Yahweh’s word came to me, saying, “Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel who prophesy, and say to those who prophesy out of their own heart, ‘Hear Yahweh’s word: The Lord Yahweh says, “Woe to the foolish prophets, who follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing! Israel, your prophets have been like foxes in the waste places. You have not gone up into the gaps or built up the wall for the house of Israel, to stand in the battle in Yahweh’s day. They have seen falsehood and lying divination, who say, ‘Yahweh says;’ but Yahweh has not sent them. They have made men to hope that the word would be confirmed. Haven’t you seen a false vision, and haven’t you spoken a lying divination, in that you say, ‘Yahweh says;’ but I have not spoken?”
“ ‘Therefore the Lord Yahweh says: “Because you have spoken falsehood and seen lies, therefore, behold, I am against you,” says the Lord Yahweh. “My hand will be against the prophets who see false visions and who utter lying divinations. They will not be in the council of my people, neither will they be written in the writing of the house of Israel, neither will they enter into the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord Yahweh.”
“ ‘Because, even because they have seduced my people, saying, “Peace;” and there is no peace. When one builds up a wall, behold, they plaster it with whitewash. Tell those who plaster it with whitewash that it will fall. There will be an overflowing shower; and you, great hailstones, will fall. A stormy wind will tear it. Behold, when the wall has fallen, won’t it be said to you, “Where is the plaster with which you have plastered it?”
“ ‘Therefore the Lord Yahweh says: “I will even tear it with a stormy wind in my wrath. There will be an overflowing shower in my anger, and great hailstones in wrath to consume it. So I will break down the wall that you have plastered with whitewash, and bring it down to the ground, so that its foundation will be uncovered. It will fall, and you will be consumed in the middle of it. Then you will know that I am Yahweh. Thus I will accomplish my wrath on the wall, and on those who have plastered it with whitewash. I will tell you, ‘The wall is no more, neither those who plastered it; to wit, the prophets of Israel who prophesy concerning Jerusalem, and who see visions of peace for her, and there is no peace,’ ” says the Lord Yahweh.’ ”
You, son of man, set your face against the daughters of your people, who prophesy out of their own heart; and prophesy against them, and say, “The Lord Yahweh says: ‘Woe to the women who sew pillows on all elbows, and make kerchiefs for the head of persons of every stature to hunt souls! Will you hunt the souls of my people, and save souls alive for yourselves? You have profaned me among my people for handfuls of barley and for pieces of bread, to kill the souls who should not die, and to save the souls alive who should not live, by your lying to my people who listen to lies.’
“Therefore the Lord Yahweh says: ‘Behold, I am against your pillows, with which you hunt the souls to make them fly, and I will tear them from your arms. I will let the souls go, even the souls whom you hunt to make them fly. I will also tear your kerchiefs, and deliver my people out of your hand, and they will be no more in your hand to be hunted. Then you will know that I am Yahweh. Because with lies you have grieved the heart of the righteous, whom I have not made sad; and strengthened the hands of the wicked, that he should not return from his wicked way, and be saved alive. Therefore you shall no more see false visions, nor practice divination. I will deliver my people out of your hand. Then you will know that I am Yahweh.’ ”
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23 He speaks of the exiled prophets, as will be…
He speaks of the exiled prophets, as will be evident from the context: for among the captives there were those who assumed the name of God, boasting themselves endowed with the prophetic spirit: but meanwhile they intruded into the office, and then vainly boasted in their deceptions. But the end which they proposed to themselves was to promise the people a speedy return, and so to will the favor of the multitude. For the captives were already almost broken-hearted by weariness: and seventy years was a long period. When therefore they heard of returning after three years, they easily suffered themselves to be deceived by such blandishments. But although God is so vehemently enraged against those impostors, it does not therefore follow that when he charges them with their crime, he absolves the people, or even extenuates their fault. Nor could the people object that they were deceived by those falsehoods, since they willingly and knowingly threw themselves into the snare. They were not destitute of true prophets; and God had distinguished his servants from false prophets by well-known marks, so that no one could mistake except willfully. (Deuteronomy 13:3.) But in the midst of light they blinded themselves, and so God suffered them to be deceived. But that was the just reward of their pride, since they could not be subject to God and his servants. Then when they thought enticements, as is evident from many passages, God also gave the reins to Satan, that there should be a lying spirit in the mouth of all the prophets. Micah reproves them because they desired prophets to be given them who should promise large grape-gatherings and a plentiful harvest, (Micah 2:11;) meanwhile, when God chastised them severely, they roared and were tumultuous. We see, therefore, that while God inveighs so sharply against false prophets, the people’s fault was not diminished; but rather each thought thus to reason with himself — if God spares not our prophets, what better have we to hope for?
When therefore the Prophet turns his discourse to the false prophets, there is no doubt of his intention to reprove the whole people for attending to such fallacies while they despised the true doctrine, and not only so, but even rejected it with fury. Say therefore to the prophets of Israel while prophesying, say to those prophesying out of their own hearts. Here he concedes the name of prophets of Israel to those who thrust themselves forward, and rashly boasted that they were commanded to utter their own imaginations, or what the devil had suggested. For then indeed no others thought to have been lawfully reckoned prophets, unless divinely chosen. But because the wicked seized upon this title, they are often called prophets, though God’s Spirit is a complete stranger to them: but the gift of prophecy can only flow from that one fountain. This great struggle then happened when the prophets, or those who assumed the title, engaged with hostility among themselves: for we are commanded to acquiesce in God’s truth alone: but when he is offered to us instead of truth, what can we do but fluctuate and at length engage in conflict? There is no doubt, then, that weak minds were thus vehemently shaken when they saw contests and dissension’s of this kind between prophets. At this day God wishes to prove the fidelity of his people by such an experiment, and to detect the hypocrisy of the multitude. For, as Paul says, there must be heresies, that those who are approved may be made manifest. (1 Corinthians 11:19.) God therefore does not rashly permit so much license to Satan’s ministers, that they should petulantly rise up against sound doctrine: nor yet without a cause does he permit the Church to be torn asunder by diverse opinions, and fictions to grow so strong sometimes, that truth itself is buried under them: he wishes indeed in this way to prove the constancy of the pious, and at the same time to detect the lightness of hypocrites who are tossed about by every wind. Meanwhile, if the contention which we now perceive between those who boast themselves pastors of the Church disturbs us, let this example come to mind, and thus novelty will not endanger our faithfulness. What we suffer the ancients have experienced, namely, the disturbance of the Church by intestine disputes, and a similar tearing asunder of the bond of unity.
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Next, God briefly defines who the false prophets are; namely, those who prophesy out of their own hearts: he will afterwards add, they have seen nothing, they only boast in the name of God, and yet they are not sent by him. The same thing is expressed in various ways, but I shall treat other forms of speech in their own places. Here, as I have said, we may readily decide at once who are the true and who the false prophets: the Spirit of God pronounces every one who prophesies from his own heart to be an impostor. Hence nothing else remains but for the prophets faithfully to utter whatever the Spirit has dictated to them. Whoever, therefore, has no sure testimony to his vision, and cannot truly testify that he speaks from God’s mouth and by the revelation of his Spirit, although he may boast in the title of prophet, yet he is only an impostor. For God here rejects all who speak from their own heart. And hence we also gather the extreme vanity of the human mind: for God puts a perpetual distinction between the human mind and the revelation of his Spirit. If this be so, it follows that what men utter of themselves is a perverse fiction, because the Spirit of God claims to himself alone, as we have said, the office of showing what is true and right. It follows —
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv2, 4, 5, 7, 9, 10, 15, 18, 19, 20, 22 After their own fantasy, and not as having the…
After their own fantasy, and not as having the revelation of the Lord, Jer. 23:16.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1–23 Eze 13:1 And the word of the LORD came…
Eze 13:1 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
Ver. 1. And the word of the Lord.] See on Eze 12:1.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv1–23 This first verse is the commission, by virtue whereof…
This first verse is the commission, by virtue whereof Ezekiel acteth as a prophet, and it is in the usual style near forty times in Ezekiel.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv1, 10, 17 The false prophets, who are here prophesied against, were…
The false prophets, who are here prophesied against, were some of them at Jerusalem (Jer 23:14): I have seen in the prophets at Jerusalem a horrible thing; some of them among the captives in Babylon, for to them Jeremiah writes (Jer 29:8), Let not your diviners, that be in the midst of you, deceive you. And as God's prophets, though at a distance from each other in place or time, yet preached the same truths, which was an evidence that they were guided by one and the same good Spirit, so the false prophets prophesied the same lies, being actuated by one and the same spirit of error. There were little hopes of bringing them to repentance, they were so hardened in their sin; yet Ezekiel must prophesy against them, in hopes that the people might be cautioned not to hearken to them; and thus a testimony will be left upon record against them, and they will thereby be left inexcusable.
Ezekiel had express orders to prophesy against the prophets of Israel; so they called themselves, as if none but they had been worthy of the name of Israel's prophets, who were indeed Israel's deceivers. But it is observable that Israel was never imposed upon by pretenders to prophecy till after they had rejected and abused the true prophets; as, afterwards, they were never deluded by counterfeit messiahs till after they had refused the true Messiah and rejected him. These false prophets must be required to hear the word of the Lord. They took upon them to speak what concerned others as from God; let them now hear what concerned themselves as from him. And two things the prophet is directed to do: -
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I. To discover their sin to them, and to convince them of that if possible, or thereby to prevent their proceeding any further, by making manifest their folly unto all men, Ti2 3:9. They are here called foolish prophets (Eze 13:3), men that did not at all understand the business they pretended to; to make fools of the people they made fools of themselves, and put the greatest cheat upon their own souls. Let us see what is here laid to their charge. 1. They pretend to have a commission from God, whereas he never sent them. They thrust themselves into the prophetic office, without warrant from him who is the Lord God of the holy prophets, which was a foolish thing; for how could they expect that God should own them in a work to which he never called them? They are prophets out of their own hearts (so the margin reads it, Eze 13:2), prophets of their own making, Eze 13:6. They say, The Lord saith; they pretend to be his messengers, but the Lord has not sent them, has not given them any orders. They counterfeit the broad seal of heaven, than which they cannot do a greater indignity to mankind, for hereby they put a reproach upon divine revelation, lessen its credit, and weaken its credibility. When these pretenders are found to be deceivers atheists and infidels will thence infer, They are all so. The Lord has not sent them; for though crafty enough in other things like the foxes, and very wise for the world, yet they are foolish prophets and have no experimental acquaintance with the things of God. Note, Foolish prophets are not of God's sending, for whom he sends he either finds fit or makes fit. Where he gives warrant he gives wisdom. 2. They pretend to have instructions from God, whereas he never made himself and his mind known to them: They followed their own spirit (Eze 13:3); they delivered that as a message from God which was the product either of their subtle invention, to serve a turn for themselves, or of their own crazed and heated imagination, to give vent to a fancy. For they have seen nothing, they have not really had any heavenly vision; they pretend that what they say the Lord saith it, but God disowns it: "I have not spoken it, I never said it, never meant any such thing." What they delivered was not what they had seen or heard, as that is which the ministers of Christ deliver (Jo1 1:1), but either what they had dreamed or what they thought would please those they coveted to make an interest in; this is called their seeing vanity and lying divination (Eze 13:6); they pretended to have seen that which they did not see, and produced that as a divine truth which they knew to be false. To the same purport (Eze 13:7): You have see a vain vision and spoken a lying divination, which had no divine original and would have no effect, but would certainly be disproved by the event; the words are changed (Eze 13:8): You have spoken vanity and seen lies; what they saw and what they said was all alike, a mere sham; they saw nothing, they said nothing, to the purpose, nothing that could be relied on or that deserved regard. Again (Eze 13:9), They see vanity and divine lies; they pretended to have had visions, as the true prophets had, whereas really they had none, but either it was the creature of their own fancy (they thought they had a vision, as men in a delirium do, that was seeing vanity) or it was a fiction of their own politics, and they knew they had none, and then they saw lies, and divined lies. See Jer 23:16, etc. Note, Since the devil is universally know to be the father of lies, those put the highest affront imaginable upon God who tell lies, and then father them upon him. But those that had put God's character upon Satan, in worshipping devils, arrived at length at such a pitch of impiety as to put Satan's character upon God. 3. They took no care to prevent the judgments of God that were breaking in upon the kingdom. They are like the foxes in the deserts, running to and fro, and seeming to be in a great hurry, but it was to get away and shift for their own safety, not to do any good: The hireling flees, and leaves the sheep. They are like foxes that are greedy of prey for themselves, crafty and cruel to feed themselves. But (Eze 13:5), "You have not gone up into the gaps, nor made up the hedge of the house of Israel. A breach is made in their fences, at which judgments are ready to pour in upon them, and then, if ever, is the time to do them service; but you have done nothing to help them." They should have made intercession for them, to turn away the wrath of God; but they were not praying prophets, had no interest in heaven nor intercourse with heaven (as prophets used to have, Gen 20:7) and so could do them no service that way. They should have made it their business by preaching and advice to bring people to repentance and reformation, and so have made up the hedge, and put a stop to the judgments of God; but this was none of their care: they contrived how to pleased people, not how to profit them. They saw a deluge of profaneness and impiety breaking in upon the land, waging war with virtue and holiness, and threatening to crush them and bear them down, and then they should have come in to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against the mighty, by witnessing against the wickedness of the time and place they lived in; but they thought that would be as dangerous a piece of service as standing in a breach to make it good against the besiegers, and therefore they declined it, did nothing to stem the tide, stood not in the battle against vice and immorality, but basely deserted the cause of religion and reformation, in the day of the Lord, when it was proclaimed, Who is on the Lord's side? Who will rise up for me against the evil-doers? Psa 94:16. Those were unworthy the name of prophets that could think so favourably of sin, and had so little zeal for God and the public welfare. 4. They flattered people into a vain hope that the judgments God had threatened would never come, whereby they hardened those in sin whom they should have endeavoured to turn from sin (Eze 13:6): They have made others to hope that all should be well, and they should have peace, though they went on still in their trespasses, and that the event would confirm the word. They were still ready to say, "We will warrant you that these troubles will be at an end quickly, and we shall be in prosperity again." as if their warrants would confirm false prophecies, in defiance of God himself.
