Chapter XXX: Renewal And Allotment Of The Land. Chapters xlvii., xlviii (1)

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.(299) Afterwards he receives another series of directions relating to the boundaries of the land and its division among the twelve tribes.(300) With this the vision and the book find their appropriate close.

I

The Temple stream, to which Ezekiel’s 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 Jehovah’s 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 Jehovah’s 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 husbandman’s 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.(301) 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;(302) 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.”(303) 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 Ezekiel’s 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 Ezekiel’s 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, Ezekiel’s 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.(304) 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 south‐ east 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,(305) 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.”(306)

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 Judæan 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 God’s 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

Ezekiel’s 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.(307)

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. Ezekiel’s 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.(308)

The prophet’s 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 8‐1/3 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 prince’s domain does the “oblation” as a whole. The produce of these lands is “for food to them that ‘serve’ [_i.e._, inhabit] the city.”(309) 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.(310) 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.(311) 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 an 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.”(312) 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 Ezekiel’s 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 Ezekiel’s 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 Redeemer’s 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 Augustine’s great work on the city of God, which ruled the ecclesiastical polity of the mediæval 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 every‐day 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.”(313)

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 Ezekiel’s city, Jehovah‐shammah,—

THE LORD IS THERE.

FOOTNOTES

1 Herodotus, i. 103‐106.

2 If the “thirtieth year” of ch. i. 1 could refer to the prophet’s age
at the time of his call, his birth would fall in the very year in
which the Law Book was found. Although that interpretation is
extremely improbable, he can hardly have been much more, or less,
than thirty years old at the time.

3 The opinion, once prevalent, that it was the Chaboras in Northern
Mesopotamia, where colonies of Northern Israelites had been settled
a century and a half before, has nothing to justify it, and is now
universally abandoned.

4 This, however, is not certain. Although Jeremiah’s property and
residence were in Anathoth, his official connection may have been
with the Temple in Jerusalem.

5 The passage xxxiii. 14‐26 is wanting in the LXX., and may possibly
be a later insertion. Even if genuine it would hardly alter the
general estimate of the prophet’s teaching expressed above.

6 Jer. xv. 4; 2 Kings xxiii. 26.

7 In the superscription of the book (ch. i. 1‐3) a double date is
given for this occurrence. In ver. 1 it is said to have taken place
“in the thirtieth year”; but this expression has never been
satisfactorily explained. The principal suggestions are: (1) that it
is the year of Ezekiel’s life; (2) that the reckoning is from the
year of Josiah’s reformation; and (3) that it is according to some
Babylonian era. But none of these has much probability, unless, with
Klostermann, we go further and assume that the explanation was given
in an earlier part of the prophet’s autobiography now lost—a view
which is supported by no evidence and is contrary to all analogy.
Cornill proposes to omit ver. 1 entirely, chiefly on the ground that
the use of the first person before the writer’s name has been
mentioned is unnatural. That the superscription does not read
smoothly as it stands has been felt by many critics; but the
rejection of the verse is perhaps a too facile solution.

8 Not “amber,” but a natural alloy of silver and gold, highly esteemed
in antiquity.

9 Cf. Exod. xxiv. 10: “like the very heavens for pureness.”

10 Duhm on Isa. xxx. 27.

11 _Bêth mĕri_, or simply _mĕrî_, occurring about fifteen times in the
first half of the book, but only once after ch. xxiv.

12 Klostermann.

13 In ch. iii. 12 read “As the glory of Jehovah arose from its place”
instead of “Blessed be the glory,” etc. (ברום for ברוך).

14 A somewhat similar episode seems to have occurred in the life of
Isaiah. See the commentaries on Isa. viii. 16‐18.

15 These verses (ch. iii. 22‐27) furnish one of the chief supports of
Klostermann’s peculiar theory of Ezekiel’s condition during the
first period of his career. Taking the word “dumb” in its literal
sense, he considers that the prophet was afflicted with the malady
known as _alalia_, that this was intermittent down to the date of
ch. xxiv., and then became chronic till the fugitive arrived from
Jerusalem (ch. xxxiii. 21), when it finally disappeared. This is
connected with the remarkable series of symbolic actions related in
ch. iv., which are regarded as exhibiting all the symptoms of
catalepsy and hemiplegia. These facts, together with the prophet’s
liability to ecstatic visions, justify, in Klostermann’s view, the
hypothesis that for seven years Ezekiel laboured under serious
nervous disorders. The partiality shown by a few writers to this
view probably springs from a desire to maintain the literal accuracy
of the prophet’s descriptions. But in that aspect the theory breaks
down. Even Klostermann admits that the binding with ropes had no
existence save in Ezekiel’s imagination. But if we are obliged to
take into account what _seemed_ to the prophet, it is better to
explain the whole phenomena on the same principle. There can be no
good grounds for taking the dumbness as real and the ropes as
imaginary. Besides, it is surely a questionable expedient to
vindicate a prophet’s literalism at the expense of his sanity. In
the hands of Klostermann and Orelli the hypothesis assumes a
stupendous miracle; but it is obvious that a critic of another
school might readily “wear his rue with a difference,” and treat the
whole of Ezekiel’s prophetic experiences as hallucinations of a
deranged intellect.

