Ezekiel 27:5 Komentář

Still we are attending the funeral of Tyre and the lamentations made for the fall of that renowned city. In this chapter we have, I. A large account of the dignity, wealth, and splendour of Tyre, while it was in its strength, the vast trade it drove, and the interest it had among the nations (v. 1-25), which is designed to make its ruin the more lamentable. II. A prediction of its fall and ruin, and the confusion and consternation which all its neighbours shall thereby be put into (Eze 27:26-36). And this is intended to stain the pride of all worldly glory, and, by setting the one over-against the other, to let us see the vanity and uncertainty of the riches, honours, and pleasures of the world, and what little reason we have to place our happiness in them or to be confident of the continuance of them; so that all this is written for our learning.

INTRODUCTION TO EZEKIEL 27 This chapter contains a lamentation on Tyre; setting forth her former grandeur, riches, and commerce; her ruin and destruction; and the concern of others on that account. The prophet is bid to take up his lamentation concerning it, Eze 27:1, observing her situation and magnificence, of which she boasted, Eze 27:3, describing the excellency of her shipping and naval stores, Eze 27:5, declaring who were her mariners, pilots, and caulkers, Eze 27:8, her military men, Eze 27:10 her several merchants, and the things they traded in with her in her fairs and markets, Eze 27:12, then follows an account of her destruction, Eze 27:26, the lamentation of pilots and mariners because of it, Eze 27:28, and of the kings and inhabitants of the isles, and merchants of the people, Eze 27:33.

Of the oaks of Bashan have they made thine oars,.... To row the ships with; for their ships probably were no other than galleys, which were rowed with oars, as were the ships of first invention. Bashan was a country in Judea where oaks grew; see Isa 2:13. The country of Judea in general was famous for oaks; it abounded with them in the times of Homer (t), who speaks of Typho being buried in a country abounding with oaks, among the rich or fat people of Judea; and he seems to design Bashan particularly, of which Og was king, whom he calls Typho, and of whose bed he makes mention in the same place; hence several places in Judea had their names from the oaks which grew, there, as Elonmoreh, Allonbachuth, Elonmeonenim, Elontabor, and Elonbethhanan, Gen 12:6 and which one would have thought were fitter to make their ships of; but of these only their oars were made: the company of the Ashurites have made thy benches of ivory, brought out of the isles of Chittim; the benches for the towers to sit on, or for others in the cabin and decks; but that these should be wholly of ivory is not very probable; nor was ivory brought from the isles of Chittim, but from other parts; nor is it easy to say who the company of the Ashurites were; some say the Assyrians; but why they should be so called is not plain. Jarchi makes to be but one word, which signifies box trees, as it is used in Isa 41:19 and he supposes that these benches, or be they what they will, were made of box trees covered or inlaid with ivory. So the Targum, "the lintels of thy gates (the hatches) were planks of box tree inlaid with ivory;'' which box, and not the ivory, was brought from the isles of Chittim; either from Cyprus, where was a place called Citium; or from Macedonia, from whence box was fetched; or from the province of Apulia, as the Targum; where there might be plenty of it, as in Corsica, and other places, where particularly the best box grows, as Pliny (u) says. Jerom interprets Cittin of Italy; and Ben Gorion says (w) that Cittim are the Romans. (t) ', . Homer. Iliad. 2. Vid. Dickinson, Delphi Phoenicix. c. 2. p. 13, 16. (u) Nat. Hist. l. 10. c. 16. (w) Heb. Hist. l. 1. c. 1. p. 7.

