Chapter 22 EZEKIEL
The time is one-hundred-years after Israel fell. Judah, totally ignoring the warnings of Isaiah, Micah, Jeremiah, and Habakkuk, deteriorated to become even worse than the ten tribes.
We saw the first of a group of Prophets to be carried into exile included Daniel and Ezekiel. Historically, after the ten tribes of the North were carried away to Assyria, Babylon continued to grow rapidly and conquered Assyria in six-twelve-BC. Babylon then invaded Judah in three waves. In the first wave she carried off all the royals and nobility including Daniel and his three friends. Egypt could see the threat from Babylon, so she went to meet Babylon which distracted the armies away from Jerusalem for a while. Judah tried to side with Egypt and Pharaoh Necho set Jehoiakim as Puppet King. Four-years later, once Babylon had seen off Egypt, they deported a second group of people which included Ezekiel. Ezekiel was from of the respected priestly clan of Zadok. He was twenty-five years old when carried off into Babylon. Priests could not perform their duties until they were thirty. On his thirtieth birthday, while he was sitting by the river, he saw a vision and was commissioned to be a prophetic Priest. Having been told by Jeremiah to settle down in Babylon, he settled by the brook Kebah at the joining of Mesopotamian rivers, (middle rivers). He married the same year. From thirty to thirty-three, he did a number of miracles and preached. Ezekiel introduces us to the term “son of man” which he uses eighty-three times to refer to himself. Jesus paralleled this, using the same term and spending three years preaching with miracles also. Like Jeremiah, Ezekiel gained the reputation of being a pessimist, until Jerusalem fell, and he became an optimist. The turning point seems to come in chapter-thirty-nine.
Foreign nations will realize that the Israelites were forced to leave their own land because they sinned against me. I turned my back on my people and let enemies attack and kill them. Now I will show mercy to the people of Israel and bring them back from the nations where they are living. They are Jacob’s descendants, so I will bless them and show that I am holy. They will live safely in their own land, but will be ashamed when they remember their evil ways and how they disgraced me.244
In the Bible as a whole, approximately twenty-five-percent of the verses are predictive. There are Seven-hundred -and-thirty-five events foretold, Five-hundred-and-ninety-three happened before the coming of Messiah. Mathematically minded Bible Scholars tell us one hundred-and-twenty have been fulfilled since Jesus ascended and the temple destroyed, leaving about twenty remaining to be completed. We have witnessed some of these since nineteen-forty-eight, when God’s people returned to the promised land and in nineteen-sixty-eight Israel enlarged its territory to three-quarters of the size of the land promised to Abraham. This is not a political statement nor is it to say God will not take them out again before the end times, but it is a reminder to “watch and pray for the time draws near”. He brought them back under Nehemiah but dispersed them again seventy-years after Jesus died.
The synagogue found its birth in Babylon. The tabernacle gave way to the Temple, but that was in Jerusalem so as they termed the phrase “coming together” into the word Synagogue.
The Call and Commission of Ezekiel in the first three chapters are about how Ezekiel was called to prophesy in a vision and then told to prophesy to the nations in several different ways. His first vision was about the Glory of God leaving the temple of Jerusalem, travelling along the valley to the mount of Olives and from there ascending into heaven. His last vision was about the glory of God returning and taking up residence again in the new temple.
In between he had several visions, some of which he delivered in the form of street theatre. In the first, Ezekiel prophesies “Jerusalem is finished”. First he made a clay model of Jerusalem and smashed it. In the Second he lay on left side three-hundred-and-ninety-days (facing North toward the ten tribes of Israel), One-day equalled one-year of Israel’s Idolatry. Then, turning on his right side facing Jerusalem for forty-days, one for each year of Judah’s Idolatry245 In the third, he got a large bowl of mixed grain and beans, tethered himself to a point in the town centre for three-hundred-and-ninety days, meticulously dividing the bowl contents into three-hundred-and-ninety equal parts and making one small cake cooked over human excrement each day. After a protest, God allowed him to replace the human waste with cow dung. The message was that the after the fall of Jerusalem they would only be able to eat a meagre amount unclean food each day. This was clearly a shock to the people, because they thought God would never let Jerusalem fall.
The people of Jerusalem will starve. They will have so little food and water that they will be afraid and hopeless. Everyone will be shocked at what is happening, and, because of their sins, they will die a slow death eating unclean food.’246
In the fourth demonstration, Ezekiel shaved his head and beard in public. Then, building a brick kiln in the shape of Jerusalem, he burned one portion, burned and chopped up a second portion with a sword, then threw a third portion into the air shouting “the nations will watch as Judah burns, the people are killed by the sword and scattered while Jerusalem falls”.
The fifth prophesy was directed at the king. He put clothes in a bag, dug a hole in the wall and crept out at night. Later, when Jerusalem was surrounded by Babylon, The king did cut a small hole in the wall and crept out with his family but the enemy spotted him caught up with him made him watch as they killed his wife and children, and then burned out his eyes.
The sixth vision was particularly sad. He was told his wife would die on her birthday, but he was not allowed to morn. He was to mark the day and time in his journal because that would be the precise moment Jerusalem would fall. When the runner came from Jerusalem a fortnight later, he asked the precise time and yes, it was exactly the moment written in his diary.