16 An ingenious attempt has been made by Professor Cornill to rearrange
the verses so as to bring out two separate series of actions, one
referring exclusively to the exile and the other to the siege. But
the proposed reading requires a somewhat violent handling of the
text, and does not seem to have met with much acceptance. The
blending of diverse elements in a single image appears also in ch.
xii. 3‐16.

17 The correspondence would be almost exact if we date the commencement
of the northern captivity from 734, when Tiglath‐pileser carried
away the inhabitants of the northern and eastern parts of the
country. This is a possible view, although hardly necessary.

18 Or, with a different pointing, “She changed My judgments to
wickedness.”

19 See ch. xxvii.

20 _Hammânim_—a word of doubtful meaning, however. The word for idols,
_gillûlîm_, is all but peculiar to Ezekiel. It is variously
explained as _block‐gods_ or _dung‐gods_—in any case an epithet of
contempt. The _ashērah_, or sacred pole, is never referred to by
Ezekiel.

21 In ver. 14 the true sense has been lost by the corruption of the
word Riblah into Diblah.

22 The reason may be that two different recensions of the text have
been combined and mixed up. So Hitzig and Cornill.

23 Amos viii. 2.

24 Cf. Luke xvii. 26‐30.

25 Ezekiel’s use of the divine names would hardly be satisfactory to
Renan. Outside of the prophecies addressed to heathen nations the
generic name אלהים is never used absolutely, except in the phrases
“visions of God” (three times) and “spirit of God” (once, in ch. xi.
24, where the text may be doubtful). Elsewhere it is used only of
God in His relation to men, as, _e.g._, in the expression “be to you
for a God.” אל שדי occurs once (ch. x. 5) and אל alone three times
in ch. xxviii. (addressed to the prince of Tyre). The prophet’s
word, when he wishes to express absolute divinity, is just the
“proper” name יהוה, in accordance no doubt with the interpretation
given in Exod. iii. 13, 14.

26 Of what nature this idolatrous symbol was we cannot certainly
determine. The word used for “image” (_semel_) occurs in only two
other passages. The writer of the books of Chronicles uses it of the
_asherah_ which was set up by Manasseh in the Temple, and it is
possible that he means thus to identify that object with what
Ezekiel saw (cf. 2 Chron. xxxiii. 7, and 2 Kings xxi. 7). This
interpretation is as satisfactory as any that has been proposed.

27 The nature of the cults is best explained by Professor Robertson
Smith, who supposes that they are a survival of aboriginal
totemistic superstitions which had been preserved in secret circles
till now, but suddenly assumed a new importance with the collapse of
the national religion and the belief that Jehovah had left the land.
Others, however, have thought that it is Egyptian rites which are
referred to. This view might best explain its prevalence among the
elders, but it has little positive support.

28 It has been supposed, however, that the sun‐worship referred to here
is of Persian origin, chiefly because of the obscure expression in
ver. 17: “Behold they put the twig to their nose.” This has been
explained by a Persian custom of holding up a branch before the
face, lest the breath of the worshipper should contaminate the
purity of the deity. But Persia had not yet played any great part in
history, and it is hardly credible that a distinctively Persian
custom should have found its way into the ritual of Jerusalem.
Moreover, the words do not occur in the description of the sun‐
worshippers, nor do they refer particularly to them.

29 Following the LXX.

30 It is noteworthy that in the dirge of ch. xix. Ezekiel ignores the
reign of Jehoiakim. Is this because he too owed his elevation to the
intervention of a foreign power?

31 Especially if we read ver. 12, as in LXX., “That he may not be seen
by any eye, and he shall not see the earth.”

32 By this name for Chaldæa Ezekiel seems to express his contempt for
the commercial activity which formed so large an element in the
greatness of Babylon (ch. xvi. 29 R.V.), perhaps also his sense of
the uncongenial environment in which the disinherited king and the
nobility of Judah now found themselves.

