{"commentary":{"id":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","website":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamieson-Fausset-Brown_Bible_Commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"db3d4c8b3c1f32ef9d1430a57392e02bda3a17aac1f9bbe398461de021a3cb13","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":66,"totalNumberOfChapters":1187,"totalNumberOfVerses":17056,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"EZK","commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Ezekiel","commonName":"Ezekiel","introduction":"The name Ezekiel means \"(whom) God will strengthen\" [GESENIUS]; or, \"God will prevail\" [ROSENMULLER]. His father was Buzi (Eze 1:3), a priest, and he probably exercised the priestly office himself at Jerusalem, previous to his captivity, as appears from the matured priestly character to be seen in his prophecies, a circumstance which much increased his influence with his captive fellow countrymen at Babylon. Tradition represents Sarera as the land of his nativity. His call to prophesy was in the fifth year from the date of his being carried away with Jehoiachin (see Kg2 24:11-15) by Nebuchadnezzar, 599 B.C. The best portions of the people seem to have been among the first carried away (Eze 11:16; Jer 24:2-7-8, Jer 24:10). The ungodly were willing to do anything to remain in their native land; whereas the godly believed the prophets and obeyed the first summons to surrender, as the only path of safety. These latter, as adhering to the theocratic principle, were among the earliest to be removed by the Chaldeans, who believed that, if they were out of the way, the nation would fall to pieces of itself. They were despised by their brethren in the Holy Land not yet captives, as having no share in the temple sacrifices. Thus Ezekiel's sphere of labor was one happier and less impeded by his countrymen than that of Jeremiah at home. The vicinity of the river Chebar, which flows into the Euphrates near Circeslum, was the first scene of his prophecies (Eze 1:1). Tel-Abib there (now Thallaba) was his place of residence (Eze 3:15), whither the elders used to come to inquire as to God's messages through him. They were eager to return to Jerusalem, but he taught them that they must first return to their God. He continued to prophesy for at least twenty-two years, that is, to the twenty-seventh year of the captivity (Eze 29:17), and probably remained with the captives by the Chebar the rest of his life. A treatise, falsely attributed to EPIPHANIUS, states a tradition that he was killed at Babylon by a prince of his people whom he had reproved for idolatry.\n\nHe was contemporary with Jeremiah and Daniel. The former had prophesied for thirty-four years before Ezekiel, and continued to do so for six or seven years after him. The call of Ezekiel followed the very next year after the communication of Jeremiah's predictions to Babylon (Jer 51:59), and was divinely intended as a sequel to them. Daniel's predictions are mostly later than Ezekiel's but his piety and wisdom had become proverbial in the early part of Ezekiel's ministry (Eze 14:14, Eze 14:16; Eze 28:3). They much resemble one another, especially in the visions and grotesque images. It is a remarkable proof of genuineness that in Ezekiel no prophecies against Babylon occur among those directed against the enemies of the covenant-people. Probably he desired not to give needless offence to the government under which he lived. The effect of his labors is to be seen in the improved character of the people towards the close of the captivity, and their general cessation from idolatry and a return to the law. It was little more than thirty years after the close of his labors when the decree of the Jews' restoration was issued. His leading characteristic is realizing, determined energy; this admirably adapted him for opposing the \"rebellious house\" \"of stubborn front and hard heart,\" and for maintaining the cause of God's Church among his countrymen in a foreign land, when the external framework had fallen to pieces. His style is plain and simple. His conceptions are definite, and the details even of the symbolical and enigmatical parts are given with lifelike minuteness. The obscurity lies in the substance, not in the form, of his communications. The priestly element predominates in his prophecies, arising from his previous training as a priest. He delights to linger about the temple and to find in its symbolical forms the imagery for conveying his instructions. This was divinely ordered to satisfy the spiritual want felt by the people in the absence of the outward temple and its sacrifices. In his images he is magnificent, though austere and somewhat harsh. He abounds in repetitions, not for ornament, but for force and weight. Poetical parallelism is not found except in a few portions, as in the seventh, twenty-first, twenty-seventh, twenty-eighth, twenty-ninth through thirty-first chapters. His great aim was to stimulate the dormant minds of the Jews. For this end nothing was better suited than the use of mysterious symbols expressed in the plainest words. The superficial, volatile, and wilfully unbelieving would thereby be left to judicial blindness (Isa 6:10; Mat 13:11-13, &c.); whereas the better-disposed would be awakened to a deeper search into the things of God by the very obscurity of the symbols. Inattention to this divine purpose has led the modern Jews so to magnify this obscurity as to ordain that no one shall read this book till he has passed his thirtieth year.