Ezekiel 35
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Ezekiel 35
Ezekiel 35
Ezekiel 35
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Chapter Summary
Ezekiel 35
Doctrines in This Chapter
Although Israel has been judged, the Lord has not abandoned His covenant ownership, presence, or purposes. Edom's attempt to seize Israel's inheritance is judged because divine discipline is not divine surrender.
The Lord judges ancient hostility, bloodshed, arrogance, and malicious rejoicing. His justice is not impulsive retaliation but measured judgment according to the offender's own ways.
The Lord explicitly says He heard Mount Seir's contemptuous speech against Israel's mountains. Human boasting, even when aimed at the vulnerable, is spoken before God.
The Lord's holiness is displayed not only in judging Jerusalem but also in judging nations that exploit Jerusalem's fall. His rule extends beyond Israel to Edom and all surrounding powers.
The Lord treats Mount Seir according to the anger, envy, hatred, and rejoicing it showed toward Israel. The form of judgment mirrors the moral shape of the sin.
Boasting against Israel's mountains is treated as boasting against the Lord. Speech is morally accountable because it reveals the heart's posture toward God's purposes.
The repeated recognition formula shows that judgment is revelatory. Mount Seir and the nations will know the Lord not because Edom repents but because His judgment exposes His sovereignty.
Edom's ancient hostility expresses itself in violence, anger, envy, hatred, and delight in calamity. The passage exposes revenge as rebellion against the Lord's justice.
The land is not ownerless after Jerusalem's collapse. Mount Seir's claim over the two nations and countries is judged because the Lord remains present and sovereign over Israel's inheritance.
Commentary (Keil & Delitzsch)
C.F. Keil & F. Delitzsch, Commentary on the Old Testament (1861–91) — public domain
The Biblical World
Passages
Chapter opening: Ezekiel 35:1-15
The two sections, Eze 35:1-15 and Eze 36:1-15, form a connected prophecy. This is apparent not only from their formal arrangement, both of them being placed together under the introductory formula, “And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,” but also from their contents, the promise in relation to the mountains of Israel being so opposed to the threat against the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15) as to form the obverse and completion of the latter; whilst allusion is evidently made to it in the form of expression employed (compare Eze 36:4, Eze 36:6, with Eze 35:8; and Eze 36:5 with Eze 35:15 ).
The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Eze 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Eze 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Eze 35:10-15). On the other hand, the mountain-land of Israel, which the heathen have despised on account of its devastation, and have appropriated to themselves as booty (Eze 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Eze 35:8-15).
This closing thought (Eze 35:15) points back to Eze 34:29, and shows that our prophecy is intended as a further expansion of that conclusion; and at the same time, that in the devastation of Edom the overthrow of the heathen world as a whole, with its enmity against God, is predicted, and in the restoration of the land of Israel the re-erection of the fallen kingdom of God. Eze 35:1.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Eze 35:3. And say to it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I will deal with thee, Mount Seir, and will stretch out my hand against thee, and make thee waste and devastation. Eze 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:5. Because thou cherishest eternal enmity, and gavest up the sons of Israel to the sword at the time of their distress, at the time of the final transgression, Eze 35:6. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will make thee blood, and blood shall pursue thee; since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee.
Eze 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Eze 35:8. And fill his mountains with his slain; upon thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy low places, those pierced with the sword shall fall. Eze 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:10. Because thou sayest, The two nations and the two lands they shall be mine, and we will take possession of it, when Jehovah was there; Eze 35:11. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thy wrath and thine envy, as thou hast done because of thy hatred, and will make myself known among them, as I shall judge thee.
Eze 35:12. And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy reproaches which thou hast uttered against the mountains of Israel, saying, “they are laid waste, they are given to us for food. ” Eze 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Eze 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee.
Eze 35:15. As thou hadst thy delight in the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee; thou shalt become a waste, Mount Seir and all Edom together; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. The theme of this prophecy, viz. , “Edom and its cities are to become a desert” (Eze 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with 'יען וגו (Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Eze 35:4 ), with 'כּי אני (וידעוּ) וידעתּם, by a distinct statement of the sins of Edom.
- Already, in Ezekiel 25, Edom has been named among the hostile border nations which are threatened with destruction (Eze 35:12-14). The earlier prophecy applied to the Edomites, according to their historical relation to the people of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. In the present word of God, on the contrary, Edom comes into consideration, on the ground of its hostile attitude towards the covenant people, as the representative of the world and of mankind in its hostility to the people and kingdom of God, as in Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6.
This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Eze 35:14), which does not apply to Edom as a small and solitary nation, and still more clearly from the circumstance that, in the promise of salvation in Ezekiel 36, not all Edom alone (Eze 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Eze 36:3-7 and Eze 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Eze 35:2, compare Eze 13:17.
הר is the name given to the mountainous district inhabited by the Edomites, between the Dead Sea and the Elanitic Gulf (see the comm. on Gen 36:9). The prophecy is directed against the land; but it also applies to the nation, which brings upon itself the desolation of its land by its hostility to Israel. For Eze 35:3, compare Eze 6:14, etc. חרבּה, destruction.
The sin of Edom mentioned in Eze 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Eze 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Gen 25:22. and Gen 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amo 1:11) has already said, in the constant retention of its malignity toward the covenant nation, so that Edom embraced every opportunity to effect its destruction, and according to the charge brought against it by Ezekiel, gave up the sons of Israel to the sword when the kingdom of Judah fell.
הנּיר על , lit. , to pour upon ( - into) the hands of the sword, i. e. , to deliver up to the power of the sword (cf. Psa 63:11; Jer 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Oba 1:13; but here it is more precisely defined by בּעת עון , and limited to the time of the overthrow of the Israelites, when Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by the Chaldeans. בּעת עון קץ, as in Eze 21:30.
On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Eze 35:6). This expression is probably chosen for the play upon the words דּם and אדם. Edom shall become what its name suggests. Making it blood does not mean merely filling it with bloodshed, or reddening the soil with blood (Hitzig); but, as in Eze 16:38, turning it as it were into blood, or causing it to vanish therein.
Blood shall pursue thee, “as blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and so delivers him up to punishment” (Hävernick). אם לא cannot be the particle employed in swearing, and dependent upon חי־אני, since this particle introduces an affirmative declaration, which would be unsuitable here, inasmuch as דּם in this connection cannot possibly signify blood-relationship.
אם לא means “if not,” in which the conditional meaning of אם coincides with the causal, “if” being equivalent to “since. ” The unusual separation of the לא from the verb is occasioned by the fact that דּם is placed before the verb to avoid collision with ודּם. To hate blood is the same as to have a horror of bloodshed or murder. This threat is carried out still further in Eze 35:7 and Eze 35:8.
The land of Edom is to become a complete and perpetual devastation; its inhabitants are to be exterminated by war. The form שׁממה stands for שׁמּמה, and is not to be changed into משׁמּה. Considering the frequency with which משׁמּה occurs, the supposition that we have here a copyist’s error is by no means a probable one, and still less probable is the perpetuation of such an error.
עבר ושׁב, as in Zec 7:14. For Eze 35:8 compare Eze 32:5-6 and Eze 31:12. The Chetib תּישׁבנה is scriptio plena for תּשׁבנה, the imperfect Kal of ישׁב in the intransitive sense to be inhabited. The Keri תּשׁבנה, from שׁוּב, is a needless and unsuitable correction, since שׁוּב does not mean restitui . In the second strophe, Eze 35:10-15, the additional reason assigned for the desolation of Edom is its longing for the possession of Israel and its land, of which it desired to take forcible possession, although it knew that they belonged to Jehovah, whereby the hatred of Edom toward Israel became contempt of Jehovah.
The two peoples and the two lands are Israel and Judah with their lands, and therefore the whole of the holy people and land. את is the sign of the accusative: as for the two peoples, they are mine. The suffix appended to ירשׁנוּה is neuter, and is to be taken as referring generally to what has gone before. ויהוה שׁם היה is a circumstantial clause, through which the desire of Edom is placed in the right light, and characterized as an attack upon Jehovah Himself.
Jehovah was there - namely, in the land of which Edom wished to take possession. Kliefoth’s rendering, “and yet Jehovah is there,” is opposed to Hebrew usage, by changing the preterite היה into a present; and the objection which he offers to the only rendering that is grammatically admissible, viz. , “when Jehovah was there,” to the effect “that it attributes to Ezekiel the thought that the Holy Land had once been the land and dwelling-place of God, but was so no longer,” calls in question the actual historical condition of things without the slightest reason.
For Jehovah had really forsaken His dwelling-place in Canaan before the destruction of the temple, but without thereby renouncing His right to the land; since it was only for the sins of Israel that He had given up the temple, city, and land to be laid waste by the heathen. “But Edom had acted as if Israel existed among the nations without God, and Jehovah had departed from it for ever” (Hävernick); or rather as if Jehovah were a powerless and useless Deity, who had not been able to defend His people against the might of the heathen nations.
The Lord will requite Edom for this, in a manner answering to its anger and envy, which had both sprung from hatred. נודעתּי בם, “I will make myself known among them (the Israelites) when I judge thee;” i. e. , by the fact that He punishes Edom for its sin, He will prove to Israel that He is a God who does not suffer His people and His possession to be attacked with impunity.
From this shall Edom learn that He is Jehovah, the omniscient God, who has heard the revilings of His enemies (Eze 35:12, Eze 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Eze 35:14 and Eze 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Neh 9:18, Neh 9:26 (cf.
Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Eze 35:12 and Eze 36:1, is occasioned by the antithesis “mountain (mountain-range) of Seir. ” The Chetib hmmhs is to be pronounced שׁממה, and to be retained in spite of the Keri . The singular of the neuter gender is used with emphasis in a broken and emotional address, and is to be taken as referring ad sensum to the land.
הגדּיל בּפה, to magnify or boast with the mouth, i. e. , to utter proud sayings against God, in other words, actually to deride God (compare הגדּיל פּה in Oba 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר, used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר, to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה, in Eze 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.
g. , Jos 6:20), when all the earth rejoices, not “over thy desolation” (Hitzig), which does not yield any rational thought, but when joy is prepared for all the world, I will prepare devastation for thee. Through this antithesis כּל־הארץ is limited to the world, with the exception of Edom, i. e. , to that portion of the human race which stood in a different relation to God and His people from that of Edom; in other words, which acknowledged the Lord as the true God.
It follows from this, that Edom represents the world at enmity against God. In כּשׂמחתך (Eze 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Eze 35:15 is: as thou didst rejoice over the desolation of the inheritance of the house of Israel, so will I cause others to rejoice over thy desolation. In Eze 35:15 we agree with the lxx, Vulgate, Syriac, and others, in taking תּהיה as the second person, not as the third.
כּל־אדום כּלּהּ serves to strengthen הר־שׂעיר (compare Eze 11:15 and Eze 36:10).
The two sections, Eze 35:1-15 and Eze 36:1-15, form a connected prophecy. This is apparent not only from their formal arrangement, both of them being placed together under the introductory formula, “And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,” but also from their contents, the promise in relation to the mountains of Israel being so opposed to the threat against the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15) as to form the obverse and completion of the latter; whilst allusion is evidently made to it in the form of expression employed (compare Eze 36:4, Eze 36:6, with Eze 35:8; and Eze 36:5 with Eze 35:15 ).
The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Eze 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Eze 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Eze 35:10-15). On the other hand, the mountain-land of Israel, which the heathen have despised on account of its devastation, and have appropriated to themselves as booty (Eze 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Eze 35:8-15).
This closing thought (Eze 35:15) points back to Eze 34:29, and shows that our prophecy is intended as a further expansion of that conclusion; and at the same time, that in the devastation of Edom the overthrow of the heathen world as a whole, with its enmity against God, is predicted, and in the restoration of the land of Israel the re-erection of the fallen kingdom of God. Eze 35:1.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Eze 35:3. And say to it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I will deal with thee, Mount Seir, and will stretch out my hand against thee, and make thee waste and devastation. Eze 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:5. Because thou cherishest eternal enmity, and gavest up the sons of Israel to the sword at the time of their distress, at the time of the final transgression, Eze 35:6. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will make thee blood, and blood shall pursue thee; since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee.
Eze 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Eze 35:8. And fill his mountains with his slain; upon thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy low places, those pierced with the sword shall fall. Eze 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:10. Because thou sayest, The two nations and the two lands they shall be mine, and we will take possession of it, when Jehovah was there; Eze 35:11. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thy wrath and thine envy, as thou hast done because of thy hatred, and will make myself known among them, as I shall judge thee.
Eze 35:12. And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy reproaches which thou hast uttered against the mountains of Israel, saying, “they are laid waste, they are given to us for food. ” Eze 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Eze 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee.
Eze 35:15. As thou hadst thy delight in the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee; thou shalt become a waste, Mount Seir and all Edom together; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. The theme of this prophecy, viz. , “Edom and its cities are to become a desert” (Eze 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with 'יען וגו (Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Eze 35:4 ), with 'כּי אני (וידעוּ) וידעתּם, by a distinct statement of the sins of Edom.
- Already, in Ezekiel 25, Edom has been named among the hostile border nations which are threatened with destruction (Eze 35:12-14). The earlier prophecy applied to the Edomites, according to their historical relation to the people of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. In the present word of God, on the contrary, Edom comes into consideration, on the ground of its hostile attitude towards the covenant people, as the representative of the world and of mankind in its hostility to the people and kingdom of God, as in Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6.
This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Eze 35:14), which does not apply to Edom as a small and solitary nation, and still more clearly from the circumstance that, in the promise of salvation in Ezekiel 36, not all Edom alone (Eze 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Eze 36:3-7 and Eze 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Eze 35:2, compare Eze 13:17.
הר is the name given to the mountainous district inhabited by the Edomites, between the Dead Sea and the Elanitic Gulf (see the comm. on Gen 36:9). The prophecy is directed against the land; but it also applies to the nation, which brings upon itself the desolation of its land by its hostility to Israel. For Eze 35:3, compare Eze 6:14, etc. חרבּה, destruction.
The sin of Edom mentioned in Eze 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Eze 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Gen 25:22. and Gen 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amo 1:11) has already said, in the constant retention of its malignity toward the covenant nation, so that Edom embraced every opportunity to effect its destruction, and according to the charge brought against it by Ezekiel, gave up the sons of Israel to the sword when the kingdom of Judah fell.
הנּיר על , lit. , to pour upon ( - into) the hands of the sword, i. e. , to deliver up to the power of the sword (cf. Psa 63:11; Jer 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Oba 1:13; but here it is more precisely defined by בּעת עון , and limited to the time of the overthrow of the Israelites, when Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by the Chaldeans. בּעת עון קץ, as in Eze 21:30.
On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Eze 35:6). This expression is probably chosen for the play upon the words דּם and אדם. Edom shall become what its name suggests. Making it blood does not mean merely filling it with bloodshed, or reddening the soil with blood (Hitzig); but, as in Eze 16:38, turning it as it were into blood, or causing it to vanish therein.
Blood shall pursue thee, “as blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and so delivers him up to punishment” (Hävernick). אם לא cannot be the particle employed in swearing, and dependent upon חי־אני, since this particle introduces an affirmative declaration, which would be unsuitable here, inasmuch as דּם in this connection cannot possibly signify blood-relationship.
אם לא means “if not,” in which the conditional meaning of אם coincides with the causal, “if” being equivalent to “since. ” The unusual separation of the לא from the verb is occasioned by the fact that דּם is placed before the verb to avoid collision with ודּם. To hate blood is the same as to have a horror of bloodshed or murder. This threat is carried out still further in Eze 35:7 and Eze 35:8.
The land of Edom is to become a complete and perpetual devastation; its inhabitants are to be exterminated by war. The form שׁממה stands for שׁמּמה, and is not to be changed into משׁמּה. Considering the frequency with which משׁמּה occurs, the supposition that we have here a copyist’s error is by no means a probable one, and still less probable is the perpetuation of such an error.
עבר ושׁב, as in Zec 7:14. For Eze 35:8 compare Eze 32:5-6 and Eze 31:12. The Chetib תּישׁבנה is scriptio plena for תּשׁבנה, the imperfect Kal of ישׁב in the intransitive sense to be inhabited. The Keri תּשׁבנה, from שׁוּב, is a needless and unsuitable correction, since שׁוּב does not mean restitui . In the second strophe, Eze 35:10-15, the additional reason assigned for the desolation of Edom is its longing for the possession of Israel and its land, of which it desired to take forcible possession, although it knew that they belonged to Jehovah, whereby the hatred of Edom toward Israel became contempt of Jehovah.
The two peoples and the two lands are Israel and Judah with their lands, and therefore the whole of the holy people and land. את is the sign of the accusative: as for the two peoples, they are mine. The suffix appended to ירשׁנוּה is neuter, and is to be taken as referring generally to what has gone before. ויהוה שׁם היה is a circumstantial clause, through which the desire of Edom is placed in the right light, and characterized as an attack upon Jehovah Himself.
Jehovah was there - namely, in the land of which Edom wished to take possession. Kliefoth’s rendering, “and yet Jehovah is there,” is opposed to Hebrew usage, by changing the preterite היה into a present; and the objection which he offers to the only rendering that is grammatically admissible, viz. , “when Jehovah was there,” to the effect “that it attributes to Ezekiel the thought that the Holy Land had once been the land and dwelling-place of God, but was so no longer,” calls in question the actual historical condition of things without the slightest reason.
For Jehovah had really forsaken His dwelling-place in Canaan before the destruction of the temple, but without thereby renouncing His right to the land; since it was only for the sins of Israel that He had given up the temple, city, and land to be laid waste by the heathen. “But Edom had acted as if Israel existed among the nations without God, and Jehovah had departed from it for ever” (Hävernick); or rather as if Jehovah were a powerless and useless Deity, who had not been able to defend His people against the might of the heathen nations.
