(o) Ideas and "motives." (o) Figure of scattered flock, ch. 1. 6, 7 (Ezek. xxxiv.). (j3) Effects of the avenging Sword of Jeho- vah, ch. L 35—38 (Ezek. zxi 30 ; zxxiii. 1-6).
(6) Word* and phrase*, (a) No word is more distinctly peculiar to Ezekiel than giUulim, idol-blocks, which occurs no less than thirty-nine times in his book, and else- where only once in Leviticus, once in Den- teronomy, six times in Kings, and once in Jeremiah (1. 2). (ff) 'Anaq, to groan, oc- curs thrice in Ezekiel, once in Jeremiah QL 52), and nowhere else. It is remarkable that in the latter passage we find not only a word but a phrase of Ezekiel's (see Ezek. xzvi. 13). (7) Fekod, the name of a Chal- dean district, occurs in oh. 1. 21 ; also Ezek. xxiii. 28. (B) The striking combination, pahhoth SsggJianim, occurs in ch. IL 28, 57 ; also Ezek. xxiii. 6, 12, 23. (e) Kasdim for ■'Chaldea" (properly the Chaldeans), ch. 1. 10 ; U. 24, 35 ; also Ezek. xvi. 29 ; xxiii. 16. (0 Ch. li. 25, 26 seems to allude to Ezek. XXXV. 8 — 5, 9 (see the Hebrew, and verify the statement by the Hebrew concordance).
(0) General characteristics of style. Grant- ing that the style of ch. 1. and li. approaches nearest on the whole to that of Jeremiah, it must be admitted, in the words of the latest German critic, Budde, that it " frequently enough declines from the simple, plain, and rather loose style of Jeremiah, to the flowery and turgid manner of speech of Ezekid ;" also that the points of contact are such as imply the originality of Ezekiel and the dependence upon him of oh. 1. and li.
Ver. 1. — Against; rather, concerainjf.
Vers. 2— 10.— Babylon's fall and Israel's deliverance.
Vers. 2, 3. — The prophet, with the eye qf fikith, sees his revelation accumplisbed.
Babylon (like Moab) U taken ; her idols art destroyed. In his exuberant joy, he calls on
the bystanders to proclaim the good news
to thn svmpathetic nations, and to set up (or rather, lift up) a standard (as ch. iv. 6), to call the attention of those who might not be within hearing of the proclamation. The idols have been convicted of false preten- sions; they are ashamed and dismayed (so we should render rather than confounded nnd broken in pieces) at the terrible result to tlieir worshippers. Bel and Merodach are not different deities, but merely different names of one of the two principal gods of the later Babylonian empire. Bel, it is true, was originally distinct from Merodach, but ultimately identified with him. Mero- dach was the tutelary god of Babylon, and Nebuchadnezzar seems to have been speci- ally adicted to his worship, though, indeed, he mentions Nebo also with hardly less honour. This is the T)eginning of an in- scription of this king's, preserved at the India House: — "Nebuchadnezzar, King of Bnbylons glorious prince, worshipper of Marduk, adorer of the lofty one, glorifier of Nabu, the exalted, the possessor of in- telligence" (Mr. Bod well's translation, *Ee- cords of the Past,' v. 113). Elsewhere Nebuchadnezzar speaks of Marduk as " the god mymaker," "the chief of tlie gods," and of himself as " his (Marduk's) eldest son, the chosen of his heart." Her images. It is a very peeular word (gillUllm), specially fre- quent in Ezekiel, and also found in a chapter of Leviticus with which Ezekiel has affini- ties (Lev. xxvi. 30). It evidently involves a sore disparagement of idol-worship. The etymological meaning is "things rolled," wliich may be variously interpreted as " idol- blocks " (Gesenius), or " doll-images " (Ewald):
Ver. 3.— Out of the north. There was • peculiar mystery attachingto the north in the Hebrew miml, as, in fact, the word very for "north " in Hebrew (literally, the hidden) in- dicates. The burnt offering was to be sacri- ficed on the north side of the altar(Lev. i. U), and the foiircherubim, in the vision of Ezekiel, are described as coming from the north (Ezek. i. 4). The horror with which Babylon was regarded was intensified, apparently, by its no. thern position (ch. i. 14), and now the "hidden" north ngain pours forth Its swarms of warriors against Babylon herself. They shall remove, they shall depart ; rather, they are fled, they are gone ; almost the same clause occurs in ch. ix. 10. The prediction is realized as past.
_ Ver. 4.— In those days, etc. The destruc- tion of Babylon is immediately followed by the deliverance of Israel. But the desciip- tion of the latter is a remarkable one. We are by no means to regard it as an idealiied
on. L. 1—46.] THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET JEREMIAH.
27^
picture of the return of the Jews under Zerubbahel, any more than we can suppose the glowing promises in the second pait of Isaiah to have their sole fiilfilraeiit in thiit diaappointinz event. No ; it is the chariic- terislio of Messianic prophecy that, with "foreshortened persptctive," the prophets represent as equally near events which are really separnted by ages. In the Book of Isaiah, for instance, preliminary judgments are repeatedly described in terms which, properly speaking, only iipply to the great final judgment. In fact, each great political revolution is a stage in the Divine drama of judgment, which will reach its close in the final catiiclysm. And so too here (as well as in Isa. il. — Ixvi) the promise of mercy to Israel, which began to be fulfilled in the edict of Cyrus, is represented as if the still future conversion of the people of Israel were actually accomplished. The descrip- tion reminds us of oh. iii. 18 — 21. Notice the penitence of the returning exiles, and the reunion of Israel and Judah (see on ch. iii. 18). Going and weeping : they shall go ; rather, they ehall go, weeping at they go.
Ver. 5. — Thitherward ; rather, hitherwarS, The prophet is eviilently writing from Jeru- salem (comp. ch. li. 50). let us join our- selves. A conjectural emendation (nilveh for nilvS, a difficult reading, meaning, per- haps, "join yourselves " ). A perpetual covenant. The same phrase occurs in ch. xxxii. 40. The addition, " that shall not be forgotten," reminds us of " the ark of the covenant," which was "not to be remem- bered " (ch. iii. 16).
Ver. 6. — Lost sheep. Not merely with reference to the scattering of the Captivity (as In Isa. xxvii. 13, where the Authorized Version has " ready to perish "), but to the transgressions of the Law of God, of which the Jews had been constantly guilty (comp. Ps. cxix. 176 ; Isa. liii. 6). Their shepherds . . . mountains. This is the marginal cor- rection in the Hebrew Uible ; the text has, " Their shepherds have caused them to go astray upon the seducing mountains" — a strange expression, which is, however, de- fended by Na'gelsbach on the ground of oh. ii. 20 ; iii, 2, 23 ; xvil. 2. Their resting- place ; literally, their couchinrj-place ; i.e. their pasture, Jehovah, at once their Pasture (ver. 7) and their true Shepherd (Ps. zxiil. 1).