vision a complete remodelling of the land is presupposed, rendering it all alike suitable for the habitation of the tribes of Israel.

The river of life is the most striking presentation of this general conception of Messianic felicity. It is one of those vivid images from Eastern life which, through the Apocalypse, have passed into the symbolism of Christian eschatology. “And He showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruits every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.” {Rev 22:1-2} So writes the seer of Patmos, in words whose music charms the ear even of those to whom running water means much less than it did to a native of thirsty Palestine. But John had read of the mystic river in the pages of his favourite prophet before he saw it in vision. The close resemblance between the two pictures leaves no doubt that the origin of the conception is to be sought in Ezekiels vision. The underlying religious truth is the same in both representations, that the presence of God is the source from which the influences flow forth that renew and purify human existence. The tree of life on each bank of the river, which yields its fruit every month and whose leaves are for healing, is a detail transferred directly from Ezekiels imagery to fill out the description of the glorious city of God into which the nations of them that are saved are gathered.

But with all its idealism, Ezekiels conception presents many points of contact with the actual physiography of Palestine; it is less universal and abstract in its significance than that of the Apocalypse. The first thing that might have suggested the idea to the prophet is that the Temple mount had at least one small stream, whose “soft-flowing” waters were already regarded as a symbol of the silent and unobtrusive influence of the Divine presence in Israel. {Isa 8:6} The waters of this stream flowed eastward, but they were too scanty to have any appreciable effect on the fertility of the region through which they passed. Further, to the southeast of Jerusalem, between it and the Dead Sea, stretched the great wilderness of Judah, the most desolate and inhospitable tract in the whole country. There the steep declivity of the limestone range refuses to detain sufficient moisture to nourish the most meagre vegetation, although the few spots where wells are found, as at Engedi, are clothed with almost tropical luxuriance. To reclaim these barren slopes and render them fit for human industry, the Temple waters are sent eastward, making the desert to blossom as the rose. Lastly, there was the Dead Sea itself, in whose bitter waters no living thing can exist, the natural emblem of resistance to the purposes of Him who is the God of life. These different elements of the physical reality were familiar to Ezekiel, and come back to mind as he follows the course of the new Temple river, and observes the wonderful transformation which it is destined to effect. He first sees it breaking forth from the wall of the Temple at the right-hand side of the entrance, and flowing eastward through the courts by the south side of the altar. Then at the outer wall he meets it rushing from the south side of the eastern gate, and still pursuing its easterly course. At a thousand cubits from the sanctuary it is only ankle-deep, but at successive distances of a thousand cubits it reaches to the knees, to the loins, and becomes finally an impassable river. The stream is of course miraculous from source to mouth. Earthly rivers do not thus broaden and deepen as they flow, except by the accession of tributaries, and tributaries are out of the question here. Thus it flows on, with its swelling volume of water, through “the eastern circuit,” “down to the Arabah” (the trough of the Jordan and the Dead Sea), and reaching the sea it sweetens its waters so that they teem with fishes of all kinds like those of the Mediterranean. Its uninviting shores become the scene of a busy and thriving industry; fishermen ply their craft from Engedi to Eneglaim, and the food supply of the country is materially increased. The prophet may not have been greatly concerned about this, but one characteristic detail illustrates his careful forethought in matters of practical utility. It is from the Dead Sea that Jerusalem has always obtained its supply of salt. The purification of this lake might have its drawbacks if the production of this indispensable commodity should be interfered with. Salt, besides its culinary uses, played an important part in the Temple ritual, and Ezekiel was not likely to forget it. Hence the strange but eminently practical provision that the shallows and marshes at the south end of the lake shall be exempted from the influence of the healing waters. “They are given for salt.” (Eze 47:11).

