1 Moreover, when you shall divide by lot the land for inheritance, you shall offer an offering to Yahweh, a holy portion of the land; the length shall be the length of twenty-five thousand [reeds], and the breadth shall be ten thousand: it shall be holy in all the border of it round about.
2 Of this there shall be for the holy place five hundred [in length] by five hundred [in breadth], square round about; and fifty cubits for the suburbs of it round about.
3 Of this measure shall you measure a length of twenty-five thousand, and a breadth of ten thousand: and in it shall be the sanctuary, which is most holy.
4 It is a holy portion of the land; it shall be for the priests, the ministers of the sanctuary, who come near to minister to Yahweh; and it shall be a place for their houses, and a holy place for the sanctuary.
5 Twenty-five thousand in length, and ten thousand in breadth, shall be to the Levites, the ministers of the house, for a possession to themselves, [for] twenty chambers.
6 You shall appoint the possession of the city five thousand broad, and twenty-five thousand long, side by side with the offering of the holy portion: it shall be for the whole house of Israel.
7 [Whatever is] for the prince [shall be] on the one side and on the other side of the holy offering and of the possession of the city, in front of the holy offering and in front of the possession of the city, on the west side westward, and on the east side eastward; and in length answerable to one of the portions, from the west border to the east border.
8 In the land it shall be to him for a possession in Israel: and my princes shall no more oppress my people; but they shall give the land to the house of Israel according to their tribes.
9 Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Let it suffice you, princes of Israel: remove violence and spoil, and execute justice and righteousness; dispossessing my people, says the Lord Yahweh.
10 You shall have just balances, and a just ephah, and a just bath.
11 The ephah and the bath shall be of one measure, that the bath may contain the tenth part of a homer, and the ephah the tenth part of a homer: the measure of it shall be after the homer.
12 The shekel shall be twenty gerahs. Twenty shekels plus twenty-five shekels plus fifteen shekels shall be your mina.
13 This is the offering that you shall offer: the sixth part of an ephah from a homer of wheat; and you shall give the sixth part of an ephah from a homer of barley;
14 and the set portion of oil, of the bath of oil, the tenth part of a bath out of the cor, [which is] ten baths, even a homer; (for ten baths are a homer;)
15 and one lamb of the flock, out of two hundred, from the well-watered pastures of Israel; -for a meal-offering, and for a burnt offering, and for peace-offerings, to make atonement for them, says the Lord Yahweh.
16 All the people of the land shall give to this offering for the prince in Israel.
17 It shall be the prince's part to give the burnt offerings, and the meal-offerings, and the drink-offerings, in the feasts, and on the new moons, and on the Sabbaths, in all the appointed feasts of the house of Israel: he shall prepare the sin-offering, and the meal-offering, and the burnt offering, and the peace-offerings, to make atonement for the house of Israel.
18 Thus says the Lord Yahweh: In the first [month], in the first [day] of the month, you shall take a young bull without blemish; and you shall cleanse the sanctuary.
19 The priest shall take of the blood of the sin-offering, and put it on the door-posts of the house, and on the four corners of the ledge of the altar, and on the posts of the gate of the inner court.
20 So you shall do on the seventh [day] of the month for everyone who errs, and for him who is simple: so shall you make atonement for the house.
21 In the first [month], in the fourteenth day of the month, you shall have the Passover, a feast of seven days; unleavened bread shall be eaten.
22 On that day shall the prince prepare for himself and for all the people of the land a bull for a sin-offering.
23 The seven days of the feast he shall prepare a burnt offering to Yahweh, seven bulls and seven rams without blemish daily the seven days; and a male goat daily for a sin-offering.
24 He shall prepare a meal-offering, an ephah for a bull, and an ephah for a ram, and a hin of oil to an ephah.
25 In the seventh [month], in the fifteenth day of the month, in the feast, shall he do the like the seven days; according to the sin-offering, according to the burnt offering, and according to the meal-offering, and according to the oil.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Ezekiel 45
Commentary on Ezekiel 45 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 45
Eze 45:1-25. Allotment of the Land for the Sanctuary, the City, and the Prince.
1. offer an oblation—from a Hebrew root to "heave" or "raise"; when anything was offered to God, the offerer raised the hand. The special territorial division for the tribes is given in the forty-seventh and forty-eighth chapters. Only Jehovah's portion is here subdivided into its three parts: (1) that for the sanctuary (Eze 45:2, 3); (2) that for the priests (Eze 45:4); (3) that for the Levites (Eze 45:5). Compare Eze 48:8-13.
five and twenty thousand reeds, &c.—So English Version rightly fills the ellipsis (compare Note, see on Eze 42:16). Hence "cubits" are mentioned in Eze 45:2, not here, implying that there alone cubits are meant. Taking each reed at twelve feet, the area of the whole would be a square of sixty miles on each side. The whole forming a square betokens the settled stability of the community and the harmony of all classes. "An holy portion of the land" (Eze 45:1) comprised the whole length, and only two-fifths of the breadth. The outer territory in its distribution harmonizes with the inner and more sacred arrangements of the sanctuary. No room is to be given for oppression (see Eze 45:8), all having ample provision made for their wants and comforts. All will mutually co-operate without constraint or contention.
7. The prince's possession is to consist of two halves, one on the west, the other on the east, of the sacred territory. The prince, as head of the holy community, stands in closest connection with the sanctuary; his possession, therefore, on both sides must adjoin that which was peculiarly the Lord's [Fairbairn].
12. The standard weights were lost when the Chaldeans destroyed the temple. The threefold enumeration of shekels (twenty, twenty-five, fifteen) probably refers to coins of different value, representing respectively so many shekels, the three collectively making up a maneh. By weighing these together against the maneh, a test was afforded whether they severally had their proper weight: sixty shekels in all, containing one coin a fourth of the whole (fifteen shekels), another a third (twenty shekels), another a third and a twelfth (twenty-five shekels) [Menochius]. The Septuagint reads, "fifty shekels shall be your maneh."
13-15. In these oblations there is a progression as to the relation between the kind and the quantity: of the corn, the sixth of a tenth, that is, a sixtieth part of the quantity specified; of the oil, the tenth of a tenth, that is, an hundredth part; and of the flock, one from every two hundred.
18. The year is to begin with a consecration service, not mentioned under the Levitical law; but an earnest of it is given in the feast of dedication of the second temple, which celebrated its purification by Judas Maccabeus, after its defilement by Antiochus.
20. for him that is simple—for sins of ignorance (Le 4:2, 13, 27).
21. As a new solemnity, the feast of consecration is to prepare for the passover; so the passover itself is to have different sacrifices from those of the Mosaic law. Instead of one ram and seven lambs for the daily burnt offering, there are to be seven bullocks and seven rams. So also whereas the feast of tabernacles had its own offerings, which diminished as the days of the feast advanced, here the same are appointed as on the passover. Thus it is implied that the letter of the law is to give place to its spirit, those outward rites of Judaism having no intrinsic efficacy, but symbolizing the spiritual truths of Messiah's kingdom, as for instance the perfect holiness which is to characterize it. Compare 1Co 5:7, 8, as to our spiritual "passover," wherein, at the Lord's supper, we feed on Christ by faith, accompanied with "the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth." Literal ordinances, though not slavishly bound to the letter of the law, will set forth the catholic and eternal verities of Messiah's kingdom.