II. He is directed to denounce the judgments of God against them for these sins, from which their pretending to the character of prophets would not exempt them. 1. In general, here is a woe against them (Eze 13:3), and what that woe is we are told (Eze 13:8). Behold, I am against you, saith the Lord God. Note, Those are in a woeful condition that have God against them. Woe, and a thousand woes, to those that have made him their enemy. 2. In particular, they are sentenced to be excluded from all the privileges of the commonwealth of Israel, for they are adjudged to have forfeited them all (Eze 13:9): God's hand shall be upon them, to seize them and bring them to his bar, to shut them out from his presence, and they will find it a fearful thing to fall into his hands. They pretend to be prophets, particular favourites of heaven, and authorized to preside in the congregation of his church on earth; but, by pretending to the honours they were not entitled to, they lost those that otherwise they might have enjoyed, Mat 5:19. Their doom is, (1.) To be expelled from the communion of saints, and not to be looked upon as belonging to it: They shall not be in the secret of my people; their folly shall be so clearly manifested that they shall never be consulted, nor their advice asked; they shall not be present at any debates about public affairs. Or, rather, they shall not be in the assembly of God's people for religious worship, for they shall be ashamed to show their heads there, when they are proved by the events to be false prophets, and, like Cain, shall go out from the presence of the Lord. The people that are deceived by them shall abandon them, and resolve to have no more to do with them. Those that usurped Moses's chair shall not be allowed so much as a door-keeper's place. In the great day they shall not stand in the congregation of the righteous (Psa 1:5), when God gathers his saints together to him (Psa 50:5, Psa 50:16), to be for ever with him. (2.) To be expunged out of the book of the living. They shall die in their captivity, and shall die childless, shall leave no posterity to take their denomination from them, and so their names shall not be found among those who either themselves or their posterity returned out of Babylon, of whom a particular account was kept in a public register, which was called the writing of the house of Israel, such as we have Ezra 2. They shall not be found among the living in Jerusalem, Isa 4:3. Or they shall not be found written among those whom God has from eternity chosen to be vessels of his mercy to eternity. We read of those who prophesied in Christ's name, and yet he will tell them that he never knew them (Mat 7:22, Mat 7:23), because they were not among those that were given to him. The Chaldee paraphrase reads it, They shall not be written in the writing of eternal life, which is written for the righteous of the house of Israel. See Psa 69:28. (3.) To be for ever excluded from the land of Israel. God has sworn in his wrath concerning them that they shall never enter with the returning captives into the land of Canaan, which a second time remains a rest for them. Note, Those who oppose the design of God's threatenings, and will not be awed and influenced by them, forfeit the benefit of his promises, and cannot expect to be comforted and encouraged by them.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv1–21 And the word of the Lord came unto me,…
And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying. Giving orders to prophesy against the false prophets and prophetesses, which were either in the land of Israel, of whom the prophet had notice; or rather who were among the captives in Babylon, where Ezekiel now was.
And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying. Giving orders to prophesy against the false prophets and prophetesses, which were either in the land of Israel, of whom the prophet had notice; or rather who were among the captives in Babylon, where Ezekiel now was.
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Ezekiel 13:2
eze 13:2
eze 13:2
eze 13:2Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel,.... Who called themselves so, and were accounted such by others; though they were not true, but false prophets; and so the Targum calls them:
that prophesy; that is, smooth things to the people; promising a speedy return from the captivity; or that Jerusalem should not be taken by the Chaldeans, and the inhabitants of it, and of the land, be carried captive:
and say thou unto them that prophesy out of their own hearts; who were not sent of God, nor spake from him; but of themselves, what came into their heads, and was agreeable to their fancies, imaginations, and carnal hearts; such are false teachers, that go forth without being sent, and teach not according to the word of God, but according to their own carnal reasonings; so the Targum,
"according to the will of their hearts;''
what they pleased themselves:
hear ye the word of the Lord; which came from the Lord himself, and not from man, meaning the following prophecy; so the written word of God should be attended to, both by teachers and hearers, as the only rule of faith and practice; see Isa 8:20.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, 14, 15, 18, 19, 20, 23 The prophet shews the sin and punishment of the…
The prophet shews the sin and punishment of the false prophets, ver. 1-16. Of the false prophetesses, ver. 17-23.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4, 5, 9, 10, 11, 17, 18, 20, 21, 22, 23 This chapter denounces heavy judgments against the lying
CHAPTER XIII
This chapter denounces heavy judgments against the lying
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prophets who flattered the people, in the midst of their sin
and danger, with false hopes of peace and security, 1-9.
The work of these deceivers is beautifully compared to a frail
and insolent piece of building, which can never stand against
the battering elements of heaven, (the Chaldean forces,) which
God will commission against it, 10-16.
In the remaining part of the chapter woes are denounced against
false prophetesses who practiced vain rites and divinations,
with the view of promoting their own gain by deceiving the
people, 17-23.
NOTES ON CHAP. XIII
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv2, 5, 6, 10, 17, 20 Eze 13:2-4. Son of man, prophesy against the prophets…
Eze 13:2-4. Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel — So they called themselves, as if none but they had been worthy of the name of Israel’s prophets, who were indeed Israel’s deceivers. Say unto them that prophesy out of their own hearts — According to their own fancy, without having received any revelation from God. The true prophets often denounced God’s judgments against the false ones: laying to their charge many misdemeanours in their private life and conversation, and upbraiding them for their unfaithfulness in the office they undertook of declaring God’s will to his people. Wo unto the foolish prophets — Ignorant and wicked, and who, while they wilfully deceived the people, unthinkingly brought destruction upon themselves. Observe, reader, foolish prophets are not of God’s sending: those whom he sends, he either finds or makes fit for his work. Where he gives warrant, he gives wisdom. That follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing — Who utter their own imaginations for true prophecies, and pretend to have visions when they never had any. O Israel, thy prophets, not mine, are like the foxes in the deserts — Hungry and ravening, crafty and guileful: “deceitful workers, (as the apostle styles such persons, 2Co 11:13,) who craftily insinuate false doctrines into weak and unstable minds, and greedily catch at any appearance of advantage to themselves.” — Lowth.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, 17 The identity of phrases and ideas of this chapter…
The identity of phrases and ideas of this chapter with Jer. 23 leads to the conclusion 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 referring to others than themselves.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 4, 5, 9, 10, 11, 14, 17, 18, 19, 20, 22 Heart; what pleases them, (Haydock) without being inspired. There…
Heart; what pleases them, (Haydock) without being inspired. There were always such impostors. These deluded the people at Jerusalem, (Calmet) or at Babylon, ver. 9. (Sanctius) --- They might be distinguished by the sincere: yet caused irreparable injury to the ignorant people. (Haydock)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On v1 2. The Discourses against the False Prophets and Prophetesses…
2. The Discourses against the False Prophets and Prophetesses (Ezekiel 13.)
1And the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying, 2Son of man, prophesy unto the prophets of Israel that prophesy, and say unto the prophets out of their own heart, Hear ye the word of Jehovah; 3Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Woe unto the foolish prophets, who walk after their own spirit, and that they 4have not seen! Like foxes in the ruins have thy prophets become, O Israel. 5Ye have not gone up into the gaps [breaches], nor built a wall round the house of 6Israel, to make a stand in the war in the day of Jehovah. They beheld deceit and lying divination who say, Sentence of Jehovah,—and Jehovah sent them 7not,—and expect confirmation of a word. Saw ye not a deceitful vision, and spake ye not a lying divination, and [that while] saying, Sentence of Jehovah, and I have not spoken? 8Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Because ye speak deceit, and see a lie, therefore, behold, I am upon you: sentence of the Lord Jehovah. 9And Mine hand is [comes] upon the prophets that see deceit, and that divine a lie: in the assembly of My people shall they not be, and in the register of the house of Israel they shall not be registered, and into the land of Israel shall they not come; and ye know that I am the Lord Jehovah. 10Because, even because they seduced My people, saying, Peace [salvation], and there is no peace; and they [i.e. the people] build a wall, and, lo, they [i.e. the false prophets] daub it with a coating. 11Say unto them which daub with a coating: And it shall fall: there comes a pouring rain; and ye, O hailstones, shall fall, and stormy wind shall 12[thou, O stormy wind, shalt] break forth. And, lo, the wall falls; shall not one say unto you, Where is the daubing wherewith ye daubed? 13Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah: And I cause stormy wind to break forth in My fury, and pouring rain shall fall in Mine anger, and hailstones in My fury, unto utter destruction. 14And I break down the wall that ye daubed with a coating, and cast it to the ground, and its foundation is uncovered, and it [Jerusalem] falls, and ye perish 15in its [Jerusalem’s] midst; and ye know that I am Jehovah. And I accomplish My wrath upon the wall, and upon them that daubed it with a coating, and I will 16say unto you, The wall is not, neither are they that daubed it; The prophets of Israel who prophesied upon Jerusalem, and who saw for it a vision of peace, 17and there is no peace: sentence of the Lord Jehovah. And thou, son of man, set thy face toward the daughters of thy people, who prophesy out of their own heart; and prophesy thou concerning them, 18And say, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Woe to those who sew together for themselves coverings upon all joints of My hands, and who make the veils upon the head of every stature to hunt [catch] souls! Ye will hunt the souls among My people, and ye will save souls 19alive among you! And ye will profane Me in face of My people for handfuls of barley and for bits of bread, to slay souls that should not die, and to save souls 20alive that should not live, by your lying to My people that hear lies! Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Behold, I am against your coverings, wherewith ye there [where ye hunt] hunt the souls when flying, and I tear them out of 21your arms, and let the souls go that ye hunt,—souls in their flying. And I tear in pieces your veils, and deliver My people, and they shall be no more in your 22hand as prey; and ye know that I am Jehovah. Because of troubling the heart of the righteous falsely, and [when] I did not make him sad, and that ye strengthen the hands of the wicked, that he should not return from his wicked way, to remain alive: 23Therefore ye shall no more see deceit, nor divine divinations; and I deliver My people out of your hand; and ye know that I am Jehovah.
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Eze_13:3. Sept.: ... προφητευουσιν ἀπο καρδιας αὐτων, τ. πορευομενοις ἀπο τ. πνευματος αὐτ.—
Eze_13:5. ... κ. συνηγαγον ποιμνια, κ. ἐπι τ. οἰχον τ. Ἰσρ. οὐκ ἀνεστησαν οἰ λεγοντες ἐν ἡμερα κυριου,—Vulg.: Non ascendistis ex adverso neque opposuistis murum pro domo—
Eze_13:6. ... κ. ἠρξαντο του ἀναστησαι λογον. Vulg.: et perseveraverunt confirmare sermonem.
Eze_13:9. …ἐν παιδεια τ. λαου μου οὐκ—
Eze_13:10. Vulg.: … liniebant eum luto absque paleis.
Eze_13:11. Sept.: ... κ. δωσω λιθους πετροβολους εἰς τ. ἐνδεσμους αὐτων, κ. πεσουνται, κ. πνευμα ἐξαιρον, κ. ῥαγησεται.
Eze_13:14. ... ὁν ἠλειψατε, κ. πεσειται... κ. συντελεσθησεσθε μετ̓ ἐλεγχων,—Vulg.: … linistis absque temperamento … et cadet it consumetur in medio ejus—
Eze_13:15. … κ. πεσειται, κ. εἰπα προς ὐμας—
Eze_13:18. ... ἐπι παντα ἀγκωνα χειρος... Κ. αἱ ψυχαι διεστραφησαν τ. λαου μου, κ. ψυχας περιεποιουντο, Vulg.: … Et cum caperent animas … vivificabant animas eorum,
Eze_13:19. Another read.: שמע—דברי כזב, audienti mendacium.
Eze_13:20. ... τ. ψυχας αὐτ. εἰς διασκορπισμον, Vulg.: animas ad volandum; (Sept., Syr., Hexapl., the Targum read: נפשם.)
Eze_13:21. ... ἐν χερσιν ὑμ. εἰς συστροφην. Vulg.: … ad prædandum; (Other readings: יהיה—בידכם, מידכם erit, וידעתם.)