(Verse 4, 5.) Your neighbors who built you have filled your beauty. They built you with Sanir fir trees and all the planks of the sea. They brought cedar from Lebanon to make harm to you. For what reason, I do not know, they translated it thus in the Septuagint: The sons of Beelim surrounded your beauty; the cedar of Sanir was built for you; they brought thin cypress planks from Lebanon to make harm to you with fir. For the sermon of Beelim is not found at all in this place among the Hebrews, but it is written in Gebulaic, which means 'your boundaries'. Also, in what they said, your sons were deceived by the ambiguity of the word and the similarity in the scripture, as the same letters are read differently, 'of masons' and 'of sons', Bonaich and Benaich. Therefore, O Tyre, you who said out of arrogance, 'I am of perfect beauty' or 'I have adorned myself with beauty', since you are situated in the midst of the sea, hear how great things have been bestowed upon you by the generosity of God. Your neighbors and bordering people, who are not from distant regions but from neighboring ones, have filled your decoration, and do you think that what is alien is yours? And he speaks as if tropically to a ship, signifying the beauty of the city and the abundance of all things, so that after he has described all the furniture of the ship, the mast, the masts, the oars, the sails, the prow, the keel, the ropes, the covers, the skins, and other things that the use of the best-equipped ships needs: then he announces that a storm and a south wind, by which the largest waves will be stirred up, will come to it, and it will be subject to shipwreck. Through these things, the destruction of the city of Tyre is signified by King Nebuchadnezzar, or, as many believe, by Alexander, the king of Macedon, who is said to have besieged and captured the city itself for six months after defeating Darius in Lycia. According to mystical interpretations, the planks of the Tyrian ship are cut from the fir or cedar trees of Sanir, from which it is woven and constructed, and its mast is made of cedar or cypress from Lebanon: fir or cedar, because of their lightness and the softness of the joints between the planks that hold and bite each other; or cedar, because it is a wood that does not rot. But Sanir is said to mean 'way of the torch'; or as we think more accurately, the tooth of the watchmen, because all the prosperity and illumination of a ship comes from true light. But Sanir is also the mountain itself which is called Hermon, which others call Sanior. Read the history. Lebanon means whiteness or whitening, which also contributes to grace coming from elsewhere.

This chapter may be considered as the second part of the prophecy concerning Tyre. The prophet pursues his subject in the manner of those ancient lamentations or funeral songs, in which the praeficiae or mourning women first recounted whatever was great or praiseworthy in the deceased, and then mourned his fall. Here the riches, glory, and extensive commerce of Tyre are enlarged upon, vv. 1-25. Her downfall is then described in a beautiful allegory, executed in a few words, with astonishing brevity, propriety, and perspicuity, Eze 27:26; upon which all the maritime and commercial world are represented as grieved and astonished at her fate, and greatly alarmed for their own, Eze 27:27-36. Besides the view which this chapter gives of the conduct of Providence, and the example with which it furnishes the critic and men of taste of a very elegant and highly finished piece of composition, it likewise affords the antiquary a very curious and interesting account of the wealth and commerce of ancient times. And to the mind that looks for "a city that hath foundations," what a picture does the whole present of the mutability and inanity of all earthly things! Many of the places mentioned in ancient history have, like Tyre, long ago lost their political consequence; the geographical situation of others cannot be traced; they have sunk in the deep waters of oblivion; the east wind hath carried them away.

Fir trees of Senir - Senir is a mountain which the Sidonians called Sirion, and the Hebrews Hermon, Deu 3:9. It was beyond Jordan, and extended from Libanus to the mountains of Gilead.

TYRE'S FORMER GREATNESS, SUGGESTING A LAMENTATION OVER HER SAD DOWNFALL. (Eze. 27:1-36) lamentation--a funeral dirge, eulogizing her great attributes, to make the contrast the greater between her former and her latter state.

Senir--the Amorite name of Hermon, or the southern height of Anti-libanus (Deu 3:9); the Sidonian name was Sirion. "All thy . . . boards"; dual in Hebrew, "double-boards," namely, placed in a double order on the two sides of which the ship consisted [VATABLUS]. Or, referring to the two sides or the two ends, the prow and the stern, which every ship has [MUNSTER]. cedars--most suited for "masts," from their height and durability.