\n\nRABBI HANANIAS is said to have satisfactorily solved the difficulties (Mischna) which were alleged against its canonicity. Ecclesiasticus 49:8 refers to it, and JOSEPHUS [Antiquities, 10.5.1]. It is mentioned as part of the canon in MELITO'S catalogue [EUSEBIUS, Ecclesiastical History, 4.26]; also in ORIGEN, JEROME, and the Talmud. The oneness of tone throughout and the repetition of favorite expressions exclude the suspicion that separate portions are not genuine. The earlier portion, the first through the thirty-second chapters, which mainly treats of sin and judgment, is a key to interpret the latter portion, which is more hopeful and joyous, but remote in date. Thus a unity and an orderly progressive character are imparted to the whole. The destruction of Jerusalem is the central point. Previous to this he calls to repentance and warns against blind confidence in Egypt (Eze 17:15-17; compare Jer 37:7) or other human stay. After it he consoles the captives by promising them future deliverance and restoration. His prophecies against foreign nations stand between these two great divisions, and were uttered in the interval between the intimation that Nebuchadnezzar was besieging Jerusalem and the arrival of the news that he had taken it (Eze 33:21). HAVERNICK marks out nine sections:--(1) Ezekiel's call to prophesy (Eze. 1:1-3:15). (2) Symbolical predictions of the destruction of Jerusalem (Eze. 3:16-7:27). (3) A year and two months later a vision of the temple polluted by Tammuz or Adonis worship; God's consequent scattering of fire over the city and forsaking of the temple to reveal Himself to an inquiring people in exile; happier and purer times to follow (Eze. 8:1-11:25). (4) Exposure of the particular sins prevalent in the several classes--priests, prophets, and princes (Eze. 12:1-19:14). (5) A year later the warning of judgment for national guilt repeated with greater distinctness as the time drew nearer (Eze. 20:1-23:49). (6) Two years and five months later--the very day on which Ezekiel speaks--is announced as the day of the beginning of the siege; Jerusalem shall be overthrown (Eze. 24:1-27). (7) Predictions against foreign nations during the interval of his silence towards his own people; if judgment begins at the house of God, much more will it visit the ungodly world (Eze. 25:1-32:32). Some of these were uttered much later than others, but they all began to be given after the fall of Jerusalem. (8) In the twelfth year of the captivity, when the fugitives from Jerusalem (Eze 33:21) had appeared in Chaldea, he foretells better times and the re-establishment of Israel and the triumph of God's kingdom on earth over its enemies, Seir, the heathen, and Gog (Eze. 33:1-39:29). (9) After an interval of thirteen years the closing vision of the order and beauty of the restored kingdom (Eze. 40:1-48:35). The particularity of details as to the temple and its offerings rather discountenances the view of this vision being only symbolical, and not at all literal. The event alone can clear it up. At all events it has not yet been fulfilled; it must be future. Ezekiel was the only prophet (in the strict sense) among the Jews at Babylon. Daniel was rather a seer than a prophet, for the spirit of prophecy was given him to qualify him, not for a spiritual office, but for disclosing future events. His position in a heathen king's palace fitted him for revelations of the outward relations of God's kingdom to the kingdoms of the world, so that his book is ranked by the Jews among the Hagiographa or \"Sacred Writings,\" not among the prophetical Scriptures. On the other hand, Ezekiel was distinctively a prophet, and one who had to do with the inward concerns of the divine kingdom. As a priest, when sent into exile, his service was but transferred from the visible temple at Jerusalem to the spiritual temple in Chaldea. \n\n\n\nNext: Ezekiel Chapter 1\n\n","order":26,"numberOfChapters":48,"sha256":"77a36f7a59a5d4db239b980af31f7a75c9b226da690c4d0154330b6770f5cfc5","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/EZK/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"EZK","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":48,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/EZK/48.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"EZK","chapter":48},"totalNumberOfVerses":932},"chapter":{"number":32,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":2,"content":["Pharaoh--\"Phra\" in Burmah, signifies the king, high priest, and idol. \n\nwhale--rather, any monster of the waters; here, the crocodile of the Nile. Pharaoh is as a lion on dry land, a crocodile in the waters; that is, an object of terror everywhere. \n\ncamest forth with thy rivers--\"breakest forth\" [FAIRBAIRN]. The antithesis of \"seas\" and \"rivers\" favors GROTIUS rendering, \"Thou camest forth from the sea into the rivers\"; that is, from thy own empire into other states. However, English Version is favored by the \"thy\": thou camest forth with thy rivers (that is, with thy forces) and with thy feet didst fall irrecoverably; so Israel, once desolate, troubles the waters (that is, neighboring states).