33 Jehoiakim.

34 The long line is divided into two unequal parts by a cæsura over the
end.

35 Mostly adopted from Cornill. The English reader may refer to Dr.
Davidson’s commentary.

36 This word is uncertain.

37 _Ezekiel_, p. 85.

38 Translating with LXX.

39 The exact force of the reflexive form used (_na’ ănêthi_, niphal) is
doubtful. The translation given is that of Cornill, which is
certainly forcible.

40 The same rule is applied to direct communion with God in prayer in
Psalm lxvi. 18: “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not
hear.”

41 See above, p. 97 f.

42 See below, pp. 179 f.

43 Ver. 33 may, however, be an interpolation (Cornill).

44 In ver. 41 the Syriac Version reads, with a slight alteration of the
text, “they shall burn thee in the midst of the fire.” The reading
has something to recommend it. Death by burning was an ancient
punishment of harlotry (Gen. xxxviii. 24), although it is not likely
that it was still inflicted in the time of Ezekiel.

45 “To eat upon the mountains” (if that reading can be retained) must
mean to take part in the sacrificial feasts which were held on the
high places in honour of idols. But if with W. R. Smith and others
we substitute the phrase “eat with the blood,” assimilating the
reading to that of ch. xxxiii. 25, the offence is still of the same
nature. In the time of Ezekiel to eat with the blood probably meant
not merely to eat that which had not been sacrificed to Jehovah, but
to engage in a rite of distinctly heathenish character. Cf. Lev.
xix. 20, and see the note in Smith’s _Kinship and Marriage in Early
Arabia_, p. 310.

46 In the striking passage ch. xiv. 12‐23 the application of the
doctrine of individual retribution to the destruction of Jerusalem
is discussed. It is treated as “an exception to the rule”
(Smend)—perhaps the exception which proves the rule. The rule is
that in a national judgment the most eminent saints save neither son
nor daughter by their righteousness, but only their own lives (vv.
13‐20). At the fall of Jerusalem, however, a remnant escapes and
goes into captivity with sons and daughters, in order that their
corrupt lives may prove to the earlier exiles how necessary the
destruction of the city was (vv. 21‐23). The argument is an
admission that the judgment on Israel was not carried out in
accordance with the strict principle laid down in ch. xviii. It is
difficult, indeed, to reconcile the various utterances of Ezekiel on
this subject. In ch. xxi. 3, 4 he expressly announces that in the
downfall of the state righteous and wicked shall perish together. In
the vision of ch. ix., on the other hand, the righteous are marked
for exemption from the fate of the city. The truth appears to be
that the prophet is conscious of standing between two dispensations,
and does not hold a consistent view regarding the time when the law
proper to the perfect dispensation comes into operation. The point
on which there is no ambiguity is that in the final judgment which
ushers in the Messianic age the principle of individual retribution
shall be fully manifested.

47 This is true whether (as some expositors think) the date in ch. xx.
is merely an external mark introducing a new division of the book,
or whether (as seems more natural) it is due to the fact that here
Ezekiel recognised a turning‐point of his ministry. Such visits of
the elders as that here recorded must have been of frequent
occurrence. Two others are mentioned, and of these one is undated
(ch. xiv. 1); the other at least admits the supposition that it was
connected with a very definite change of opinion among the exiles
(ch. viii. 1: see above, p. 80). We may therefore reasonably suppose
that the precise note of time here introduced marks this particular
incident as having possessed a peculiar significance in the
relations between the prophet and his fellow‐exiles. What its
significance may have been we shall consider in the next lecture,
see p. 174.

48 The verses xx. 45‐49 of the English Version really belong to ch.
xxi., and are so placed in the Hebrew. In what follows the verses
will be numbered according to the Hebrew text.

49 At three places the meaning is entirely lost, through corruption of
the text.

50 Cf. ch. xvii.

51 The reference is to the Messiah, and seems to be based on the
ancient prophecy of Gen. xlix. 10, reading there שֶׁלּה instead of
שִׁלה.

52 The word “covenant” is not here used.

53 Apart from the case of Jephthah, which is entirely exceptional, the
first historical instance is that of Ahaz (2 Kings xvi. 3).

