2 Son of man, set thy face against mount Seir, and prophesy against it,
Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Because Moab and Seir do say, Behold, the house of Judah is like unto all the nations,
Son of man, set thy face toward the mountains of Israel, and prophesy against them,
Rejoice and be glad, daughter of Edom, that dwellest in the land of Uz: the cup shall pass also unto thee; thou shalt be drunken, and make thyself naked. The punishment of thine iniquity is accomplished, O daughter of Zion; he will no more carry thee away into captivity. He will visit thine iniquity, O daughter of Edom; he will discover thy sins.
and for me in order that utterance may be given to me in [the] opening of my mouth to make known with boldness the mystery of the glad tidings,
Because of violence against thy brother Jacob, shame shall cover thee, and thou shalt be cut off for ever. In the day that thou stoodest on the other side, in the day that strangers carried away captive his substance, and foreigners entered into his gates, and cast lots upon Jerusalem, even thou wast as one of them. But thou shouldest not have looked on the day of thy brother in the day of his disaster; neither shouldest thou have rejoiced over the children of Judah in the day of their destruction; nor have opened wide thy mouth in the day of distress. Thou shouldest not have entered into the gate of my people in the day of their calamity, nor have looked, even thou, on their affliction in the day of their calamity, neither shouldest thou have laid [hands] on their substance in the day of their calamity; and thou shouldest not have stood on the crossway, to cut off those of his that did escape, nor have delivered up those remaining of him in the day of distress.
The vision of Obadiah. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah concerning Edom: We have heard a report from Jehovah, and an ambassador is sent among the nations. Arise ye, and let us rise up against her in battle.
Thus saith Jehovah: For three transgressions of Edom, and for four, I will not revoke its sentence; because he pursued his brother with the sword, and cast off all pity; and his anger did tear continually, and he kept his wrath for ever. And I will send a fire upon Teman, and it shall devour the palaces of Bozrah.
Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Because Edom hath dealt against the house of Judah by taking vengeance, and hath made himself very guilty, and revenged himself upon them, therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah: I will also stretch out my hand upon Edom; and will cut off man and beast from it; and I will make it desolate from Teman; and unto Dedan shall they fall by the sword. And I will execute my vengeance upon Edom, by the hand of my people Israel; and they shall do in Edom according to mine anger and according to my fury; and they shall know my vengeance, saith the Lord Jehovah.
Son of man, set thy face against the children of Ammon, and prophesy against them;
Son of man, set thy face toward the south, and drop [words] against the south, and prophesy against the forest of the south field;
Thus Esau dwelt in mount Seir; Esau is Edom. And these are the generations of Esau, the father of Edom, in mount Seir.
Concerning Edom. Thus saith Jehovah of hosts: Is there no more wisdom in Teman? is counsel perished from the prudent? is their wisdom spent? Flee, turn back, dwell deep down, ye inhabitants of Dedan! For I will bring the calamity of Esau upon him, the time that I visit him. If grape-gatherers had come to thee, would they not have left a gleaning? If thieves by night, they would destroy only till they had enough. But I have made Esau bare, I have uncovered his secret places, that he is unable to hide himself: his seed is wasted, and his brethren, and his neighbours, and he is not. Leave thine orphans, I will preserve them alive; and let thy widows trust in me. For thus saith Jehovah: Behold, they whose judgment was not to drink of the cup shall assuredly drink; and thou indeed, shouldest thou be altogether unpunished? Thou shalt not go unpunished, but thou shalt surely drink. For I have sworn by myself, saith Jehovah, that Bozrah shall become an astonishment, a reproach, a waste, and a curse; and all the cities thereof shall be perpetual wastes. I have heard a rumour from Jehovah, and an ambassador is sent among the nations: -- Gather yourselves together, and come against her and rise up for the battle. For behold, I have made thee small among the nations, despised among men. Thy terribleness, the pride of thy heart, hath deceived thee, thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock, that holdest the height of the hill. Though thou shouldest make thy nest high as the eagle, I will bring thee down from thence, saith Jehovah. And Edom shall be an astonishment: every one that goeth by it shall be astonished, and shall hiss, because of all the plagues thereof. As in the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, and their neighbour cities, saith Jehovah, no one shall dwell there, neither shall a son of man sojourn therein. Behold, he shall come up like a lion from the swelling of the Jordan against the strong habitation; for I will make them suddenly run away from it; and who is a chosen [man] whom I shall appoint over her? For who is like me? and who will assign me a time? and who is that shepherd that will stand before me? Therefore hear the counsel of Jehovah, which he hath taken against Edom, and his purposes which he hath purposed against the inhabitants of Teman: The little ones of the flock shall certainly draw them away; he shall certainly make their habitation desolate for them. The earth quaketh at the sound of their fall; there is a cry, the sound whereof is heard in the Red sea. Behold, he shall come up, and fly as an eagle, and spread forth his wings against Bozrah; and at that day the heart of the mighty men of Edom shall be as the heart of a woman in her pangs.