Eze_13:22. …το καθολου μη ἀποστρεψαι—
EXEGETICAL REMARKS
Now that the text has been given in Eze_12:24, there follows in two parts (Eze_13:1-23)—in each case first the characteristics with which they are reproached (Eze_13:1-7, Eze_13:17-19), and then the penal sentence (Eze_13:8-16, Eze_13:20-23)—the sermon upon the text, a detailed treatment of the theme, viz. false prophecy in Israel, as the same was in vogue both at home and in the exile (comp. Jeremiah 29.), and cannot be overlooked as an element in the interchange of false hopes and expectations in either case, and of mutual intercourse (Introd. p. 9). While the second part is usually understood of false prophetesses, Hengst. makes the false prophets the subject here also, merely “on account of their feeble nature, like Women” (!). He brings forward as an argument for this Oriental and poetic exegesis the “designedly interspersed masculine pronouns (Eze_13:19-20),” whereby the prophet “all but expressly says that he has to do with women in men’s clothes;” and farther, that in the whole of the Old Testament “a false prophetess is nowhere mentioned,” “so that so serious a punishment as we have here would have been out of place.” Comp. as against both statements, the exposition of the section in question below. Neteler sees in the prophetesses “striking representatives of the synagogues,” with their interpretations, sayings, commentaries.
Eze_13:2. אֶל indicates the destination of the prophetic discourse which follows, which, as regards its tendency and contents, is directed against the prophets of Israel. Who are meant, הַנִּבָּאִים tells us, viz. those who prophesy—who, from the fact of their prophesying, and consequently being in authority, are (alas!) the prophets of Israel. “Jeremiah in Jerusalem, and Ezekiel among the exiles, stood as oddities there, and had the government and the spirit of the age and of the people absolutely against them” (Hengst.). A more exact definition follows as regards the source whence their prophecy flows or is drawn: out of their own heart; and thus out of what is their own (Neh_6:8), in contrast with the true prophet, who utters God’s word from God. And in this way their pretended office, their dignity in Israel, is already gone, and an ironical light falls upon the title, prophets of Israel. It fits into the contrast indicated with the true prophet, that they are to hear the word of Jehovah.
Eze_13:3. Woe, already announcing the due punishment inevitably awaiting them, an exclamation of grief; telling at the same time with mingled pain and anger (as in Isa_1:4; Mat_23:13 sq.) what ought not to be, but is the case with prophets of what is their own. חַנְּבָלִים, a paronomasia with הַנְּבִיאִים. Why they are called fools is clear from Psa_14:1; Psa_53:1. To exhibit themselves as prophets, and not to be so from God, was a practical denial of God, especially of His avenging justice; was ungodliness, and at the same time stupidity in the highest degree. Where wisdom is wanting in this way, and where God is not the source, man “walks after his own spirit.” The “heart” with its lusts is the source, the spirit the guide, i.e. instead of the Spirit of God, the thoughts, which take shape as they come out of the heart, make themselves master of the man; the man goes after his imaginations, fancies, himself at last believing in them. According to Hävern., therefore, the two necessary conditions are wanting, the right starting-point and goal. רָאוּ וּלְבִלְתִּי, usually taken as a relative clause: “and after that which they have not seen” (?). For the woe, at all events, a positive as well as negative reason is given. Comp. Doct. Reflect., p. 54.
They are compared to the foxes in Eze_13:4, as destroyers in a general sense, because the foxes are hurtful creatures; and there is no need for us to think specially of the undermining of the ground, hence of the “sapping of the moral foundations of the state” (Keil), or of depasturing the vineyard (of Israel, Isaiah 5.; Jer_12:10), Son_2:15 (Rosenm.), or of injuring the game (Hengst.); and, least of all, have we to think of what is proverbial with us, the cunning of the fox. Comp. besides, Luk_13:31-32; Mat_7:15; Act_20:29. The ruins, on the one hand, indicate the favourite haunt of foxes and similar animals, and on the other, point to the ruin of Israel. [Klief.: “The ruins of the theocracy are undermined by the false prophets besides, inasmuch as they take up their abode in them.” Hengst.: “At no time were the false prophets rifer than in the last days of the Jewish state.” Kimchi: “Thy prophets,” which are not Jehovah’s.]—Their conviction, however, in the form of an energetic address in reference to Israel’s welfare, turns in Eze_13:5 not so much on what they have done, as on what they have neglected to do as regards the “ruins.” As prophets, as men of God, they had to place themselves in the gap, or to build a wall, etc. Both images are chosen with reference to the siege of Jerusalem. (According to Hävernick, the thing meant is the watching of the vineyard against thieves and wild beasts!) To make a stand in the war has reference both to what is required of the person and to what the state of affairs requires. The day of Jehovah is the time fixed by Him with reference to the reckoning to be given in to Him. Although the case is only as yet impending, yet it is spoken of as if it were an accomplished fact. It cannot happen otherwise with them, considering what they are (Eze_13:5), and how they are acting (Eze_13:6). [Ewald: “But what follows from such internal perversity has already taken place long before, while they, when wrath breaks forth as in the divine assault, and the helpless people are panting all the more after prophetic help, withdraw from cowardice, speaking flatteringly where it causes them no danger,” etc.] Comp. Eze_22:30 (Psa_106:23; Isa_58:12; 1Sa_25:16); Amo_5:18; Amo_5:20; Mal. 3:23 [Eze_4:5]. For the meaning of the figurative language in Eze_13:5, we must think with the older expositors of intercessory mediation, of the awakening of Israel to repentance, the putting a stop to their wickedness, the building of them up in newness of spirit, etc. In the day, etc., and in the war, throw light on each other, so that he who wages war against Israel is Jehovah in the day of His wrath (Eze_7:19; Isa_63:10; Job_38:22-23). The “breach” is the sinful condition of the people. (Hitz., Hengst.) [Häv., like Cocc., understands לְַעַמֹד of the house of Israel (others: of the wall). The day of the Lord means, according to Cocc., the day of Christ’s appearing!]
Eze_13:6. Jeremiah 23. וְיִחְַלוּ, according to others, is dependent on שְׁלָחָם: that they might hope, etc. Inasmuch as they believe their own lie, they wait (in vain) for its becoming true by being realized, that I would confirm it. Instead of this, in Eze_13:7, just as in Eze_13:5, guilt is brought home in a direct address on God s part. Hengst.: a question of conscience.
Eze_13:8. The retributive punishment. אְַלֵיכֶם הִנְנִי is the explanation of the אֶל in Eze_13:2. After the purpose has been expressed generally, there follows in Eze_13:9 a carrying out of it in detail. סוֹד, abbreviated from יְסוֹד (יָםַד), “a taking together,” is: an assembly, a council, and also a confidential circle; here the former.—כְּחָב, the roll of citizens, and that the new one that is to be drawn up.—The exclusion from the people, just as their assembling, taking note of their condition, and afterwards returning home,—implying, of course, an advance,—refer to the (Eze_11:17 sq.) promised restoration. Comp. Psa_1:5; Psa_87:6; Ezr_2:62.—יַעַן וּבְיַעַן, in Eze_13:10, formally and solemnly, in the style of judgment (Lev_26:43). In this way an additional and special retribution is introduced; the unauthorized announcement of salvation (Jer_6:14; Jer_8:11; Isa_48:22), which is expressively compared to the daubing of a wall, beneath which the slim and worthless building material, as well as any gaps that may exist, disappear from the eye, is to be punished with the manifestation in actual fact of the misleading activity of the false prophets. And they build, viz. the people, not the false prophets. Compared with Eze_13:5, instead of the wall which the prophets were to build, the people left to themselves in their self-help are reduced to a clay wall (חַיִץ) merely, which they erect for themselves with their wishes and hopes. (Hengst.: the political effort made by the coalition, to which the false prophets gave the appearance of a higher sanction.) The daubing which masks the unstable handiwork is provided by those prophets with their announcement of salvation. תָּפֵל, not טִיחַ, as in Eze_13:12, because the sense, the meaning, breaks forth from the figure. Ewald: “elsewhere what is absurd intellectually, what is inconsistent with itself; here the mortar that does not hold together, clay without straw, or dry clay.” They spread their dull, stupid coating of words of salvation over it. Hengst.: absurdity (Jer_23:13; Lam_2:14). Comp. also Act_23:3; Mat_23:27.—The fall of the wall in Eze_13:11 is in fact the special sentence on the daubers, יִפֹּל having a resemblance in sound to יִפֹּל.—הָיָה, as it were beginning a narrative, after the manner of a parable (Ewald).—A lively address (and ye) to the powers of nature. The circumstance that the description proceeds in this physical strain is perhaps intended to suggest the thought, how much as a matter of course it lies in the very nature of such a wall that it should fall, in spite of all the art of the daubing and coating.—אֶלְגָּבִישׁ, peculiar to Ezekiel, is hail, an expansion of גָּבִישׁ, “something stiffened” (ice), with א prosthetic and dagesh forte following אֶלְגָּבִישׁ = אַגָּבִישׁ, a Chaldee form. Ewald: probably from אֵל נָּבִישׁ, “a mist of hail,” i.e. thickest hail frozen together. Gesenius summons to his help unnecessarily the Arabic article; Hävernick regards the whole word as Arabia, as the crystal came to the Hebrews from Arabia. Comp. Exo_9:18; Jos_10:10 sq.; Isa_30:30; Psa_18:13-14 [12, 13]; Job_38:22; Mat_7:25; Mat_7:27; Rev_16:21. Hail, though rare in Palestine, is a thing well known in its devastating effects.—םְעָדוֹת, because of the violent rushings. תְּבַקֵּעַ may also be the second person, but can hardly as an address apply to God: a stormy wind thou shalt rend (!), as Hengstenberg. Expositors have also thought of a breaking through the wall. [So the Eng. Vers.: “a stormy wind shall rend it.”]—In Eze_13:12 now הַקִּיר, which it ought to be, the wall, instead of חַיִץ in Eze_13:10. The daubing was meant to give it the appearance of a solid wall.
Eze_13:13. Eze_8:18; Eze_11:13.
Eze_13:14. Breaking down to the foundation. בְּתוֹבָהּ, the feminine suffix pointing from the figure to the thing itself, the city to be destroyed, viz. Jerusalem, as נָפְלָה already does.
Eze_13:15. The discourse plays upon the כָּלָה; comp. Eze_13:13-14. There is a bringing to an end (Eze_5:13; Eze_6:12; Eze_7:8), and hence an application in Eze_13:16 to the false prophets, against whom this first part of the discourse is directed. In Eze_13:15 we need not read with Ewald: וְאָמַד, “that it is said of you.” What is impending will be a sermo realis.
Eze_13:16. An apposition which brings the reference to the false prophets to an end.
Eze_13:17. The False Prophetesses.—Peculiar to Ezekiel, and so much the more interesting, and none the less accordant with the actual condition of those last days of a life ever more and more mixed up with heathenisms. The prophetess Huldah appears, however, in 2Ki_22:14, as a divinely inspired woman on the side of the living God. In caricature of her, in connection with idolatries like Eze_8:14, the class of false prophetesses, against whom Ezekiel is to bear testimony, may have been formed. Hävernick mentions the old Arabian legendary history.—Set thy face toward, etc., Eze_6:2.—עַמְּךָ, as it were: to this has it come with them! Comp. on Eze_13:2. The Hithpael perhaps more sharply emphasizes their betaking themselves thereto, their conducting themselves as such, their female vanity, עַל indicates therefore the correspondingly superior prophetic commission of Ezekiel.
Eze_13:18. Comp. Eze_13:3. Like the false prophets, the false prophetesses also prophesy out of their own hearts, but quite in womanly fashion “sewing together for themselves (Ew. Gr. § 120b, with bad assiduity) kĕsathoth, and making mispachoth.” (1) The literal interpretation of these words: Ewald makes both things be placed on the body of these divineresses as ornament, so that while thus employed they were wont to look as upon a magic mirror upon the “knobs” which were sewed firmly on the wrist or arm, and with their mantles hanging over their heads they imitated the mantles of the prophets. Farfetched; especially “the children’s heads,” which Ewald brings forward in addition to the sorceries.—According to Calvin, a kind of sleepy condition was aimed at in this way, whereby they carried themselves and others away in transport from the earth.—[Old expositors explained the expressions in question of armlets for the purpose of divination; more modern ones, like J. D. Michaelis, explained them of magic fillets on the hands and head, which preserve the life of the wearer, but which bring death to the enemy.] Hävernick notices, first of all, the contrast of the luxurious, wanton life (Isa_3:16 sq., Eze_32:9 sq.) with the pretence of being prophetesses, and then compares for the catching of souls, Pro_6:26; Eze_7:21 sq. The unusual form בְּםָתוֹת is, according to him, a technical term for a definite kind of coverlets, rugs, which are sewed together for cushions, sofas. יָדַי he takes as an abbreviated dual form, and understands by אַצִּילֵי the joints of the hand in the wider sense (Jer_38:12), so that every joint of the arm has its rug. Thus they lie on a comfortable couch (Pro_7:16), in luxurious clothing besides—instar omnium מִםְפָּחוֹת, a word which (Isa_3:22; Rth_3:15), as a designation of the upper garments, the large shawls of the women, is put by Ezekiel for מִטְפָחוֹת, with an allusion to מִםְפַּחַת (scab, Isa_3:17); taken in connection with עַל־רֹאשׁ, hence coquettish wearing of veils over the head for every stature. That rugs were not laid over or upon (עַל) the joints, elbows, shoulders, cannot certainly be maintained by Keil as against Hävernick, since עַל may here as well as afterwards be rendered by “for” of the standard.—Hitzig thinks of the analogy of the תְּפִלִּין, which one fastened during prayer on his left hand, and of the טַלִּית, a long and broad piece of cloth with which the suppliant covered his head. (2) The figurative interpretation: According as יָדַי is referred indirectly or directly to God; in the former case, so that: “upon all joints of My hands” = those of My people, hence that Jehovah regards Himself as injured in His people;—they impede the free movement, cover the eyes of every one (Umbreit) by their lies and flatteries (usually: they lay the people in a bed of deceitful rest, cover them with all sorts of excuses, high and low alike); in the other case, as Klief. has it: it is brought as a charge against the prophetesses, that they cover by their false divination the word of God and the threatening hand of the Judge therein, and that they veil, exactly according to the stature of the individual, men’s hearing and seeing.—There is a correspondence between the analogy of the preceding discourse to the false prophets, which is certainly to be held fast, and the figurative interpretation, to which Hengstenberg and Keil also have given in their adhesion. What in the former case is daubing with a coating, is here covering and veiling. [בָּםָה is: “to cover;” םָפַח, to draw together, to envelope closely. עַל־רֹאשׁ, however, is not meant of the standard by which one is regulated, but is simply “over,” inasmuch as they know how to counsel every קוֹמָה (height, stature) of those who trust them.]—Jewish expositors have unnecessarily taken הַנְּפָשׁוֹת as a question. The contrast with חָיָה shows what צוּד has in view. Hence what tends to destruction in the one case, is meant to turn out for preservation in the other. Such a result cannot possibly occur where the living God and these women confront each other (among My people and among you), and where He would be profaned. [Häv.: לְ = those belonging to the people—those belonging to you, i.e. your own souls. Others draw the distinction between members of the people and adherents of the false prophetesses, to the former of whom they threaten destruction; to the latter, on the other hand, they promise prosperity. Ewald: souls of honest men they render gloomy and sickly, and thus they bring them down to death; souls of sinners they strengthen in their sins, in order that they themselves also through their gratitude may be the better able to live along with them. Luther: when ye have caught them among My people, ye promise them life. Klief.: they steal from the people of God their life, and take care of their own.]