54 There still remain the critical difficulties. What are the ambiguous
laws to which the prophet refers? It is of course not to be assumed
as certain that they are to be found in the Pentateuch, at least in
the exact form which Ezekiel has in view. There may have been at
that time a considerable amount of uncodified legislative material
which passed vaguely as the law of Jehovah. The “lying pen of the
scribes” seems to have been busy in the multiplication of such
enactments (Jer. viii. 8). Still, it is a legitimate inquiry whether
any of the extant laws of the Pentateuch are open to the
interpretation which Ezekiel seems to have in view. The parts of the
Pentateuch in which the regulation about the dedication of the
firstborn occurs are the so‐called Book of the Covenant (Exod. xxii.
29, 30), the short code of Exod. xxxiv. 17‐26 (vv. 19 f.), the
enactment connected with the institution of the Passover (Exod.
xiii. 12 f.), and the priestly ordinance (Numb. xviii. 15). Now, in
three of these four passages, the inference to which Ezekiel refers
is expressly excluded by the provision that the firstborn of men
shall be redeemed. The only one which bears the appearance of
ambiguity is that in the Book of the Covenant, where we read: “The
firstborn of thy sons shalt thou give unto Me; likewise shalt thou
do with thine oxen and thy sheep: seven days it shall be with its
dam, on the eighth day thou shalt give it to Me.” Here the firstborn
children and the firstlings of animals are put on a level; and if
any passage in our present Pentateuch would lend itself to the false
construction which the later Israelites favoured, it would be this.
On the other hand this passage does not contain the particular
technical word (_he’ebîr_) used by Ezekiel. The word probably means
simply “dedicate,” although this was understood in the sense of
dedication by sacrifice. The only passage of the four where the verb
occurs is Exod. xiii. 12; and this accordingly is the one generally
fixed on by critics as having sanctioned the abuse in question. But
apart from its express exemption of firstborn children from the
rule, the passage fails in another respect to meet the requirements
of the case. The prophet appears to speak here of legislation
addressed to the second generation in the wilderness, and this could
not refer to the Passover ordinance in its present setting. On the
whole we seem to be driven to the conclusion that Ezekiel is not
thinking of any part of our present Pentateuch, but to some other
law similar in its terms to that of Exod. xiii. 12 f., although
equivocal in the same way as Exod. xxii. 29 f.

In the text above I have given what appears to me the most natural
interpretation of the passage, without referring to the numerous
other views which have been put forward. Van Hoonacker, in _Le
Museon_ (1893), subjects the various theories to a searching
criticism, and arrives himself at the nebulous conclusion that the
“statutes which were not good” are not statutes at all, but
providential chastisements. That cuts the knot, it does not untie
it.

55 None of the interpretations of ver. 29 gives a satisfactory sense.
Cornill rejects it as “absonderlich und aus dem Tenor des ganzen
Cap. herausfallend.”

56 See Dillmann’s note on Lev. xxvii. 32, quoted by Davidson.

57 Reading במספר for במסרת with the LXX.

58 The transition ver. 39 is, however, very difficult. As it stands in
the Hebrew text it contains an ironical concession (a good‐natured
one, Smend thinks) to the persistent advocates of idolatry, the only
tolerable translation being, “So serve ye every man his idols, but
hereafter ye shall surely hearken to Me, and My holy name ye shall
no longer profane with your gifts and your idols.” But this sense is
not in itself very natural, and the Hebrew construction by which it
is expressed would be somewhat strained. The most satisfactory
rendering is perhaps that given in the Syriac Version, where two
clauses of our Hebrew text are transposed: “But as for you, O house
of Israel, if ye will not hearken to Me, go serve every man his
idols! Yet hereafter ye shall no more profane My holy name in you,”
etc.

59 It is not certain what is the exact meaning wrapped up in these
designations. A very slight change in the pointing of the Hebrew
would give the sense “_her_ tent” for Ohola and “_my_ tent in her”
for Oholibah. This is the interpretation adopted by most
commentators, the idea being that while the tent or temple of
Jehovah was in Judah, Samaria’s “tent” (religious system) was of her
own making. It is not likely, however, that Ezekiel has any such
sharp contrast in his mind, since the whole of the argument proceeds
on the similarity of the course pursued by the two kingdoms. It is
simpler to take the word Ohola as meaning “tent,” and Oholibah as
“tent in her,” the signification of the names being practically
identical. The allusion is supposed to be to the tents of the high
places which formed a marked feature of the idolatrous worship
practised in both divisions of the country (cf. ch. xvi. 16). This
is better, though not entirely convincing, since it does not explain
how Ezekiel came to fix on this particular emblem as a mark of the
religious condition of Israel. It may be worth noting that the word
אהלה contains the same number of consonants as שׂמרן (= Samaria,
although the word is always written שׂמרון in the Old Testament),
and אהליבה the same number as ירושלם. The Eastern custom of giving
similar names to children of the same family (like Hasan and Husein)
is aptly instanced by Smend and Davidson.