Behold, days are coming, saith Jehovah, when I will visit all [them that are] circumcised with the uncircumcised; Egypt, and Judah, and Edom, and the children of Ammon, and Moab, and all that have the corners [of their beard] cut off, that dwell in the wilderness: for all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart.
Who is this that cometh from Edom, with deep-red garments from Bozrah, this that is glorious in his apparel, travelling in the greatness of his strength? -- I that speak in righteousness, mighty to save. -- Wherefore is redness in thine apparel, and thy garments like him that treadeth in the winevat? I have trodden the winepress alone, and of the peoples not a man was with me; and I have trodden them in mine anger, and trampled them in my fury; and their blood is sprinkled upon my garments, and I have stained all mine apparel. For the day of vengeance was in my heart, and the year of my redeemed had come. And I looked, and there was none to help; and I wondered that there was none to uphold: and mine own arm brought salvation unto me; and my fury, it upheld me. And I have trodden down the peoples in mine anger, and made them drunk in my fury; and their blood have I brought down to the earth.
Come near, ye nations, to hear; and hearken, ye peoples: let the earth hear, and all its fulness; the world, and all that cometh forth of it. For the wrath of Jehovah is against all the nations, and [his] fury against all their armies: he hath devoted them to destruction, he hath delivered them to the slaughter. And their slain shall be cast out, and their stink shall come up from their carcases, and the mountains shall be melted with their blood. And all the host of the heavens shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll; and all their host shall fade away, as a leaf fadeth from off the vine, and as the withered [fruit] from the fig-tree. For my sword is bathed in the heavens; behold, it shall come down upon Edom, and upon the people of my ban, to judgment. The sword of Jehovah is filled with blood, it is made fat with fatness, with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams; for Jehovah hath a sacrifice in Bozrah, and a great slaughter in the land of Edom. And the buffaloes shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls; and their land shall be soaked with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness. For it is the day of Jehovah's vengeance, the year of recompenses for the controversy of Zion. And the torrents thereof shall be turned into pitch, and its dust into brimstone; yea, the land thereof shall become burning pitch: it shall not be quenched night nor day; the smoke thereof shall go up for ever: from generation to generation it shall lie waste; none shall pass through it for ever and ever. And the pelican and the bittern shall possess it, and the great owl and the raven shall dwell in it. And he shall stretch out upon it the line of waste, and the plummets of emptiness. Of her nobles who should proclaim the kingdom, none are there; and all her princes shall be nought. And thorns shall come up in her palaces, nettles and brambles in her fortresses; and it shall be a dwelling-place of wild dogs, a court for ostriches. And there shall the beasts of the desert meet with the jackals, and the wild goat shall cry to his fellow; the lilith also shall settle there, and find for herself a place of rest. There shall the arrow-snake make her nest, and lay, and hatch, and gather under her shadow; there also shall the vultures be gathered one with another. Search ye in the book of Jehovah and read: not one of these shall fail, one shall not have to seek for the other; for my mouth, it hath commanded, and his Spirit, it hath gathered them. For he himself hath cast the lot for them, and his hand hath divided it unto them with the line: they shall possess it for ever; from generation to generation shall they dwell therein.
They take crafty counsel against thy people, and consult against thy hidden ones: They say, Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation, and let the name of Israel be mentioned no more. For they have consulted together with one heart: they have made an alliance together against thee. The tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites, Moab and the Hagarites; Gebal, and Ammon, and Amalek; Philistia, with the inhabitants of Tyre; Asshur also is joined with them: they are an arm to the sons of Lot. Selah. Do unto them as to Midian; as to Sisera, as to Jabin, at the torrent of Kishon: Who were destroyed at Endor; they became as dung for the ground. Make their nobles as Oreb and as Zeeb; and all their chiefs as Zebah and as Zalmunna. For they have said, Let us take to ourselves God's dwelling-places in possession. O my God, make them like a whirling thing, like stubble before the wind. As fire burneth a forest, and as the flame setteth the mountains on fire, So pursue them with thy tempest, and terrify them with thy whirlwind. Fill their faces with shame, that they may seek thy name, O Jehovah. Let them be put to shame and be dismayed for ever, and let them be confounded and perish: That they may know that thou alone, whose name is Jehovah, art the Most High over all the earth.
But Amaziah strengthened himself, and led forth his people, and went to the valley of salt, and smote of the children of Seir ten thousand. And the children of Judah took ten thousand captive, alive, and brought them to the top of the cliff, and cast them down from the top of the cliff, so that they all were broken in pieces. But those of the troop that Amaziah had sent back, that they should not go with him to battle, fell upon the cities of Judah from Samaria as far as Beth-horon, and smote three thousand of them, and took much spoil. And it came to pass after Amaziah was come from the slaughter of the Edomites, that he brought the gods of the children of Seir, and set them up to be his gods, and bowed himself down before them, and burned incense to them.
