The Pulpit Commentary — Ezekiel — Volume 1 — Section 114

EXPOSITION. CHAPTER VI. Ezekiel a.re Identical with those of Lev, xxvi. 80. The Be.moth, or high places, of Vera. 2, 8.-Bet thy face toward the mo1lJl- Be.al, are mentioned in Numb. xxii. 41 and tains, etc. The formula. is eminently charac- Josh. xiii. 17, and a.re probably identical teristic of Ezekiel. We have had it with e. with the high places of Amon in Numb. different verb in the Hebrew, in eh. iv. 8. xxi. 28, There they a.re named only in- It will meet us a.gain in oh. xx. 46 ; x.xi. cidentally, not in the way of prohibition or 2; XXV, 2; xxvili. 21; xxix. 2; XXXV. 2; condemnation. So, in like manner, in Deut, xxxvili. 2. In this oe.se it probably implied xxxii. 13 and xxxiii, 29, if the teohnical sense an outward act, like that of Daniel, when exists at all, it is referred to only as included he, with a very different purpose, looked in the triumph of the worship of Jehovah towards Jerusalem (Dan. vi. 10), In con- over the hill-fortresses as the sanctuaries of trast with the widespread plains of Meso- other gods. The absence of the word from potamia in which Ezekiel found himself, this the Book of Judges is difficult to explain, was the chief characteristic of the land whioh e.s it was precisely in that period of the his- he had left. The mountains represent the tory of Israel, irregular and unsettled, that whole country, including the rivers (Revised we should have expected to find the people Version, here and throughout, renders the adopting the cultus of their neighbours. A Hebrew "water-courses," to distinguish it probable solution of the problem is that, eo from the "l"iver" (naliar) of eh. i 1, 8, et long as the tabernacle and the ark were at al., and the "river" (naclial) of eh. xlvii. 5. Shiloh, that was so pre-eminently the centre Its strict meaning is that of a "re.vine" of the worship of Jehovah, that the people or " gorge," the wady of modern A.re.hie, were not tempted to forsake it, or to set up through which e. stream rushes in the win- • the worship upon the high places aide by ter, but is dried up .in the summer), All aide with it. When, after the captnre of the the localities a.re named e.s having been ark, Shiloh was e. deserted sanctuary, we alike polluted by the worship of idols. For meet for the first time with the worship of the mountains and liilla as the scenes of such high places, not as a thing forbidden, but e.s worship, see Deut. xii. 2 ; 2 Kings xvii. 10, sanctioned by the presence of Samuel, ae 11; Jer. ii. 20; iii. 6; Hos. iv. 13; for the the judge and prophet of the people (1 Sam. r11vinee 11ud valleys, 2 Kings xxiii. 10 and ix. 12-14; x. 5), the "high pluce" in the Jer, vii. 31 (the Valley of Hinnom); and last passage being, apparently, the same ns more generally, Isa. lvii. 5, 6. The same "the hill of God." In 2 Sam. i. 19, possibly combination meets us in eh. xxxv. 8; xxxvi. from the Book of Je.shar, we have the older, 4, 6. In hie address to the mountains, less technical sense of Deut. xxxii. 12 and Ezekiel follows in the footsteps of Micah xx.xiii. 19. It would seem, accordingly, as vi. 2. I will destroy your high places. The if Samuel had aoted on a policy like that words point to the most persilltent, though of the counsel whioh Gregory I. gave Augus- not the worst, of e.11 the idolatries by which tine. He found the worship of the hi;;h the worship of Jehovah ns the God of Israel places adopted by the Iernelites from the had been overshndowed. The words of neighbourillg natioDll, He sought to turn 102 THE BOOR OF THE PROPHET EZEKIEL. [ou. vr. 1-14.