to stand--that is, that the city may "stand."
in ... day of ... Lord--In the day of the battle which God wages against Israel for their sins, ye do not try to stay God's vengeance by prayers, and by leading the nation to repentance.
6. made others to hope, &c.--rather, "they hoped" to confirm (that is, 'make good') their word, by the event corresponding to their prophecy. The Hebrew requires this [Havernick]. Also the parallel clause, "they have seen vanity," implies that they believed their own lie ([2Th 2:11]). Subjective revelation is false unless it rests on the objective.
8. I am against you--rather understand, "I come against you," to punish your wicked profanation of My name (compare [Re 2:5], ).
9. mine hand--My power in vengeance.
not ... in ... assembly--rather, the "council"; "They shall not occupy the honorable office of councillors in the senate of elders after the return from Babylon" ([Ezr 2:1], ).
neither ... written in ... Israel--They shall not even have a place in the register kept of all citizens' names; they shall be erased from it, just as the names of those who died in the year, or had been deprived of citizenship for their crimes, were at the annual revisal erased. Compare [Jr 17:13]; [Lu 10:20]; [Re 3:5], as to those spiritually Israelites; [Joh 1:47], and those not so. Literally fulfilled ([Ezr 2:59], 62; compare [Ne 7:5]; [Psa 69:28]).
neither ... enter ... land--They shall not so much as be allowed to come back at all to their country.
10. Because, even because--The repetition heightens the emphasis.
Peace--safety to the nation. Ezekiel confirms [Jr 6:14]; .
one--literally, "this one"; said contemptuously, as in [2Ch 28:22].
a wall--rather, "a loose wall." Ezekiel had said that the false prophets did not "go up into the gaps, or make up the breaches" ([Eze 13:5]), as good architects do; now he adds that they make a bustling show of anxiety about repairing the wall; but it is without right mortar, and therefore of no use.
one ... others--besides individual effort, they jointly co-operated to delude the people.
daubed ... with untempered mortar--as sand without lime, mud without straw [Grotius]. Fairbairn translates, "plaster it with whitewash." But besides the hypocrisy of merely outwardly "daubing" to make the wall look fair ([Mt 23:27], ; [Ac 23:3]), there is implied the unsoundness of the wall from the absence of true uniting cement; the "untempered cement" answering to the lie of the prophets, who say, in support of their prophecies, "Thus saith the Lord, when the Lord hath not spoken" ([Eze 22:28]).
11. overflowing--inundating; such as will at once wash away the mere clay mortar. The three most destructive agents shall co-operate against the wall--wind, rain, and hailstones. These last in the East are more out of the regular course of nature and are therefore often particularly specified as the instruments of God's displeasure against His foes ([Ex 9:18]; [Jos 10:11]; [Job 38:22]; [Psa 18:12], ; [Is 28:2]; ; [Re 16:21]). The Hebrew here is, literally, "stones of ice." They fall in Palestine at times an inch thick with a destructive velocity. The personification heightens the vivid effect, "O ye hail stones." The Chaldeans will be the violent agency whereby God will unmask and refute them, overthrowing their edifice of lies.
12. shall it not be said--Your vanity and folly shall be so manifested that it shall pass into a proverb, "Where is the daubing?"
13. God repeats, in His own name, as the Source of the coming calamity, what had been expressed generally in [Eze 13:11].
14. The repetition of the same threat (see on [Eze 13:11]) is to awaken the people out of their dream of safety by the certainty of the event.
foundation--As the "wall" represents the security of the nation, so the "foundation" is Jerusalem, on the fortifications of which they rested their confidence. Grotius makes the "foundation" refer to the false principles on which they rested; [Eze 13:16] supports the former view.
16. prophesy concerning Jerusalem--With all their "seeing visions of peace for her," they cannot ensure peace or safety to themselves.
17. set thy face--put on a bold countenance, fearlessly to denounce them ([Eze 3:8], ; [Is 50:7]).
daughters--the false prophetesses; alluded to only here; elsewhere the guilt specified in the women is the active share they took in maintaining idolatry ([Eze 8:14]). It was only in extraordinary emergencies that God bestowed prophecy on women, for example on Miriam, Deborah, Huldah ([Ex 15:20]; [Jud 4:4]; [2Ki 22:14]); so in the last days to come ([Joe 2:28]). The rareness of such instances enhanced their guilt in pretending inspiration.
