--- title: "Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible" author: "Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown" languages: [en] shelf: "Commentaries" section: 449 of 927 url: https://scriptura.si/works/jamieson-fausset-brown-commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/449/ cite: "Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, section 449. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/jamieson-fausset-brown-commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/449/" --- # Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible *Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown* The Victorian standard commentary, critical and practical, from Genesis to Revelation. ## 449. Ezekiel · 10 of 41 Source: https://scriptura.si/works/jamieson-fausset-brown-commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/449/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/jamieson-fausset-brown-commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/449/#p-N [¶0] as they that go forth into captivity--literally, "as the goings forth of the captivity," that is, of the captive band of exiles, namely, amid the silent darkness: typifying Zedekiah's flight by night on the taking of the city ([Jr 39:4]; ). [¶1] 5. Dig--as Zedekiah was to escape like one digging through a wall, furtively to effect an escape ([Eze 12:12]). [¶2] carry out--namely, "thy stuff" ([Eze 12:4]). [¶3] thereby--by the opening in the wall. Zedekiah escaped "by the gate betwixt the two walls" ([Jr 39:4]). [¶4] 6. in ... twilight--rather, "in the dark." So in [Ge 15:17], "it" refers to "thy stuff." [¶5] cover thy face--as one who muffles his face, afraid of being recognized by anyone meeting him. So the Jews and Zedekiah should make their exit stealthily and afraid to look around, so hurried should be their fight [Calvin]. [¶6] sign--rather, "a portent," namely, for evil. [¶7] 9. What doest thou?--They ask not in a docile spirit, but making a jest of his proceedings. [¶8] 10. burden--that is, weighty oracle. [¶9] the prince--The very man Zedekiah, in whom they trust for safety, is to be the chief sufferer. Josephus [Antiquities, 10.7] reports that Ezekiel sent a copy of this prophecy to Zedekiah. As Jeremiah had sent a letter to the captives at the Chebar, which was the means of calling forth at first the agency of Ezekiel, so it was natural for Ezekiel to send a message to Jerusalem confirming the warnings of Jeremiah. The prince, however, fancying a contradiction between [Eze 12:13]; "he shall not see Babylon," and [Jr 24:8], , declaring he should be carried to Babylon, believed neither. Seeming discrepancies in Scripture on deeper search prove to be hidden harmonies. [¶10] 11. sign--portent of evil to come ([Eze 24:27]; [Zec 3:8], Margin). Fulfilled ([2Ki 25:1-7]; [Jr 52:1-11]). [¶11] 12. prince ... among them--literally, "that is in the midst of them," that is, on whom the eyes of all are cast, and "under whose shadow" they hope to live ([La 4:20]). [¶12] shall bear--namely, his "stuff for removing"; his equipments for his journey. [¶13] cover his face, that he see not the ground--See on [Eze 12:6]; the symbol in [Eze 12:6] is explained in this verse. He shall muffle his face so as not to be recognized: a humiliation for a king! [¶14] 13. My net--the Chaldean army. He shall be inextricably entangled in it, as in the meshes of a net. It is God's net ([Job 19:6]). Babylon was God's instrument ([Is 10:5]). Called "a net" ([Ha 1:14-16]). [¶15] bring him to Babylon ... ; yet shall he not see it--because he should be deprived of sight before he arrived there ([Jr 52:11]). [¶16] 14. all ... about him--his satellites: his bodyguard. [¶17] bands--literally, "the wings" of an army ([Is 8:8]). [¶18] draw out ... sword after them--(See on [Eze 5:2]; [Eze 5:12]). [¶19] 16. I will leave a few ... that they may declare ... abominations--God's purpose in scattering a remnant of Jews among the Gentiles; namely, not only that they themselves should be weaned from idolatry (see [Eze 12:15]), but that by their own word, as also by their whole state as exiles, they should make God's righteousness manifest among the Gentiles, as vindicated in their punishment for their sins (compare [Is 43:10]; [Zec 8:13]). [¶20] 18. Symbolical representation of the famine and fear with which they should eat their scanty morsel, in their exile, and especially at the siege. [¶21] 19. people of the land--the Jews "in the land" of Chaldea who thought themselves miserable as being exiles and envied the Jews left in Jerusalem as fortunate. [¶22] land of Israel--contrasted with "the people in the land" of Chaldea. So far from being fortunate as the exiles in Chaldea regarded them, the Jews in Jerusalem are truly miserable, for the worst is before them, whereas the exiles have escaped the miseries of the coming siege. [¶23] land ... desolate from all that is therein--literally, "that the land (namely, Judea) may be despoiled of the fulness thereof"; emptied of the inhabitants and abundance of flocks and corn with which it was filled. [¶24] because of ... violence--([Psa 107:34]). [¶25] 20. the cities--left in Judea after the destruction of Jerusalem. [¶26] 22. proverb--The infidel scoff, that the threatened judgment was so long in coming, it would not come at all, had by frequent repetition come to be a "proverb" with them. This skeptical habit contemporary prophets testify to ([Jr 17:15]; ; [Zep 1:12]). Ezekiel, at the Chebar, thus sympathizes with Jeremiah and strengthens his testimony at Jerusalem. The tendency to the same scoff showed itself in earlier times, but had not then developed into a settled "proverb" ([Is 5:19]; [Am 5:18]). It shall again be the characteristic of the last times, when "faith" shall be regarded as an antiquated thing ([Lu 18:8]), seeing that it remains stationary, whereas worldly arts and sciences progress, and when the "continuance of all things from creation" will be the argument against the possibility of their being suddenly brought to a standstill by the coming of the Lord ([Is 66:5]; [2Pe 3:3], ). The very long-suffering of God, which ought to lead men to