We may venture to draw one lesson for our own instruction from this beautiful prophetic image of the blessings that flow from a pure religion. The river of God has its source high up in the mount where Jehovah dwells in inaccessible holiness, and where the white-robed priests minister ceaselessly before Him; but in its descent it seeks out the most desolate and unpromising region in the country and turns it into a garden of the Lord. While the whole land of Israel is to be renewed and made to minister to the good of man in fellowship with God, the main stream of fertility is expended in the apparently hopeless task of reclaiming the Judean desert and purifying the Dead Sea. It is an emblem of the earthly ministry of Him who made Himself the friend of publicans and sinners, and lavished the resources of His grace and the wealth of His affection on those who were deemed beyond ordinary possibility of salvation. It is to be feared, however, that the practice of most Churches has been too much the reverse of this. They have been tempted to confine the water of life within fairly respectable channels, amongst the prosperous and contented, the occupants of happy homes, where the advantages of religion are most likely to be appreciated. That seems to have been found the line of least resistance, and in times when spiritual life has run low it has been counted enough to keep the old ruts filled and leave the waste places and stagnant waters of our civilisation ill provided with the means of grace. Nowadays we are sometimes reminded that the Dead Sea must be drained before the gospel can have a fair chance of influencing human lives, and there may be much wisdom in the suggestion. A vast deal of social drainage may have to be accomplished before the word of God has free course. Unhealthy and impure conditions of life may be mitigated by wise legislation, temptations to vice may be removed, and vested interests that thrive on the degradation of human lives may be crushed by the strong arm of the community. But the true spirit of Christianity can neither be confined to the watercourses of religious habit, nor wait for the schemes of the social reformer. Nor will it display its powers of social salvation until it carries the energies of the Church into the lowest haunts of vice and misery with an earnest desire to seek and to save that which is lost. Ezekiel had his vision, and he believed in it. He believed in the reality of Gods presence in the sanctuary and in the stream of blessings that flowed from His throne, and he believed in the possibility of reclaiming the waste places of his country for the kingdom of God. When Christians are united in like faith in the power of Christ and the abiding presence of His Spirit, we may expect to see times of refreshing from the presence of God and the whole earth filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

II.

Ezekiels map of Palestine is marked by something of the same mathematical regularity which was exhibited in his plan of the Temple. His boundaries are like those we sometimes see on the map of a newly settled country like America or Australia-that is to say, they largely follow the meridian lines and parallels of latitude, but take advantage here and there of natural frontiers supplied by rivers and mountain ranges. This is absolutely true of the internal divisions of the land between the tribes. Here the northern and southern boundaries are straight lines running east and west over hill and dale, and terminating at the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan Valley, which form of course the western and eastern limits. As to the external delimitation of the country it is unfortunately not possible to speak with certainty. The eastern frontier is fixed by the Jordan and the Dead Sea so far as they go, and the western is the sea. But on the north and south the lines of demarcation cannot be traced, the places mentioned being nearly all unknown. The north frontier extends from the sea to a place called Hazar-enon, said to lie on the border of Hauran. It passes the “entrance to Hamath,” and has to the north not only Hamath, but also the territory of Damascus. But none of the towns through which it passes-Hethlon, Berotha, Sibraim-can be identified, and even its general direction is altogether uncertain.

From Hazar-enon the eastern border stretches southward till it reaches the Jordan, and is prolonged south of the Dead Sea to a place called Tamar, also unknown. From this we proceed westwards by Kadesh till we strike the river of Egypt, the Wady el-Arish, which carries the boundary to the sea. It will be seen that Ezekiel, for reasons on which it is idle to speculate, excludes the transjordanic territory from the Holy Land. Speaking broadly, we may say that he treats Palestine as a rectangular strip of country, which he divides into transverse sections of indeterminate breadth, and then proceeds to parcel out these amongst the twelve tribes.