Eze_13:19. In contrast with the intended profanation of Jehovah, specially of His name by their lying (in face of My people, as afterwards: to My people), the price is emphasized sharply, the wretched life of the body (Mic_3:5; Tit_1:11; Rom_16:18). Those that should not die are the souls of the people of Jehovah (Eze_3:17 sq.); those contrasted with them are the souls of the prophetesses themselves (Deu_18:20). According to others: the former are the pious, the latter the wicked. Comp. Eze_13:18. בְּכַזֶּבְכֶם, the masc. suffix, embracing at the same time the false prophets along with them, or an inaccuracy of Ezekiel’s (Häv.). Comp. on Eze_13:20. Comp. besides, Mic_2:11.
Thereafter, in Eze_13:20, the judgment, as in the case of the false prophets (Eze_13:8 sq.). There—the coverings are, as it were, the ground on which the hunt takes place, according to Hengstenberg. According to others: there, at Jerusalem (Eze_13:16).—לְפֹרְחוֹת (from פָּרַח, to break through (בָּרַך), like בָּרַח, to flee) is rendered by Häv.: “to rejoicings (excesses).” Pro_7:18. Neteler: “in their bloom.” Others: “to blooming pleasure-gardens”; others still: “in order that they may blossom,” according to your prophecy. Philippson: “to flutter in the net.” Hengst.: “like birds.” Ewald: “as if they were birds of passage.” פֹּדְתוֹת, Aramaic, means “flying ones”; so it is acknowledged by most in what follows, and so it is here likewise, only that the connection makes the difference,—that here they are hunted, caught, as such, but instead of this, in what follows, with piquant repetition, they are let fly. The very sameness of the expression, amid opposite surroundings, is the point. Because the false prophetesses are conceived of here (Psalms 11) as fowlers, who are usually men, the masc. suffix preceding the comparison is easily understood. The souls are torn out of the arms in question; according to the usual interpretation: the coverings are torn away from the arms of the false prophetesses.—וְשִׁלַּחתִּי, as in Deu_22:7 (Exo_21:26).
Eze_13:21. With the feminine suffix the address returns again to the women. While hitherto Eze_13:18 was kept in view, with Eze_13:22-23 the reference is to Eze_13:19. While they threw suspicion on the pious among the exiles, and made them sad, etc., they strengthened those in Jerusalem in their pride of expectation. They did evil to the good, and to the bad they did no good. And so shall all their doings come to an end. By the events shall they be put to shame, and they shall perish in them.
DOCTRINAL REFLECTIONS
1. Cocceius gives the name of false prophecy to the doctrine which is contrary to God’s word, to the false exposition of Scripture, as well as to prophesying without having seen and heard God’s word, as well as, above all, to the imagination of, or the laying claim to, possessing such divine revelation.
[2. “Here, then, lay the grand characteristic of the true prophet, as distinguished from the false. There was exhibited objectively to his soul, through the operation of the Spirit of God, a thought, or succession of thoughts,—an action, perhaps, revealing the mind and will of God; and then taking up this in the apprehension of his mind, he went forth to declare it to others, as from his own inward consciousness, clothed in such words as fitly expressed what had been seen within. With the false prophet, on the other hand, even supposing him to be perfectly sincere in what he uttered, all proceeded from the impulse of his own inflated imagination or excited feelings; the whole was from within merely, nothing from without, from above. Yet, with this distinction so clearly traced, and traced for the express purpose of drawing the line of demarcation between the true and the false in prophetic utterances, we are still presented with views and theories of inspiration, which, in the case of inspired men generally, prophets as well as evangelists and apostles, if they do not altogether discard the objective, render the subjective alone prominent,—make so much account of the internal consciousness or intuitional sense of the subject of inspiration, as necessarily to throw into the background the divine communication made to him from above. But in the two classes of prophets here presented to our notice, the one could lay claim, as well as the other, to the internal consciousness of some spiritual thought or idea; the only question was, whence came the idea? Did it spring up from within, as of itself? or was it presented there by the Spirit of God? Was the mind’s consciousness of the thoughts and feelings it experienced of its own awakening, or was it awakened by a divine and formal communication from above? If we lose sight of this important distinction, we virtually make no account of what constitutes the fundamental element of a divine revelation, and leave ourselves without a fixed landmark between the movements of God’s Spirit and the capricious workings of human fancy. And confounding thus things that essentially differ in regard to the origin of a revelation, we lay ourselves open to the farther error of disparaging the value of a revelation, when made; we totally change it, indeed, and lower its character, and assign it only a kind of higher room among the views and cogitations of men’s own imagining.”—Fairbairn’s Ezekiel, pp. 133, 134.—W. F.]
3. “False prophecy does not believe in any day of judgment of Jehovah’s” (Hävernick).
4. “Because God will never be separated from His word, while He is in Himself invisible, He manifests Himself only in His word. Hence in the case of false prophecy, making constant use as it did of the expression: ‘The Lord hath said,’ all the attributes of the divine nature necessarily ran the risk of being denied or profaned” (Calvin).
5. Prophecy in Israel was a gift of the Spirit, and already, as being so, had no restriction as to sex. But when it came to be upheld by the Spirit of Christ, in whom there is neither male nor female (Gal_3:28), this overlooking of all sexual distinctions of necessity still more characterized it.
6. It is a symptom of dissolution of all social bonds when women are in power in such fashion as we find them here in Ezekiel. The French Revolution and the most recent so-called emancipation question [emancipation of women] are proofs of this.
7. On the other hand, in the sister of Moses, in Deborah, in the mother of Samuel, during the time of the Old Covenant even, we have illustrations of what was to be set forth in the highest degree by the blessed among women, viz. the religious capabilities of the female sex. The caricatures of the holy are also its foil.
8. Inspiration is essentially a thing belonging to women. If the apostle (1 Timothy 2; 1 Corinthians 14) prohibits the female sex from teaching, yet he shows, even in the former of these passages (comp. 2Co_11:3), how receptive woman is for the spirit-world, for all that is transcendental in word and deed, in form and substance; and not less must we take into account the influence of the female sex, and the art (so easy to them) of deception, of seduction.
HOMILETIC HINTS
Eze_13:2. “Prophecy against prophecy, the prophecy from above against the prophecy from beneath: this is the everlasting ordinance in the kingdom of God” (Hengst.).—“But when he says that God is coming against the false prophets, he by no means intends to excuse the people. For the people had the law and likewise true prophets. In Deuteronomy 13. the distinguishing marks of the true and false prophets were given. Theirs was blindness in clear day. And therefore God suffered the arrogance and disobedience of the people to be punished” (Calv.).—“Satan’s power is especially very great in the case of teachers and preachers, 1 Kings 22.” (Lange.)—“Thus prophet came into collision with prophet. And now-a-days still God will in this way test the faith of His own, and disclose the hypocrisy of many (1Co_11:19). It is not in vain that He permits the servants of Satan to rise up against sound doctrine, and that the Church is torn in pieces by divergent opinions, and that vain conceits are able to attain such strength that the truth must have the worst of it. For in this way the stedfastness of the pious comes to light, and equally the lightmindedness of the hypocrites, who suffer themselves to be carried away by every wind” (Calv.).—The presence of false prophets a sign of dissolution, as well as of the judgment of God.—The false prophets involve the people in guilt; the people are to blame for the false prophets, 2Th_2:11.—The word of God, that which is to be heard by all, in all things, and at all times.
Eze_13:3. Self-deception and the deception of others go together.—“From this we see how it stands with man’s spirit, for God presupposes here a standing controversy between man’s spirit and the revelation of His Spirit” (Calv.).—And yet, for the most part, it is just the wise people that are found among these fools.—The wisdom of the world and folly before God.—“Whoever will open the eyes of others, let him see to it beforehand whether he himself has an eye open Godwards” (Stck.).
Eze_13:4. “The spiritual foxes flourish the better, the more degraded the condition of the people” (Hengst.).—“The people in the wilderness of the exile were very much exposed to the false prophets” (Luth.).
Eze_13:5. False prophets cannot pray.—The intercession of the prophets steps into the breach.—“Right doctrine is the right wall, just as it also teaches right living” (Calv.).—“There is no better wall than reformation of life” (Berl. Bib.).
Eze_13:6-7. Without being sent by God, no one ought to enter a teacher’s office.
Eze_13:8-9. We have to give an account of our words even.—God convicts sinners sometimes out of their own mouth.
Eze_13:9. “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of God; a king’s hands we may escape, but not God’s” (Stck.).—“Because the Jews have refused to become Christians, they have not been enrolled in the register of Israel” (Cocc.).—“It is not enough that men should reckon us members of the Church. We must know in our own hearts whether we have the inward marks whereby the children of God are distinguished from those who do not belong to His family” (Calv.).
Eze_13:10. “Ungodly teachers preach to their hearers of good days merely, and comfort them into hell, Jer_8:11” (Starke).—“The wall is the mere external service of God; and yet all the while the false prophets flatter them, treat them as pious persons, all without exception saints in Christ” (Berl. Bib.).—The world, too, wishes peace, but not the peace of God through Jesus Christ.—“God proclaims peace to us, it is true. But we must wage war with ourselves and with our vices” (Calv.).—There are among preachers those who build without a foundation, and, alas! also mere outside-daubers.—[Scott: “Some teach men to expect safety from a comparative decency of moral character; some on account of formal or superstitious observances; some because they belong to an orthodox part of the Church, and have got some notions of certain important doctrines; some because of their impressions and enthusiastic reveries; and others even by a direct abuse of the gospel, and making Christ the minister of sin. Men of learning and ingenuity employ themselves in daubing these tottering walls with untempered mortar, to prevent their weakness from being discovered. But they are all alike distant from Christ, the true foundation: they build not on Him by a penitent faith, that worketh by love, and produceth obedience; they either leave out His merits and atonement, or the work of His new-creating Spirit, or the substantial fruits of righteousness; and in different ways endeavour to varnish, paint, and repair the old building, instead of erecting a new one on a new foundation, for ‘an habitation of God through the Spirit.’ ”—W. F.]—“We believe much more readily those who preach to us of glory, riches, and peace, than those who promise us nothing but the cross. And yet the words of glory are deceitful words, and the devil can very easily mix himself up with prophecies of that sort, and does it too; but the cross abides and remains” (Berl. Bib.).—False hope of life is a sign of approaching death.
Eze_13:11 sq.: “Every building of which faith has not laid the foundation helplessly gives way when God’s storms come” (Umbreit).—“No doctrine of mere human reason can stand in the time of trouble and temptation; but he who is built upon the doctrine of the holy apostles and prophets has built his house firm and sure, Eph_2:20” (Cr.).—Man’s work, slim work; God’s storms, bad storms.—Vain conceits, hypocrisy, and deceit do not stand in the divine judgment.
Eze_13:14. “The foundation is the important thing in building, and even when the wall falls. For one may (1Co_3:12; 1Co_3:15) build on the true foundation all sorts of things, which are consumed in the fire, yet so that the builder himself is saved. Here, on the other hand, the foundation is false, and therefore building and builder alike disappear” (Cocc.).—“It is besides a peculiarity of the judgments of God, that they are a revelation, and make manifest to all the world what was deceit and falsehood” (Luther).