60 This word is of doubtful meaning.

61 Smend thinks that the illustration is explained by the secluded life
of females in the East, which makes it quite intelligible that a
woman might be captivated by the picture of a man she had never
seen, and try to induce him to visit her.

62 On these names of nations see Davidson’s Commentary, p. 168, and the
reference there to Delitzsch.

63 The words rendered in E.V., “thou shalt be laughed to scorn and had
in derision” (ver. 32), “and pluck off thy own breasts” (ver. 34),
are wanting in the LXX. The passage gains in force by the omission.
The words translated “break the sherds thereof” (ver. 34) are
unintelligible.

64 Although the text in parts of vv. 42, 43 is very imperfect.

65 On the reading here see above, p. 150.

66 The eighth verse, referring to the Sabbath and the sanctuary, is
rejected by Cornill on internal grounds, but for that there is no
justification. If the verse is retained, it will be seen that the
enumeration of sins corresponds pretty closely in substance, though
not in arrangement, with the precepts of the Decalogue.

67 Read with the LXX. מטּרה, instead of מטהרה, “purified.”

68 This appears to be the meaning of the simile in ver. 24; the
judgment is conceived as a parching drought, and the point of the
comparison is that its severity is not tempered by the fertilising
streams which should have descended on the people in the shape of
sound political and religious guidance.

69 Following the LXX. we should read “whose princes” (אשר נשיאיה) for
“the conspiracy of her prophets” (קשר נביאיה) in ver. 25.

70 Read עצים, “wood,” instead of עצמים, “bones” (Boettcher and others).

71 The words “except by fire” represent an emendation proposed by
Cornill, which may be somewhat bold, but certainly expresses an idea
in the passage.

72 Cf. Jer. xiii. 27: “Thou shalt not be pronounced clean, for how long
a time yet!”

73 _I.e._, as generally explained, bread brought by sympathising
friends, to be shared with the mourning household: cf. Jer. xvi. 7;
2 Sam. iii. 35. Wellhausen, however, proposes to read “bread of
mourners” (אֲנִשֻׁים for אֲנָשִׁים).

74 The words “and Seir” in ver. 8 are wanting in the true text of the
LXX., and should probably be omitted.

75 Isa. xvi. 6, xxv. 11; Jer. xlviii. 29, 42.

76 Rawlinson, _History of Phœnicia_.

77 Closing stanzas of _The Scholar Gipsy_.

78 Both Movers and Rawlinson make it the basis of their survey of
Tyrian commerce.

79 Babylon and Egypt are probably omitted because of the peculiar point
of view assumed by the prophet. They were too powerful to be
represented as slaves of Tyre, even in poetry.

80 E.V., “going to and fro.”

81 So Cornill, חוילה for רכלי ( = merchants).

82 See ch. xxvii. 6, where ivory is said to come from Chittim or
Cyprus.

83 The Hebrew text adds “purple, embroidered work, and byssus”; but
most of these things are omitted in the LXX.

84 The text of vv. 18, 19 is in confusion, and Cornill, from a
comparison with a contemporary wine‐list of Nebuchadnezzar, and also
an Assyrian one from the library of Asshurbanipal, makes it read
thus: “Wine of Helbon and Zimin and Arnaban they furnished in thy
markets. From Uzal,” etc. Both lists are quoted in Schrader’s
_Cuneiform Inscriptions and the Old Testament_, under this verse.

85 The latter half of this verse, however, is of very uncertain
interpretation. For full explanation of the archæological details in
this chapter it will be necessary to consult the commentaries and
the lexicon. See also Rawlinson’s _History of Phœnicia_, pp. 285 ff.

86 With a change of one letter in the Hebrew text, המלאה for אמלאה, as
in the LXX. and Targum.

87 Hebrew, _Tĕhôm_; Babylonian, _Tiamat_.

88 Psalm xxxvi. 6: cf. Gen. vii, 11.

89 _Contra Ap._, I. 21; _Ant._, X. xi. 1.

90 Cf. Hävernick against Hitzig and Winer, _Ezekiel_, pp. 436 f.

91 The same engineering feat was accomplished by Alexander the Great in
seven months, but the Greek general probably adopted more scientific
methods (such as pile‐driving) than the Babylonians; and, besides,
it is possible that the remains of Nebuchadnezzar’s embankment may
have facilitated the operation.