18. sew pillows to ... armholes--rather, elbows and wrists, for which the false prophetesses made cushions to lean on, as a symbolical act, typifying the perfect tranquility which they foretold to those consulting them. Perhaps they made their dupes rest on these cushions in a fancied state of ecstasy after they had made them at first stand (whence the expression, "every stature," is used for "men of every age"). As the men are said to have built a wall ([Eze 13:10]), so the women are said to sew pillows, &c., both alike typifying the "peace" they promised the impenitent.
make kerchiefs--magical veils, which they put over the heads of those consulting them, as if to fit them for receiving a response, that they might be rapt in spiritual trance above the world.
head of every stature--"men of every age," old and young, great and small, if only these had pay to offer them.
hunt souls--eagerly trying to allure them to the love of yourselves ([Pr 6:26]; [2Pe 2:14]), so as unwarily to become your prey.
will ye save ... souls ... that come unto you--Will ye haul after souls, and when they are yours ("come unto you"), will ye promise them life? "Save" is explained ([Eze 13:22]), "promising life" [Grotius]. Calvin explains, "Will ye hunt My people's souls and yet will ye save your own souls"; I, the Lord God, will not allow it. But "save" is used ([Eze 13:19]) of the false prophetesses promising life to the impenitent, so that English Version and Grotius explain it best.
19. handfuls--expressing the paltry gain for which they bartered immortal souls (compare [Mi 3:5], ; [He 12:16]). They "polluted" God by making His name the cloak under which they uttered falsehoods.
among my people--an aggravation of their sin, that they committed it "among the people" whom God had chosen as peculiarly His own, and among whom He had His temple. It would have been a sin to have done so even among the Gentiles, who knew not God; much more so among the people of God (compare [Pr 28:21]).
slay ... souls that should not die, &c.--to predict the slaying or perdition of the godly whom I will save. As true ministers are said to save and slay their hearers, according to the spirit respectively in which these receive their message ([2Co 2:15], ), so false ministers imitate them; but they promise safety to those on the broad way to ruin and predict ruin to those on the narrow way of God.
my people that hear your lies--who are therefore wilfully deceived, so that their guilt lies at their own door ([Joh 3:19]).
20. I am against your pillows--that is, against your lying ceremonial tricks by which ye cheat the people.
to make them fly--namely, into their snares, as fowlers disturb birds so as to be suddenly caught in the net spread for them. "Fly" is peculiarly appropriate as to those lofty spiritual flights to which they pretended to raise their dupes when they veiled their heads with kerchiefs and made them rest on luxurious arm-cushions ([Eze 13:18]).
let ... souls go--"Ye make them fly" in order to destroy them; "I will let them go" in order to save them ([Psa 91:3]; [Pr 6:5]; [Ho 9:8]).
21. in your hand--in your power. "My people" are the elect remnant of Israel to be saved.
ye shall know--by the judgments which ye shall suffer.
22. ye have made ... the righteous sad--by lying predictions of calamities impending ever the godly.
strengthened ... wicked--([Jr 23:14]).
heart of ... righteous ... hands of ... wicked--Heart is applied to the righteous because the terrors foretold penetrated to their inmost feelings; hands, to the wicked because they were so hardened as not only to despise God in their minds, but also to manifest it in their whole acts, as if avowedly waging war with Him.
23. ye shall see no more vanity--The event shall confute your lies, involving yourselves in destruction ([Eze 13:9]; [Eze 14:8]; ; [Mi 3:6]).
Chapter 14
Eze 14:1-23. Hypocritical Inquirers Are Answered According to Their Hypocrisy. The Calamities Coming on the People; but a Remnant Is to Escape
1. elders--persons holding that dignity among the exiles at the Chebar. Grotius refers this to Seraiah and those sent with him from Judea ([Jr 51:59]). The prophet's reply, first, reflecting on the character of the inquirers, and, secondly, foretelling the calamities coming on Judea, may furnish an idea of the subject of their inquiry.
sat before me--not at once able to find a beginning of their speech; indicative of anxiety and despondency.
3. heart ... face--The heart is first corrupted, and then the outward manifestation of idol-worship follows; they set their idols before their eyes. With all their pretense of consulting God now, they have not even put away their idols outwardly; implying gross contempt of God. "Set up," literally, "aloft"; implying that their idols had gained the supreme ascendancy over them.