Eze_13:17 sq. “False prophets for the most part rear for themselves false prophetesses” (Cocc).—“The woman Jezebel speaks (Rev_2:20), alleging that she is a prophetess, by false interpretation, application, and perversion of Scripture, whereof each one chooses for his own use what suits him best. Of such cushions there are enough in the present day still, and God’s mercy itself is so perverted. But whenever one would hunt and would fain catch something, it is commonly the destruction and death of the object that he has in view. And so here one seeks his gain and advantage with and from the destruction of other people” (Berl. Bib.).—“What Satan cannot accomplish by means of the male sex, he attempts by means of the female, Act_16:16” (Starke).—“Effeminate is all accommodation theology. It is its nature to set aside, as in general all that is uncomfortable for the old Adam and gives him pain, so especially the energy of the requiring and punishing divine righteousness—the severity of God, Rom_11:22. Where Ezekiel puts the cushions, there we put perhaps the icy glove. Besides the cushions for the hands of the Lord, which touch [men in their natural state] very ungently, they make coverings for the heads of their penitents, that the hand of God may not touch them ungently, and indeed for heads or people of every stature, always according to the greatness of the reward to be expected—the greatest for the king. The higher any one is placed, the more zealously do they endeavour to clear his conscience, as Jesuits before the Jesuits, differing from their successors in this, that the latter had in view the interest and power of the Church, while the former serve merely their own belly” (Hengst.).
Eze_13:18. “It is a striking, awful word, that a lie has the power to catch and to kill souls” (Umbreit).—A heart, indeed, for every head, for the wrong-headed even, the servant of God ought to have, but not pious caps for all heads.—“Satan keeps a large richly furnished store of rugs and pillows, such as cherished habits, the example of others, the way of all the world, church-going even, partaking of the Lord’s Supper,” etc. (Stck.)—“God is angry with them, for they prop up souls, hinder them, lay under their deeds a pillow of reward, teach them to place their reliance in their own thoughts and imaginings, instead of in the truth. But they become still worse through a certain emotional power, which flatters them with a semblance of life in the midst of death. The prophets who know how to produce this feeling of life with their promises are more readily accepted as true prophets than those who cut off all supports, and bring about death. A true prophet announces nothing but destruction—war, famine, and death (1Ki_22:8). And the reason is this, that the prophesying of death must precede the prophesying of life” (Berl. Bib.).
Eze_13:19. The prophetic spirit of lying, a spirit of murder, and also of blasphemy, putting an end alike to men’s fellowship with one another and to their fellowship with God.—“God is the truth; with it He too vanishes, becomes the ghost of one that is dead. But it was a special pledge of His love that God gave them prophets, that He had promised the gift of prophets to Israel. With the prostitution of the name of prophet God’s own gracious name must of necessity in a special way nave been put to shame, and that among His own people, as distinguished above all other nations” (Calv.).—“They profane God among His people, by making Him take up a friendly position toward sin” (Hengst.).—To cast away the living God for the means of sustaining this earthly life, what self-murder!—“Mark it, ye brethren of Gehazi, what hateful leprosy, 2 Kings 5.” (Starke.)—“The true and faithful servants of God also kill souls and make them alive; for the word of God is life, and brings salvation to lost men; and not less does it become a savour of death unto death to those who are lost, 2 Corinthians 2.” (Calv.)—“Whoever wishes to live, let him betake himself to the living God, to whom the word of life of all true prophets points us. Every soul must die that does not tread this way of life” (Calv.).—“Those who have no pleasure in the truth, must, in accordance with the righteous judgment of God, believe a lie” (O.).—“They would so fain have it, that the false might turn out truth” (Cocc).
Eze_13:20 sq. That they do not remain unpunished is no special act of judgment on God’s part, but nothing else save the revelation of judgment contained in the third commandment.—The ten commandments are full of judgment-seats for God.—“It is the everlasting comfort of the poor human race, exposed as it is to that spirit who is a liar and a murderer, that the almighty God of truth rules as a defender and protector of souls. The Lord will also save and set free captive souls from the hands of their deceiver and seducer; for in truth they are not irrational birds, destined for fluttering and flying, but images of their Divine Creator” (Umbreit).—“Pious hearts are filled with fear of God’s name, and hence they are easily vexed and taken captive with false doctrine, delivered to them in God’s name” (Randgl.).
Eze_13:22. “It is nevertheless sin not to comfort or to trouble still more those who are troubled, as well as to strengthen the stiffnecked in their wickedness, Isa_5:20” (Cr.).—The unlawful “trouble” caused by certain preachers of repentance.—Rightly to divide the word of God, a gift and distinguishing mark of a true teacher.—False doctrine makes wounded hearts, but also hard hands.
Eze_13:23. False prophecy also was to cease until the appearance of the Great Prophet, the Son of God.—“Thus God was resolved to save His people under the New Testament; so that brother should no more need to teach brother, because the fulfilment would be in their midst. The Word Himself would in very deed become flesh” (Cocc.).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23 that prophesy--namely, a speedy return to Jerusalem.
that prophesy--namely, a speedy return to Jerusalem.
out of . . . own hearts--alluding to the words of Jeremiah (Jer 23:16, Jer 23:26); that is, what they prophesied was what they and the people wished; the wish was father to the thought. The people wished to be deceived, and so were deceived. They were inexcusable, for they had among them true prophets (who spoke not their own thoughts, but as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, Pe2 1:21), whom they might have known to be such, but they did not wish to know (Joh 3:19).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv2–22 2. Prophets of Israel that prophesy — Dr. Davidson…
2. Prophets of Israel that prophesy — Dr. Davidson sees a kind of sarcasm in this phrase. The false prophets were indeed prophets of Israel, though not prophets of Jehovah. The people eagerly grasped their smooth sayings as true and repudiated Jeremiah and Ezekiel as the false prophets (Jer_18:18; Jer_43:2).
Prophesy out of their own hearts — Their own wish to be popular and please the people (Eze_13:19; Jer_23:16) colors their message. They are the mouthpiece of the people, Ezekiel speaks the word which is opposed to his natural desire. These men speak the smooth things which their own selfish hope suggests and their own human judgment seeks to sustain (Mic_3:8; compare Jer_28:8-9).
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19, 22, 23 1–9. The lying prophets are like foxes among the…
1–9. The lying prophets are like foxes among the ruins
(1) Eze_13:1-3. The inspiration of these prophets is not from the spirit of God but from their own heart.
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(2) Eze_13:4-5. Consequently so far as the state was concerned they were like foxes among the ruins; they burrowed among these and only helped to bring down what might still be standing.
(3) Eze_13:6-7. They deceived the people, and were self-deceived. They prophesied lies, and looked that God would establish their lies.
(4) Eze_13:8-9. Therefore destruction shall overtake them. The people of the Lord, when the day of chastisement has passed, shall be again a people in their own land, but the names of these prophets shall not be found among them.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv3, 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, 11, 12, 17, 18, 19, 23 (3) Foolish prophets.—They were certainly foolish who undertook to…
(3) Foolish prophets.—They were certainly foolish who undertook to forge the name of the Omniscient, as it were, to utterances of their own devising. Folly according to the use of the word in the Old Testament, was not merely an intellectual failing, but was always associated with moral obliquity. (See Psa_14:1, and Proverbs throughout.) The last clause of the verse is better expressed in the margin: these prophets were. “seers of that which they have not seen.”
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, 11, 17, 18, 19, 20, 22 Another interval follows, and then a fresh and fuller…
Another interval follows, and then a fresh and fuller burst of inspiration, manifestly in close connection with Eze_12:21-28, and to be read in combination with Jeremiah 23., which, as Jeremiah was in communication with the exiles, (Jer_29:1) Ezekiel may probably have seen. There were false prophets and prophetesses among the exiles as well as in Jerusalem, and an utterance is now found for his long pent up indignation.
HOMILIES BY J.R. THOMSON Vers. 1-9. Pretended prophets.
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There is no institution in itself so good but it may be corrupted and turned to evil purposes. Prophecy was given to the Hebrew people as a token of Jehovah"s interest in them and care for them. The intention was to afford national guidance and consolation, to give to religion an intellectual character, and to counteract any tendency to formalism which a misunderstanding of the sacerdotal and sacrificial system would naturally encourage. Prophecy was especially adapted to those Israelites who were far from Jerusalem, the scene of sacrifices and of festivals; and the children of the Captivity were, in an especial manner, indebted to the prophets for the counsel, the inspiration, the encouragement, which they needed in their banishment from the land of their fathers. Amongst these exiles in the East there arose self-seeking, ambitious, hypocritical, and pretentious men, who assumed the prophetic office, ministered to the prejudices of their fellow countrymen, and often led them astray by their erroneous advice. Against such men Ezekiel was commissioned to raise his protest, in language of severe denunciation and warning.
I THE PROFESSION AND CLAIMS OF THE FALSE PROPHETS. The men here exposed were not prophets of any heathen deity, ministers of any idolatrous religion. They claimed to be servants of Jehovah, and to speak in his name to their fellow countrymen. They prefaced their statements and their advice with such language as Ezekiel here quotes: "Hear ye the word of the Lord;" "The Lord saith." Doubtless there were those who were conciliated and attracted by such claims, but who would have resented any summons addressed to them in the name of a heathen deity.
II THE PRACTICAL CONTRADICTION OF THEIR PROFESSION AND CLAIMS. In terms figurative, yet impressive and conclusive, Ezekiel exhibits the hollowness of the pretences advanced by these lying leaders of the people. They are "like foxes in the waste places cunning, crafty creatures, who make their dwelling in the ruins and the wreck of a deserted city. So the prophets who profess to guide the people really prey upon them, and are most at home in the destruction and desolation which they have bellied to effect. They have not taken their place in the breach, they have not helped in the defence of the city, they have not stood in the van of the battle, when the enemy has made an assault. Here is the practical test, which reveals the worthlessness of all professions of patriotism, of all claims to leadership.
III THE REAL INSPIRATION OF THE FALSE PROPHETS. The secret is disclosed; the explanation of the illusion is given. The false prophets prophesy out of their own hearts; they follow their own spirit; they have seen nothing; the Lord hath not sent them; theirs is a lying divination; they have spoken vanity, and seen lies. In a word, professing to derive their commission and their message from the Eternal, the All-wise, they simply utter what commends itself to their own opinion, what serves their own interest, what agrees with their own sinful prejudices. This accounts fur the unwisdom and worthlessness of their advice. They who follow them may expect to be misled.
IV THE CONDEMNATION OF THE FALSE PROPHETS. "Woe unto the foolish prophets, saith the Lord God;" "I am against you." This condemnation is apparent from several facts.
1. Their predictions are falsified, and their counsels brought to nought.
2. They mislead the people to destruction.
3. They bring confusion upon themselves. This sentence is pronounced inlanguage very plain and very smiting. The hypocritical pretenders to a Divine commission are excluded from the register of the house of Israel, and are denied entrance into the land of Israel. All their plotting and lies are not only unmasked; they issue in confusion and destruction to themselves. T.
HOMILIES BY J.D. DAVIES
Vers. 1-9. The perils of falseness.
The work of God"s prophets is made more difficult by the competition of pretenders. They cater for popularity by predicting only what is pleasing to flesh and blood. Hence they bring discredit on all God"s revelations. In Ezekiel"s day the false teachers were specially busy in Jerusalem, confronting and counteracting Jeremiah; and the sad effect of false hopes was felt at Chebar as well as in Judaea.
I CARNAL AMBITION IS OFTEN THE PARENT OF FALSEHOOD. The prophecies and counsels of Jeremiah ran counter to all the prejudices and predilections of the people. Their fleshly nature rose in arms against such possible disaster. Heedless of God and God"s plans, they would create for themselves a better fortune. The worldly wise among them, gifted with superior speech, resolved to outrival God"s prophets to become candidates for popularity to aspire alter political power. Amidst a nation"s disaster and weakness there is always opportunity for the crafty to gain some sinister end. They countenanced any intrigue that promised temporary advantage. Under pretence of patriotic zeal, they sought mainly, if not wholly, a personal elevation.
II CAUSAL AMBITION LEADS TO SELF-ASSUMPTION. It is very likely that, at the outset, these false prophets deceived themselves. They imagined that they saw a way out of the catastrophe, and urged the rulers, against Jeremiah"s advice, to pursue that way. If it was pleaded that God had ordered otherwise, these men set up a counter authority. Stung by the suggestion that their counsel was not equal in value to that of Jeremiah, they boldly claimed to be the messengers of God. In their fanatic zeal they deemed their sagacious plans to have been given them from heaven. They were too much bent on gaining their end to inquire carefully into this matter. Where was the proof that Jeremiah or Ezekiel was more favoured to receive Divine intelligence than they? The end would justify the means! Heedless of consequences, they would publicly claim to speak as the ambassadors of God.
III SELF-ASSUMPTION EMPLOYS SOPHISTICAL ARTS OF SPEECH. They are described as foxes notorious for cunning yea, cunning as hungry foxes in the desert. All their wits were exercised to weave the most plausible web of argument. Every possible circumstance favourable to their designs was seized upon, and made to prop their nefarious policy, until what they had induced others to believe, they believed also themselves. They ensnared themselves in their own nets. From knaves they gradually became fanatics. Careless about the exact truth at the beginning, they lost at length the power to discern between truth and falsehood.