The Lord will requite Edom for this, in a manner answering to its anger and envy, which had both sprung from hatred. נודעתּי בם, “I will make myself known among them (the Israelites) when I judge thee;” i. e. , by the fact that He punishes Edom for its sin, He will prove to Israel that He is a God who does not suffer His people and His possession to be attacked with impunity.
From this shall Edom learn that He is Jehovah, the omniscient God, who has heard the revilings of His enemies (Eze 35:12, Eze 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Eze 35:14 and Eze 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Neh 9:18, Neh 9:26 (cf.
Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Eze 35:12 and Eze 36:1, is occasioned by the antithesis “mountain (mountain-range) of Seir. ” The Chetib hmmhs is to be pronounced שׁממה, and to be retained in spite of the Keri . The singular of the neuter gender is used with emphasis in a broken and emotional address, and is to be taken as referring ad sensum to the land.
הגדּיל בּפה, to magnify or boast with the mouth, i. e. , to utter proud sayings against God, in other words, actually to deride God (compare הגדּיל פּה in Oba 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר, used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר, to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה, in Eze 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.
g. , Jos 6:20), when all the earth rejoices, not “over thy desolation” (Hitzig), which does not yield any rational thought, but when joy is prepared for all the world, I will prepare devastation for thee. Through this antithesis כּל־הארץ is limited to the world, with the exception of Edom, i. e. , to that portion of the human race which stood in a different relation to God and His people from that of Edom; in other words, which acknowledged the Lord as the true God.
It follows from this, that Edom represents the world at enmity against God. In כּשׂמחתך (Eze 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Eze 35:15 is: as thou didst rejoice over the desolation of the inheritance of the house of Israel, so will I cause others to rejoice over thy desolation. In Eze 35:15 we agree with the lxx, Vulgate, Syriac, and others, in taking תּהיה as the second person, not as the third.
כּל־אדום כּלּהּ serves to strengthen הר־שׂעיר (compare Eze 11:15 and Eze 36:10).
The two sections, Eze 35:1-15 and Eze 36:1-15, form a connected prophecy. This is apparent not only from their formal arrangement, both of them being placed together under the introductory formula, “And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,” but also from their contents, the promise in relation to the mountains of Israel being so opposed to the threat against the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15) as to form the obverse and completion of the latter; whilst allusion is evidently made to it in the form of expression employed (compare Eze 36:4, Eze 36:6, with Eze 35:8; and Eze 36:5 with Eze 35:15 ).
The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Eze 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Eze 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Eze 35:10-15). On the other hand, the mountain-land of Israel, which the heathen have despised on account of its devastation, and have appropriated to themselves as booty (Eze 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Eze 35:8-15).
This closing thought (Eze 35:15) points back to Eze 34:29, and shows that our prophecy is intended as a further expansion of that conclusion; and at the same time, that in the devastation of Edom the overthrow of the heathen world as a whole, with its enmity against God, is predicted, and in the restoration of the land of Israel the re-erection of the fallen kingdom of God. Eze 35:1.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Eze 35:3. And say to it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I will deal with thee, Mount Seir, and will stretch out my hand against thee, and make thee waste and devastation. Eze 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:5. Because thou cherishest eternal enmity, and gavest up the sons of Israel to the sword at the time of their distress, at the time of the final transgression, Eze 35:6. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will make thee blood, and blood shall pursue thee; since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee.
Eze 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Eze 35:8. And fill his mountains with his slain; upon thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy low places, those pierced with the sword shall fall. Eze 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:10. Because thou sayest, The two nations and the two lands they shall be mine, and we will take possession of it, when Jehovah was there; Eze 35:11. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thy wrath and thine envy, as thou hast done because of thy hatred, and will make myself known among them, as I shall judge thee.
Eze 35:12. And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy reproaches which thou hast uttered against the mountains of Israel, saying, “they are laid waste, they are given to us for food. ” Eze 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Eze 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee.
Eze 35:15. As thou hadst thy delight in the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee; thou shalt become a waste, Mount Seir and all Edom together; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. The theme of this prophecy, viz. , “Edom and its cities are to become a desert” (Eze 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with 'יען וגו (Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Eze 35:4 ), with 'כּי אני (וידעוּ) וידעתּם, by a distinct statement of the sins of Edom.
- Already, in Ezekiel 25, Edom has been named among the hostile border nations which are threatened with destruction (Eze 35:12-14). The earlier prophecy applied to the Edomites, according to their historical relation to the people of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. In the present word of God, on the contrary, Edom comes into consideration, on the ground of its hostile attitude towards the covenant people, as the representative of the world and of mankind in its hostility to the people and kingdom of God, as in Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6.
This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Eze 35:14), which does not apply to Edom as a small and solitary nation, and still more clearly from the circumstance that, in the promise of salvation in Ezekiel 36, not all Edom alone (Eze 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Eze 36:3-7 and Eze 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Eze 35:2, compare Eze 13:17.
הר is the name given to the mountainous district inhabited by the Edomites, between the Dead Sea and the Elanitic Gulf (see the comm. on Gen 36:9). The prophecy is directed against the land; but it also applies to the nation, which brings upon itself the desolation of its land by its hostility to Israel. For Eze 35:3, compare Eze 6:14, etc. חרבּה, destruction.
The sin of Edom mentioned in Eze 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Eze 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Gen 25:22. and Gen 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amo 1:11) has already said, in the constant retention of its malignity toward the covenant nation, so that Edom embraced every opportunity to effect its destruction, and according to the charge brought against it by Ezekiel, gave up the sons of Israel to the sword when the kingdom of Judah fell.
הנּיר על , lit. , to pour upon ( - into) the hands of the sword, i. e. , to deliver up to the power of the sword (cf. Psa 63:11; Jer 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Oba 1:13; but here it is more precisely defined by בּעת עון , and limited to the time of the overthrow of the Israelites, when Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by the Chaldeans. בּעת עון קץ, as in Eze 21:30.
On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Eze 35:6). This expression is probably chosen for the play upon the words דּם and אדם. Edom shall become what its name suggests. Making it blood does not mean merely filling it with bloodshed, or reddening the soil with blood (Hitzig); but, as in Eze 16:38, turning it as it were into blood, or causing it to vanish therein.
Blood shall pursue thee, “as blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and so delivers him up to punishment” (Hävernick). אם לא cannot be the particle employed in swearing, and dependent upon חי־אני, since this particle introduces an affirmative declaration, which would be unsuitable here, inasmuch as דּם in this connection cannot possibly signify blood-relationship.
אם לא means “if not,” in which the conditional meaning of אם coincides with the causal, “if” being equivalent to “since. ” The unusual separation of the לא from the verb is occasioned by the fact that דּם is placed before the verb to avoid collision with ודּם. To hate blood is the same as to have a horror of bloodshed or murder. This threat is carried out still further in Eze 35:7 and Eze 35:8.
The land of Edom is to become a complete and perpetual devastation; its inhabitants are to be exterminated by war. The form שׁממה stands for שׁמּמה, and is not to be changed into משׁמּה. Considering the frequency with which משׁמּה occurs, the supposition that we have here a copyist’s error is by no means a probable one, and still less probable is the perpetuation of such an error.
עבר ושׁב, as in Zec 7:14. For Eze 35:8 compare Eze 32:5-6 and Eze 31:12. The Chetib תּישׁבנה is scriptio plena for תּשׁבנה, the imperfect Kal of ישׁב in the intransitive sense to be inhabited. The Keri תּשׁבנה, from שׁוּב, is a needless and unsuitable correction, since שׁוּב does not mean restitui . In the second strophe, Eze 35:10-15, the additional reason assigned for the desolation of Edom is its longing for the possession of Israel and its land, of which it desired to take forcible possession, although it knew that they belonged to Jehovah, whereby the hatred of Edom toward Israel became contempt of Jehovah.
The two peoples and the two lands are Israel and Judah with their lands, and therefore the whole of the holy people and land. את is the sign of the accusative: as for the two peoples, they are mine. The suffix appended to ירשׁנוּה is neuter, and is to be taken as referring generally to what has gone before. ויהוה שׁם היה is a circumstantial clause, through which the desire of Edom is placed in the right light, and characterized as an attack upon Jehovah Himself.
Jehovah was there - namely, in the land of which Edom wished to take possession. Kliefoth’s rendering, “and yet Jehovah is there,” is opposed to Hebrew usage, by changing the preterite היה into a present; and the objection which he offers to the only rendering that is grammatically admissible, viz. , “when Jehovah was there,” to the effect “that it attributes to Ezekiel the thought that the Holy Land had once been the land and dwelling-place of God, but was so no longer,” calls in question the actual historical condition of things without the slightest reason.
For Jehovah had really forsaken His dwelling-place in Canaan before the destruction of the temple, but without thereby renouncing His right to the land; since it was only for the sins of Israel that He had given up the temple, city, and land to be laid waste by the heathen. “But Edom had acted as if Israel existed among the nations without God, and Jehovah had departed from it for ever” (Hävernick); or rather as if Jehovah were a powerless and useless Deity, who had not been able to defend His people against the might of the heathen nations.
The Lord will requite Edom for this, in a manner answering to its anger and envy, which had both sprung from hatred. נודעתּי בם, “I will make myself known among them (the Israelites) when I judge thee;” i. e. , by the fact that He punishes Edom for its sin, He will prove to Israel that He is a God who does not suffer His people and His possession to be attacked with impunity.
From this shall Edom learn that He is Jehovah, the omniscient God, who has heard the revilings of His enemies (Eze 35:12, Eze 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Eze 35:14 and Eze 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Neh 9:18, Neh 9:26 (cf.
Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Eze 35:12 and Eze 36:1, is occasioned by the antithesis “mountain (mountain-range) of Seir. ” The Chetib hmmhs is to be pronounced שׁממה, and to be retained in spite of the Keri . The singular of the neuter gender is used with emphasis in a broken and emotional address, and is to be taken as referring ad sensum to the land.
הגדּיל בּפה, to magnify or boast with the mouth, i. e. , to utter proud sayings against God, in other words, actually to deride God (compare הגדּיל פּה in Oba 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר, used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר, to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה, in Eze 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.
g. , Jos 6:20), when all the earth rejoices, not “over thy desolation” (Hitzig), which does not yield any rational thought, but when joy is prepared for all the world, I will prepare devastation for thee. Through this antithesis כּל־הארץ is limited to the world, with the exception of Edom, i. e. , to that portion of the human race which stood in a different relation to God and His people from that of Edom; in other words, which acknowledged the Lord as the true God.
It follows from this, that Edom represents the world at enmity against God. In כּשׂמחתך (Eze 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Eze 35:15 is: as thou didst rejoice over the desolation of the inheritance of the house of Israel, so will I cause others to rejoice over thy desolation. In Eze 35:15 we agree with the lxx, Vulgate, Syriac, and others, in taking תּהיה as the second person, not as the third.
כּל־אדום כּלּהּ serves to strengthen הר־שׂעיר (compare Eze 11:15 and Eze 36:10).
The two sections, Eze 35:1-15 and Eze 36:1-15, form a connected prophecy. This is apparent not only from their formal arrangement, both of them being placed together under the introductory formula, “And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,” but also from their contents, the promise in relation to the mountains of Israel being so opposed to the threat against the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15) as to form the obverse and completion of the latter; whilst allusion is evidently made to it in the form of expression employed (compare Eze 36:4, Eze 36:6, with Eze 35:8; and Eze 36:5 with Eze 35:15 ).
The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Eze 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Eze 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Eze 35:10-15). On the other hand, the mountain-land of Israel, which the heathen have despised on account of its devastation, and have appropriated to themselves as booty (Eze 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Eze 35:8-15).
This closing thought (Eze 35:15) points back to Eze 34:29, and shows that our prophecy is intended as a further expansion of that conclusion; and at the same time, that in the devastation of Edom the overthrow of the heathen world as a whole, with its enmity against God, is predicted, and in the restoration of the land of Israel the re-erection of the fallen kingdom of God. Eze 35:1.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Eze 35:3. And say to it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I will deal with thee, Mount Seir, and will stretch out my hand against thee, and make thee waste and devastation. Eze 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:5. Because thou cherishest eternal enmity, and gavest up the sons of Israel to the sword at the time of their distress, at the time of the final transgression, Eze 35:6. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will make thee blood, and blood shall pursue thee; since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee.
Eze 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Eze 35:8. And fill his mountains with his slain; upon thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy low places, those pierced with the sword shall fall. Eze 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:10. Because thou sayest, The two nations and the two lands they shall be mine, and we will take possession of it, when Jehovah was there; Eze 35:11. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thy wrath and thine envy, as thou hast done because of thy hatred, and will make myself known among them, as I shall judge thee.
Eze 35:12. And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy reproaches which thou hast uttered against the mountains of Israel, saying, “they are laid waste, they are given to us for food. ” Eze 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Eze 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee.
Eze 35:15. As thou hadst thy delight in the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee; thou shalt become a waste, Mount Seir and all Edom together; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. The theme of this prophecy, viz. , “Edom and its cities are to become a desert” (Eze 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with 'יען וגו (Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Eze 35:4 ), with 'כּי אני (וידעוּ) וידעתּם, by a distinct statement of the sins of Edom.
- Already, in Ezekiel 25, Edom has been named among the hostile border nations which are threatened with destruction (Eze 35:12-14). The earlier prophecy applied to the Edomites, according to their historical relation to the people of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. In the present word of God, on the contrary, Edom comes into consideration, on the ground of its hostile attitude towards the covenant people, as the representative of the world and of mankind in its hostility to the people and kingdom of God, as in Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6.
This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Eze 35:14), which does not apply to Edom as a small and solitary nation, and still more clearly from the circumstance that, in the promise of salvation in Ezekiel 36, not all Edom alone (Eze 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Eze 36:3-7 and Eze 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Eze 35:2, compare Eze 13:17.
הר is the name given to the mountainous district inhabited by the Edomites, between the Dead Sea and the Elanitic Gulf (see the comm. on Gen 36:9). The prophecy is directed against the land; but it also applies to the nation, which brings upon itself the desolation of its land by its hostility to Israel. For Eze 35:3, compare Eze 6:14, etc. חרבּה, destruction.
The sin of Edom mentioned in Eze 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Eze 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Gen 25:22. and Gen 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amo 1:11) has already said, in the constant retention of its malignity toward the covenant nation, so that Edom embraced every opportunity to effect its destruction, and according to the charge brought against it by Ezekiel, gave up the sons of Israel to the sword when the kingdom of Judah fell.
הנּיר על , lit. , to pour upon ( - into) the hands of the sword, i. e. , to deliver up to the power of the sword (cf. Psa 63:11; Jer 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Oba 1:13; but here it is more precisely defined by בּעת עון , and limited to the time of the overthrow of the Israelites, when Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by the Chaldeans. בּעת עון קץ, as in Eze 21:30.
On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Eze 35:6). This expression is probably chosen for the play upon the words דּם and אדם. Edom shall become what its name suggests. Making it blood does not mean merely filling it with bloodshed, or reddening the soil with blood (Hitzig); but, as in Eze 16:38, turning it as it were into blood, or causing it to vanish therein.
Blood shall pursue thee, “as blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and so delivers him up to punishment” (Hävernick). אם לא cannot be the particle employed in swearing, and dependent upon חי־אני, since this particle introduces an affirmative declaration, which would be unsuitable here, inasmuch as דּם in this connection cannot possibly signify blood-relationship.
אם לא means “if not,” in which the conditional meaning of אם coincides with the causal, “if” being equivalent to “since. ” The unusual separation of the לא from the verb is occasioned by the fact that דּם is placed before the verb to avoid collision with ודּם. To hate blood is the same as to have a horror of bloodshed or murder. This threat is carried out still further in Eze 35:7 and Eze 35:8.
The land of Edom is to become a complete and perpetual devastation; its inhabitants are to be exterminated by war. The form שׁממה stands for שׁמּמה, and is not to be changed into משׁמּה. Considering the frequency with which משׁמּה occurs, the supposition that we have here a copyist’s error is by no means a probable one, and still less probable is the perpetuation of such an error.
עבר ושׁב, as in Zec 7:14. For Eze 35:8 compare Eze 32:5-6 and Eze 31:12. The Chetib תּישׁבנה is scriptio plena for תּשׁבנה, the imperfect Kal of ישׁב in the intransitive sense to be inhabited. The Keri תּשׁבנה, from שׁוּב, is a needless and unsuitable correction, since שׁוּב does not mean restitui . In the second strophe, Eze 35:10-15, the additional reason assigned for the desolation of Edom is its longing for the possession of Israel and its land, of which it desired to take forcible possession, although it knew that they belonged to Jehovah, whereby the hatred of Edom toward Israel became contempt of Jehovah.
The two peoples and the two lands are Israel and Judah with their lands, and therefore the whole of the holy people and land. את is the sign of the accusative: as for the two peoples, they are mine. The suffix appended to ירשׁנוּה is neuter, and is to be taken as referring generally to what has gone before. ויהוה שׁם היה is a circumstantial clause, through which the desire of Edom is placed in the right light, and characterized as an attack upon Jehovah Himself.
Jehovah was there - namely, in the land of which Edom wished to take possession. Kliefoth’s rendering, “and yet Jehovah is there,” is opposed to Hebrew usage, by changing the preterite היה into a present; and the objection which he offers to the only rendering that is grammatically admissible, viz. , “when Jehovah was there,” to the effect “that it attributes to Ezekiel the thought that the Holy Land had once been the land and dwelling-place of God, but was so no longer,” calls in question the actual historical condition of things without the slightest reason.