A similar obscurity rests on the motives which determined the disposition of the different tribes within the sacred territory. We can understand, indeed, why seven tribes are placed to the north and only five to the south of the capital and the sanctuary. Jerusalem lay much nearer the south of the land, and in the original distribution all the tribes had their settlements to the north of it except Judah and Simeon. Ezekiels arrangement seems thus to combine a desire for symmetry with a recognition of the claims of historical and geographic reality. We can also see that to a certain extent the relative positions of the tribes correspond with those they held before the Exile, although of course the system requires that they shall lie in a regular series from north to south. Dan, Asher, and Naphtali are left in the extreme north, Manasseh and Ephraim to the south of them, while Simeon lies as of old in the south with one tribe between it and the capital. But we cannot tell why Benjamin should be placed to the south and Judah to the north of Jerusalem, why Issachar and Zebulun are transferred from the far north to the south, or why Reuben and Gad are taken from the east of the Jordan to be settled one to the north and the other to the south of the city. Some principle of arrangement there must have been in the mind of the prophet, and several have been suggested; but it is perhaps better to confess that we have lost the key to his meaning.

The prophets interest is centred on the strip of land reserved for the sanctuary and public purposes, which is subdivided and measured out with the utmost precision. It is twenty-five thousand cubits (about eight and one-third miles) broad, and extends right across the country. The two extremities east and west are the crown lands assigned to the prince for the purposes we have already seen.

In the middle a square of twenty-five thousand cubits is marked off; this is the “oblation” or sacred offering of land, in the middle of which the Temple stands. This again is subdivided into three parallel sections, as shown in the accompanying diagram. The most northerly, ten thousand cubits in breadth, is assigned to the Levites; the central portion, including the sanctuary, to the priests; and the remaining five thousand cubits is a “profane place” for the city and its common lands. The city itself is a square of four thousand five hundred cubits, situated in the middle of this southmost section of the oblation. With its free space of two hundred and fifty cubits in width belting the wall it fills the entire breadth of the section: the communal possessions flanking it on either hand, just as the princes domain does the “oblation” as a whole. The produce of these lands is “for food to them that serve (i.e., inhabit) the city.” (Eze 48:18) Residence in the capital, it appears, is to be regarded as a public service. The maintenance of the civic life of Jerusalem was an object in which the whole nation was interested, a truth symbolised by naming its twelve gates after the twelve sons of Jacob. Hence, also, its population is to be representative of all the tribes of Israel, and whoever comes to dwell there is to have a share in the land belonging to the city. (Eze 48:19) But evidently the legislation on this point is incomplete. How were the inhabitants of the capital to be chosen out of all the tribes? Would its citizenship be regarded as a privilege or as a onerous responsibility? Would it be necessary to make a selection out of a host of applications, or would special inducements have to be offered to procure a sufficient population? To these questions the vision furnishes no answer, and there is nothing to show whether Ezekiel contemplated the possibility that residence in the new city might present few attractions and many disadvantages to an agricultural community such as he had in view. It is a curious incident of the return from the Exile that the problem of peopling Jerusalem emerged in a more serious form than Ezekiel from his ideal point of view could have foreseen. We read that “the rulers of the people dwelt at Jerusalem: the rest of the people also cast lots, to bring one of ten to dwell in Jerusalem, the holy city, and nine parts in [other] cities. And the people blessed all the men that willingly offered themselves to dwell at Jerusalem.” {Neh 11:1-2} There may have been causes for this general reluctance which are unknown to us, but the principal reason was doubtless the one which has been hinted at, that the new colony lived mainly by agriculture, and the district in the immediate vicinity of the capital was not sufficiently fertile to support a large agricultural population. The new Jerusalem was at first a somewhat artificial foundation, and a city too largely developed for the resources of the community of which it was the centre. Its existence was necessary more for the protection and support of the Temple than for the ordinary ends of civilisation; and hence to dwell in it was for the majority an act of self-sacrifice by which a man was felt to deserve well of his country. And the only important difference between the actual reality and Ezekiels ideal is that in the latter the supernatural fertility of the land and the reign of universal peace obviate the difficulties which the founders of the post-exilic theocracy had to encounter.