IV SELF-ASSUMPTION IS DEAD TO THE INTERESTS OF OTHERS. In the fifth verse the prophet accuses them thus: "Ye have not gone up into the gaps, neither made up the hedge for the house of Israel to stand in the battle." They used others, as the monkey did the cat"s paw. Where arduous toil, and especially where serious danger, appeared, they were conspicuous by their absence. Truth makes men at all times courageous, but falsehood corrodes the metal of a man"s bravery. These pretentious prophets desired the honour and the advantage; the risks they devolved on others. Honest men were made the ladder by which they sought to climb.
V SELF-ASSUMPTION IS SURE TO COLLAPSE. Vaulting ambition overleaps itself. The frog that would swell its dimensions to the size of a bull destroyed itself.
1. False teachers make God their direct enemy. "I am against you, saith the Lord God." The God of truth hates hypocrisy. All falseness shall be like empty thistle down, which the wind scatters.
2. They shall be excluded from the circle of honour. They had assumed to be heads and leaders in the councils of the nation; they shall be dishonoured, and cast out of the deliberative assembly. The false shall be, sooner or later, excommunicated blackballed.
3. Their posterity shall become extinct. There shall be none to perpetuate their name. New honour often comes to the memory of a righteous man from children of renown. Such honour and satisfaction shall be denied to them. They shall perish root and branch.
4. They shall not participate in the coming restoration. "Neither shall they enter into the land of Israel." The distinctive possession which God gives shall be for the true Israel, "even for those who have no guile." In the time of Israel"s real prosperity there "shall not come into them the uncircumcised or the unclean." He is a Jew who is one inwardly. D.
HOMILIES BY W. JONES Vers. 1-16. The sin and punishment of false prophets.
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 Eze_12:24. 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_23:9-40. "The identity of phrases and 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 29) 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. The 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 Commentary"). 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 SIN OF THE FALSE PROPHETS. Certain prominent features of their sin are brought into view.
1. Their prophecies were self-originated. They prophesied "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 made known to them. There 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 untrue. "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 Chaldean powers. (cf. Jer_14:13 Jer_28:1-4) And when the people endeavoured to strengthen themselves by the coalition with Egypt, they encouraged them in that course; for as we understand it, that is the meaning of the prophetic figure: "When one buildeth up a wall, behold, they daub it with untempered mortar." The figure itself is thus explained by Dr. Kitto: "It is a wall made of beaten earth rammed into moulds or boxes, to give the parts the requisite shape and consistence, and so deposited, by the withdrawal of the mould, layer by layer, upon the wall, each layer drying in its place as the work proceeds. The blocks are usually of considerable size, and are of various quality and strength, as well as cost, according to the materials employed, and the time expended upon them. The simplest are merely of earth, or of earth compacted with straw. This is the kind which the prophet had in view, and which is used in Devon and in Morocco, as well as in the East. It cannot stand against heavy rains; and therefore, unless the climate be very dry, it requires to be faced or coated with a tempered mortar of lime or sand, as a fence against the weather. Without this the body of the wall is liable to the contingencies described by the prophet" ("Daily Bible Illustrations"). The people built their slight and flimsy wall of political alliance against the Chaldeans, and the false prophets coated it with their un tempered mortar of vain assurances of safety; and the people believed them to their own dread discomfiture.
3. They claimed Divine authority for their lying prophecies. They said, "The Lord saith," although he had not spoken unto them. Great was their presumption and impious daring in making this high claim. "They counterfeit," as M. Henry says, "the broad seal of heaven, than which they cannot do a greater indignity to mankind, for hereby they put a reproach upon Divine revelation, lessen its credit, and weaken its credibility. When these pretenders are found to be deceivers, atheists and infidels will thence infer, They are all so.
4. Their influence was destructive. It was so in two ways.
(1) Negatively. They made no attempt to save the people from the ruin which was coming upon them. "Ye have not gone up into the gaps, neither made up the fence for the house of Israel, to stand in the battle in the day of the Lord." When a city is besieged and a breach is made in its walls, the leaders of the defence take prompt measures for stopping the breach. The Lord had come against his people as a besieger by reason of their sins, but these false prophets, who aspired to be leaders of the people, made no effort to save them. (cf. Eze_22:30) They rid not call for that repentance and reformation which might have averted the approaching ruin, as it did in the case of Nineveh. (Jon_3:5-10) They did not call upon God in prayer to spare the sinful people, as Moses did on several occasions. (Exo_32:11-14, Exo_32:31-34; Num_14:13-24; Psa_106:23) False prophets are not likely to be famous intercessors.
(2) Positively. They actively promoted the ruin of the people by assuring them of peace and safety when there was no peace, and peril was imminent and sine. They were "like foxes in the waste places" for destructiveness. Nowhere in the sacred Scriptures are foxes mentioned because of their cunning, but because of their injuriousness. (cf. Son_2:15) "The foxes here correspond to the ravening wolves in Mat_7:15, and the grievous wolves in Act_20:29, representing false teachers." Terrible is the injury which is wrought by corrupt religious teachers. (cf. Isa_9:16; Jer_12:10 Jer_50:6; Act_20:29; 2Pe_2:1-3)
II THE JUDGMENT OF GOD UPON THE FALSE PROPHETS. This judgment is expressed generally in ver. 8, and in a way that should have awakened serious concern. "Behold, I am against you, saith the Lord God." When God is against any one, nothing can be really well with him. "if God is for us, who is against us?" If God is against us, who is for us in any true sense? But the judgment is set forth with something of detail in vers. 9-16. It has two chief features.
1. Their exclusion.from the community of Israel. (Ver. 9.) They had sought prominence and distinction among the people, and had attained their object; but a complete reversal of their position awaited them. They should not have won a place among the chosen people; their names should be erased or omitted from the authorized register of the Israelites; and when the exiles returned unto their own land, they should not return with them. As Fairbairn says, "Inheriting the curse of the covenant," they should be cut of from among their people. There is, perhaps, in this a hint of a darker doom, even the omission of their names from a much more important register (Luk_10:20; Php_4:3; Rev_21:27) and their non-recognition by the Lord Jesus Christ. (Mat_7:22, Mat_7:23)
2. The total overthrow and ruin of both themselves and their work. (Vers. 11-16.) Their work was to be swept away by overwhelming forces. The stormy wind, the overflowing shower, and the great hailstones represent the Chaldean army. That army would make an utter end of the vain hopes which the false prophets had originated and fostered. No work can be stable which is begun and carried on against the will of God. Every wall which is built in defiance of his laws will soon fall into ruin. And in the case before us the presumptuous and foolish builders were ruined with their work. "it shall fail, and ye shall be consumed in the midst, thereof." The wail of delusive hopes, which they had daubed with untempered mortar, would be thrown down, and Jerusalem would be destroyed, and in its fall the false prophets would be ruined. "Thus will I accomplish my fury upon the wall, and upon thegn that have daubed it with untempered mortar," etc. (vers. 15, 16).
APPLICATION. Here is solemn warning against false prophets and teachers, who are not confined to any one age or people. When God is represented as love without righteousness, or mercy without judgment; when men are assured of salvation without repentance for sin or renewal of heart; when peace is proclaimed to men who are living in sin, then the spirit of the false prophets of Ezekiel"s age is reproduced. We are warned in the New Testament of the rise of false Christs and of many false prophets (Mat_24:11; Mar_13:22) of "false apostles, deceitful workers", (2Co_11:13) of some who "would pervert the gospel of Christ", (Gal_1:7) and of "false teachers who shall bring in destructive heresies". (2Pe_2:1) Wherefore let Christians take heed what they hear and read and receive. Happily, the test by which to prove religious teaching is not abstruse or difficult. Does it agree with "that which is inscribed in the writing of truth?" Does the teaching of man harmonize with the eternal law of God? Does it "make for righteousness"? "If any man willeth to do his will, he shall know of the teaching, whether it be of God, or" whether the teachers "prophesy out of their own heart." Vigorous physical health is cue of the most effective safeguards against the diseases which assail the body. And when the heart is susceptible to Divine influence, and the conscience loyally responds to the will of God, and the life is governed by that holy will, the man is not in much danger of being misled by erroneous teaching. W.J.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv1, 4, 10, 16, 18, 22 Them that prophesy out of their own hearts.
Eze_13:1-3
Them that prophesy out of their own hearts.
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The false prophet
To be a false prophet seems to us, indeed, an enormity. To have the great gift and trust of prophecy, and then to misuse it; to be admitted, if we may so speak, of Gods council, and then to sink that heavenly teaching in earthly and sensual thoughts,--this seems so high a measure of guilt, that we wonder not at the woe pronounced against it. Nay, as we read, we set our amen to it, little thinking that in so doing we may be, in truth, sealing our own condemnation. We see not that this very sin is that which doth most constantly beset us also; that many a ministry which seems to mans eye without reproach is indeed stained with the self-same guilt as that wherewith these prophets were defiled; that, in spite of its fair outline, the woe of the Almighty is gone forth against it. If we examine the testimonies against these false prophets which abound throughout the Books of Jeremiah and Ezekiel, we shall find that God does not charge them with altering His message wilfully and of set purpose to deceive. The charges are rather, that they are themselves deceived (Jer_5:13; Jer_10:9; Jer_14:14; Jer_23:16; Lam_2:14; Eze_13:3; Eze_13:7; Eze_13:9). It was not, apparently, that the false prophet knowingly altered the message he had received, but that for some cause or other there was this peril incident to his office, that he might be deceived and become a deceiver in some sense unconsciously; and then, if we look closer, we shall see that various causes are given for the fearful fall of the false prophet, and that they are all of one complexion--that they are what we call moral causes. Uncleanness of life, covetousness, softness of spirit, luxury, fondness for the pleasures of this life, these and many such like moral faults are expressly mentioned as the causes of this spirit of error and lies which filled these men and brought on them Gods fearful woe. The prophets prophesied lies, because they followed their own spirit, and had seen nothing. And now, if from the case of false prophets we turn to that of those who were faithful, we shall be brought to the same conclusion: we shall see, that is, that the distinction between them and the prophets of lies consisted not in their exclusive possession of those supernatural illapses of knowledge, to which we are apt to look, as making all the difference between one and another, but in the use which, from their spiritual and moral condition, they were able to make of these gifts. Look at the prophet who never prophesied good of the wicked king, but always evil; and see whether it was not in that noble gift of venturing all for the truth of God, wherein in very deed he differed from the earthly-minded sycophants, who made horns of iron, and prophesied, that as with them the Syrians should be pushed unto entire destruction. Or take, as a sufficient proof, the case of the prophet Jeremiah. To him was opened, by a special revelation, the speedy coming of Gods judgments upon Judah, which nothing but the absolute submission of Jerusalem to the King of Babylon could turn aside. So far he learned by revelation; but having learned thus much, mark his after history; see the constantly recurring moral temptation to tamper with this truth, to which he was subjected: the violence of the princes--the rage of the people--the feebleness of the king--their private interviews--the bribes offered to buy off his faithfulness--the miry dungeon of Malchiah; each of these was a temptation to lower down his message; to utter it less boldly, less frequently; less simply--to suppress it, to alter it. But against them all he stood firm, and why? Because a deep and abiding sense of Gods greatness and truth and awfulness lay beneath all other things, as the very foundation of his mind; and this kept him ever firm and constant. In an utterly unfaithful age and nation, remaining faithful when well-nigh everyone around him failed, he preserved untainted, amidst the crowd of lying seers, the truth of Gods anointed prophet. So that here we are brought to the same point: the blindness of the false prophet was the fruit of failing in his moral probation; the ghostly insight of the true prophet was kept quick and piercing, by his faithful cleaving to God amidst the ordinary temptations of life. And if this be so, surely this is exactly our condition, as far as concerns the ministry of the Word; and these woes against deceived prophets stand written on high, in their characters of fire, to warn us upon our ordinary way. For we also have our message: that which was given to the old prophets by special revelation we have plainly written for us in the page of Holy Scripture. Nor can we doubt that, if this message be delivered faithfully and wisely, it will produce an evident result in awakening sinners and building up the saints. We may see, moreover, that in our case the cause of failure is, in fact, the same as in the prophets of old. First, our own perceptions become obscured. For it is only by the teaching of the Holy Spirit that we can really enter into the deep mysteries of redemption. Impurity cannot lay hold upon purity. There are many doors of holy teaching, which open only to the key of love; and there is in love a marvellous power of understanding, a wonderful forecasting of the future; for love is a great reader of secrets. Even in earthly things, which are but a shadow of the true, we may see this. What an interpreter of hidden meanings is a loving spirit! how quick and piercing is it in reaching to the inner wishes, feeling, and intentions of another! And so doubtless it is where the love of God dwells in an earthly heart. The man is free, as it were, of the counsels of God. He reaches on to great things at unawares. In doing common duties, as they seem to him, he is sowing good seed for a distant day; he is reaching out far beyond the present, anticipating Gods future doings. Nor, secondly, can our own views of Gods truth become thus obscured without their impairing in an equal degree our power of conveying the message to others. First, this state of heart must destroy the reality of our teaching. We shall prophesy a lie; for we shall prophesy of truth itself as if it were a lie. There is nothing that our people feel more readily than this unreal declaration of Gods message. There is no close work with the heart or the life; but all is exhausted in mere form, or else in general appeals to the feelings, or in yet more fruitless addresses to the understanding, as the case may be. What., then, is this but to prophesy a lie? And this is not all. There can be little of a true loving earnestness in such ministry. There may be an apparent zeal as to forms, or as to preaching, and its other more external parts; but there can be little true sympathy with the wants and sufferings of mans heart, because there is little knowledge of them. There can be little of that deep earnest casting forth of the inmost spirit to meet anothers wants, which oftentimes makes silent sympathy in one man far more expressive than a multitude of words in another; and which, as by some heavenly influence, soothes and opens and wins the sufferers heart. I may not detain you to trace out all the characters of that earnest seeking after Gods truth to which we are bound; its faintest sketch may supply us with much ground for profitable thought. First, then, if we would attain to it, we must live in the habitual and devotional study of Gods Word. The great importance of this habit is not so much that we may understand obscure passages, still less that we may be discoverers of new truths, as that our whole tone of thinking and feeling may be attuned to things Divine. But then, to this we must add an humble use of every means that God has given us for understanding His Word rightly. By the ordinances of the Church; the testimony of succeeding generations; the judgment of humble and holy men; the witness borne to various truths by all the saints, living and departed, reformers, fathers, and antiquity; by each of these in their place, we humbly hope that God may teach us better how to understand His Word. Secondly, we must watch earnestly for the leading of the Spirit of the Lord. We must believe that this gift is in the Church, and seek to use it lawfully; we must remember how the Spirit of God does teach us, not by conveying to our minds direct propositions, but by clearing off those moral clouds which would dim all our perceptions of truth; by teaching our hearts, by giving us reality, earnestness, love, and a bold humility,--those mighty masters of the secret things of God. We shall therefore cooperate with Him by watching diligently our own hearts; by guarding them against the beginnings of worldliness; by seeking after a deeper humility of spirit; knowing that pride above all things breaks and distorts the images of heavenly truth which are cast forth upon our minds; that pride in the heart of the learner makes all teaching vain; that humility can learn great lessons from any teacher. And lastly, as the bond which is to hold together all these various elements, we must, if we would be faithful prophets, seek after eminent holiness of life. This will give us an insight into Gods truth in its reality; this will open to us our own hearts, and so the hearts of our brethren; this will set us in the way of those blessed breathings of the Holy Spirit which fall ever upon the still waters of holiness, and waft on most noiselessly those who always haunt them into the secrets of the Lord. This will enable us to live ever with Him even in this world of shadows. (Bishop S. Wilberforce.)