For Jehovah had really forsaken His dwelling-place in Canaan before the destruction of the temple, but without thereby renouncing His right to the land; since it was only for the sins of Israel that He had given up the temple, city, and land to be laid waste by the heathen. “But Edom had acted as if Israel existed among the nations without God, and Jehovah had departed from it for ever” (Hävernick); or rather as if Jehovah were a powerless and useless Deity, who had not been able to defend His people against the might of the heathen nations.
The Lord will requite Edom for this, in a manner answering to its anger and envy, which had both sprung from hatred. נודעתּי בם, “I will make myself known among them (the Israelites) when I judge thee;” i. e. , by the fact that He punishes Edom for its sin, He will prove to Israel that He is a God who does not suffer His people and His possession to be attacked with impunity.
From this shall Edom learn that He is Jehovah, the omniscient God, who has heard the revilings of His enemies (Eze 35:12, Eze 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Eze 35:14 and Eze 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Neh 9:18, Neh 9:26 (cf.
Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Eze 35:12 and Eze 36:1, is occasioned by the antithesis “mountain (mountain-range) of Seir. ” The Chetib hmmhs is to be pronounced שׁממה, and to be retained in spite of the Keri . The singular of the neuter gender is used with emphasis in a broken and emotional address, and is to be taken as referring ad sensum to the land.
הגדּיל בּפה, to magnify or boast with the mouth, i. e. , to utter proud sayings against God, in other words, actually to deride God (compare הגדּיל פּה in Oba 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר, used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר, to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה, in Eze 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.
g. , Jos 6:20), when all the earth rejoices, not “over thy desolation” (Hitzig), which does not yield any rational thought, but when joy is prepared for all the world, I will prepare devastation for thee. Through this antithesis כּל־הארץ is limited to the world, with the exception of Edom, i. e. , to that portion of the human race which stood in a different relation to God and His people from that of Edom; in other words, which acknowledged the Lord as the true God.
It follows from this, that Edom represents the world at enmity against God. In כּשׂמחתך (Eze 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Eze 35:15 is: as thou didst rejoice over the desolation of the inheritance of the house of Israel, so will I cause others to rejoice over thy desolation. In Eze 35:15 we agree with the lxx, Vulgate, Syriac, and others, in taking תּהיה as the second person, not as the third.
כּל־אדום כּלּהּ serves to strengthen הר־שׂעיר (compare Eze 11:15 and Eze 36:10).
The two sections, Eze 35:1-15 and Eze 36:1-15, form a connected prophecy. This is apparent not only from their formal arrangement, both of them being placed together under the introductory formula, “And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,” but also from their contents, the promise in relation to the mountains of Israel being so opposed to the threat against the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15) as to form the obverse and completion of the latter; whilst allusion is evidently made to it in the form of expression employed (compare Eze 36:4, Eze 36:6, with Eze 35:8; and Eze 36:5 with Eze 35:15 ).
The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Eze 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Eze 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Eze 35:10-15). On the other hand, the mountain-land of Israel, which the heathen have despised on account of its devastation, and have appropriated to themselves as booty (Eze 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Eze 35:8-15).
This closing thought (Eze 35:15) points back to Eze 34:29, and shows that our prophecy is intended as a further expansion of that conclusion; and at the same time, that in the devastation of Edom the overthrow of the heathen world as a whole, with its enmity against God, is predicted, and in the restoration of the land of Israel the re-erection of the fallen kingdom of God. Eze 35:1.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Eze 35:3. And say to it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I will deal with thee, Mount Seir, and will stretch out my hand against thee, and make thee waste and devastation. Eze 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:5. Because thou cherishest eternal enmity, and gavest up the sons of Israel to the sword at the time of their distress, at the time of the final transgression, Eze 35:6. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will make thee blood, and blood shall pursue thee; since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee.
Eze 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Eze 35:8. And fill his mountains with his slain; upon thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy low places, those pierced with the sword shall fall. Eze 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:10. Because thou sayest, The two nations and the two lands they shall be mine, and we will take possession of it, when Jehovah was there; Eze 35:11. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thy wrath and thine envy, as thou hast done because of thy hatred, and will make myself known among them, as I shall judge thee.
Eze 35:12. And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy reproaches which thou hast uttered against the mountains of Israel, saying, “they are laid waste, they are given to us for food. ” Eze 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Eze 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee.
Eze 35:15. As thou hadst thy delight in the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee; thou shalt become a waste, Mount Seir and all Edom together; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. The theme of this prophecy, viz. , “Edom and its cities are to become a desert” (Eze 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with 'יען וגו (Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Eze 35:4 ), with 'כּי אני (וידעוּ) וידעתּם, by a distinct statement of the sins of Edom.
- Already, in Ezekiel 25, Edom has been named among the hostile border nations which are threatened with destruction (Eze 35:12-14). The earlier prophecy applied to the Edomites, according to their historical relation to the people of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. In the present word of God, on the contrary, Edom comes into consideration, on the ground of its hostile attitude towards the covenant people, as the representative of the world and of mankind in its hostility to the people and kingdom of God, as in Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6.
This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Eze 35:14), which does not apply to Edom as a small and solitary nation, and still more clearly from the circumstance that, in the promise of salvation in Ezekiel 36, not all Edom alone (Eze 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Eze 36:3-7 and Eze 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Eze 35:2, compare Eze 13:17.
הר is the name given to the mountainous district inhabited by the Edomites, between the Dead Sea and the Elanitic Gulf (see the comm. on Gen 36:9). The prophecy is directed against the land; but it also applies to the nation, which brings upon itself the desolation of its land by its hostility to Israel. For Eze 35:3, compare Eze 6:14, etc. חרבּה, destruction.
The sin of Edom mentioned in Eze 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Eze 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Gen 25:22. and Gen 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amo 1:11) has already said, in the constant retention of its malignity toward the covenant nation, so that Edom embraced every opportunity to effect its destruction, and according to the charge brought against it by Ezekiel, gave up the sons of Israel to the sword when the kingdom of Judah fell.
הנּיר על , lit. , to pour upon ( - into) the hands of the sword, i. e. , to deliver up to the power of the sword (cf. Psa 63:11; Jer 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Oba 1:13; but here it is more precisely defined by בּעת עון , and limited to the time of the overthrow of the Israelites, when Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by the Chaldeans. בּעת עון קץ, as in Eze 21:30.
On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Eze 35:6). This expression is probably chosen for the play upon the words דּם and אדם. Edom shall become what its name suggests. Making it blood does not mean merely filling it with bloodshed, or reddening the soil with blood (Hitzig); but, as in Eze 16:38, turning it as it were into blood, or causing it to vanish therein.
Blood shall pursue thee, “as blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and so delivers him up to punishment” (Hävernick). אם לא cannot be the particle employed in swearing, and dependent upon חי־אני, since this particle introduces an affirmative declaration, which would be unsuitable here, inasmuch as דּם in this connection cannot possibly signify blood-relationship.
אם לא means “if not,” in which the conditional meaning of אם coincides with the causal, “if” being equivalent to “since. ” The unusual separation of the לא from the verb is occasioned by the fact that דּם is placed before the verb to avoid collision with ודּם. To hate blood is the same as to have a horror of bloodshed or murder. This threat is carried out still further in Eze 35:7 and Eze 35:8.
The land of Edom is to become a complete and perpetual devastation; its inhabitants are to be exterminated by war. The form שׁממה stands for שׁמּמה, and is not to be changed into משׁמּה. Considering the frequency with which משׁמּה occurs, the supposition that we have here a copyist’s error is by no means a probable one, and still less probable is the perpetuation of such an error.
עבר ושׁב, as in Zec 7:14. For Eze 35:8 compare Eze 32:5-6 and Eze 31:12. The Chetib תּישׁבנה is scriptio plena for תּשׁבנה, the imperfect Kal of ישׁב in the intransitive sense to be inhabited. The Keri תּשׁבנה, from שׁוּב, is a needless and unsuitable correction, since שׁוּב does not mean restitui . In the second strophe, Eze 35:10-15, the additional reason assigned for the desolation of Edom is its longing for the possession of Israel and its land, of which it desired to take forcible possession, although it knew that they belonged to Jehovah, whereby the hatred of Edom toward Israel became contempt of Jehovah.
The two peoples and the two lands are Israel and Judah with their lands, and therefore the whole of the holy people and land. את is the sign of the accusative: as for the two peoples, they are mine. The suffix appended to ירשׁנוּה is neuter, and is to be taken as referring generally to what has gone before. ויהוה שׁם היה is a circumstantial clause, through which the desire of Edom is placed in the right light, and characterized as an attack upon Jehovah Himself.
Jehovah was there - namely, in the land of which Edom wished to take possession. Kliefoth’s rendering, “and yet Jehovah is there,” is opposed to Hebrew usage, by changing the preterite היה into a present; and the objection which he offers to the only rendering that is grammatically admissible, viz. , “when Jehovah was there,” to the effect “that it attributes to Ezekiel the thought that the Holy Land had once been the land and dwelling-place of God, but was so no longer,” calls in question the actual historical condition of things without the slightest reason.
For Jehovah had really forsaken His dwelling-place in Canaan before the destruction of the temple, but without thereby renouncing His right to the land; since it was only for the sins of Israel that He had given up the temple, city, and land to be laid waste by the heathen. “But Edom had acted as if Israel existed among the nations without God, and Jehovah had departed from it for ever” (Hävernick); or rather as if Jehovah were a powerless and useless Deity, who had not been able to defend His people against the might of the heathen nations.
The Lord will requite Edom for this, in a manner answering to its anger and envy, which had both sprung from hatred. נודעתּי בם, “I will make myself known among them (the Israelites) when I judge thee;” i. e. , by the fact that He punishes Edom for its sin, He will prove to Israel that He is a God who does not suffer His people and His possession to be attacked with impunity.
From this shall Edom learn that He is Jehovah, the omniscient God, who has heard the revilings of His enemies (Eze 35:12, Eze 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Eze 35:14 and Eze 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Neh 9:18, Neh 9:26 (cf.
Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Eze 35:12 and Eze 36:1, is occasioned by the antithesis “mountain (mountain-range) of Seir. ” The Chetib hmmhs is to be pronounced שׁממה, and to be retained in spite of the Keri . The singular of the neuter gender is used with emphasis in a broken and emotional address, and is to be taken as referring ad sensum to the land.
הגדּיל בּפה, to magnify or boast with the mouth, i. e. , to utter proud sayings against God, in other words, actually to deride God (compare הגדּיל פּה in Oba 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר, used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר, to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה, in Eze 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.
g. , Jos 6:20), when all the earth rejoices, not “over thy desolation” (Hitzig), which does not yield any rational thought, but when joy is prepared for all the world, I will prepare devastation for thee. Through this antithesis כּל־הארץ is limited to the world, with the exception of Edom, i. e. , to that portion of the human race which stood in a different relation to God and His people from that of Edom; in other words, which acknowledged the Lord as the true God.
It follows from this, that Edom represents the world at enmity against God. In כּשׂמחתך (Eze 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Eze 35:15 is: as thou didst rejoice over the desolation of the inheritance of the house of Israel, so will I cause others to rejoice over thy desolation. In Eze 35:15 we agree with the lxx, Vulgate, Syriac, and others, in taking תּהיה as the second person, not as the third.
כּל־אדום כּלּהּ serves to strengthen הר־שׂעיר (compare Eze 11:15 and Eze 36:10).
The two sections, Eze 35:1-15 and Eze 36:1-15, form a connected prophecy. This is apparent not only from their formal arrangement, both of them being placed together under the introductory formula, “And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,” but also from their contents, the promise in relation to the mountains of Israel being so opposed to the threat against the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15) as to form the obverse and completion of the latter; whilst allusion is evidently made to it in the form of expression employed (compare Eze 36:4, Eze 36:6, with Eze 35:8; and Eze 36:5 with Eze 35:15 ).
The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Eze 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Eze 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Eze 35:10-15). On the other hand, the mountain-land of Israel, which the heathen have despised on account of its devastation, and have appropriated to themselves as booty (Eze 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Eze 35:8-15).
This closing thought (Eze 35:15) points back to Eze 34:29, and shows that our prophecy is intended as a further expansion of that conclusion; and at the same time, that in the devastation of Edom the overthrow of the heathen world as a whole, with its enmity against God, is predicted, and in the restoration of the land of Israel the re-erection of the fallen kingdom of God. Eze 35:1.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Eze 35:3. And say to it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I will deal with thee, Mount Seir, and will stretch out my hand against thee, and make thee waste and devastation. Eze 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:5. Because thou cherishest eternal enmity, and gavest up the sons of Israel to the sword at the time of their distress, at the time of the final transgression, Eze 35:6. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will make thee blood, and blood shall pursue thee; since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee.
Eze 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Eze 35:8. And fill his mountains with his slain; upon thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy low places, those pierced with the sword shall fall. Eze 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:10. Because thou sayest, The two nations and the two lands they shall be mine, and we will take possession of it, when Jehovah was there; Eze 35:11. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thy wrath and thine envy, as thou hast done because of thy hatred, and will make myself known among them, as I shall judge thee.
Eze 35:12. And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy reproaches which thou hast uttered against the mountains of Israel, saying, “they are laid waste, they are given to us for food. ” Eze 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Eze 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee.
Eze 35:15. As thou hadst thy delight in the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee; thou shalt become a waste, Mount Seir and all Edom together; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. The theme of this prophecy, viz. , “Edom and its cities are to become a desert” (Eze 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with 'יען וגו (Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Eze 35:4 ), with 'כּי אני (וידעוּ) וידעתּם, by a distinct statement of the sins of Edom.
- Already, in Ezekiel 25, Edom has been named among the hostile border nations which are threatened with destruction (Eze 35:12-14). The earlier prophecy applied to the Edomites, according to their historical relation to the people of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. In the present word of God, on the contrary, Edom comes into consideration, on the ground of its hostile attitude towards the covenant people, as the representative of the world and of mankind in its hostility to the people and kingdom of God, as in Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6.
This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Eze 35:14), which does not apply to Edom as a small and solitary nation, and still more clearly from the circumstance that, in the promise of salvation in Ezekiel 36, not all Edom alone (Eze 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Eze 36:3-7 and Eze 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Eze 35:2, compare Eze 13:17.
הר is the name given to the mountainous district inhabited by the Edomites, between the Dead Sea and the Elanitic Gulf (see the comm. on Gen 36:9). The prophecy is directed against the land; but it also applies to the nation, which brings upon itself the desolation of its land by its hostility to Israel. For Eze 35:3, compare Eze 6:14, etc. חרבּה, destruction.
The sin of Edom mentioned in Eze 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Eze 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Gen 25:22. and Gen 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amo 1:11) has already said, in the constant retention of its malignity toward the covenant nation, so that Edom embraced every opportunity to effect its destruction, and according to the charge brought against it by Ezekiel, gave up the sons of Israel to the sword when the kingdom of Judah fell.
הנּיר על , lit. , to pour upon ( - into) the hands of the sword, i. e. , to deliver up to the power of the sword (cf. Psa 63:11; Jer 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Oba 1:13; but here it is more precisely defined by בּעת עון , and limited to the time of the overthrow of the Israelites, when Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by the Chaldeans. בּעת עון קץ, as in Eze 21:30.
On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Eze 35:6). This expression is probably chosen for the play upon the words דּם and אדם. Edom shall become what its name suggests. Making it blood does not mean merely filling it with bloodshed, or reddening the soil with blood (Hitzig); but, as in Eze 16:38, turning it as it were into blood, or causing it to vanish therein.
Blood shall pursue thee, “as blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and so delivers him up to punishment” (Hävernick). אם לא cannot be the particle employed in swearing, and dependent upon חי־אני, since this particle introduces an affirmative declaration, which would be unsuitable here, inasmuch as דּם in this connection cannot possibly signify blood-relationship.
אם לא means “if not,” in which the conditional meaning of אם coincides with the causal, “if” being equivalent to “since. ” The unusual separation of the לא from the verb is occasioned by the fact that דּם is placed before the verb to avoid collision with ודּם. To hate blood is the same as to have a horror of bloodshed or murder. This threat is carried out still further in Eze 35:7 and Eze 35:8.
The land of Edom is to become a complete and perpetual devastation; its inhabitants are to be exterminated by war. The form שׁממה stands for שׁמּמה, and is not to be changed into משׁמּה. Considering the frequency with which משׁמּה occurs, the supposition that we have here a copyist’s error is by no means a probable one, and still less probable is the perpetuation of such an error.
עבר ושׁב, as in Zec 7:14. For Eze 35:8 compare Eze 32:5-6 and Eze 31:12. The Chetib תּישׁבנה is scriptio plena for תּשׁבנה, the imperfect Kal of ישׁב in the intransitive sense to be inhabited. The Keri תּשׁבנה, from שׁוּב, is a needless and unsuitable correction, since שׁוּב does not mean restitui . In the second strophe, Eze 35:10-15, the additional reason assigned for the desolation of Edom is its longing for the possession of Israel and its land, of which it desired to take forcible possession, although it knew that they belonged to Jehovah, whereby the hatred of Edom toward Israel became contempt of Jehovah.
The two peoples and the two lands are Israel and Judah with their lands, and therefore the whole of the holy people and land. את is the sign of the accusative: as for the two peoples, they are mine. The suffix appended to ירשׁנוּה is neuter, and is to be taken as referring generally to what has gone before. ויהוה שׁם היה is a circumstantial clause, through which the desire of Edom is placed in the right light, and characterized as an attack upon Jehovah Himself.