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["with a company of many people--namely, the Chaldeans (Eze 29:3-4; Hos 7:12). \n\nmy net--for they are My instrument.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["leave thee upon the land--as a fish drawn out of the water loses all its strength, so Pharaoh (in Eze 32:3, compared to a water monster) shall be (Eze 29:5).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["thy height--thy hugeness [FAIRBAIRN]. The great heap of corpses of thy forces, on which thou pridest thyself. \"Height\" may refer to mental elevation, as well as bodily [VATABLUS].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["land wherein thou swimmest--Egypt: the land watered by the Nile, the the source of its fertility, wherein thou swimmest (carrying on the image of the crocodile, that is, wherein thou dost exercise thy wanton power at will). Irony. The land shall still afford seas to swim in, but they shall be seas of blood. Alluding to the plague (Exo 7:19; Rev 8:8). HAVERNICK translates, \"I will water the land with what flows from thee, even thy blood, reaching to the mountains\": \"with thy blood overflowing even to the mountains.\" Perhaps this is better.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["put thee out--extinguish thy light (Job 18:5). Pharaoh is represented as a bright star, at the extinguishing of whose light in the political sky the whole heavenly host is shrouded in sympathetic darkness. Here, too, as in Eze 32:6, there is an allusion to the supernatural darkness sent formerly (Exo 10:21-23). The heavenly bodies are often made images of earthly dynasties (Isa 13:10; Mat 24:29).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["thy destruction--that is tidings of thy destruction (literally, \"thy breakage\") carried by captive and dispersed Egyptians \"among the nations\" [GROTIUS]; or, thy broken people, resembling one great fracture, the ruins of what they had been [FAIRBAIRN].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":10,"content":["brandish my sword before them--literally, \"in their faces,\" or sight.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["(See on Eze 29:11). The picture is ideally true, not to be interpreted by the letter. The political ascendency of Egypt was to cease with the Chaldean conquest [FAIRBAIRN]. Henceforth Pharaoh must figuratively no longer trouble the waters by man or beast, that is, no longer was he to flood other peoples with his overwhelming forces.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["make their waters deep--rather, \"make . . . to subside\"; literally, \"sink\" [FAIRBAIRN]. \n\nlike oil--emblem of quietness. No longer shall they descend violently on other countries as the overflowing Nile, but shall be still and sluggish in political action.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":16,"content":["As in Eze 19:14. This is a prophetical lamentation; yet so it shall come to pass [GROTIUS].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":17,"content":["The second lamentation for Pharaoh. This funeral dirge in imagination accompanies him to the unseen world. Egypt personified in its political head is ideally represented as undergoing the change by death to which man is liable. Expressing that Egypt's supremacy is no more, a thing of the past, never to be again. \n\nthe month--the twelfth month (Eze 32:1); fourteen days after the former vision.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":18,"content":["cast them down--that is predict that they shall be cast down (so Jer 1:10). The prophet's word was God's, and carried with it its own fulfilment. \n\ndaughters of . . . nations--that is the nations with their peoples. Egypt is to share the fate of other ancient nations once famous, now consigned to oblivion: Elam (Eze 32:24), Meshech, &c. (Eze 32:26), Edom (Eze 32:29), Zidon (Eze 32:30).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":19,"content":["Whom dost thou pass in beauty?--Beautiful as thou art, thou art not more so than other nations, which nevertheless have perished. \n\ngo down, &c.--to the nether world, where all \"beauty\" is speedily marred.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["she is delivered to the sword--namely, by God. \n\ndraw her--as if addressing her executioners: drag her forth to death.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":21,"content":["(Eze 31:16). Ezekiel has before his eyes Isa 14:9, &c. \n\nshall speak to him--with \"him\" join \"with them that help him\"; shall speak to him and his helpers with a taunting welcome, as now one of themselves.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":22,"content":["her . . . his--The abrupt change of gender is, because Ezekiel has in view at one time the kingdom (feminine), at another the monarch. \"Asshur,\" or Assyria, is placed first in punishment, as being first in guilt.