False prophesying
1. What is the specific charge made against false prophets? That they speak out of their own hearts, and that they follow their own spirit. How prone are all men to do this!
2. Every man now prophesies out of himself. Let us beware how we degrade a right into a perversion of liberty and a mischievous use of independence. There is a right of private judgment, there is an individuality of conscience: but no judgment is complete that does not measure itself with other judgments, and no conscience is complete that is not in touch with other consciences; for the last conscience is the result and expression of spiritual chemistry, combination, intermixture, divinely conducted. There may come a time when personal testimony must be delivered with burning emphasis, and when a man is compelled to enclose himself within a solitary altar; all these concessions do not interfere with the central and dominant truth that no prophecy is of private interpretation, and that all secret prayer needs to be brought out into the open air of the Church, that there it may bloom in its completest beauty.
3. False prophets excite false hopes: what other could they do? They have made others to hope that they would confirm the Word. A liar is very careful to maintain some foothold upon the confidence of society. He who is all false himself can only live upon the trustfulness of others. So, then, the false prophet is the creator of false hopes; and if there be counterfeit coin makers in our neighbourhood, it would not be an unwise thing to put out our coin upon the table and look at it very carefully; and as there are false prophets who have excited false hopes, it would not be unwise to take our hopes one by one, and conduct upon each of them an unsparing analysis, saying, What is it? what is its reason? what is its purpose? what is its value? what is its origin? how is it supported by evidence? how is it ennobled by sacrifice? Any hope that will not accept the test of sacrifice is a false hope.
4. False prophets had, however, some little ground to work upon: they mistook the imaginary for the real: Have ye not seen a vain vision? That is the difficulty. If there was absolutely nothing, we should have a clear course; but we have lying definitions, we have occasional dreams, and peculiar impressions; and people who resent the idea of accepting a theology made by the Church adopt an astrology or a theology of their own, founded upon cobwebs, built upon mist, and pointing to nothing. Let us pray God to cleanse our vision, lest, seeing men as trees walking, or trees as men walking, we confound the reality of things; and above all, let us say to one another, Brother, help me, and I will help some weaker man, Let us have our strength common.
5. What course does the Lord pursue against such falsity? I am against you, saith the Lord God. We know, then, exactly what strength we have to encounter. It is only omnipotence. We have sometimes wondered how it is we do not succeed. There need not be any wonder about it; for our failure arises from one of two causes: either, first, that God is against us, in the sense of judging us to be false; or God is trying us to develop our strength. Let us adopt the second conclusion where we can, for it will cheer us and help us on many a weary day.
6. What further course will the Lord take against these false prophets? He will destroy them. They build a wall; He sends hail down upon it, and brings the wall all to pieces. We need not go to the Prophet Ezekiel to know if this is true. What walls we have built! What strength we were going to have! We had already drawn out a hundred programmes, every one of which ended in pounds, shillings, and pence; and a hundred more, ending in honour, fame, influence; and another hundred, ending in herds and flocks, and abundance of family connections and great peace, and long days: and whilst we were filling our mouth with the wind the Lord touched us, and we fell down as dead men. If the Lord, then, is so set against falsehood, what will He do for us? He will speak the truth, He will send angels of truth, messengers of mercy and love. Beware lest we have all our truth on paper, in propositions, innumerable and well detailed dogmas: we must first have it in our souls, hearts, lives; we must be prepared to live for it and to die for it, and then it will grow, accumulate, multiply; and we shall begin to see, with the ever excellent because ever modest philosopher, Sir Isaac Newton, that we have only gathered a few shells on the shore, while the great ocean of truth lies all undiscovered before us. Such modesty well becomes men who were born yesterday and may be forgotten tomorrow. (J. Parker, D. D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv1, 17 (4.) OF FALSE PROPHETS AND PROPHETESSES (Chap. 13)
(4.) OF FALSE PROPHETS AND PROPHETESSES (Chap. 13)
Condemnation of the Prophets (Eze_13:1-16)
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EXEGETICAL NOTES.—The declaration in Eze_12:24 was that unsubstantiated and delusive prophecy should cease by the fulfilment of the true, and in this chapter a description and denunciation of the former are given. The men and women who had taken upon themselves to announce “salvation without repentance, grace without judgment,” were found both in Judea and among the captive Jews. The utterance of Ezekiel is akin to that of Jeremiah (chap. 23.). Both indicate that the wishes of the people framed a mould for conclusions as to the will of the Lord. They made the prophets they believed in.
Eze_13:1-7 describe the characteristics of the unauthorised prophets. Eze_13:2. Ezekiel is enjoined to prophecy “to the prophets of Israel;” they had popular sympathy and acceptance. The spirit of the age approved of them, although they were “prophets out of their own hearts.” They might sincerely hold what they said as true, but their words were nothing except the products of their imaginations; anything but the communications of God. “Hear the word of the Lord.” That which they had not within they shall obtain from without, and to their shame. If false representations of God are powerful He will raise up a standard against them.
Eze_13:3. They are threatened. “Woe to the prophets, fools,” not merely in going where they were not sent, but actually godless men (Psa_14:1), and consequently “who walk after their own spirit, and that which they have not seen.” Not by the insight which the Lord gives (Rev_1:2; Rev_1:11, &c.) A twofold aspect of a revelation of God is presented. Its starting-point. It begins in an impression made on a man’s spirit, and is not originated by his own thoughts and fancies. Its goal. The statement of truth accordant with God’s justice and love. The light of the face of God, not the man’s inner light, is to satisfy the calls for guidance in right thoughts and ways. Christ, and not humanity, must be our test of truth.
Eze_13:4. “As foxes among ruins thy prophets, O Israel, are.” Deserted places are a favourite resort of foxes. “Because of the mountain of Zion which is desolate, the foxes walk upon it” (Lam_5:18). And those who were counted messengers of the Lord found their sphere of profit in the omens of the desolation of Jerusalem.
Eze_13:5. Israel by sins had become exposed to the assaults of divine penalties; but its favoured prophets had acted like unpatriotic cowards in the crisis of danger. “Ye have not gone up into the breaches, nor made up a wall about the house of Israel to stand in the battle in the day of the Lord.” The moral and spiritual evils of the people were as gaps in the wall of Jerusalem; but the prophets had done nothing by reproof and personal conduct to urge to repentance and reformation. They had nothing of that self-humiliation and intercession for the guilty which was manifested by Abraham (Gen_18:23-33), Moses (Exo_32:11-13), Paul (Rom_9:3).
Eze_13:6. All pseudo-prophets might not be deceiving, but though “the Lord had not sent them,” yet “they hoped to establish the word,” i.e., they tried to persuade the people that the unsupported promises made to them would be fully realised, with this result alone, that the falsity would be all the more painfully brought home.
Eze_13:8-16. Announce the consequences of prophesying without divine impulse. Eze_13:8 states that the Lord is against the prophets; and Eze_13:9 intimates three calamities which shall befall them in relation to the new theocratic regime. They shall neither be numbered “in the council of my people,” they will not be members of the influential and ruling circle; nor “be written in the register of the house of Israel,” they will not be struck out of that roll which has given them a name and place among the citizens of Israel, but they will not be entered into the roll of the Israel which shall arise from the faithful remnant; and the portion which is in exile “shall not come into the land of Israel” (Eze_13:10). The erring prophets had brought condemnation upon themselves, and produced such a state that “it,” the people, “built a wall, and behold, they,” the prophets, “coat it with plaster” (or whitewash, Fair., who refers to Paul’s indignant charge on the high priest, “Thou whited wall!” Act_23:3); ministering to the deceptive hopes of the people instead of exposing their worthlessness. The deluding of the prophets would not last (Eze_13:11). “It,” the wall, daubed “with whited plaster, shall fall” by means of agencies controlled by God the Lord: the “rain,” “hail-stones,” and “storm,” which should be launched against it. Eze_13:14 applies the figure to the reality, and threatens the destruction of those who believed a lie. “I cast it to the ground, and its foundation is laid bare and it falls, and ye are consumed in the midst of it,” i.e. of Jerusalem (comp. Mat_7:24-27). Eze_13:15. Both deceived and deceivers would be overwhelmed: “And I will say unto you, The wall is not, and they who coated it are not.” Eze_13:16. Ezekiel rounds off this portion of his utterance with a thrust at “the prophets of Israel” who affirmed that they saw “a vision of peace for her,” Jerusalem, “and there is no peace.”
HOMILETICS
MISLEADING HOPES OF FREEDOM FROM FUTURE EVILS
The Jews entertained delusive hopes regarding the future welfare of their city and land, and observation proves that, where the Gospel is preached in town or country, many hearers indulge in ungrounded trust as to their escape from the judgment of God against their doings. The reasons which are at work to produce this mistake are similar in the present age to those which operated in the past. They are—
I. Slighting notions as to the evil of sin. People may neglect to follow a prescribed course of obedience, or may openly take the course which cuts across it; but they are not humbled for so doing. They make up excuses. “I am not like this publican.” “I have a good heart.” “I have not done things worthy to suffer destruction.” At the base of all wrong thoughts, at the base of all erroneous teachings as to man’s position before God, lies a misconception of the guilt of secret or presumptuous sins. All unrighteousness is sin and a gap through which unknown penalty rushes on the guilty.
II. Listening to one’s own wishes. We do not wish to count ourselves really “miserable sinners,” or to look at the signs which show that we are moving down the hellward slopes of sin; so we evade the accusations which the true and faithful witness brings against us. His voice is not heard, or, if we cannot ignore it, we easily suppose that its warnings must be meant for others, not for us. How needful to arm ourselves with the mind which will ask, Am I regulating my convictions by what I wish or by what the Lord wishes? Are the teachings to which I listen such as I like to have, or are they based upon the truth and holiness of God?
III. Influenced by misguiding teachers. This influence is exerted by self originated doctrines. They speak from their own heart. They propound and defend opinions grounded on their views of things, and not on the reality. They can evolve worlds, form conscience, do away with all necessity of a living God. They promise smooth things to a people who have a form of godliness. They hide the present damnation of sin under statements which excuse defective and immoral conduct, and its future under explanations which impugn eternal justice. By plausible help. They covered over ugly and dangerous inlets of evil, and they seemed safe; but the covering was of too flimsy a kind. It did not show lives lived differently from those of the transgressors. It did not indicate effectual prayer for the people. It did not denounce sin and warn of its impending punishment: or it did so in such general terms that none are convinced that they are the evildoers who are doomed to the overwhelming wrath of Him before whom evil cannot stand. By their professed authorisation. They prophesied in the name of the Lord though He knew them not. They had so far regard to God as to believe that they ought to say only what He commanded. They may speak what they think; sincerely suppose that they have right on their side; but they are deceived. They see that which might be perceived to be a lie, thus they buoy up their hearers with false hopes and do untold harm to bodies and souls by their errors.