Jehovah was there - namely, in the land of which Edom wished to take possession. Kliefoth’s rendering, “and yet Jehovah is there,” is opposed to Hebrew usage, by changing the preterite היה into a present; and the objection which he offers to the only rendering that is grammatically admissible, viz. , “when Jehovah was there,” to the effect “that it attributes to Ezekiel the thought that the Holy Land had once been the land and dwelling-place of God, but was so no longer,” calls in question the actual historical condition of things without the slightest reason.
For Jehovah had really forsaken His dwelling-place in Canaan before the destruction of the temple, but without thereby renouncing His right to the land; since it was only for the sins of Israel that He had given up the temple, city, and land to be laid waste by the heathen. “But Edom had acted as if Israel existed among the nations without God, and Jehovah had departed from it for ever” (Hävernick); or rather as if Jehovah were a powerless and useless Deity, who had not been able to defend His people against the might of the heathen nations.
The Lord will requite Edom for this, in a manner answering to its anger and envy, which had both sprung from hatred. נודעתּי בם, “I will make myself known among them (the Israelites) when I judge thee;” i. e. , by the fact that He punishes Edom for its sin, He will prove to Israel that He is a God who does not suffer His people and His possession to be attacked with impunity.
From this shall Edom learn that He is Jehovah, the omniscient God, who has heard the revilings of His enemies (Eze 35:12, Eze 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Eze 35:14 and Eze 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Neh 9:18, Neh 9:26 (cf.
Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Eze 35:12 and Eze 36:1, is occasioned by the antithesis “mountain (mountain-range) of Seir. ” The Chetib hmmhs is to be pronounced שׁממה, and to be retained in spite of the Keri . The singular of the neuter gender is used with emphasis in a broken and emotional address, and is to be taken as referring ad sensum to the land.
הגדּיל בּפה, to magnify or boast with the mouth, i. e. , to utter proud sayings against God, in other words, actually to deride God (compare הגדּיל פּה in Oba 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר, used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר, to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה, in Eze 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.
g. , Jos 6:20), when all the earth rejoices, not “over thy desolation” (Hitzig), which does not yield any rational thought, but when joy is prepared for all the world, I will prepare devastation for thee. Through this antithesis כּל־הארץ is limited to the world, with the exception of Edom, i. e. , to that portion of the human race which stood in a different relation to God and His people from that of Edom; in other words, which acknowledged the Lord as the true God.
It follows from this, that Edom represents the world at enmity against God. In כּשׂמחתך (Eze 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Eze 35:15 is: as thou didst rejoice over the desolation of the inheritance of the house of Israel, so will I cause others to rejoice over thy desolation. In Eze 35:15 we agree with the lxx, Vulgate, Syriac, and others, in taking תּהיה as the second person, not as the third.
כּל־אדום כּלּהּ serves to strengthen הר־שׂעיר (compare Eze 11:15 and Eze 36:10).
The two sections, Eze 35:1-15 and Eze 36:1-15, form a connected prophecy. This is apparent not only from their formal arrangement, both of them being placed together under the introductory formula, “And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,” but also from their contents, the promise in relation to the mountains of Israel being so opposed to the threat against the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15) as to form the obverse and completion of the latter; whilst allusion is evidently made to it in the form of expression employed (compare Eze 36:4, Eze 36:6, with Eze 35:8; and Eze 36:5 with Eze 35:15 ).
The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Eze 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Eze 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Eze 35:10-15). On the other hand, the mountain-land of Israel, which the heathen have despised on account of its devastation, and have appropriated to themselves as booty (Eze 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Eze 35:8-15).
This closing thought (Eze 35:15) points back to Eze 34:29, and shows that our prophecy is intended as a further expansion of that conclusion; and at the same time, that in the devastation of Edom the overthrow of the heathen world as a whole, with its enmity against God, is predicted, and in the restoration of the land of Israel the re-erection of the fallen kingdom of God. Eze 35:1.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Eze 35:3. And say to it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I will deal with thee, Mount Seir, and will stretch out my hand against thee, and make thee waste and devastation. Eze 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:5. Because thou cherishest eternal enmity, and gavest up the sons of Israel to the sword at the time of their distress, at the time of the final transgression, Eze 35:6. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will make thee blood, and blood shall pursue thee; since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee.
Eze 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Eze 35:8. And fill his mountains with his slain; upon thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy low places, those pierced with the sword shall fall. Eze 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:10. Because thou sayest, The two nations and the two lands they shall be mine, and we will take possession of it, when Jehovah was there; Eze 35:11. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thy wrath and thine envy, as thou hast done because of thy hatred, and will make myself known among them, as I shall judge thee.
Eze 35:12. And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy reproaches which thou hast uttered against the mountains of Israel, saying, “they are laid waste, they are given to us for food. ” Eze 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Eze 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee.
Eze 35:15. As thou hadst thy delight in the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee; thou shalt become a waste, Mount Seir and all Edom together; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. The theme of this prophecy, viz. , “Edom and its cities are to become a desert” (Eze 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with 'יען וגו (Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Eze 35:4 ), with 'כּי אני (וידעוּ) וידעתּם, by a distinct statement of the sins of Edom.
- Already, in Ezekiel 25, Edom has been named among the hostile border nations which are threatened with destruction (Eze 35:12-14). The earlier prophecy applied to the Edomites, according to their historical relation to the people of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. In the present word of God, on the contrary, Edom comes into consideration, on the ground of its hostile attitude towards the covenant people, as the representative of the world and of mankind in its hostility to the people and kingdom of God, as in Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6.
This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Eze 35:14), which does not apply to Edom as a small and solitary nation, and still more clearly from the circumstance that, in the promise of salvation in Ezekiel 36, not all Edom alone (Eze 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Eze 36:3-7 and Eze 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Eze 35:2, compare Eze 13:17.
הר is the name given to the mountainous district inhabited by the Edomites, between the Dead Sea and the Elanitic Gulf (see the comm. on Gen 36:9). The prophecy is directed against the land; but it also applies to the nation, which brings upon itself the desolation of its land by its hostility to Israel. For Eze 35:3, compare Eze 6:14, etc. חרבּה, destruction.
The sin of Edom mentioned in Eze 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Eze 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Gen 25:22. and Gen 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amo 1:11) has already said, in the constant retention of its malignity toward the covenant nation, so that Edom embraced every opportunity to effect its destruction, and according to the charge brought against it by Ezekiel, gave up the sons of Israel to the sword when the kingdom of Judah fell.
הנּיר על , lit. , to pour upon ( - into) the hands of the sword, i. e. , to deliver up to the power of the sword (cf. Psa 63:11; Jer 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Oba 1:13; but here it is more precisely defined by בּעת עון , and limited to the time of the overthrow of the Israelites, when Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by the Chaldeans. בּעת עון קץ, as in Eze 21:30.
On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Eze 35:6). This expression is probably chosen for the play upon the words דּם and אדם. Edom shall become what its name suggests. Making it blood does not mean merely filling it with bloodshed, or reddening the soil with blood (Hitzig); but, as in Eze 16:38, turning it as it were into blood, or causing it to vanish therein.
Blood shall pursue thee, “as blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and so delivers him up to punishment” (Hävernick). אם לא cannot be the particle employed in swearing, and dependent upon חי־אני, since this particle introduces an affirmative declaration, which would be unsuitable here, inasmuch as דּם in this connection cannot possibly signify blood-relationship.
אם לא means “if not,” in which the conditional meaning of אם coincides with the causal, “if” being equivalent to “since. ” The unusual separation of the לא from the verb is occasioned by the fact that דּם is placed before the verb to avoid collision with ודּם. To hate blood is the same as to have a horror of bloodshed or murder. This threat is carried out still further in Eze 35:7 and Eze 35:8.
The land of Edom is to become a complete and perpetual devastation; its inhabitants are to be exterminated by war. The form שׁממה stands for שׁמּמה, and is not to be changed into משׁמּה. Considering the frequency with which משׁמּה occurs, the supposition that we have here a copyist’s error is by no means a probable one, and still less probable is the perpetuation of such an error.
עבר ושׁב, as in Zec 7:14. For Eze 35:8 compare Eze 32:5-6 and Eze 31:12. The Chetib תּישׁבנה is scriptio plena for תּשׁבנה, the imperfect Kal of ישׁב in the intransitive sense to be inhabited. The Keri תּשׁבנה, from שׁוּב, is a needless and unsuitable correction, since שׁוּב does not mean restitui . In the second strophe, Eze 35:10-15, the additional reason assigned for the desolation of Edom is its longing for the possession of Israel and its land, of which it desired to take forcible possession, although it knew that they belonged to Jehovah, whereby the hatred of Edom toward Israel became contempt of Jehovah.
The two peoples and the two lands are Israel and Judah with their lands, and therefore the whole of the holy people and land. את is the sign of the accusative: as for the two peoples, they are mine. The suffix appended to ירשׁנוּה is neuter, and is to be taken as referring generally to what has gone before. ויהוה שׁם היה is a circumstantial clause, through which the desire of Edom is placed in the right light, and characterized as an attack upon Jehovah Himself.
Jehovah was there - namely, in the land of which Edom wished to take possession. Kliefoth’s rendering, “and yet Jehovah is there,” is opposed to Hebrew usage, by changing the preterite היה into a present; and the objection which he offers to the only rendering that is grammatically admissible, viz. , “when Jehovah was there,” to the effect “that it attributes to Ezekiel the thought that the Holy Land had once been the land and dwelling-place of God, but was so no longer,” calls in question the actual historical condition of things without the slightest reason.
For Jehovah had really forsaken His dwelling-place in Canaan before the destruction of the temple, but without thereby renouncing His right to the land; since it was only for the sins of Israel that He had given up the temple, city, and land to be laid waste by the heathen. “But Edom had acted as if Israel existed among the nations without God, and Jehovah had departed from it for ever” (Hävernick); or rather as if Jehovah were a powerless and useless Deity, who had not been able to defend His people against the might of the heathen nations.
The Lord will requite Edom for this, in a manner answering to its anger and envy, which had both sprung from hatred. נודעתּי בם, “I will make myself known among them (the Israelites) when I judge thee;” i. e. , by the fact that He punishes Edom for its sin, He will prove to Israel that He is a God who does not suffer His people and His possession to be attacked with impunity.
From this shall Edom learn that He is Jehovah, the omniscient God, who has heard the revilings of His enemies (Eze 35:12, Eze 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Eze 35:14 and Eze 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Neh 9:18, Neh 9:26 (cf.
Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Eze 35:12 and Eze 36:1, is occasioned by the antithesis “mountain (mountain-range) of Seir. ” The Chetib hmmhs is to be pronounced שׁממה, and to be retained in spite of the Keri . The singular of the neuter gender is used with emphasis in a broken and emotional address, and is to be taken as referring ad sensum to the land.
הגדּיל בּפה, to magnify or boast with the mouth, i. e. , to utter proud sayings against God, in other words, actually to deride God (compare הגדּיל פּה in Oba 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר, used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר, to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה, in Eze 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.
g. , Jos 6:20), when all the earth rejoices, not “over thy desolation” (Hitzig), which does not yield any rational thought, but when joy is prepared for all the world, I will prepare devastation for thee. Through this antithesis כּל־הארץ is limited to the world, with the exception of Edom, i. e. , to that portion of the human race which stood in a different relation to God and His people from that of Edom; in other words, which acknowledged the Lord as the true God.
It follows from this, that Edom represents the world at enmity against God. In כּשׂמחתך (Eze 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Eze 35:15 is: as thou didst rejoice over the desolation of the inheritance of the house of Israel, so will I cause others to rejoice over thy desolation. In Eze 35:15 we agree with the lxx, Vulgate, Syriac, and others, in taking תּהיה as the second person, not as the third.
כּל־אדום כּלּהּ serves to strengthen הר־שׂעיר (compare Eze 11:15 and Eze 36:10).
The two sections, Eze 35:1-15 and Eze 36:1-15, form a connected prophecy. This is apparent not only from their formal arrangement, both of them being placed together under the introductory formula, “And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,” but also from their contents, the promise in relation to the mountains of Israel being so opposed to the threat against the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15) as to form the obverse and completion of the latter; whilst allusion is evidently made to it in the form of expression employed (compare Eze 36:4, Eze 36:6, with Eze 35:8; and Eze 36:5 with Eze 35:15 ).
The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Eze 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Eze 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Eze 35:10-15). On the other hand, the mountain-land of Israel, which the heathen have despised on account of its devastation, and have appropriated to themselves as booty (Eze 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Eze 35:8-15).
This closing thought (Eze 35:15) points back to Eze 34:29, and shows that our prophecy is intended as a further expansion of that conclusion; and at the same time, that in the devastation of Edom the overthrow of the heathen world as a whole, with its enmity against God, is predicted, and in the restoration of the land of Israel the re-erection of the fallen kingdom of God. Eze 35:1.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Eze 35:3. And say to it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I will deal with thee, Mount Seir, and will stretch out my hand against thee, and make thee waste and devastation. Eze 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:5. Because thou cherishest eternal enmity, and gavest up the sons of Israel to the sword at the time of their distress, at the time of the final transgression, Eze 35:6. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will make thee blood, and blood shall pursue thee; since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee.
Eze 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Eze 35:8. And fill his mountains with his slain; upon thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy low places, those pierced with the sword shall fall. Eze 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:10. Because thou sayest, The two nations and the two lands they shall be mine, and we will take possession of it, when Jehovah was there; Eze 35:11. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thy wrath and thine envy, as thou hast done because of thy hatred, and will make myself known among them, as I shall judge thee.
Eze 35:12. And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy reproaches which thou hast uttered against the mountains of Israel, saying, “they are laid waste, they are given to us for food. ” Eze 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Eze 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee.
Eze 35:15. As thou hadst thy delight in the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee; thou shalt become a waste, Mount Seir and all Edom together; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. The theme of this prophecy, viz. , “Edom and its cities are to become a desert” (Eze 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with 'יען וגו (Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Eze 35:4 ), with 'כּי אני (וידעוּ) וידעתּם, by a distinct statement of the sins of Edom.
- Already, in Ezekiel 25, Edom has been named among the hostile border nations which are threatened with destruction (Eze 35:12-14). The earlier prophecy applied to the Edomites, according to their historical relation to the people of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. In the present word of God, on the contrary, Edom comes into consideration, on the ground of its hostile attitude towards the covenant people, as the representative of the world and of mankind in its hostility to the people and kingdom of God, as in Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6.
This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Eze 35:14), which does not apply to Edom as a small and solitary nation, and still more clearly from the circumstance that, in the promise of salvation in Ezekiel 36, not all Edom alone (Eze 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Eze 36:3-7 and Eze 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Eze 35:2, compare Eze 13:17.
הר is the name given to the mountainous district inhabited by the Edomites, between the Dead Sea and the Elanitic Gulf (see the comm. on Gen 36:9). The prophecy is directed against the land; but it also applies to the nation, which brings upon itself the desolation of its land by its hostility to Israel. For Eze 35:3, compare Eze 6:14, etc. חרבּה, destruction.
The sin of Edom mentioned in Eze 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Eze 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Gen 25:22. and Gen 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amo 1:11) has already said, in the constant retention of its malignity toward the covenant nation, so that Edom embraced every opportunity to effect its destruction, and according to the charge brought against it by Ezekiel, gave up the sons of Israel to the sword when the kingdom of Judah fell.
הנּיר על , lit. , to pour upon ( - into) the hands of the sword, i. e. , to deliver up to the power of the sword (cf. Psa 63:11; Jer 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Oba 1:13; but here it is more precisely defined by בּעת עון , and limited to the time of the overthrow of the Israelites, when Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by the Chaldeans. בּעת עון קץ, as in Eze 21:30.
On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Eze 35:6). This expression is probably chosen for the play upon the words דּם and אדם. Edom shall become what its name suggests. Making it blood does not mean merely filling it with bloodshed, or reddening the soil with blood (Hitzig); but, as in Eze 16:38, turning it as it were into blood, or causing it to vanish therein.
Blood shall pursue thee, “as blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and so delivers him up to punishment” (Hävernick). אם לא cannot be the particle employed in swearing, and dependent upon חי־אני, since this particle introduces an affirmative declaration, which would be unsuitable here, inasmuch as דּם in this connection cannot possibly signify blood-relationship.
אם לא means “if not,” in which the conditional meaning of אם coincides with the causal, “if” being equivalent to “since. ” The unusual separation of the לא from the verb is occasioned by the fact that דּם is placed before the verb to avoid collision with ודּם. To hate blood is the same as to have a horror of bloodshed or murder. This threat is carried out still further in Eze 35:7 and Eze 35:8.
The land of Edom is to become a complete and perpetual devastation; its inhabitants are to be exterminated by war. The form שׁממה stands for שׁמּמה, and is not to be changed into משׁמּה. Considering the frequency with which משׁמּה occurs, the supposition that we have here a copyist’s error is by no means a probable one, and still less probable is the perpetuation of such an error.
עבר ושׁב, as in Zec 7:14. For Eze 35:8 compare Eze 32:5-6 and Eze 31:12. The Chetib תּישׁבנה is scriptio plena for תּשׁבנה, the imperfect Kal of ישׁב in the intransitive sense to be inhabited. The Keri תּשׁבנה, from שׁוּב, is a needless and unsuitable correction, since שׁוּב does not mean restitui . In the second strophe, Eze 35:10-15, the additional reason assigned for the desolation of Edom is its longing for the possession of Israel and its land, of which it desired to take forcible possession, although it knew that they belonged to Jehovah, whereby the hatred of Edom toward Israel became contempt of Jehovah.