This seeming indifference of the prophet to the secular interests represented by the metropolis strikes us as a singular feature in his programme. It is strange that the man who was so thoughtful about the salt-pans of the Dead Sea should pass so lightly over the details of the reconstruction of a city. But we have had several intimations that this is not the department of things in which Ezekiels hold on reality is most conspicuous. We have already remarked on the boldness of the conception which changes the site of the capital in order to guard the sanctity of the Temple. And now, when its situation and form are accurately defined, we have no sketch of municipal institutions, no hint of the purposes for which the city exists, and no glimpse of the busy and varied activities which we naturally connect with the name. If Ezekiel thought of it at all, except as existing on paper, he was probably interested in it as furnishing the representative congregation on minor occasions of public worship, such as the Sabbaths and new moons, When the whole people could not be expected to assemble. The truth is that the idea of the city in the vision is simply an abstract religious symbol, a sort of epitome and concentration of theocratic life. Like the figure of the prince in earlier chapters, it is taken from the national institutions which perished at the Exile; the outline is retained, the typical significance is enhanced, but the form is shadowy and indistinct, the colour and variety of concrete reality are absent. It was perhaps a stage through which political conceptions had to pass before their religious meaning could be apprehended. And yet the fact that the symbol of the Holy City is preserved is deeply suggestive and indeed scarcely less important in its own way than the retention of the type of the king. Ezekiel can no more think of the land without a capital than of the state without a prince. The word “city”-synonym of the fullest and most intense form of life, of life regulated by law and elevated by devotion to a common ideal, in which every worthy faculty of human nature is quickened by the close and varied intercourse of men with each other-has definitely taken its place in the vocabulary of religion. It is there, not to be superseded, but to be refined and spiritualised, until the city of God, glorified in the praises of Israel, becomes the inspiration of the loftiest thought and the most ardent longing of Christendom. And even for the perplexing problems that the Church has to face at this day there is hardly a more profitable exercise of the Christian imagination than to dream with practical intent of the consecration of civic life through the subjection of all its influences to the ends of the Redeemers kingdom.

On the other hand we must surely recognise that this vision of a Temple and a city separated from each other-where religious and secular interests are as it were concentrated at different points, so that the one may be more effectually subordinated to the other-is not the final and perfect vision of the kingdom of God. That ideal has played a leading and influential part in the history of Christianity. It is essentially the ideal formulated in Augustines great work on the city of God, which ruled the ecclesiastical polity of the mediaeval Church. The State is an unholy institution; it is an embodiment of the power of this present evil world: the true city of God is the visible Catholic Church, and only by subjection to the Church can the State be redeemed from itself and be made a means of blessing. That theory served a providential purpose in preserving the traditions of Christianity through dark and troubled ages, and training the rude nations of Europe in purity and righteousness and reverence for that by which God makes Himself known. But the Reformation was, amongst other things, a protest against this conception of the relation of Church to State, of the sacred to the secular. By asserting the right of each believer to deal with Christ directly, without the mediation of Church or priest it broke down the middle wall of partition between religion and everyday duty; it sanctified common life by showing how a man may serve God as a citizen in the family or the workshop better than in the cloister or at the altar. It made the kingdom of God to be a present power wherever there are lives transformed by love to Christ and serving their fellow men for His sake. And if Catholicism may find some plausible support for its theory in Ezekiel and the Old Testament theocracy in general, Protestants may perhaps with better right appeal to the grander ideal represented by the new Jerusalem of the Apocalypse-the city that needs no Temple, because the Lord Himself is in her midst.

“And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof.” {Rev 21:2-3; Rev 21:22-23}

It may be difficult for us amid the entanglements of the present to read that vision aright-difficult to say whether it is on earth or in heaven that we are to look for the city in which there is no Temple. Worship is an essential function of the Church of Christ; and so long as we are in our earthly abode worship will require external symbols and a visible organisation. But this at least we know, that the will of God must be done on earth as it is in heaven. The true kingdom of God is within us; and His presence with men is realised, not in special religious services which stand apart from our common life, but in the constant influence of His Spirit, forming our characters after the image of Christ, and permeating all the channels of social intercourse and public action, until everything done on earth is to the glory of our Father which is in heaven. That is the ideal set forth by the coming of the holy city of God, and only in this way. can we look for the fulfilment of the promise embodied in the new name of Ezekiels city, Jehovah-shammah, –

THE LORD IS THERE.

Fuente: Expositors Bible Commentary