The Pulpit Commentary — Ezekiel — Volume 1 — Section 246

they should have joy. This is their encouragement and, in part, their reward. He who seeks to prevent this is fighting against Goel. But it is a greater wrong still to encourage tbo wicked in their evil ways. The pains and disappointments which the wicket! experience aro the thorns with which God would hedge up their way and turn them back. Ho who promises heaven b sinners is a confederate in their sin, and shall share their punishment. Such a one is a soul-murderer. On his skirts is indelibly fixed the blood of human souls. To encourage false hopes is treason against humanity. VI. SELF-MADE RELIGION BllALL BUFFER A COLLAPSE. Sooner or later the bubLle will burst, for it has no foundation in truth or in reality. It is a mirage of men's heated imagination, and cannot long endure. The God of truth will, in his own time, appear; will scatter to the winds the flimsy fancies of men; and tbe mischief they have sought to do to others shall return in tenfold disaster upon their own heads. If men will not know and acknowledge God in the day of his kindness, they shall recog- nize him in the night-time of his vengeance. Falsehood cannot perpetuate itself. Like Jonah's gourd, it springs up in a night, and in a night it perishes. But the truth, like its Author, is omnipotent, and must prevail. "Troth, crushed to earth, shall rise again, The eternal yeo.rs of God are hers. But Error, wounded, writhes with pain, And dies amid her worshippers." D. Vere. 1-16.-The sin and punishment of false prophels. "And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel," etc. This subject has already been introduced in eh. xii. 24. In that verse we have as it were the text, and in this chapter the sermon. It has been suggested that this chapter should be read in conjunction with Jer. :xxiii. 9-40. "'l'he identity of phrases a.ad ideas forces upon us the conclusion that the author of the one must have had the other before him. We know that Jeremiah's writings were forwarded to the Jews in Chaldea (Jer. xxix.), and there is therefore no reason to doubt that Ezekiel took up a well- known prophecy to enforce and apply it to his companions in exile. They probably had read Jeremiah's words as applying to others than themselves. Ezekiel now would teach them that it is not at Jerusalem alone that false prophets are to be discovered and reproved, 'l'he present chapter, therefore, must be taken as addressed to the Jews in exile, which agrees with the whole tenor; see for instance ver. 9" (' Speaker's Com- mentary'). Two principal lines of thought are followed by the prophet, viz. the sin of the false prophets, and the judgment of God upon them because of their sin. .And these lines of thought are not kept separate from each other, but they interlace each other. We will notice each apart. I. THE BIN OF THE FALSE PROPllETS. Certain prominent features of their sin are brought into view. 1. Their prophecies were self-originaled. They propbe,ied "out of their own heart" (ver. 2); they "followed their own spirit, and had seen nothing" (ver. 3). In the case of the true prophet, a communication was received by him from God which he communicated to the people, or a vision was unfolded to him which he afterwards me.de known to them. '!'here was an objective reality of that which he was conscious of within himself; his consciousness of the things which he published arose from their verity impressed upon him by the Spirit of God; his consciousness as a prophet was a consequence of Divine influence. But the things proclaimed by the false prophets had no existence except in their own mind and heart; they were entirely subjective, having no objective truth answering to them. And they were not sent of God (ver. 6); they had not received any commission from him; yet they presumed to speak in his Name, and to impose upon the people their own imaginations as communications received from him. 2. Their prophecies were unlrue. "They have seen vanity and lying divination, that say, The Lord saith; and the Lord hath not sent them," etc. (vers. 6, 7). "Thus saith the Lord God; Because ye have spoken vanity, and seen lies," etc. An example is given of their lying prophecies: "They have seduced my people, saying, Peace; and there is no peace," etc. They encouraged the Jews in Jerusalem to believe that they had nothing to fear from the Chaldea11 E2,EIUEl,, B  242 THE BOOK OF THE PROPHE1.' EZEKIEL. [oH. xm. 1-23.