The two peoples and the two lands are Israel and Judah with their lands, and therefore the whole of the holy people and land. את is the sign of the accusative: as for the two peoples, they are mine. The suffix appended to ירשׁנוּה is neuter, and is to be taken as referring generally to what has gone before. ויהוה שׁם היה is a circumstantial clause, through which the desire of Edom is placed in the right light, and characterized as an attack upon Jehovah Himself.
Jehovah was there - namely, in the land of which Edom wished to take possession. Kliefoth’s rendering, “and yet Jehovah is there,” is opposed to Hebrew usage, by changing the preterite היה into a present; and the objection which he offers to the only rendering that is grammatically admissible, viz. , “when Jehovah was there,” to the effect “that it attributes to Ezekiel the thought that the Holy Land had once been the land and dwelling-place of God, but was so no longer,” calls in question the actual historical condition of things without the slightest reason.
For Jehovah had really forsaken His dwelling-place in Canaan before the destruction of the temple, but without thereby renouncing His right to the land; since it was only for the sins of Israel that He had given up the temple, city, and land to be laid waste by the heathen. “But Edom had acted as if Israel existed among the nations without God, and Jehovah had departed from it for ever” (Hävernick); or rather as if Jehovah were a powerless and useless Deity, who had not been able to defend His people against the might of the heathen nations.
The Lord will requite Edom for this, in a manner answering to its anger and envy, which had both sprung from hatred. נודעתּי בם, “I will make myself known among them (the Israelites) when I judge thee;” i. e. , by the fact that He punishes Edom for its sin, He will prove to Israel that He is a God who does not suffer His people and His possession to be attacked with impunity.
From this shall Edom learn that He is Jehovah, the omniscient God, who has heard the revilings of His enemies (Eze 35:12, Eze 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Eze 35:14 and Eze 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Neh 9:18, Neh 9:26 (cf.
Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Eze 35:12 and Eze 36:1, is occasioned by the antithesis “mountain (mountain-range) of Seir. ” The Chetib hmmhs is to be pronounced שׁממה, and to be retained in spite of the Keri . The singular of the neuter gender is used with emphasis in a broken and emotional address, and is to be taken as referring ad sensum to the land.
הגדּיל בּפה, to magnify or boast with the mouth, i. e. , to utter proud sayings against God, in other words, actually to deride God (compare הגדּיל פּה in Oba 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר, used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר, to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה, in Eze 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.
g. , Jos 6:20), when all the earth rejoices, not “over thy desolation” (Hitzig), which does not yield any rational thought, but when joy is prepared for all the world, I will prepare devastation for thee. Through this antithesis כּל־הארץ is limited to the world, with the exception of Edom, i. e. , to that portion of the human race which stood in a different relation to God and His people from that of Edom; in other words, which acknowledged the Lord as the true God.
It follows from this, that Edom represents the world at enmity against God. In כּשׂמחתך (Eze 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Eze 35:15 is: as thou didst rejoice over the desolation of the inheritance of the house of Israel, so will I cause others to rejoice over thy desolation. In Eze 35:15 we agree with the lxx, Vulgate, Syriac, and others, in taking תּהיה as the second person, not as the third.
כּל־אדום כּלּהּ serves to strengthen הר־שׂעיר (compare Eze 11:15 and Eze 36:10).
The two sections, Eze 35:1-15 and Eze 36:1-15, form a connected prophecy. This is apparent not only from their formal arrangement, both of them being placed together under the introductory formula, “And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,” but also from their contents, the promise in relation to the mountains of Israel being so opposed to the threat against the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15) as to form the obverse and completion of the latter; whilst allusion is evidently made to it in the form of expression employed (compare Eze 36:4, Eze 36:6, with Eze 35:8; and Eze 36:5 with Eze 35:15 ).
The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Eze 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Eze 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Eze 35:10-15). On the other hand, the mountain-land of Israel, which the heathen have despised on account of its devastation, and have appropriated to themselves as booty (Eze 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Eze 35:8-15).
This closing thought (Eze 35:15) points back to Eze 34:29, and shows that our prophecy is intended as a further expansion of that conclusion; and at the same time, that in the devastation of Edom the overthrow of the heathen world as a whole, with its enmity against God, is predicted, and in the restoration of the land of Israel the re-erection of the fallen kingdom of God. Eze 35:1.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Eze 35:3. And say to it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I will deal with thee, Mount Seir, and will stretch out my hand against thee, and make thee waste and devastation. Eze 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:5. Because thou cherishest eternal enmity, and gavest up the sons of Israel to the sword at the time of their distress, at the time of the final transgression, Eze 35:6. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will make thee blood, and blood shall pursue thee; since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee.
Eze 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Eze 35:8. And fill his mountains with his slain; upon thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy low places, those pierced with the sword shall fall. Eze 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:10. Because thou sayest, The two nations and the two lands they shall be mine, and we will take possession of it, when Jehovah was there; Eze 35:11. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thy wrath and thine envy, as thou hast done because of thy hatred, and will make myself known among them, as I shall judge thee.
Eze 35:12. And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy reproaches which thou hast uttered against the mountains of Israel, saying, “they are laid waste, they are given to us for food. ” Eze 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Eze 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee.
Eze 35:15. As thou hadst thy delight in the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee; thou shalt become a waste, Mount Seir and all Edom together; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. The theme of this prophecy, viz. , “Edom and its cities are to become a desert” (Eze 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with 'יען וגו (Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Eze 35:4 ), with 'כּי אני (וידעוּ) וידעתּם, by a distinct statement of the sins of Edom.
- Already, in Ezekiel 25, Edom has been named among the hostile border nations which are threatened with destruction (Eze 35:12-14). The earlier prophecy applied to the Edomites, according to their historical relation to the people of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. In the present word of God, on the contrary, Edom comes into consideration, on the ground of its hostile attitude towards the covenant people, as the representative of the world and of mankind in its hostility to the people and kingdom of God, as in Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6.
This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Eze 35:14), which does not apply to Edom as a small and solitary nation, and still more clearly from the circumstance that, in the promise of salvation in Ezekiel 36, not all Edom alone (Eze 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Eze 36:3-7 and Eze 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Eze 35:2, compare Eze 13:17.
הר is the name given to the mountainous district inhabited by the Edomites, between the Dead Sea and the Elanitic Gulf (see the comm. on Gen 36:9). The prophecy is directed against the land; but it also applies to the nation, which brings upon itself the desolation of its land by its hostility to Israel. For Eze 35:3, compare Eze 6:14, etc. חרבּה, destruction.
The sin of Edom mentioned in Eze 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Eze 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Gen 25:22. and Gen 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amo 1:11) has already said, in the constant retention of its malignity toward the covenant nation, so that Edom embraced every opportunity to effect its destruction, and according to the charge brought against it by Ezekiel, gave up the sons of Israel to the sword when the kingdom of Judah fell.
הנּיר על , lit. , to pour upon ( - into) the hands of the sword, i. e. , to deliver up to the power of the sword (cf. Psa 63:11; Jer 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Oba 1:13; but here it is more precisely defined by בּעת עון , and limited to the time of the overthrow of the Israelites, when Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by the Chaldeans. בּעת עון קץ, as in Eze 21:30.
On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Eze 35:6). This expression is probably chosen for the play upon the words דּם and אדם. Edom shall become what its name suggests. Making it blood does not mean merely filling it with bloodshed, or reddening the soil with blood (Hitzig); but, as in Eze 16:38, turning it as it were into blood, or causing it to vanish therein.
Blood shall pursue thee, “as blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and so delivers him up to punishment” (Hävernick). אם לא cannot be the particle employed in swearing, and dependent upon חי־אני, since this particle introduces an affirmative declaration, which would be unsuitable here, inasmuch as דּם in this connection cannot possibly signify blood-relationship.
אם לא means “if not,” in which the conditional meaning of אם coincides with the causal, “if” being equivalent to “since. ” The unusual separation of the לא from the verb is occasioned by the fact that דּם is placed before the verb to avoid collision with ודּם. To hate blood is the same as to have a horror of bloodshed or murder. This threat is carried out still further in Eze 35:7 and Eze 35:8.
The land of Edom is to become a complete and perpetual devastation; its inhabitants are to be exterminated by war. The form שׁממה stands for שׁמּמה, and is not to be changed into משׁמּה. Considering the frequency with which משׁמּה occurs, the supposition that we have here a copyist’s error is by no means a probable one, and still less probable is the perpetuation of such an error.
עבר ושׁב, as in Zec 7:14. For Eze 35:8 compare Eze 32:5-6 and Eze 31:12. The Chetib תּישׁבנה is scriptio plena for תּשׁבנה, the imperfect Kal of ישׁב in the intransitive sense to be inhabited. The Keri תּשׁבנה, from שׁוּב, is a needless and unsuitable correction, since שׁוּב does not mean restitui . In the second strophe, Eze 35:10-15, the additional reason assigned for the desolation of Edom is its longing for the possession of Israel and its land, of which it desired to take forcible possession, although it knew that they belonged to Jehovah, whereby the hatred of Edom toward Israel became contempt of Jehovah.
The two peoples and the two lands are Israel and Judah with their lands, and therefore the whole of the holy people and land. את is the sign of the accusative: as for the two peoples, they are mine. The suffix appended to ירשׁנוּה is neuter, and is to be taken as referring generally to what has gone before. ויהוה שׁם היה is a circumstantial clause, through which the desire of Edom is placed in the right light, and characterized as an attack upon Jehovah Himself.
Jehovah was there - namely, in the land of which Edom wished to take possession. Kliefoth’s rendering, “and yet Jehovah is there,” is opposed to Hebrew usage, by changing the preterite היה into a present; and the objection which he offers to the only rendering that is grammatically admissible, viz. , “when Jehovah was there,” to the effect “that it attributes to Ezekiel the thought that the Holy Land had once been the land and dwelling-place of God, but was so no longer,” calls in question the actual historical condition of things without the slightest reason.
For Jehovah had really forsaken His dwelling-place in Canaan before the destruction of the temple, but without thereby renouncing His right to the land; since it was only for the sins of Israel that He had given up the temple, city, and land to be laid waste by the heathen. “But Edom had acted as if Israel existed among the nations without God, and Jehovah had departed from it for ever” (Hävernick); or rather as if Jehovah were a powerless and useless Deity, who had not been able to defend His people against the might of the heathen nations.
The Lord will requite Edom for this, in a manner answering to its anger and envy, which had both sprung from hatred. נודעתּי בם, “I will make myself known among them (the Israelites) when I judge thee;” i. e. , by the fact that He punishes Edom for its sin, He will prove to Israel that He is a God who does not suffer His people and His possession to be attacked with impunity.
From this shall Edom learn that He is Jehovah, the omniscient God, who has heard the revilings of His enemies (Eze 35:12, Eze 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Eze 35:14 and Eze 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Neh 9:18, Neh 9:26 (cf.
Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Eze 35:12 and Eze 36:1, is occasioned by the antithesis “mountain (mountain-range) of Seir. ” The Chetib hmmhs is to be pronounced שׁממה, and to be retained in spite of the Keri . The singular of the neuter gender is used with emphasis in a broken and emotional address, and is to be taken as referring ad sensum to the land.
הגדּיל בּפה, to magnify or boast with the mouth, i. e. , to utter proud sayings against God, in other words, actually to deride God (compare הגדּיל פּה in Oba 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר, used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר, to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה, in Eze 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.
g. , Jos 6:20), when all the earth rejoices, not “over thy desolation” (Hitzig), which does not yield any rational thought, but when joy is prepared for all the world, I will prepare devastation for thee. Through this antithesis כּל־הארץ is limited to the world, with the exception of Edom, i. e. , to that portion of the human race which stood in a different relation to God and His people from that of Edom; in other words, which acknowledged the Lord as the true God.
It follows from this, that Edom represents the world at enmity against God. In כּשׂמחתך (Eze 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Eze 35:15 is: as thou didst rejoice over the desolation of the inheritance of the house of Israel, so will I cause others to rejoice over thy desolation. In Eze 35:15 we agree with the lxx, Vulgate, Syriac, and others, in taking תּהיה as the second person, not as the third.
כּל־אדום כּלּהּ serves to strengthen הר־שׂעיר (compare Eze 11:15 and Eze 36:10).
The two sections, Eze 35:1-15 and Eze 36:1-15, form a connected prophecy. This is apparent not only from their formal arrangement, both of them being placed together under the introductory formula, “And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,” but also from their contents, the promise in relation to the mountains of Israel being so opposed to the threat against the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15) as to form the obverse and completion of the latter; whilst allusion is evidently made to it in the form of expression employed (compare Eze 36:4, Eze 36:6, with Eze 35:8; and Eze 36:5 with Eze 35:15 ).
The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Eze 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Eze 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Eze 35:10-15). On the other hand, the mountain-land of Israel, which the heathen have despised on account of its devastation, and have appropriated to themselves as booty (Eze 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Eze 35:8-15).
This closing thought (Eze 35:15) points back to Eze 34:29, and shows that our prophecy is intended as a further expansion of that conclusion; and at the same time, that in the devastation of Edom the overthrow of the heathen world as a whole, with its enmity against God, is predicted, and in the restoration of the land of Israel the re-erection of the fallen kingdom of God. Eze 35:1.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Eze 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Eze 35:3. And say to it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, I will deal with thee, Mount Seir, and will stretch out my hand against thee, and make thee waste and devastation. Eze 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:5. Because thou cherishest eternal enmity, and gavest up the sons of Israel to the sword at the time of their distress, at the time of the final transgression, Eze 35:6. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will make thee blood, and blood shall pursue thee; since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee.
Eze 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Eze 35:8. And fill his mountains with his slain; upon thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy low places, those pierced with the sword shall fall. Eze 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Eze 35:10. Because thou sayest, The two nations and the two lands they shall be mine, and we will take possession of it, when Jehovah was there; Eze 35:11. Therefore, as truly as I live, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thy wrath and thine envy, as thou hast done because of thy hatred, and will make myself known among them, as I shall judge thee.
Eze 35:12. And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy reproaches which thou hast uttered against the mountains of Israel, saying, “they are laid waste, they are given to us for food. ” Eze 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Eze 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee.
Eze 35:15. As thou hadst thy delight in the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee; thou shalt become a waste, Mount Seir and all Edom together; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. The theme of this prophecy, viz. , “Edom and its cities are to become a desert” (Eze 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with 'יען וגו (Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Eze 35:4 ), with 'כּי אני (וידעוּ) וידעתּם, by a distinct statement of the sins of Edom.
- Already, in Ezekiel 25, Edom has been named among the hostile border nations which are threatened with destruction (Eze 35:12-14). The earlier prophecy applied to the Edomites, according to their historical relation to the people of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. In the present word of God, on the contrary, Edom comes into consideration, on the ground of its hostile attitude towards the covenant people, as the representative of the world and of mankind in its hostility to the people and kingdom of God, as in Isa 34 and Isa 63:1-6.
This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Eze 35:14), which does not apply to Edom as a small and solitary nation, and still more clearly from the circumstance that, in the promise of salvation in Ezekiel 36, not all Edom alone (Eze 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Eze 36:3-7 and Eze 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Eze 35:2, compare Eze 13:17.
הר is the name given to the mountainous district inhabited by the Edomites, between the Dead Sea and the Elanitic Gulf (see the comm. on Gen 36:9). The prophecy is directed against the land; but it also applies to the nation, which brings upon itself the desolation of its land by its hostility to Israel. For Eze 35:3, compare Eze 6:14, etc. חרבּה, destruction.
The sin of Edom mentioned in Eze 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Eze 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Gen 25:22. and Gen 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amo 1:11) has already said, in the constant retention of its malignity toward the covenant nation, so that Edom embraced every opportunity to effect its destruction, and according to the charge brought against it by Ezekiel, gave up the sons of Israel to the sword when the kingdom of Judah fell.
הנּיר על , lit. , to pour upon ( - into) the hands of the sword, i. e. , to deliver up to the power of the sword (cf. Psa 63:11; Jer 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Oba 1:13; but here it is more precisely defined by בּעת עון , and limited to the time of the overthrow of the Israelites, when Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by the Chaldeans. בּעת עון קץ, as in Eze 21:30.
On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Eze 35:6). This expression is probably chosen for the play upon the words דּם and אדם. Edom shall become what its name suggests. Making it blood does not mean merely filling it with bloodshed, or reddening the soil with blood (Hitzig); but, as in Eze 16:38, turning it as it were into blood, or causing it to vanish therein.
Blood shall pursue thee, “as blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and so delivers him up to punishment” (Hävernick). אם לא cannot be the particle employed in swearing, and dependent upon חי־אני, since this particle introduces an affirmative declaration, which would be unsuitable here, inasmuch as דּם in this connection cannot possibly signify blood-relationship.
אם לא means “if not,” in which the conditional meaning of אם coincides with the causal, “if” being equivalent to “since. ” The unusual separation of the לא from the verb is occasioned by the fact that דּם is placed before the verb to avoid collision with ודּם. To hate blood is the same as to have a horror of bloodshed or murder. This threat is carried out still further in Eze 35:7 and Eze 35:8.
The land of Edom is to become a complete and perpetual devastation; its inhabitants are to be exterminated by war. The form שׁממה stands for שׁמּמה, and is not to be changed into משׁמּה. Considering the frequency with which משׁמּה occurs, the supposition that we have here a copyist’s error is by no means a probable one, and still less probable is the perpetuation of such an error.