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":23,"content":["in the sides of the pit--Sepulchres in the East were caves hollowed out of the rock, and the bodies were laid in niches formed at the sides. MAURER needlessly departs from the ordinary meaning, and translates, \"extremities\" (compare Isa 14:13, Isa 14:15). \n\nwhich caused terror--They, who alive were a terror to others, are now, in the nether world, themselves a terrible object to behold.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":24,"content":["Elam--placed next, as having been an auxiliary to Assyria. Its territory lay in Persia. In Abraham's time an independent kingdom (Gen 14:1). Famous for its bowmen (Isa 22:6). \n\nborne their shame--the just retribution of their lawless pride. Destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar (Jer 49:34-38).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":25,"content":["a bed--a sepulchral niche. \n\nall . . . slain by . . . sword, &c.-- (Eze 32:21, Eze 32:23-24). The very monotony of the phraseology gives to the dirge an awe-inspiring effect.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":26,"content":["Meshech, Tubal--northern nations: the Moschi and Tibareni, between the Black and Caspian Seas. HERODOTUS [3.94], mentions them as a subjugated people, tributaries to Darius Hystaspes (see Eze 27:13).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":27,"content":["they shall not lie with the mighty--that is, they shall not have separate tombs such as mighty conquerors have: but shall all be heaped together in one pit, as is the case with the vanquished [GROTIUS]. HAVERNICK reads it interrogatively, \"Shall they not lie with the mighty that are fallen?\" But English Version is supported by the parallel (Isa 14:18-19), to which Ezekiel refers, and which represents them as not lying as mighty kings lie in a grave, but cast out of one, as a carcass trodden under foot. \n\nwith . . . weapons of war--alluding to the custom of burying warriors with their arms (1 Maccabees 13:29). Though honored by the laying of \"their swords under their heads,\" yet the punishment of \"their iniquities shall be upon their bones.\" Their swords shall thus attest their shame, not their glory (Mat 26:52), being the instruments of their violence, the penalty of which they are paying.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":28,"content":["Yea, thou--Thou, too, Egypt, like them, shalt lie as one vanquished.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":29,"content":["princes--Edom was not only governed by kings, but by subordinate \"princes\" ox \"dukes\" (Gen 36:40). \n\nwith their might--notwithstanding their might, they shall be brought down (Isa 34:5, Isa 34:10-17; Jer 49:7, Jer 49:13-18). \n\nlie with the uncircumcised--Though Edom was circumcised, being descended from Isaac, he shall lie with the uncircumcised; much more shall Egypt, who had no hereditary right to circumcision.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":30,"content":["princes of the north--Syria, which is still called by the Arabs the north; or the Tyrians, north of Palestine, conquered by Nebuchadnezzar (Eze. 26:1-28:26), [GROTIUS]. \n\nZidonians--who shared the fate of Tyre (Eze 28:21). \n\nwith their terror they are ashamed of their might--that is, notwithstanding the terror which they inspired in their contemporaries. \"Might\" is connected by MAURER thus, \"Notwithstanding the terror which resulted from their might.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":31,"content":["comforted--with the melancholy satisfaction of not being alone, but of having other kingdoms companions in his downfall. This shall be his only comfort--a very poor one!\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":32,"content":["my terror--the Margin or Keri. The Hebrew text or Chetib is \"his terror,\" which gives good sense (Eze 32:25, Eze 32:30). \"My terror\" implies that God puts His terror on Pharaoh's multitude, as they put \"their terror\" on others, for example, under Pharaoh-necho on Judea. As \"the land of the living\" was the scene of \"their terror,\" so it shall be God's; especially in Judea, He will display His glory to the terror of Israel's foes (Eze 26:20). In Israel's case the judgment is temporary, ending in their future restoration under Messiah. In the case of the world kingdoms which flourished for a time, they fall to rise no more.\n\nHeretofore his functions had been chiefly threatening; from this point, after the evil had got to its worst in the overthrow of Jerusalem, the consolatory element preponderates.\n\n\n\n\nNext: Ezekiel Chapter 33\n\n"]}],"introduction":"TWO ELEGIES OVER PHARAOH, ONE DELIVERED ON THE FIRST DAY (Eze 32:1), THE OTHER ON THE FIFTEENTH DAY OF THE SAME MONTH, THE TWELFTH OF THE TWELFTH YEAR. (Eze. 32:1-32)\n\nThe twelfth year from the carrying away of Jehoiachin; Jerusalem was by this time overthrown, and Amasis was beginning his revolt against Pharaoh-hophra.\n\n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/EZK/32.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"EZK","chapter":32},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/EZK/33.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"EZK","chapter":33},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/EZK/31.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"EZK","chapter":31},"numberOfVerses":27}