Ezekiel also spoke in parables. God said “Utter a parable unto the rebellious house”. In fact, he uttered five. The first of these was the parable of the wild vine. In it God points out that Judah had been chosen out of all the trees in the forest to different by producing good fruit. But now it was no different and therefore only useful as firewood just like all the other trees. So God is about to chop it down.247
In the deserted girl parable, Ezekiel reminds Israel they were abandoned in Egypt until He rescued them, adopted them, raised them like a princess, to the envy of the world. But the princess becomes a prostitute for all the nations around. God had tried to reform her and now it was too late. He would no longer listen to anyone who interceded for her.248
The parable of two birds of prey, one an Eagle (Nebuchadnezzar compared to an eagle)249 and the other a bird of prey (Cyrus is to a bird of prey)250. They come to nest in grapevine (Judah). They eat all the grapes and then destroy the branches and break it away from its roots. God declares:
“As I live, Judah will be punished. But so also will Assyria, Egypt and Babylon. And then from the root of the tree will I will make many trees that will grow tall.”251
Taking Judah’s Emblem, the Lion, Ezekiel speaks plainly to the leaders of Judah and holds them responsible for the downfall of the nation. The lioness had taught the lion cub to fight in order to protect the pride, but instead the lion had turned on the pride and consumed it. For that reason God will allow the nations to capture the lion in a net and carry it away.252
The parable of the two sisters, Israel (Oholah) who prostituted herself to Assyria and so God gave her to the Assyrians; And Judah (Oholibah) who displayed herself to Babylon (a reference to the time Babylon sent greetings to Nebuchadnezzar, and he showed them the treasures of the temple). But then she became enamoured by Egypt, (a reference to the treaty they had just made with Egypt). Ezekiel told them both the evidence had been heard in His court and the judgement passed. There was no more chances to repent and sentence would be carried out.253
Besides street theatre and Parables, Ezekiel had visions to relay to the people. In these visions Ezekiel sees with great detail how God will punish the nations.
Because Tyre has shouted Hip Hip Hooray at Jerusalem’s fall, I am against you. I will cause the nations to come up against her, and cast her into the sea. They will pull down her walls and break down her towers and even scrape her dust to make her like the top of a rock. She will be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea: I have spoken says the Lord GOD: She will become a spoil to the nations.254
Tyre was a fishing village half a mile inland having a little island offshore. When Alexander the Great came down from Egypt, the fishermen got into boats and went to the island thinking themselves safe. Alexander ordered the city to be thrown into the sea to make a causeway which even today is place for fishermen to dry nets. His predictions for Egypt, Ammon, Edom, and Moab, all came equally true. The chances of that happening in detail must be enormous!
There are two recurring phrases throughout this book. The first is “I will”, which is covenant phrase and appears at least seventy-seven times. The second is “will know” and appears at least sixty-one times. Taken together they run “I Will …and then they will know”. Particularly in chapter-thirty-three, we are warned that God is searching for a watchman to look out for these signs and warn the people. If they are warned then the judgement lies on the hearer, otherwise it remains on those charged with delivery of the message. Chapter-thirty-four turns his attentions toward the leaders and priests. He berates them for using the people to boost their own ego, for not feeding the people as they were charged to do, for not gathering them but leaving them to their own devices, for leaving them as food for wolves and finally, for imposing conditions on them that drive them away into the mouths of wild beasts.
The Lord GOD says; Behold, I am against the shepherds; and I will require my flock at their hand,255
In chapter-thirty-seven, he turns from judgement to focus on hope. A vision of dry bones that God revived and filled them with life again. This is a well known picture. But it is accompanied by the picture of two sticks, one is Ephraim representing the ten tribes, The other is Judah. These are held together and become one stick. These were then placed in the sanctuary like Aeron’s rod. All nations will come to see them. This began to come true under the freedom of movement edict of Cyrus when all the tribes began to intermingle again.
Prophecies from chapter-thirty-eight on, have not yet been fulfilled. These are about the final conflict with Gog and Magog and ties up with Daniel and Revelation which we will look closer at in later chapters. There was a gap of about fifteen-years until Ezekiel was eighty. And saw the throne of Glory on wings returning. He saw it depart from the temple, travel down the valley to the mount of Olives and ascend into the heavens at the beginning of his ministry, now he sees it return in like manner, to a brand-new temple. But the difference is there is no Holy of Holies and no priests. Instead, there is a river flowing from the temple down to the deepest valley,256 and then on through Africa. This river flows from Jerusalem to the Dead Sea via Engedi and fishermen are fishing on the dead sea. This is one to watch carefully as it is now public knowledge Israel has been planning with others, a channel linking the Red Sea and Dead Sea.257
244 Ezekiel 39: 23
245 Ezekiel 4: 4-6.
246 Ezekiel 4: 16 -17
247 Ezekiel 15:
248 Ezekiel 16:
249 Jeremiah 48: 40 and 49: 22
250 Isaiah_46: 11
251 Ezekiel 17:
252 Ezekiel 19:
253 Ezekiel 24
254 Ezekiel 26: 2-5
255 Ezekiel 34: 10