עבר ושׁב, as in Zec 7:14. For Eze 35:8 compare Eze 32:5-6 and Eze 31:12. The Chetib תּישׁבנה is scriptio plena for תּשׁבנה, the imperfect Kal of ישׁב in the intransitive sense to be inhabited. The Keri תּשׁבנה, from שׁוּב, is a needless and unsuitable correction, since שׁוּב does not mean restitui . In the second strophe, Eze 35:10-15, the additional reason assigned for the desolation of Edom is its longing for the possession of Israel and its land, of which it desired to take forcible possession, although it knew that they belonged to Jehovah, whereby the hatred of Edom toward Israel became contempt of Jehovah.
The two peoples and the two lands are Israel and Judah with their lands, and therefore the whole of the holy people and land. את is the sign of the accusative: as for the two peoples, they are mine. The suffix appended to ירשׁנוּה is neuter, and is to be taken as referring generally to what has gone before. ויהוה שׁם היה is a circumstantial clause, through which the desire of Edom is placed in the right light, and characterized as an attack upon Jehovah Himself.
Jehovah was there - namely, in the land of which Edom wished to take possession. Kliefoth’s rendering, “and yet Jehovah is there,” is opposed to Hebrew usage, by changing the preterite היה into a present; and the objection which he offers to the only rendering that is grammatically admissible, viz. , “when Jehovah was there,” to the effect “that it attributes to Ezekiel the thought that the Holy Land had once been the land and dwelling-place of God, but was so no longer,” calls in question the actual historical condition of things without the slightest reason.
For Jehovah had really forsaken His dwelling-place in Canaan before the destruction of the temple, but without thereby renouncing His right to the land; since it was only for the sins of Israel that He had given up the temple, city, and land to be laid waste by the heathen. “But Edom had acted as if Israel existed among the nations without God, and Jehovah had departed from it for ever” (Hävernick); or rather as if Jehovah were a powerless and useless Deity, who had not been able to defend His people against the might of the heathen nations.
The Lord will requite Edom for this, in a manner answering to its anger and envy, which had both sprung from hatred. נודעתּי בם, “I will make myself known among them (the Israelites) when I judge thee;” i. e. , by the fact that He punishes Edom for its sin, He will prove to Israel that He is a God who does not suffer His people and His possession to be attacked with impunity.
From this shall Edom learn that He is Jehovah, the omniscient God, who has heard the revilings of His enemies (Eze 35:12, Eze 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Eze 35:14 and Eze 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Neh 9:18, Neh 9:26 (cf.
Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Eze 35:12 and Eze 36:1, is occasioned by the antithesis “mountain (mountain-range) of Seir. ” The Chetib hmmhs is to be pronounced שׁממה, and to be retained in spite of the Keri . The singular of the neuter gender is used with emphasis in a broken and emotional address, and is to be taken as referring ad sensum to the land.
הגדּיל בּפה, to magnify or boast with the mouth, i. e. , to utter proud sayings against God, in other words, actually to deride God (compare הגדּיל פּה in Oba 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר, used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר, to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה, in Eze 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.
g. , Jos 6:20), when all the earth rejoices, not “over thy desolation” (Hitzig), which does not yield any rational thought, but when joy is prepared for all the world, I will prepare devastation for thee. Through this antithesis כּל־הארץ is limited to the world, with the exception of Edom, i. e. , to that portion of the human race which stood in a different relation to God and His people from that of Edom; in other words, which acknowledged the Lord as the true God.
It follows from this, that Edom represents the world at enmity against God. In כּשׂמחתך (Eze 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Eze 35:15 is: as thou didst rejoice over the desolation of the inheritance of the house of Israel, so will I cause others to rejoice over thy desolation. In Eze 35:15 we agree with the lxx, Vulgate, Syriac, and others, in taking תּהיה as the second person, not as the third.
כּל־אדום כּלּהּ serves to strengthen הר־שׂעיר (compare Eze 11:15 and Eze 36:10).
Eze 36:1-15 Eze 36:1. And thou, son of man, prophesy to the mountains of Israel, and say, Mountains of Israel, hear the word of Jehovah: Eze 36:2. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because the enemy saith concerning you, Aha! the everlasting heights have become ours for a possession: Eze 36:3. Therefore prophesy, and say, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because, even because they lay you waste, and pant for you round about, so that ye have become a possession to the remnant of the nations, and have come to the talk of the tongue and gossip of the people: Eze 36:4.
Therefore, ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord Jehovah: Thus saith the Lord Jehovah to the mountains and hills, to the low places and valleys, and to the waste ruins and the forsaken cities, which have become a prey and derision to the remnant of the nations round about; Eze 36:5. Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Truly in the fire of my jealousy I have spoken against the remnant of the nations, and against Edom altogether, which have made my land a possession for themselves in all joy of heart, in contempt of soul, to empty it out for booty.
Eze 36:6. Therefore prophesy concerning the land of Israel, and say to the mountains and hills, to the low places and valleys, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, in my jealousy and fury have I spoken, because ye have borne the disgrace of the nations. Eze 36:7. Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, I, I have lifted up my hand; truly the nations round about you, they shall bear their disgrace.
Eze 36:8. But ye, ye mountains of Israel, shall put forth your branches, and bear your fruit to my people Israel; for they will soon come. Eze 36:9. For, behold, I will deal with you, and turn toward you, and ye shall be tilled and sown. Eze 36:10. I will multiply men upon you, all the house of Israel at once; and the cities shall be inhabited, and the ruins built.
Eze 36:11. And I will multiply upon you man and beast; they shall multiply and be fruitful: and I will make you inhabited as in your former time, and do more good to you than in your earlier days; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah. Eze 36:12. I will cause men, my people Israel, to walk upon you; and they shall possess thee, and thou shalt be an inheritance to them, and make them childless no more.
Eze 36:13. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because they say to you, “Thou art a devourer of men, and hast made thy people childless;” Eze 36:14. Therefore thou shalt no more devour men, and no more cause thy people to stumble, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah. Eze 36:15. And I will no more cause thee to hear the scoffing of the nations, and the disgrace of the nations thou shalt bear no more, and shalt no more cause thy people to stumble, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah.
This prophecy is uttered concerning the land of Israel, as is plainly declared in Eze 36:6; whereas in Eze 36:1 and Eze 36:4 the mountains of Israel are mentioned instead of the land, in antithesis to the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15; see the comm. on Eze 35:12). The promise takes throughout the form of antithesis to the threat against Edom in Eze 35:1-15.
Because Edom rejoices that the Holy Land, which has been laid waste, has fallen to it for a possession, therefore shall the devastated land be cultivated and sown again, and be inhabited by Israel as in the former time. The heathen nations round about shall, on the other hand, bear their disgrace; Edom, as we have already observed, being expanded, so far as the idea is concerned, into all the heathen nations surrounding Israel (Eze 36:3-7).
In Eze 36:2, האויב, the enemy, is mentioned in quite a general manner; and what has already been stated concerning Edom in Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10, is her predicted of the enemy. In Eze 36:3 and Eze 36:4 this enemy is designated as a remnant of the heathen nations; and it is not till Eze 36:5 that it is more precisely defined by the clause, “and all Edom altogether.
” The גּוים round about (אשׁר, Eze 36:4, compared with Eze 36:3) are the heathen nations which are threatened with destruction in Ezekiel 25 and 26, on account of their malicious rejoicing at the devastation of Jerusalem and Judah. This serves to explain the fact that these nations are designated as שׁארית הגּוים, the rest, or remnant of the heathen nations, which presupposes that the judgment has fallen upon them, and that only a remnant of them is left, which remnant desires to take possession of the devastated land of Israel.
The epithet applied to this land, בּמות, everlasting, i. e. , primeval heights, points back to the גּבעות עולם of Gen 49:26 and Deu 33:15, and is chosen for the purpose of representing the land as a possession secured to the people of Israel by primeval promises, in consequence of which the attempt of the enemy to seize upon this land has become a sin against the Lord God.
The indignation at such a sin is expressed in the emotional character of the address. As Ewald has aptly observed, “Ezekiel is seized with unusual fire, so that after the brief statement in Eze 36:2 'therefore' is repeated five times, the charges brought against these foes forcing themselves in again and again, before the prophecy settles calmly upon the mountains of Israel, to which it was really intended to apply.
” For יען בּיען, see the comm. on Eze 13:10. שׁמּות is an infinitive Kal , formed after the analogy of the verbs ה'ל (cf. Ewald, §238 e ), from שׁמם, to be waste, to devastate, as in Dan 8:13; Dan 9:27; Dan 12:11, and is not to be taken in the sense of נשׁם, after Isa 42:14, as Hitzig supposes. שׁאף, to pant for a thing; here it is equivalent to snapping at anything.
This is required by a comparison with Eze 36:4 , where היה לבז corresponds to שׁמּות ושׁאף, and ללעג to 'תּעלוּ על שׂפת וגו. In the connection שׂפת לשׁון, שׂפה signifies the lip as an organ of speech, or, more precisely, the words spoken; and לשׁון, the tongue, is personified, and stands for אישׁ לשׁון (Psa 140:12), a tongue-man, i. e. , a talker. In Eze 36:4 the idea expressed in “the mountains of Israel” is expanded into mountains, hills, lowlands, and valleys (cf.
Eze 31:12; Eze 32:5-6); and this periphrastic description of the land is more minutely defined by the additional clause, “waste ruins and forsaken cities. ” אם לא in Eze 36:5 is the particle used in oaths (cf. Eze 5:11, etc.) ; and the perfect דּבּרתּי is not merely prophetic, but also a preterite. God has already uttered a threatening word concerning the nations round about in Ezekiel 25, 26, and Eze 35:1-15; and here He once more declares that they shall bear their disgrace.
אשׁ קנאח is the fiery jealousy of wrath. כּלּא is an Aramean form for כּלּהּ (Eze 35:15). For בשׁאט נפשׁ, see Eze 25:6. In the expression למען מגרשׁהּ לבז noisserp, which has been rendered in various ways, we agree with Gesenius and others in regarding מגרשׁ as an Aramean form of the infinitive of גּרשׁ, with the meaning to empty out, which is confirmed by the Syriac; for מגרשׁ cannot be a substantive, on account of the למען; and Hitzig’s conjecture, that לבז should be pointed לבז, and the clause rendered “to plunder its produce,” is precluded by the fact that the separation of the preposition למען ל, by the insertion of a word between, is unexampled, to say nothing of the fact that מגרשׁ does not mean produce at all.
The thought expressed in Eze 36:6 and Eze 36:7 is the following: because Israel has hitherto borne the contempt of the heathen, the heathen shall now bear their own contempt. The lifting of the hand is a gesture employed in taking an oath, as in Eze 20:6, etc. But the land of Israel is to receive a blessing. This blessing is described in Eze 36:8 in general terms, as the bearing of fruit by the mountains, i.
e. , by the land of Israel; and its speedy commencement is predicted. It is then depicted in detail in Eze 36:9. In the clause כּי קרבוּ לבוא, the Israelites are not to be regarded as the subject, as Kliefoth supposes, in which case their speedy return from exile would be announced. The כּי shows that this cannot be the meaning; for it is immediately preceded by 'לעמּי ישׁ' yb , which precludes the supposition that, when speaking of the mountains, Ezekiel had the inhabitants in his mind.
The promised blessings are the subject, or the branches and fruits, which the mountains are to bear. Nearly all the commentators have agreed in adopting this explanation of the words, after the analogy of Isa 56:1. With the כּי in Eze 36:9 the carrying out of the blessing promised is appended in the form of a reason assigned for the general promise. The mountains shall be cultivated, the men upon them, viz.
, all Israel, multiplied, the desolated cities rebuilt, so that Israel shall dwell in the land as in the former time, and be fruitful and blessed. This promise was no doubt fulfilled in certain weak beginnings after the return of a portion of the people under Zerubbabel and Ezra; but the multiplying and blessing, experienced by those who returned from Babylon, did not take place till long after the salvation promised here, and more especially in Eze 36:12-15.
According to Eze 36:12, the land is to become the inheritance of the people Israel, and will no more make the Israelites childless, or (according to Eze 36:14) cause them to stumble; and the people are no more to bear the contempt of the heathen. But that portion of the nation which returned from exile not only continued under the rule of the heathen, but had also in various ways to bear the contempt of the heathen still; and eventually, because Israel not only stumbled, but fell very low through the rejection of its Saviour, it was scattered again out of the land among the heathen, and the land was utterly wasted...
until this day. In Eze 36:12 the masculine suffix attached to וירשׁוּך refers to the land regarded as הר, which is also the subject to היית and תּוסף. It is not till Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14, where the idea of the land becomes so prominent, that the feminine is used. שׁכּלם, to make them (the Israelites) childless, or bereaved, is explained in Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14 by אכלת, devouring men.
That the land devours its inhabitants, is what the spies say of the land of Canaan in Num 13:32; and in 2Ki 2:19 is it affirmed of the district of Jericho that it causes משׁכּלת, i. e. , miscarriages, on account of its bad water. The latter passage does not come into consideration; but the former (Num 13:32) probably does, and Ezekiel evidently refers to this.
For there is no doubt whatever that he explains or expands שׁכּלם by אכלת אדם yb. Although, for example, the charge that the land devours men is brought against it by the enemies or adversaries of Israel (אמרים לּכם, they say to you), the truth of the charge is admitted, since it is said that the land shall henceforth no more devour men, though without a repetition of the שׁכּל.
But the sense in which Ezekiel affirms of the land that it had been אכלת אדם, and was henceforth to be so no more, is determined by וגויך לא תכשׁלי אוד, thou wilt no more cause thy people to stumble, which is added in Eze 36:14 in the place of משׁכּלת גּויך היית in Eze 36:14 . Hence the land became a devourer of men by the fact that it caused its people to stumble, i.
e. , entangled them in sins (the Keri תּשׁכּלי for תכשׁלי is a bad conjecture, the incorrectness of which is placed beyond all doubt by the לא־תכשׁלי עוד of Eze 36:15). Consequently we cannot understand the “devouring of men,” after Num 13:32, as signifying that, on account of its situation and fruitfulness, the land is an apple of discord, for the possession of which the nations strive with one another, so that the inhabitants are destroyed, or at all events we must not restrict the meaning to this; and still less can we agree with Ewald and Hitzig in thinking of the restless hurrying and driving by which individual men were of necessity rapidly swept away.
If the sweeping away of the population so connected with the stumbling, the people are devoured by the consequences of their sins, i. e. , by the penal judgment, unfruitfulness, pestilence, and war, with which God threatened Israel for its apostasy from Him. These judgments had depopulated the land; and this fact was attributed by the heathen in their own way to the land, and thrown in the teeth of the Israelites as a disgrace.
The Lord will henceforth remove this charge, and take away from the heathen all occasion to despise His people, namely, by bestowing upon His land and people the blessing which He promised in the law to those who kept His commandments. But this can only be done by His removing the occasion to stumble or sin, i. e. , according to Eze 36:25. (compared with Eze 11:18.)
, by His cleansing His people from all uncleanness and idols, and giving them a new heart and a new spirit. The Keri גּוייך in Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14, and Eze 36:15 is a needless alteration of the Chetib גּויך. - In Eze 36:15 this promise is rounded off and concluded by another summing up of the principal thoughts. Because Israel has defiled its land by its sins, God has scattered the people among the heathen; but because they also profaned His name among the heathen, He will exercise forbearance for the sake of His holy name (Eze 36:16-21), will gather Israel out of the lands, cleanse it from its sins, and sanctify it by the communication of His Spirit, so that it will walk in His ways (Eze 36:22-28), and will so bless and multiply it, that both the nations around and Israel itself will know that He is the Lord (Eze 36:29-38).
- This promise is shown by the introductory formula in Eze 36:16 and by the contents to be an independent word of God; but it is substantially connected in the closest manner with the preceding word of God, showing, on the one hand, the motive which prompted God to restore and bless His people;, and, on the other hand, the means by which He would permanently establish the salvation predicted in Ezekiel 34 and Eze 36:1-15. - The kernel of this promise is formed by Eze 36:25-28, for which the way is prepared in Eze 36:17-24, whilst the further extension is contained in Eze 36:29-38.
Eze 36:1-15 Eze 36:1. And thou, son of man, prophesy to the mountains of Israel, and say, Mountains of Israel, hear the word of Jehovah: Eze 36:2. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because the enemy saith concerning you, Aha! the everlasting heights have become ours for a possession: Eze 36:3. Therefore prophesy, and say, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because, even because they lay you waste, and pant for you round about, so that ye have become a possession to the remnant of the nations, and have come to the talk of the tongue and gossip of the people: Eze 36:4.
Therefore, ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord Jehovah: Thus saith the Lord Jehovah to the mountains and hills, to the low places and valleys, and to the waste ruins and the forsaken cities, which have become a prey and derision to the remnant of the nations round about; Eze 36:5. Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Truly in the fire of my jealousy I have spoken against the remnant of the nations, and against Edom altogether, which have made my land a possession for themselves in all joy of heart, in contempt of soul, to empty it out for booty.
Eze 36:6. Therefore prophesy concerning the land of Israel, and say to the mountains and hills, to the low places and valleys, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, in my jealousy and fury have I spoken, because ye have borne the disgrace of the nations. Eze 36:7. Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, I, I have lifted up my hand; truly the nations round about you, they shall bear their disgrace.
Eze 36:8. But ye, ye mountains of Israel, shall put forth your branches, and bear your fruit to my people Israel; for they will soon come. Eze 36:9. For, behold, I will deal with you, and turn toward you, and ye shall be tilled and sown. Eze 36:10. I will multiply men upon you, all the house of Israel at once; and the cities shall be inhabited, and the ruins built.
Eze 36:11. And I will multiply upon you man and beast; they shall multiply and be fruitful: and I will make you inhabited as in your former time, and do more good to you than in your earlier days; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah. Eze 36:12. I will cause men, my people Israel, to walk upon you; and they shall possess thee, and thou shalt be an inheritance to them, and make them childless no more.