“Some teach men to expect safety from a comparative decency of moral character; some on account of formal and superstitious observances; some because they belong to an orthodox part of the Church and have got some notions of certain important doctrines; some because of their impressions and enthusiastic reveries; and others even by a direct abuse of the gospel and making Christ the minister of sin.… All are alike distant from Christ the true foundation: they build not on Him by a penitent faith that worketh by love, and produceth obedience; they either leave out His merits and atonement, or the work of His new-creating Spirit, or the substantial fruits of righteousness; and in different ways endeavour to varnish, paint and repair the old building, instead of erecting a new one on a new foundation, for ‘an habitation of God through the Spirit.’ ”—W. F.
1. Judgment will come notwithstanding hopes of escaping it. Nothing of man can avail to resist it. The daubed wall shall fall and overwhelm misleaders and misled.
2. Beware lest thou flatter with a trust to hopes of safety which are not drawn from God’s will revealed in Christ. Thou hast the knowledge given of Him. Be true and faithful to Him only.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain On v1 Eze 13:17-23
Eze 13:17-23
I. The sewing of the pillows under the arms or elbows of those who came to consult the prophetesses was a symbolical act, intended to convey an answer by way of parable. The prophetesses wished to assure the people who came to them, of peace and ease and emancipation from slavery; what more likely than that they should not only give promises of these good things to come by word of mouth, but cause the people, who applied to them, to sit at ease, to be propped up with pillows as a sign and token of the condition of peace and rest and ease, which they promised in their prophecies. In like manner I think it probable that the handkerchiefs which the prophetesses put on the heads of their votaries, "on the heads of persons of all ages," were probably an emblem of liberty. And when the prophetesses placed these handkerchiefs on the heads of those who came to them, it was probably intended to declare by a parable, that the people would soon be free, and not subject to the king of Babylon any more.
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II. The dealing of the prophetesses is particularly blamed because it was the same to all; there was only one message, and that one of peace for Jerusalem, one of joy in the future. There was no examination of the spiritual condition of those who came, and adapting of the message accordingly. The penitent and the impenitent had the same pillow to rest upon, and the same cap of liberty put upon the head. When we consider the utter confusion that would be produced, and the fearful manner in which the lessons of Ezekiel and his messages of lamentation and mourning and woe would be neutralised and made of none effect, we shall not be surprised that God pronounced a very grievous woe against these prophetesses, and promised as a special boon to His people that they should be delivered out of their hands.
III. We all have our Ezekiels to tell us the truth, and we all have our false prophets and prophetesses ready to contradict the truth, and to substitute lies in place of it. Ezekiel tells us that we must repent; he assures us that God does not wish the death of a sinner, that God has, in fact, sent His Son into the world that we might live and not die. But still he tells us that we must repent; that we must correct what is amiss; that we must examine what our sins are, and forsake them. The ministers of Christ’s Gospel make a fearful and dangerous mistake, if they ever cry, "Peace, peace," and nothing else.
Bishop Harvey Goodwin, Parish Sermons, 5th series, p. 154.
Eze 13:22
I. Where the way of life was broad the false prophets strove to make it narrow, and where it was narrow they strove to make it broad; by their solemn and superstitious lies they frightened and perplexed the good, while by their lives of ungodliness they emboldened and encouraged the wicked. The tendency of either evil to produce the other is sure and universal. We cannot exist without some influences of fear and restraint on the one hand, and without some indulgence of freedom on the other. God has provided for both these wants, so to speak, of our nature; He has told us whom we should fear, and where we should be restrained, and where, also, we may safely be in freedom; there is the fruit forbidden, and the fruit which we may eat freely. But if the restraint and the liberty be either of them put in the wrong place the double evil is sure to follow. Superstition is the rest of wickedness, and wickedness is the breaking loose of superstition.
II. Nothing is more common than to see great narrowness of mind, great prejudices, and great disorderliness of conduct, united in the same person. Nothing is more common than to see the same mind utterly prostrated before some idol of its own, and supporting that idol with the most furious zeal, and at the same time utterly rebellious to Christ, and rejecting with scorn the enlightening, the purifying, the loving influences of Christ’s spirit. Every one of us has a tendency to some idol or other, if not to many; and our business is especially each to watch ourselves, lest we be ensnared to our particular idol.
III. Things good, things noble, things sacred, may all become idols. To some minds truth is an idol, to others justice, to others charity or benevolence; and others are beguiled by objects of a different sort of sacredness; some have made Christ’s mother their idol; some Christ’s servants; some, again, Christ’s sacraments, and Christ’s own body, the Church. If these may all be idols, where can we find a name so holy as that we may surrender up our whole souls to it; before which obedience, reverence without measure, intense humility, most unreserved adoration, may be duly tendered? One name there is, and one only; one alone in heaven and in earth; not truth, not justice, not benevolence, not Christ’s mother, not His holiest servants, not His blessed sacraments, not His very mystical body, but Himself only, who died for us, and rose again, Jesus Christ, both God and man. As no idol can stand in Christ’s place, or in any way save us, so whoever worships Christ truly is preserved from all idols and has life eternal.
T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. iv.
Reference: Eze 14:1-3.—Bishop How, Plain Words, 2nd series, p. 252.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v1 Eze 13:1-23. And now the Lord speaks through Ezekiel…
Eze 13:1-23. And now the Lord speaks through Ezekiel about the false prophets in the midst of His people. They prophesied out of their own hearts; or as it might be rendered, “Who prophesy from their own mind without having seen.” Such they were and such are the false teachers of this present age 2Pe 2:1-22. Of such our Lord warned: “Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves” Mat 7:15. Every man who prophesies out of his own heart, who utters his own mind, whose preaching and teaching is not according to the oracles of God, is a false prophet, a blind leader of the blind. Like false prophets in Israel the false teachers in Christendom are the cause of the spiritual condition of the professing people of God. Of all such it is true what the Lord said through Ezekiel: “They have seen vanity and lying divination, saying, “The Lord saith, and the Lord has not sent them.” They are self-called and self-sent. Behind them stands the father of lies 1Ki 22:19-53; 1Ti 4:11. Next we find in Eze 13:8-16 their condemnation and punishment. But there were also false women prophets; they practised occultism.
All this is also done in the very midst of Christendom in the twentieth century. Women prophets, the most subtle instruments of Satan, are plentiful in these days. The fact has often been pointed out that the prominent leaders in the evil cults of the last days are women. There has been a strange modern-day revival of occult practices upon Christian ground. Spiritualism, Theosophy, and Christian Science belong to this class. All three started with women. Spiritualism with its mediums, fortune-tellers and necromancers is almost entirely in the hands of women, who claim to be religious leaders. The same is true of theosophy, with its Hindu philosophy, and occultism, surrounded with an air of unholy mysticism. Christian Science is closely related to these two cults. Its founder practiced for a time the calling of a medium.
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Significant is the description of their evil testimony as given in Eze 13:22.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv1, 17 Against the False Prophets
Against the False Prophets
v. 1. And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying,
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v. 2. Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel, self-styled teachers and leaders as they were, that prophesy, and say thou unto them that prophesy out of their own hearts, without a call from the Lord, speaking of a speedy return to Jerusalem without any warrant on His part, Hear ye the word of the Lord, whose proclamation of truth was opposed to all such deception,
v. 3. Thus saith the Lord God, the sovereign Ruler of the universe, Woe unto the foolish prophets, vaunting themselves with a wisdom which was nothing but foolishness in the sight of God, that follow their own spirit, the imagination of their own hearts, and have seen nothing! have bad no vision given them by God, teaching only what they themselves have thought out.
v. 4. O Israel, thy prophets are like the foxes in the deserts, in the ruins, for the self-appointed leaders and teachers of the people were wily destroyers, who worked stealthily, but none the less surely, at the ruin of the nation. The Lord now once more turns to the false Prophets themselves.
v. 5. Ye have not gone up into the gaps, by placing themselves in the breaches to resist the attacks of the enemies directed against such weak spots, neither made up the hedge for the house of Israel, literally, "neither built a wall about Israel," to stand in the battle in the day of the Lord, in the war which all believers must wage for the honor of Jehovah. The false prophets did not try to repair the evil with which the nation was suffering; they made no attempt to bring back the people to the Law of God with good counsels, nor by withstanding the efforts of the wicked with proper rebukes.
v. 6. They have seen vanity, nothingness, empty imaginations, and lying divination, so that they even believed their own lies, saying, The Lord saith, insisting that their message was the inspired Word of God, and the Lord hath not sent them; and they have made others to hope that they would confirm the word, literally, "and hope for confirmation of a word," that is, they foolishly trusted that their false prophecy, in spite of all evidences to the contrary, would yet be fulfilled.
v. 7. Have ye not seen a vain vision, and have ye not spoken a lying divination, whereas ye say, The Lord saith it, albeit I have not spoken? They should deceive neither themselves nor others, for there was not the slightest foundation for their claim.
v. 8. Therefore, thus saith the Lord God, Jehovah, the sovereign Ruler of the universe, Because ye have spoken vanity and seen lies, publishing them as the truth of the Lord, therefore, behold, I am against you, coming against them with a severe punishment, saith the Lord God.
v. 9. And Mine hand shall be upon the prophets that see vanity and that divine lies, namely, for the purpose of severely punishing them; they shall not be in the assembly of My people, in the roll of the citizens belonging to the Lord, to the people of God, neither shall they be written in the writing of the house of Israel, excluded from those whom the Lord had chosen as His own, neither shall they enter into the land of Israel, namely, as members entitled to possess the Lord’s heritage; and ye shall know that I am the Lord God. The false prophets should lose all the rights and privileges which the members of God’s nation had, being denied all the special blessings which are the portion of his children.
v. 10. Because, even because they have seduced My people, the introduction to His sentence being made in a most solemn and formal manner in order to heighten the effect of its condemnation, saying, Peace, and there was no peace, speaking of deliverance and salvation in spite of God’s threats to the contrary; and one built up a wall, by proclaiming false hopes, and, lo, others, members of the same class of false teachers, daubed it with untempered mortar, with worthless building material, with a cheap grade of whitewash. Thus the unsoundness of the wall from the absence of true binding cement is brought out.
v. 11. Say unto them which daub it with untempered mortar that it shall fall, this being the consequence of building so unsafely, even if it was not the intention. There shall be an overflowing shower, a very severe shower of rain, a rainstorm; and ye, O great hailstones, shall fall, and a stormy wind shall rend it, so that the weak wall with its many breaches would not be able to stand up under the impact of the forces of nature summoned against it by God. Thus the deceitful, hypocritical covering over of the inner corruption would become evident.
v. 12. Lo, when the wall is fallen, shall it not be said unto you, Where is the daubing wherewith ye have daubed it? The hypocrisy and falsehood of the false prophets’ ministry would become evident in the course of time, so that they would be exposed before all men.
v. 13. Therefore, thus saith the Lord God, I will even rend it with a stormy wind in My fury, or, "I cause a windstorm to break forth in My fury"; and there shall be an overflowing shower in Mine anger and great hailstones in My fury to consume it, unto utter destruction.
v. 14. So will I break down the wall that ye have daubed with untempered mortar and bring it down to the ground, so that the foundation thereof shall be discovered, laid bare, and it shall fall, and ye shall be consumed in the midst thereof, perishing in the midst of Jerusalem, as the center of the theocracy; and ye shall know that I am the Lord.
v. 15. Thus will I accomplish My wrath upon the wall and upon them that have daubed it with untempered mortar, with the coating of hypocritical whitewash which lacked all the qualities of a binding cement, and will say unto you, The wail is no more, neither they that daubed it,
v. 16. to wit, the prophets of Israel which prophesy concerning Jerusalem, setting forth their own false predictions, and which see visions of peace for her, of salvation and deliverance in spite of her idolatrous ways, and there is no piece, says the Lord God. It is true of all false prophets that their hypocrisy and deceit will eventually be uncovered, if not before, then on the day of the Lord’s great reckoning with the whole world.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 5, 8, 10, 13, 15, 17, 19, 20, 22 the word of Yahweh came
the word of Yahweh came
This is an idiom that is used to introduce something that God told his prophets or his people. See how you translated this in Ezekiel 3:16. AT: "Yahweh spoke this message" or "Yahweh spoke these words" (See: Idiom)
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Son of man
"Son of a human being" or "Son of humanity." God calls Ezekiel this to emphasize that Ezekiel is only a human being. God is eternal and powerful, but humans are not. See how you translated this in Ezekiel 2:1. AT: "Mortal person" or "Human"
prophesying out of their own imaginations
"prophesying only the things that they imagine"
who follow their own spirit
Here the word "spirit" represents the thoughts and ideas of the person. To "follow" here is an idiom that means to do what their own ideas suggest for them to do. AT: "who act according to their own ideas" (See: Idiom)
like jackals in the wastelands
Like jackals that scavenge for food and shelter among the abandoned ruins of cities, the prophets are using the destruction of Jerusalem for their own benefit. (See: Simile)
jackals
wild animals that are related to dogs and that scavenge for food in abandoned places.
translationWords
word of God
Son of Man
prophet
Israel
mind
Lord Yahweh
woe
fool
spirit
waste
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 4, 6, 8, 10, 17, 20 13:1-3 The fundamental difference between true and false prophets…
13:1-3 The fundamental difference between true and false prophets was that false prophets were inventing their own prophecies, while true prophets spoke the word of the Lord. Now these false prophets would receive a word from the Lord about their own destruction. Sorrow awaited these deceived and deceiving messengers.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.