repentance, is made an argument against His word ([Ec 8:11]; [Am 6:3]). [¶27] days ... prolonged ... vision faileth--their twofold argument: (1) The predictions shall not come to pass till long after our time. (2) They shall fail and prove vain shadows. God answers both in [Eze 12:23], . [¶28] 23. effect--literally, "the word," namely, fulfilled; that is, the effective fulfilment of whatever the prophets have spoken is at hand. [¶29] 24. no more ... vain vision ... flattering divination--All those false prophets ([La 2:14]), who "flattered" the people with promises of peace and safety, shall be detected and confounded by the event itself. [¶30] 25. word ... shall come to pass--in opposition to their scoff "the vision faileth" ([Eze 12:22]). The repetition, "I will speak ... speak," &c. (or as Fairbairn, "For I, Jehovah, will speak whatever word I shall speak, and it shall be done") implies that whenever God speaks, the effect must follow; for God, who speaks, is not divided in Himself ([Eze 12:28]; [Is 55:11]; [Da 9:12]; [Lu 21:33]). [¶31] no more prolonged--in opposition to the scoff ([Eze 12:22]), "The days are prolonged." [¶32] in your days--while you are living (compare [Mt 24:34]). [¶33] 27. Not a mere repetition of the scoff ([Eze 12:22]); there the scoffers asserted that the evil was so often threatened and postponed, it must have no reality; here formalists do not go so far as to deny that a day of evil is coming, but assert it is still far off ([Am 6:3]). The transition is easy from this carnal security to the gross infidelity of the former class. ### Chapter 13 ### Eze 13:1-23. Denunciation of False Prophets and Prophetesses; Their False Teachings, and God's Consequent Judgments [¶36] 1. As the twelfth chapter denounced the false expectations of the people, so this denounces the false leaders who fed those expectations. As an independent witness, Ezekiel confirms at the Chebar the testimony of Jeremiah ([Jr 29:21], ) in his letter from Jerusalem to the captive exiles, against the false prophets; of these some were conscious knaves, others fanatical dupes of their own frauds; for example, Ahab, Zedekiah, and Shemaiah. Hananiah must have believed his own lie, else he would not have specified so circumstantial details ([Jr 28:2-4]). The conscious knaves gave only general assurances of peace ([Jr 5:31]; ; ). The language of Ezekiel has plain references to the similar language of Jeremiah (for example, [Jr 23:9-38]); the bane of false prophecy, which had its stronghold in Jerusalem, having in some degree extended to the Chebar; this chapter, therefore, is primarily intended as a message to those still in the Jewish metropolis; and, secondarily, for the good of the exiles at the Chebar. [¶37] 2. that prophesy--namely, a speedy return to Jerusalem. [¶38] out of ... own hearts--alluding to the words of Jeremiah ([Jr 23:16], ); that is, what they prophesied was what they and the people wished; the wish was father to the thought. The people wished to be deceived, and so were deceived. They were inexcusable, for they had among them true prophets (who spoke not their own thoughts, but as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, [2Pe 1:21]), whom they might have known to be such, but they did not wish to know ([Joh 3:19]). [¶39] 3. foolish--though vaunting as though exclusively possessing "wisdom" ([1Co 1:19-21]); the fear of God being the only beginning of wisdom ([Psa 111:10]). [¶40] their own spirit--instead of the Spirit of God. A threefold distinction lay between the false and the true prophets: (1) The source of their messages respectively; of the false, "their own hearts"; of the true, an object presented to the spiritual sense (named from the noblest of the senses, a seeing) by the Spirit of God as from without, not produced by their own natural powers of reflection. The word, the body of the thought, presented itself not audibly to the natural sense, but directly to the spirit of the prophet; and so the perception of it is properly called a seeing, he perceiving that which thereafter forms itself in his soul as the cover of the external word [Delitzsch]; hence the peculiar expression, "seeing the word of God" ([Is 2:1]; ; [Am 1:1]; [Mi 1:1]). () The point aimed at; the false "walking after their own spirit"; the true, after the Spirit of God. (3) The result; the false saw nothing, but spake as if they had seen; the true had a vision, not subjective, but objectively real [Fairbairn]. A refutation of those who set the inward word above the objective, and represent the Bible as flowing subjectively from the inner light of its writers, not from the revelation of the Holy Ghost from without. "They are impatient to get possession of the kernel without its fostering shell--they would have Christ without the Bible" [Bengel]. [¶41] 4. foxes--which cunningly "spoil the vines" ([So 2:15]), Israel being the vineyard ([Psa 80:8-15]; Is 5:1-7; 27:2; [Jr 2:21]); their duty was to have guarded it from being spoiled, whereas they themselves spoiled it by corruptions. [¶42] in ... deserts--where there is nothing to eat; whence the foxes become so ravenous and crafty in their devices to get food. So the prophets wander in Israel, a moral desert, unrestrained, greedy of gain which they get by craft. [¶43] 5. not gone up into ... gaps--metaphor from breaches made in a wall, to which the defenders ought to betake themselves in order to repel the entrance of the foe. The breach is that made in the theocracy through the nation's sin; and, unless it be made up, the vengeance of God will break in through it. Those who would advise the people to repentance are the restorers of the breach ([Eze 22:30]; [Psa 106:23], ). [¶44] hedge--the law of God ([Psa 80:12]; [Is 5:2], ); by violating it, the people stripped themselves of the fence of God's protection and lay exposed to the foe. The false prophets did not try to repair the evil by bringing back the people to the law with good counsels, or by checking the bad with reproofs. These two duties answer to the double office of defenders in case of a breach made in a wall: (1) To repair the breach from within; (2) To oppose the foe from without.