Eze 36:13. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because they say to you, “Thou art a devourer of men, and hast made thy people childless;” Eze 36:14. Therefore thou shalt no more devour men, and no more cause thy people to stumble, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah. Eze 36:15. And I will no more cause thee to hear the scoffing of the nations, and the disgrace of the nations thou shalt bear no more, and shalt no more cause thy people to stumble, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah.
This prophecy is uttered concerning the land of Israel, as is plainly declared in Eze 36:6; whereas in Eze 36:1 and Eze 36:4 the mountains of Israel are mentioned instead of the land, in antithesis to the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15; see the comm. on Eze 35:12). The promise takes throughout the form of antithesis to the threat against Edom in Eze 35:1-15.
Because Edom rejoices that the Holy Land, which has been laid waste, has fallen to it for a possession, therefore shall the devastated land be cultivated and sown again, and be inhabited by Israel as in the former time. The heathen nations round about shall, on the other hand, bear their disgrace; Edom, as we have already observed, being expanded, so far as the idea is concerned, into all the heathen nations surrounding Israel (Eze 36:3-7).
In Eze 36:2, האויב, the enemy, is mentioned in quite a general manner; and what has already been stated concerning Edom in Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10, is her predicted of the enemy. In Eze 36:3 and Eze 36:4 this enemy is designated as a remnant of the heathen nations; and it is not till Eze 36:5 that it is more precisely defined by the clause, “and all Edom altogether.
” The גּוים round about (אשׁר, Eze 36:4, compared with Eze 36:3) are the heathen nations which are threatened with destruction in Ezekiel 25 and 26, on account of their malicious rejoicing at the devastation of Jerusalem and Judah. This serves to explain the fact that these nations are designated as שׁארית הגּוים, the rest, or remnant of the heathen nations, which presupposes that the judgment has fallen upon them, and that only a remnant of them is left, which remnant desires to take possession of the devastated land of Israel.
The epithet applied to this land, בּמות, everlasting, i. e. , primeval heights, points back to the גּבעות עולם of Gen 49:26 and Deu 33:15, and is chosen for the purpose of representing the land as a possession secured to the people of Israel by primeval promises, in consequence of which the attempt of the enemy to seize upon this land has become a sin against the Lord God.
The indignation at such a sin is expressed in the emotional character of the address. As Ewald has aptly observed, “Ezekiel is seized with unusual fire, so that after the brief statement in Eze 36:2 'therefore' is repeated five times, the charges brought against these foes forcing themselves in again and again, before the prophecy settles calmly upon the mountains of Israel, to which it was really intended to apply.
” For יען בּיען, see the comm. on Eze 13:10. שׁמּות is an infinitive Kal , formed after the analogy of the verbs ה'ל (cf. Ewald, §238 e ), from שׁמם, to be waste, to devastate, as in Dan 8:13; Dan 9:27; Dan 12:11, and is not to be taken in the sense of נשׁם, after Isa 42:14, as Hitzig supposes. שׁאף, to pant for a thing; here it is equivalent to snapping at anything.
This is required by a comparison with Eze 36:4 , where היה לבז corresponds to שׁמּות ושׁאף, and ללעג to 'תּעלוּ על שׂפת וגו. In the connection שׂפת לשׁון, שׂפה signifies the lip as an organ of speech, or, more precisely, the words spoken; and לשׁון, the tongue, is personified, and stands for אישׁ לשׁון (Psa 140:12), a tongue-man, i. e. , a talker. In Eze 36:4 the idea expressed in “the mountains of Israel” is expanded into mountains, hills, lowlands, and valleys (cf.
Eze 31:12; Eze 32:5-6); and this periphrastic description of the land is more minutely defined by the additional clause, “waste ruins and forsaken cities. ” אם לא in Eze 36:5 is the particle used in oaths (cf. Eze 5:11, etc.) ; and the perfect דּבּרתּי is not merely prophetic, but also a preterite. God has already uttered a threatening word concerning the nations round about in Ezekiel 25, 26, and Eze 35:1-15; and here He once more declares that they shall bear their disgrace.
אשׁ קנאח is the fiery jealousy of wrath. כּלּא is an Aramean form for כּלּהּ (Eze 35:15). For בשׁאט נפשׁ, see Eze 25:6. In the expression למען מגרשׁהּ לבז noisserp, which has been rendered in various ways, we agree with Gesenius and others in regarding מגרשׁ as an Aramean form of the infinitive of גּרשׁ, with the meaning to empty out, which is confirmed by the Syriac; for מגרשׁ cannot be a substantive, on account of the למען; and Hitzig’s conjecture, that לבז should be pointed לבז, and the clause rendered “to plunder its produce,” is precluded by the fact that the separation of the preposition למען ל, by the insertion of a word between, is unexampled, to say nothing of the fact that מגרשׁ does not mean produce at all.
The thought expressed in Eze 36:6 and Eze 36:7 is the following: because Israel has hitherto borne the contempt of the heathen, the heathen shall now bear their own contempt. The lifting of the hand is a gesture employed in taking an oath, as in Eze 20:6, etc. But the land of Israel is to receive a blessing. This blessing is described in Eze 36:8 in general terms, as the bearing of fruit by the mountains, i.
e. , by the land of Israel; and its speedy commencement is predicted. It is then depicted in detail in Eze 36:9. In the clause כּי קרבוּ לבוא, the Israelites are not to be regarded as the subject, as Kliefoth supposes, in which case their speedy return from exile would be announced. The כּי shows that this cannot be the meaning; for it is immediately preceded by 'לעמּי ישׁ' yb , which precludes the supposition that, when speaking of the mountains, Ezekiel had the inhabitants in his mind.
The promised blessings are the subject, or the branches and fruits, which the mountains are to bear. Nearly all the commentators have agreed in adopting this explanation of the words, after the analogy of Isa 56:1. With the כּי in Eze 36:9 the carrying out of the blessing promised is appended in the form of a reason assigned for the general promise. The mountains shall be cultivated, the men upon them, viz.
, all Israel, multiplied, the desolated cities rebuilt, so that Israel shall dwell in the land as in the former time, and be fruitful and blessed. This promise was no doubt fulfilled in certain weak beginnings after the return of a portion of the people under Zerubbabel and Ezra; but the multiplying and blessing, experienced by those who returned from Babylon, did not take place till long after the salvation promised here, and more especially in Eze 36:12-15.
According to Eze 36:12, the land is to become the inheritance of the people Israel, and will no more make the Israelites childless, or (according to Eze 36:14) cause them to stumble; and the people are no more to bear the contempt of the heathen. But that portion of the nation which returned from exile not only continued under the rule of the heathen, but had also in various ways to bear the contempt of the heathen still; and eventually, because Israel not only stumbled, but fell very low through the rejection of its Saviour, it was scattered again out of the land among the heathen, and the land was utterly wasted...
until this day. In Eze 36:12 the masculine suffix attached to וירשׁוּך refers to the land regarded as הר, which is also the subject to היית and תּוסף. It is not till Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14, where the idea of the land becomes so prominent, that the feminine is used. שׁכּלם, to make them (the Israelites) childless, or bereaved, is explained in Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14 by אכלת, devouring men.
That the land devours its inhabitants, is what the spies say of the land of Canaan in Num 13:32; and in 2Ki 2:19 is it affirmed of the district of Jericho that it causes משׁכּלת, i. e. , miscarriages, on account of its bad water. The latter passage does not come into consideration; but the former (Num 13:32) probably does, and Ezekiel evidently refers to this.
For there is no doubt whatever that he explains or expands שׁכּלם by אכלת אדם yb. Although, for example, the charge that the land devours men is brought against it by the enemies or adversaries of Israel (אמרים לּכם, they say to you), the truth of the charge is admitted, since it is said that the land shall henceforth no more devour men, though without a repetition of the שׁכּל.
But the sense in which Ezekiel affirms of the land that it had been אכלת אדם, and was henceforth to be so no more, is determined by וגויך לא תכשׁלי אוד, thou wilt no more cause thy people to stumble, which is added in Eze 36:14 in the place of משׁכּלת גּויך היית in Eze 36:14 . Hence the land became a devourer of men by the fact that it caused its people to stumble, i.
e. , entangled them in sins (the Keri תּשׁכּלי for תכשׁלי is a bad conjecture, the incorrectness of which is placed beyond all doubt by the לא־תכשׁלי עוד of Eze 36:15). Consequently we cannot understand the “devouring of men,” after Num 13:32, as signifying that, on account of its situation and fruitfulness, the land is an apple of discord, for the possession of which the nations strive with one another, so that the inhabitants are destroyed, or at all events we must not restrict the meaning to this; and still less can we agree with Ewald and Hitzig in thinking of the restless hurrying and driving by which individual men were of necessity rapidly swept away.
If the sweeping away of the population so connected with the stumbling, the people are devoured by the consequences of their sins, i. e. , by the penal judgment, unfruitfulness, pestilence, and war, with which God threatened Israel for its apostasy from Him. These judgments had depopulated the land; and this fact was attributed by the heathen in their own way to the land, and thrown in the teeth of the Israelites as a disgrace.
The Lord will henceforth remove this charge, and take away from the heathen all occasion to despise His people, namely, by bestowing upon His land and people the blessing which He promised in the law to those who kept His commandments. But this can only be done by His removing the occasion to stumble or sin, i. e. , according to Eze 36:25. (compared with Eze 11:18.)
, by His cleansing His people from all uncleanness and idols, and giving them a new heart and a new spirit. The Keri גּוייך in Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14, and Eze 36:15 is a needless alteration of the Chetib גּויך. - In Eze 36:15 this promise is rounded off and concluded by another summing up of the principal thoughts. Because Israel has defiled its land by its sins, God has scattered the people among the heathen; but because they also profaned His name among the heathen, He will exercise forbearance for the sake of His holy name (Eze 36:16-21), will gather Israel out of the lands, cleanse it from its sins, and sanctify it by the communication of His Spirit, so that it will walk in His ways (Eze 36:22-28), and will so bless and multiply it, that both the nations around and Israel itself will know that He is the Lord (Eze 36:29-38).
- This promise is shown by the introductory formula in Eze 36:16 and by the contents to be an independent word of God; but it is substantially connected in the closest manner with the preceding word of God, showing, on the one hand, the motive which prompted God to restore and bless His people;, and, on the other hand, the means by which He would permanently establish the salvation predicted in Ezekiel 34 and Eze 36:1-15. - The kernel of this promise is formed by Eze 36:25-28, for which the way is prepared in Eze 36:17-24, whilst the further extension is contained in Eze 36:29-38.
Eze 36:1-15 Eze 36:1. And thou, son of man, prophesy to the mountains of Israel, and say, Mountains of Israel, hear the word of Jehovah: Eze 36:2. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because the enemy saith concerning you, Aha! the everlasting heights have become ours for a possession: Eze 36:3. Therefore prophesy, and say, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because, even because they lay you waste, and pant for you round about, so that ye have become a possession to the remnant of the nations, and have come to the talk of the tongue and gossip of the people: Eze 36:4.
Therefore, ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord Jehovah: Thus saith the Lord Jehovah to the mountains and hills, to the low places and valleys, and to the waste ruins and the forsaken cities, which have become a prey and derision to the remnant of the nations round about; Eze 36:5. Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Truly in the fire of my jealousy I have spoken against the remnant of the nations, and against Edom altogether, which have made my land a possession for themselves in all joy of heart, in contempt of soul, to empty it out for booty.
Eze 36:6. Therefore prophesy concerning the land of Israel, and say to the mountains and hills, to the low places and valleys, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, in my jealousy and fury have I spoken, because ye have borne the disgrace of the nations. Eze 36:7. Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, I, I have lifted up my hand; truly the nations round about you, they shall bear their disgrace.
Eze 36:8. But ye, ye mountains of Israel, shall put forth your branches, and bear your fruit to my people Israel; for they will soon come. Eze 36:9. For, behold, I will deal with you, and turn toward you, and ye shall be tilled and sown. Eze 36:10. I will multiply men upon you, all the house of Israel at once; and the cities shall be inhabited, and the ruins built.
Eze 36:11. And I will multiply upon you man and beast; they shall multiply and be fruitful: and I will make you inhabited as in your former time, and do more good to you than in your earlier days; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah. Eze 36:12. I will cause men, my people Israel, to walk upon you; and they shall possess thee, and thou shalt be an inheritance to them, and make them childless no more.
Eze 36:13. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because they say to you, “Thou art a devourer of men, and hast made thy people childless;” Eze 36:14. Therefore thou shalt no more devour men, and no more cause thy people to stumble, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah. Eze 36:15. And I will no more cause thee to hear the scoffing of the nations, and the disgrace of the nations thou shalt bear no more, and shalt no more cause thy people to stumble, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah.
This prophecy is uttered concerning the land of Israel, as is plainly declared in Eze 36:6; whereas in Eze 36:1 and Eze 36:4 the mountains of Israel are mentioned instead of the land, in antithesis to the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15; see the comm. on Eze 35:12). The promise takes throughout the form of antithesis to the threat against Edom in Eze 35:1-15.
Because Edom rejoices that the Holy Land, which has been laid waste, has fallen to it for a possession, therefore shall the devastated land be cultivated and sown again, and be inhabited by Israel as in the former time. The heathen nations round about shall, on the other hand, bear their disgrace; Edom, as we have already observed, being expanded, so far as the idea is concerned, into all the heathen nations surrounding Israel (Eze 36:3-7).
In Eze 36:2, האויב, the enemy, is mentioned in quite a general manner; and what has already been stated concerning Edom in Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10, is her predicted of the enemy. In Eze 36:3 and Eze 36:4 this enemy is designated as a remnant of the heathen nations; and it is not till Eze 36:5 that it is more precisely defined by the clause, “and all Edom altogether.
” The גּוים round about (אשׁר, Eze 36:4, compared with Eze 36:3) are the heathen nations which are threatened with destruction in Ezekiel 25 and 26, on account of their malicious rejoicing at the devastation of Jerusalem and Judah. This serves to explain the fact that these nations are designated as שׁארית הגּוים, the rest, or remnant of the heathen nations, which presupposes that the judgment has fallen upon them, and that only a remnant of them is left, which remnant desires to take possession of the devastated land of Israel.
The epithet applied to this land, בּמות, everlasting, i. e. , primeval heights, points back to the גּבעות עולם of Gen 49:26 and Deu 33:15, and is chosen for the purpose of representing the land as a possession secured to the people of Israel by primeval promises, in consequence of which the attempt of the enemy to seize upon this land has become a sin against the Lord God.
The indignation at such a sin is expressed in the emotional character of the address. As Ewald has aptly observed, “Ezekiel is seized with unusual fire, so that after the brief statement in Eze 36:2 'therefore' is repeated five times, the charges brought against these foes forcing themselves in again and again, before the prophecy settles calmly upon the mountains of Israel, to which it was really intended to apply.
” For יען בּיען, see the comm. on Eze 13:10. שׁמּות is an infinitive Kal , formed after the analogy of the verbs ה'ל (cf. Ewald, §238 e ), from שׁמם, to be waste, to devastate, as in Dan 8:13; Dan 9:27; Dan 12:11, and is not to be taken in the sense of נשׁם, after Isa 42:14, as Hitzig supposes. שׁאף, to pant for a thing; here it is equivalent to snapping at anything.
This is required by a comparison with Eze 36:4 , where היה לבז corresponds to שׁמּות ושׁאף, and ללעג to 'תּעלוּ על שׂפת וגו. In the connection שׂפת לשׁון, שׂפה signifies the lip as an organ of speech, or, more precisely, the words spoken; and לשׁון, the tongue, is personified, and stands for אישׁ לשׁון (Psa 140:12), a tongue-man, i. e. , a talker. In Eze 36:4 the idea expressed in “the mountains of Israel” is expanded into mountains, hills, lowlands, and valleys (cf.
Eze 31:12; Eze 32:5-6); and this periphrastic description of the land is more minutely defined by the additional clause, “waste ruins and forsaken cities. ” אם לא in Eze 36:5 is the particle used in oaths (cf. Eze 5:11, etc.) ; and the perfect דּבּרתּי is not merely prophetic, but also a preterite. God has already uttered a threatening word concerning the nations round about in Ezekiel 25, 26, and Eze 35:1-15; and here He once more declares that they shall bear their disgrace.
אשׁ קנאח is the fiery jealousy of wrath. כּלּא is an Aramean form for כּלּהּ (Eze 35:15). For בשׁאט נפשׁ, see Eze 25:6. In the expression למען מגרשׁהּ לבז noisserp, which has been rendered in various ways, we agree with Gesenius and others in regarding מגרשׁ as an Aramean form of the infinitive of גּרשׁ, with the meaning to empty out, which is confirmed by the Syriac; for מגרשׁ cannot be a substantive, on account of the למען; and Hitzig’s conjecture, that לבז should be pointed לבז, and the clause rendered “to plunder its produce,” is precluded by the fact that the separation of the preposition למען ל, by the insertion of a word between, is unexampled, to say nothing of the fact that מגרשׁ does not mean produce at all.
The thought expressed in Eze 36:6 and Eze 36:7 is the following: because Israel has hitherto borne the contempt of the heathen, the heathen shall now bear their own contempt. The lifting of the hand is a gesture employed in taking an oath, as in Eze 20:6, etc. But the land of Israel is to receive a blessing. This blessing is described in Eze 36:8 in general terms, as the bearing of fruit by the mountains, i.
e. , by the land of Israel; and its speedy commencement is predicted. It is then depicted in detail in Eze 36:9. In the clause כּי קרבוּ לבוא, the Israelites are not to be regarded as the subject, as Kliefoth supposes, in which case their speedy return from exile would be announced. The כּי shows that this cannot be the meaning; for it is immediately preceded by 'לעמּי ישׁ' yb , which precludes the supposition that, when speaking of the mountains, Ezekiel had the inhabitants in his mind.
