The Pulpit Commentary — Ezekiel — Volume 1 — Section 150

in that day, Are not these evils come upon us, because our God is not amon" us?" (Deut. nxi. 16-18). " CoNoLusroN. Here are solemn admonitions as to our use of the privileges and possessions, the gifts and goods, which God has bestowed upon us.-W. J, Vers. 23-27.-The dread deve'loprrwnt of moral evil. "Make a chain: for the land is full of bloody crimes," etc. This paragraph suggests the following observations. I. THAT PERSISTENCE IN.SIN LEADS TO PLENITUDE OF SIN. .. Make a chain: for the land is full of bloody crimes, and the city is full of violence." The wickedness of the people had grown to such an extent that the darkest crimes were everywhere prevalent and predominant. The city was filled with outrage, and the country with blood- guiltness. Sin, unless it be striven against and resisted, increases both in measure and in power, until it attains unto terrible fulness and maturity. As in holiness, so also in wickedness, full development is reached gradually. Peoples and nations arrive at thorough moral corruption not with a bound, but step by step. But unless checked, wickedness ever tends to that dreadful goal ( cf. Gen. xv. 16; Dan. vili. 23; Matt, niii. 32; 1 Thess. ii. 16). II. THAT PLENITUDE OF SIN USHERS IN THE AWFUL JUDGMENTS OF GoD. Because of the fulness of wickedness, the calamities announced by the prophet were coming upon the people. This is explicitly stated in both the twenty-third and twenty-fourth verses. The prevalent iniquities of Israel were the meritorious cause of the stern judgments of the Lord. Several features of these require notice. 1. They were of dread severity. They were to be carried into captivity. To set forth this truth Ezekiel is summoned to "make a chain." And, as a. matter of fact, Zedekiah the king was bound with fetters of brass, and carried to Babylon (2 Kings xxv. 7). And a post-exilian poet speaks of the miserable captivity of the people (Ps. cvii. 10-12). Their homes were to be seized and held by their enemies. " I will bring the worst of the heathen, and they shall possess their houses." Their sanctuary was to be profaned. "Their holy pi.aces shall be defiled." The reference is to the temple, their " holy and beautiful house." The prophet speaks of it as theirs, not God's, probably to indicate that God had already forsaken the sanctuary which they had defiled. " Woe be to us when onr sanctuaries are nothing but our sanctuaries!" Anguish was to take hold upon them. "Destruction cometh;" literally, "standing up of the hair cometh" (Professor Cheyne). If we accept this view of the word, it denotes extreme anguish or horror by one of the physical manifestations thereof, as in' Hamlet' (act i. sc. 5)- " I could e. tale unfold. whose lightest word Would harrow up thy soul: freeze thy young blood; Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres; Thy knotted e.nd combined locks to part, And each pe.rticule.r hair to stand on end. Lilrt, quills upon the fretful porpentine." (She.kespee.re.) 2. They were to come in terrible succession. "Mischief shall come upon mischief, and rumour shall be upon rnmour." "Mischief" fails to fully express the force of the original word. Fairbairn renders it "woe;" Cheyne, "ruin;" Schroder, "destruction." Woe upon woe, misery upon misery, would befall them. Calamities would rush upon them in troops. As the king of Egypt was visited with plague after plague, so the strokes of the Divine judgments are sometimes sternly repeated, each stroke for a time being the harbinger of others. 3. Even the mightiest would be unable to sta'f!,'l against them. "I will also make the pomp of the strong to cease." Jehovah by bis servant Moses had threatened the Israelites with a. dreadful series of punishments if they persisted in rebelling against him, including this, "I will break the pride of your power" (Lev. xxvi 19). When the Omnipotent arises for judgment, the most powerful creature is impotent to withstand him. "Hast thou an arm like God?" Ill. THAT 1N TIMES OF SORE DIBTBEBS THE WICKED BEEK HELP OF TRE LORD OR OF BIS SERv ANTS. " They shall seek peace, and there shall be none; •.. they shall seek a vision of the prophet." "Peace" is not an adequate rendering of the Hebrew here. Professor Cheyne translates," aafety; n and Schroder," salvation." In their overwhelm- OH, vm. 1-18.] THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET EZEKIEL. 143