Ezekiel 5:14 Komentář

In this chapter we have a further, and no less terrible, denunciation of the judgments of God, which were coming with all speed and force upon the Jewish nation, which would utterly ruin it; for when God judges he will overcome. This destruction of Judah and Jerusalem is here, I. Represented by a sign, the cutting, and burning, and scattering of hair (Eze 5:1-4). II. That sign is expounded, and applied to Jerusalem. 1. Sin is charged upon Jerusalem as the cause of this desolation - contempt of God's law (Eze 5:5-7) and profanation of his sanctuary (Eze 5:11). 2 Wrath is threatened, great wrath (Eze 5:8-10), a variety of miseries (Eze 5:12, Eze 5:16, Eze 5:17), such as should be their reproach and ruin (Eze 5:13-15).

INTRODUCTION TO EZEKIEL 5 This chapter is of the same argument with the former; and contains a type of Jerusalem's destruction; an explanation of that type; what were the reasons of God's judgments on that city; and the nature, rise, and end of them. The type is in Eze 5:1; the explanation of that type is in Eze 5:5; the reasons of the severe judgments threatened are changing the statutes of the Lord, and not walking in them, and defiling the sanctuary with their abominations, Eze 5:6; an account of the judgments of God, answerable to each of the parts in the type, Eze 5:12; the ends of these judgments are, with respect to God, the accomplishment of his anger, and the satisfaction of his justice; with respect to the Jews, bringing them to an acknowledgment that he had spoken in his zeal; and, with respect to the nations, their instruction and astonishment, Eze 5:13; and the chapter is concluded with an assurance that these judgments would be sent, Eze 5:16.

Moreover I will make thee waste,.... That is, their land; which, being without inhabitants, lay untilled; and so became barren and unfruitful: and a reproach among the nations that are round about thee, in the sight of all that pass by; who, seeing it in this desolate condition, shall throw out their taunts and jeers upon it, as in Lam 2:15.

(Verse 14.) And I will make you a desert; and what follows: and a reproach to the nations that are around you, which is not found in the Septuagint: for which they added from their own, and your daughters in your vicinity. And again, according to both editions, in the sight of all passing by. However, it is beneficial for Jerusalem to be destroyed by all its vices, and to be brought to a desert, and to recognize its own sins, so that what should have been an example of virtues to other nations may be an example of miseries. But we can understand his daughters, the cities or villages, or the Churches dispersed throughout the whole world, so that whoever is a pilgrim of this world may say with the Psalmist: I am a stranger and a sojourner like all my fathers (Ps. 38:12); and regarding whom it is said: Those who pass by say not: The blessing of the Lord be upon you (Ps. 129:8), let him see his disgrace and mourn.

In this chapter the prophet shows, under the type of hair, the judgments which God was about to execute on the inhabitants of Jerusalem by famine, sword, and dispersion, Eze 5:14. The type or allegory is then dropped, and God is introduced declaring in plain terms the vengeance that was coming on the whole nation which had proved so unworthy of those mercies with which they had hitherto been distinguished, Eze 5:5-17.

VISION OF CUTTING THE HAIRS, AND THE CALAMITIES FORESHADOWED THEREBY. (Eze. 5:1-17) knife . . . razor--the sword of the foe (compare Isa 7:20). This vision implies even severer judgments than the Egyptian afflictions foreshadowed in the former, for their guilt was greater than that of their forefathers. thine head--as representative of the Jews. The whole hair being shaven off was significant of severe and humiliating (Sa2 10:4-5) treatment. Especially in the case of a priest; for priests (Lev 21:5) were forbidden "to make baldness on their head," their hair being the token of consecration; hereby it was intimated that the ceremonial must give place to the moral. balances--implying the just discrimination with which Jehovah weighs out the portion of punishment "divided," that is, allotted to each: the "hairs" are the Jews: the divine scales do not allow even one hair to escape accurate weighing (compare Mat 10:30).

reproach among the nations--They whose idolatries Israel had adopted, instead of comforting, would only exult in their calamities brought on by those idolatries (compare Luk 15:15).