The promised blessings are the subject, or the branches and fruits, which the mountains are to bear. Nearly all the commentators have agreed in adopting this explanation of the words, after the analogy of Isa 56:1. With the כּי in Eze 36:9 the carrying out of the blessing promised is appended in the form of a reason assigned for the general promise. The mountains shall be cultivated, the men upon them, viz.
, all Israel, multiplied, the desolated cities rebuilt, so that Israel shall dwell in the land as in the former time, and be fruitful and blessed. This promise was no doubt fulfilled in certain weak beginnings after the return of a portion of the people under Zerubbabel and Ezra; but the multiplying and blessing, experienced by those who returned from Babylon, did not take place till long after the salvation promised here, and more especially in Eze 36:12-15.
According to Eze 36:12, the land is to become the inheritance of the people Israel, and will no more make the Israelites childless, or (according to Eze 36:14) cause them to stumble; and the people are no more to bear the contempt of the heathen. But that portion of the nation which returned from exile not only continued under the rule of the heathen, but had also in various ways to bear the contempt of the heathen still; and eventually, because Israel not only stumbled, but fell very low through the rejection of its Saviour, it was scattered again out of the land among the heathen, and the land was utterly wasted...
until this day. In Eze 36:12 the masculine suffix attached to וירשׁוּך refers to the land regarded as הר, which is also the subject to היית and תּוסף. It is not till Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14, where the idea of the land becomes so prominent, that the feminine is used. שׁכּלם, to make them (the Israelites) childless, or bereaved, is explained in Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14 by אכלת, devouring men.
That the land devours its inhabitants, is what the spies say of the land of Canaan in Num 13:32; and in 2Ki 2:19 is it affirmed of the district of Jericho that it causes משׁכּלת, i. e. , miscarriages, on account of its bad water. The latter passage does not come into consideration; but the former (Num 13:32) probably does, and Ezekiel evidently refers to this.
For there is no doubt whatever that he explains or expands שׁכּלם by אכלת אדם yb. Although, for example, the charge that the land devours men is brought against it by the enemies or adversaries of Israel (אמרים לּכם, they say to you), the truth of the charge is admitted, since it is said that the land shall henceforth no more devour men, though without a repetition of the שׁכּל.
But the sense in which Ezekiel affirms of the land that it had been אכלת אדם, and was henceforth to be so no more, is determined by וגויך לא תכשׁלי אוד, thou wilt no more cause thy people to stumble, which is added in Eze 36:14 in the place of משׁכּלת גּויך היית in Eze 36:14 . Hence the land became a devourer of men by the fact that it caused its people to stumble, i.
e. , entangled them in sins (the Keri תּשׁכּלי for תכשׁלי is a bad conjecture, the incorrectness of which is placed beyond all doubt by the לא־תכשׁלי עוד of Eze 36:15). Consequently we cannot understand the “devouring of men,” after Num 13:32, as signifying that, on account of its situation and fruitfulness, the land is an apple of discord, for the possession of which the nations strive with one another, so that the inhabitants are destroyed, or at all events we must not restrict the meaning to this; and still less can we agree with Ewald and Hitzig in thinking of the restless hurrying and driving by which individual men were of necessity rapidly swept away.
If the sweeping away of the population so connected with the stumbling, the people are devoured by the consequences of their sins, i. e. , by the penal judgment, unfruitfulness, pestilence, and war, with which God threatened Israel for its apostasy from Him. These judgments had depopulated the land; and this fact was attributed by the heathen in their own way to the land, and thrown in the teeth of the Israelites as a disgrace.
The Lord will henceforth remove this charge, and take away from the heathen all occasion to despise His people, namely, by bestowing upon His land and people the blessing which He promised in the law to those who kept His commandments. But this can only be done by His removing the occasion to stumble or sin, i. e. , according to Eze 36:25. (compared with Eze 11:18.)
, by His cleansing His people from all uncleanness and idols, and giving them a new heart and a new spirit. The Keri גּוייך in Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14, and Eze 36:15 is a needless alteration of the Chetib גּויך. - In Eze 36:15 this promise is rounded off and concluded by another summing up of the principal thoughts. Because Israel has defiled its land by its sins, God has scattered the people among the heathen; but because they also profaned His name among the heathen, He will exercise forbearance for the sake of His holy name (Eze 36:16-21), will gather Israel out of the lands, cleanse it from its sins, and sanctify it by the communication of His Spirit, so that it will walk in His ways (Eze 36:22-28), and will so bless and multiply it, that both the nations around and Israel itself will know that He is the Lord (Eze 36:29-38).
- This promise is shown by the introductory formula in Eze 36:16 and by the contents to be an independent word of God; but it is substantially connected in the closest manner with the preceding word of God, showing, on the one hand, the motive which prompted God to restore and bless His people;, and, on the other hand, the means by which He would permanently establish the salvation predicted in Ezekiel 34 and Eze 36:1-15. - The kernel of this promise is formed by Eze 36:25-28, for which the way is prepared in Eze 36:17-24, whilst the further extension is contained in Eze 36:29-38.
Eze 36:1-15 Eze 36:1. And thou, son of man, prophesy to the mountains of Israel, and say, Mountains of Israel, hear the word of Jehovah: Eze 36:2. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because the enemy saith concerning you, Aha! the everlasting heights have become ours for a possession: Eze 36:3. Therefore prophesy, and say, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because, even because they lay you waste, and pant for you round about, so that ye have become a possession to the remnant of the nations, and have come to the talk of the tongue and gossip of the people: Eze 36:4.
Therefore, ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord Jehovah: Thus saith the Lord Jehovah to the mountains and hills, to the low places and valleys, and to the waste ruins and the forsaken cities, which have become a prey and derision to the remnant of the nations round about; Eze 36:5. Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Truly in the fire of my jealousy I have spoken against the remnant of the nations, and against Edom altogether, which have made my land a possession for themselves in all joy of heart, in contempt of soul, to empty it out for booty.
Eze 36:6. Therefore prophesy concerning the land of Israel, and say to the mountains and hills, to the low places and valleys, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, in my jealousy and fury have I spoken, because ye have borne the disgrace of the nations. Eze 36:7. Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, I, I have lifted up my hand; truly the nations round about you, they shall bear their disgrace.
Eze 36:8. But ye, ye mountains of Israel, shall put forth your branches, and bear your fruit to my people Israel; for they will soon come. Eze 36:9. For, behold, I will deal with you, and turn toward you, and ye shall be tilled and sown. Eze 36:10. I will multiply men upon you, all the house of Israel at once; and the cities shall be inhabited, and the ruins built.
Eze 36:11. And I will multiply upon you man and beast; they shall multiply and be fruitful: and I will make you inhabited as in your former time, and do more good to you than in your earlier days; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah. Eze 36:12. I will cause men, my people Israel, to walk upon you; and they shall possess thee, and thou shalt be an inheritance to them, and make them childless no more.
Eze 36:13. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because they say to you, “Thou art a devourer of men, and hast made thy people childless;” Eze 36:14. Therefore thou shalt no more devour men, and no more cause thy people to stumble, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah. Eze 36:15. And I will no more cause thee to hear the scoffing of the nations, and the disgrace of the nations thou shalt bear no more, and shalt no more cause thy people to stumble, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah.
This prophecy is uttered concerning the land of Israel, as is plainly declared in Eze 36:6; whereas in Eze 36:1 and Eze 36:4 the mountains of Israel are mentioned instead of the land, in antithesis to the mountains of Seir (Eze 35:1-15; see the comm. on Eze 35:12). The promise takes throughout the form of antithesis to the threat against Edom in Eze 35:1-15.
Because Edom rejoices that the Holy Land, which has been laid waste, has fallen to it for a possession, therefore shall the devastated land be cultivated and sown again, and be inhabited by Israel as in the former time. The heathen nations round about shall, on the other hand, bear their disgrace; Edom, as we have already observed, being expanded, so far as the idea is concerned, into all the heathen nations surrounding Israel (Eze 36:3-7).
In Eze 36:2, האויב, the enemy, is mentioned in quite a general manner; and what has already been stated concerning Edom in Eze 35:5 and Eze 35:10, is her predicted of the enemy. In Eze 36:3 and Eze 36:4 this enemy is designated as a remnant of the heathen nations; and it is not till Eze 36:5 that it is more precisely defined by the clause, “and all Edom altogether.
” The גּוים round about (אשׁר, Eze 36:4, compared with Eze 36:3) are the heathen nations which are threatened with destruction in Ezekiel 25 and 26, on account of their malicious rejoicing at the devastation of Jerusalem and Judah. This serves to explain the fact that these nations are designated as שׁארית הגּוים, the rest, or remnant of the heathen nations, which presupposes that the judgment has fallen upon them, and that only a remnant of them is left, which remnant desires to take possession of the devastated land of Israel.
The epithet applied to this land, בּמות, everlasting, i. e. , primeval heights, points back to the גּבעות עולם of Gen 49:26 and Deu 33:15, and is chosen for the purpose of representing the land as a possession secured to the people of Israel by primeval promises, in consequence of which the attempt of the enemy to seize upon this land has become a sin against the Lord God.
The indignation at such a sin is expressed in the emotional character of the address. As Ewald has aptly observed, “Ezekiel is seized with unusual fire, so that after the brief statement in Eze 36:2 'therefore' is repeated five times, the charges brought against these foes forcing themselves in again and again, before the prophecy settles calmly upon the mountains of Israel, to which it was really intended to apply.
” For יען בּיען, see the comm. on Eze 13:10. שׁמּות is an infinitive Kal , formed after the analogy of the verbs ה'ל (cf. Ewald, §238 e ), from שׁמם, to be waste, to devastate, as in Dan 8:13; Dan 9:27; Dan 12:11, and is not to be taken in the sense of נשׁם, after Isa 42:14, as Hitzig supposes. שׁאף, to pant for a thing; here it is equivalent to snapping at anything.
This is required by a comparison with Eze 36:4 , where היה לבז corresponds to שׁמּות ושׁאף, and ללעג to 'תּעלוּ על שׂפת וגו. In the connection שׂפת לשׁון, שׂפה signifies the lip as an organ of speech, or, more precisely, the words spoken; and לשׁון, the tongue, is personified, and stands for אישׁ לשׁון (Psa 140:12), a tongue-man, i. e. , a talker. In Eze 36:4 the idea expressed in “the mountains of Israel” is expanded into mountains, hills, lowlands, and valleys (cf.
Eze 31:12; Eze 32:5-6); and this periphrastic description of the land is more minutely defined by the additional clause, “waste ruins and forsaken cities. ” אם לא in Eze 36:5 is the particle used in oaths (cf. Eze 5:11, etc.) ; and the perfect דּבּרתּי is not merely prophetic, but also a preterite. God has already uttered a threatening word concerning the nations round about in Ezekiel 25, 26, and Eze 35:1-15; and here He once more declares that they shall bear their disgrace.
אשׁ קנאח is the fiery jealousy of wrath. כּלּא is an Aramean form for כּלּהּ (Eze 35:15). For בשׁאט נפשׁ, see Eze 25:6. In the expression למען מגרשׁהּ לבז noisserp, which has been rendered in various ways, we agree with Gesenius and others in regarding מגרשׁ as an Aramean form of the infinitive of גּרשׁ, with the meaning to empty out, which is confirmed by the Syriac; for מגרשׁ cannot be a substantive, on account of the למען; and Hitzig’s conjecture, that לבז should be pointed לבז, and the clause rendered “to plunder its produce,” is precluded by the fact that the separation of the preposition למען ל, by the insertion of a word between, is unexampled, to say nothing of the fact that מגרשׁ does not mean produce at all.
The thought expressed in Eze 36:6 and Eze 36:7 is the following: because Israel has hitherto borne the contempt of the heathen, the heathen shall now bear their own contempt. The lifting of the hand is a gesture employed in taking an oath, as in Eze 20:6, etc. But the land of Israel is to receive a blessing. This blessing is described in Eze 36:8 in general terms, as the bearing of fruit by the mountains, i.
e. , by the land of Israel; and its speedy commencement is predicted. It is then depicted in detail in Eze 36:9. In the clause כּי קרבוּ לבוא, the Israelites are not to be regarded as the subject, as Kliefoth supposes, in which case their speedy return from exile would be announced. The כּי shows that this cannot be the meaning; for it is immediately preceded by 'לעמּי ישׁ' yb , which precludes the supposition that, when speaking of the mountains, Ezekiel had the inhabitants in his mind.
The promised blessings are the subject, or the branches and fruits, which the mountains are to bear. Nearly all the commentators have agreed in adopting this explanation of the words, after the analogy of Isa 56:1. With the כּי in Eze 36:9 the carrying out of the blessing promised is appended in the form of a reason assigned for the general promise. The mountains shall be cultivated, the men upon them, viz.
, all Israel, multiplied, the desolated cities rebuilt, so that Israel shall dwell in the land as in the former time, and be fruitful and blessed. This promise was no doubt fulfilled in certain weak beginnings after the return of a portion of the people under Zerubbabel and Ezra; but the multiplying and blessing, experienced by those who returned from Babylon, did not take place till long after the salvation promised here, and more especially in Eze 36:12-15.
According to Eze 36:12, the land is to become the inheritance of the people Israel, and will no more make the Israelites childless, or (according to Eze 36:14) cause them to stumble; and the people are no more to bear the contempt of the heathen. But that portion of the nation which returned from exile not only continued under the rule of the heathen, but had also in various ways to bear the contempt of the heathen still; and eventually, because Israel not only stumbled, but fell very low through the rejection of its Saviour, it was scattered again out of the land among the heathen, and the land was utterly wasted...
until this day. In Eze 36:12 the masculine suffix attached to וירשׁוּך refers to the land regarded as הר, which is also the subject to היית and תּוסף. It is not till Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14, where the idea of the land becomes so prominent, that the feminine is used. שׁכּלם, to make them (the Israelites) childless, or bereaved, is explained in Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14 by אכלת, devouring men.
That the land devours its inhabitants, is what the spies say of the land of Canaan in Num 13:32; and in 2Ki 2:19 is it affirmed of the district of Jericho that it causes משׁכּלת, i. e. , miscarriages, on account of its bad water. The latter passage does not come into consideration; but the former (Num 13:32) probably does, and Ezekiel evidently refers to this.
For there is no doubt whatever that he explains or expands שׁכּלם by אכלת אדם yb. Although, for example, the charge that the land devours men is brought against it by the enemies or adversaries of Israel (אמרים לּכם, they say to you), the truth of the charge is admitted, since it is said that the land shall henceforth no more devour men, though without a repetition of the שׁכּל.
But the sense in which Ezekiel affirms of the land that it had been אכלת אדם, and was henceforth to be so no more, is determined by וגויך לא תכשׁלי אוד, thou wilt no more cause thy people to stumble, which is added in Eze 36:14 in the place of משׁכּלת גּויך היית in Eze 36:14 . Hence the land became a devourer of men by the fact that it caused its people to stumble, i.
e. , entangled them in sins (the Keri תּשׁכּלי for תכשׁלי is a bad conjecture, the incorrectness of which is placed beyond all doubt by the לא־תכשׁלי עוד of Eze 36:15). Consequently we cannot understand the “devouring of men,” after Num 13:32, as signifying that, on account of its situation and fruitfulness, the land is an apple of discord, for the possession of which the nations strive with one another, so that the inhabitants are destroyed, or at all events we must not restrict the meaning to this; and still less can we agree with Ewald and Hitzig in thinking of the restless hurrying and driving by which individual men were of necessity rapidly swept away.
If the sweeping away of the population so connected with the stumbling, the people are devoured by the consequences of their sins, i. e. , by the penal judgment, unfruitfulness, pestilence, and war, with which God threatened Israel for its apostasy from Him. These judgments had depopulated the land; and this fact was attributed by the heathen in their own way to the land, and thrown in the teeth of the Israelites as a disgrace.
The Lord will henceforth remove this charge, and take away from the heathen all occasion to despise His people, namely, by bestowing upon His land and people the blessing which He promised in the law to those who kept His commandments. But this can only be done by His removing the occasion to stumble or sin, i. e. , according to Eze 36:25. (compared with Eze 11:18.)
, by His cleansing His people from all uncleanness and idols, and giving them a new heart and a new spirit. The Keri גּוייך in Eze 36:13, Eze 36:14, and Eze 36:15 is a needless alteration of the Chetib גּויך. - In Eze 36:15 this promise is rounded off and concluded by another summing up of the principal thoughts. Because Israel has defiled its land by its sins, God has scattered the people among the heathen; but because they also profaned His name among the heathen, He will exercise forbearance for the sake of His holy name (Eze 36:16-21), will gather Israel out of the lands, cleanse it from its sins, and sanctify it by the communication of His Spirit, so that it will walk in His ways (Eze 36:22-28), and will so bless and multiply it, that both the nations around and Israel itself will know that He is the Lord (Eze 36:29-38).
- This promise is shown by the introductory formula in Eze 36:16 and by the contents to be an independent word of God; but it is substantially connected in the closest manner with the preceding word of God, showing, on the one hand, the motive which prompted God to restore and bless His people;, and, on the other hand, the means by which He would permanently establish the salvation predicted in Ezekiel 34 and Eze 36:1-15. - The kernel of this promise is formed by Eze 36:25-28, for which the way is prepared in Eze 36:17-24, whilst the further extension is contained in Eze 36:29-38.