92 For the word גבוליך, rendered “thy borders,” Cornill proposes to
read זבולך, which he thinks might mean “thine anchorage.” The
translation is doubtful, but the sense is certainly appropriate.

93 Senir was the Amorite name of Mount Hermon, the Phœnician name being
Sirion (Deut. iii. 9). Senir, however, occurs on the Assyrian
monuments, and was probably widely known.

94 _Teasshur_ (read בִּחְאַשֻׁרִים instead of בַּת‐אַשׁוּרִים), a kind
of tree mentioned several times in the Old Testament, is generally
identified with the sherbîn tree.

95 Elishah is one of the sons of Javan (Ionia) (Gen. x. 4), and must
have been some part of the Mediterranean coast, subject to the
influence of Greece. Italy, Sicily, and the Peloponnesus have been
suggested.

96 The details of the description are nearly all illustrated in
pictures of Phœnician war‐galleys found on Assyrian monuments. They
show the single mast with its square sail, the double row of oars,
the fighting men on the deck, and the row of shields along the
bulwarks. In an Egyptian picture we have a representation of the
embroidered _sail_ (ancient ships are said not to have carried a
_flag_). The canvas is richly ornamented with various devices over
its whole surface, and beneath the sail we see the cabin or awning
of coloured stuff mentioned in the text.

97 See above, pp. 232 ff.

98 It is not clear whether the dirge is continued to the end of the
chapter, or whether vv. 33 ff. are spoken by the prophet in
explanation of the distress of the nations. The proper elegiac
measure cannot be made out without some alteration of the text.

99 Dan. x. 20, 21, xii. 1.

100 “The death of the uncircumcised”—_i.e._, a death which involves
exclusion from the rites of honourable burial; like burial in
unconsecrated ground among Christian nations.

101 Dean Church, _Cathedral and University Sermons_, p. 150.

102 “We have, indeed, a nominal religion, to which we pay tithes of
property and sevenths of time; but we have also a practical and
earnest religion, to which we devote nine‐tenths of our property,
and six‐sevenths of our time. And we dispute a great deal about the
nominal religion: but we are all unanimous about this practical one;
of which I think you will admit that the ruling goddess may be best
generally described as the ‘Goddess of Getting‐on,’ or ‘Britannia of
the Market.’ The Athenians had an ‘Athena Agoraia,’ or Athena of the
Market; but she was a subordinate type of their goddess, while our
Britannia Agoraia is the principal type of ours. And all your great
architectural works are, of course, built to her. It is long since
you built a great cathedral; and how you would laugh at me if I
proposed building a cathedral on the top of one of these hills of
yours, to make it an Acropolis! But your railroad mounds, vaster
than the walls of Babylon; your railroad stations, vaster than the
temple of Ephesus, and innumerable; your chimneys, how much more
mighty and costly than cathedral spires! your harbour‐piers; your
warehouses; your exchanges!—all these are built to your great
Goddess of ‘Getting‐on;’ and she has formed, and will continue to
form, your architecture, as long as you worship her; and it is quite
vain to ask me to tell you how to build to _her_; you know far
better than I.”—_The Crown of Wild Olive._

103 The “fiery stones” may represent the thunderbolts, which were
harmless to the prince in virtue of his innocence. It may be noted
that the “precious stones” that were his covering (ver. 13)
correspond with nine out of the twelve jewels that covered the high‐
priestly breastplate (Exod. xxviii. 17‐19), the stones of the third
row being those not here represented. This suggests that the
allusion is rather to bejewelled garments than to the plumage of the
wings of the cherub with whom the prince has been wrongly
identified.

104 Jer. xxv. 22, xxvii. 3.

105 Ezek. xxix. 6, 7: cf. Isa. xxxvi. 6 (the words of Rabshakeh). In
ver. 7 read כף, “hand,” for כתף, “shoulder,” and המעדת, “madest to
totter,” for העמדת, “madest to stand.”

106 This is probable according to the Hebrew text, which, however, omits
the number of the _month_ in ch. xxxii. 17. The Septuagint reads “in
the _first_ month”; if this is accepted, it would be better to read
the _eleventh_ year instead of the twelfth in ch. xxxii. 1, as is
done by some ancient versions and Hebrew codices. The change
involves a difference of only one letter in Hebrew.

107 Ch. xxxii. 17, following the LXX. reading.