And when they began the song of triumph and praise, Jehovah set liers-in-wait against the children of Ammon, Moab, and mount Seir, who had come against Judah, and they were smitten. And the children of Ammon and Moab stood up against the inhabitants of mount Seir, to exterminate and destroy [them]; and when they had made an end of the inhabitants of Seir, they helped to destroy one another.
And now, behold, the children of Ammon and Moab, and those of mount Seir, amongst whom thou wouldest not let Israel go when they came out of the land of Egypt, (for they turned from them, and destroyed them not,)
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Ezekiel 35
Commentary on Ezekiel 35 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
Devastation of Edom, and Restoration of the Land of Israel - Ezekiel 35:1-36:15
The two sections, Ezekiel 35:1-15 and Ezekiel 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 (Ezekiel 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 Ezekiel 36:4, Ezekiel 36:6, with Ezekiel 35:8; and Ezekiel 36:5 with Ezekiel 35:15 ). The contents are the following: The mountains of Seir shall be laid waste (Ezekiel 35:1-4), because Edom cherishes eternal enmity and bloody hatred towards Israel (Ezekiel 35:5-9), and because it has coveted the land of Israel and blasphemed Jehovah (Ezekiel 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 (Ezekiel 36:1-7), shall be inhabited by Israel again, and shall be cultivated and no longer bear the disgrace of the heathen (Ezekiel 35:8-15). This closing thought (Ezekiel 35:15) points back to Ezekiel 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.
The Devastation of Edom
Ezekiel 35:1. And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Ezekiel 35:2. Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, Ezekiel 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. Ezekiel 35:4. Thy cities will I make into ruins, and thou wilt become a waste, and shalt know that I am Jehovah. Ezekiel 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, Ezekiel 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. Ezekiel 35:7. I will make Mount Seir devastation and waste, and cut off therefrom him that goeth away and him that returneth, Ezekiel 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. Ezekiel 35:9. I will make thee eternal wastes, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah. Ezekiel 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; Ezekiel 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. Ezekiel 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.” Ezekiel 35:13. Ye have magnified against me with your mouth, and heaped up your sayings against me; I have heard it. Ezekiel 35:14. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will prepare devastation for thee. Ezekiel 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” (Ezekiel 35:2-4), is vindicated and earnestly elaborated in two strophes, commencing with ' יען וגו (Ezekiel 35:5 and Ezekiel 35:10), and closing, like the announcement of the theme itself ( Ezekiel 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 (Ezekiel 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 Isaiah 63:1-6. This is apparent from the fact that devastation is to be prepared for Edom, when the whole earth rejoices (Ezekiel 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 (Ezekiel 35:5), but the remnant of the heathen nations generally (Ezekiel 36:3-7 and Ezekiel 36:15), are mentioned as the enemies from whose disgrace and oppression Israel is to be delivered. For Ezekiel 35:2, compare Ezekiel 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 Genesis 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 Ezekiel 35:3, compare Ezekiel 6:14, etc. חרבּה , destruction. The sin of Edom mentioned in Ezekiel 35:5 is eternal enmity toward Israel, which has also been imputed to the Philistines in Ezekiel 25:15, but which struck deeper root, in the case of Edom, in the hostile attitude of Esau toward Jacob (Genesis 25:22. and Genesis 27:37), and was manifested, as Amos (Amos 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. Psalms 63:11; Jeremiah 18:21). בּעת recalls to mind בּיום אידם in Obadiah 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 Ezekiel 21:30. On account of this display of its hostility, the Lord will make Edom blood (Ezekiel 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 Ezekiel 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 Ezekiel 35:7 and Ezekiel 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 Zechariah 7:14. For Ezekiel 35:8 compare Ezekiel 32:5-6 and Ezekiel 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, Ezekiel 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 (Ezekiel 35:12, Ezekiel 35:13), and the almighty God, who rewards those who utter such proud sayings according to their deeds (Ezekiel 35:14 and Ezekiel 35:15). נאצות has retained the Kametz on account of the guttural in the first tone, in contrast with נאצות in Nehemiah 9:18, Nehemiah 9:26 (cf. Ewald, §69 b ). - The expression “mountains of Israel,” for the land of Israel, in Ezekiel 35:12 and Ezekiel 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 Obadiah 1:12, which has a kindred meaning). העתיר , used here according to Aramean usage for העשׁיר , to multiply, or heap up. In כּשׂמה , in Ezekiel 35:14, כּ is a particle of time, as it frequently is before infinitives (e.g., Joshua 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 (Ezekiel 35:15) כ is a particle of comparison; and the meaning of Ezekiel 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 Ezekiel 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 Ezekiel 11:15 and Ezekiel 36:10).