therefore the Lord Yahweh says, ‘Behold, I am against you, Tyre, and will cause many nations to come up against you, as the sea causes its waves to come up.
Parallel Translations
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therefore the Lord Yahweh says, ‘Behold, I am against you, Tyre, and will cause many nations to come up against you, as the sea causes its waves to come up.
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Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Tyrus, and will cause many nations to come up against thee, as the sea causeth his waves to come up.
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Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD: Behold, I am against thee, O Tyre, and will cause many nations to come up against thee, as the sea causeth its waves to come up.
Cross-references (18)
Passages linked to Ezekiel 26:3 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Jeremiah 51:42 The sea has come up on Babylon. She is covered with the multitude of its waves.
- Isaiah 5:30 They will roar against them in that day like the roaring of the sea. If one looks to the land, behold, darkness and distress. The light is darkened in its clouds.
- Ezekiel 27:32-34 In their wailing they will take up a lamentation for you, and lament over you, saying, ‘Who is there like Tyre, like her who is brought to silence in the middle of the sea?’ When your wares went out of the seas, you filled many peoples. You enriched the kings of the earth with the multitude of your riches and of your merchandise. In the time that you were broken by the seas, in the depths of the waters, your merchandise and all your company fell within you.
- Micah 4:11 Now many nations have assembled against you, that say, “Let her be defiled, and let our eye gloat over Zion.”
- Psalms 93:3-4 The floods have lifted up, Yahweh, the floods have lifted up their voice. The floods lift up their waves. Above the voices of many waters, the mighty breakers of the sea, Yahweh on high is mighty.
- Psalms 107:25 For he commands, and raises the stormy wind, which lifts up its waves.
- Jeremiah 6:23 They take hold of bow and spear. They are cruel, and have no mercy. Their voice roars like the sea, and they ride on horses, everyone set in array, as a man to the battle, against you, daughter of Zion.”
- Jeremiah 21:13 Behold, I am against you, O inhabitant of the valley, and of the rock of the plain,’ says Yahweh. ‘You that say, “Who would come down against us?” or “Who would enter into our homes?”
- Jeremiah 50:31 “Behold, I am against you, you proud one,” says the Lord, Yahweh of Armies; “for your day has come, the time that I will visit you.
- Jeremiah 50:42 They take up bow and spear. They are cruel, and have no mercy. Their voice roars like the sea. They ride on horses, everyone set in array, as a man to the battle, against you, daughter of Babylon.
- Ezekiel 5:8 therefore the Lord Yahweh says: ‘Behold, I, even I, am against you; and I will execute judgments among you in the sight of the nations.
- Ezekiel 21:3 Tell the land of Israel, ‘Yahweh says: “Behold, I am against you, and will draw my sword out of its sheath, and will cut off from you the righteous and the wicked.
- Ezekiel 27:26 Your rowers have brought you into great waters. The east wind has broken you in the heart of the seas.
- Ezekiel 28:22 and say, ‘The Lord Yahweh says: “Behold, I am against you, Sidon. I will be glorified among you. Then they will know that I am Yahweh, when I have executed judgments in her, and am sanctified in her.
- Ezekiel 38:3 and say, ‘The Lord Yahweh says: “Behold, I am against you, Gog, prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal.
- Nahum 2:12 The lion tore in pieces enough for his cubs, and strangled for his lionesses, and filled his caves with the kill, and his dens with prey.
- Zechariah 14:2 For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city will be taken, the houses rifled, and the women ravished. Half of the city will go out into captivity, and the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city.
- Luke 21:25 There will be signs in the sun, moon, and stars; and on the earth anxiety of nations, in perplexity for the roaring of the sea and the waves;
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (12 sources)
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John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Eze 26:3 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold,…
Eze 26:3 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I [am] against thee, O Tyrus, and will cause many nations to come up against thee, as the sea causeth his waves to come up.
Ver. 3. Therefore thus saith the Lord God.] And thy merchants will soon do thee word of it; for they are great newsmongers, and ill news is swift of foot. {a}
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Behold, I am against them.] Neither can thine Apollo help or deliver thee out of my hands; no, though thou chain that idol and nail him to a post, that thou mayest be sure of him; for so these Tyrians did when Alexander besieged their city and took it.
{a} αι γλαγαι ποδωκεις. - Pindar.
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 I am against thee; and if God be against…
I am against thee; and if God be against them, they will soon have enemies enough too against them: God purposeth, threateneth, and assureth them he is and will be against them.
Many nations, for number, and mighty for strength, riches, authority, and feats of war already done.
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As the sea causeth his waves to come up, with such violence, constancy, swelling in height, and making thee fear the issue, so shall the Babylonians come.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Therefore thus saith the Lord God,.... Who knew the…
Therefore thus saith the Lord God,.... Who knew the thoughts of the inhabitants of Tyre, and what joy possessed their hearts, and which their lips expressed; and who informs the prophet of it, though at a great distance, and declares his resentment at it:
behold, I am against thee, O Tyrus; and nothing can be more dreadful and formidable than to have God against a nation, city, or a particular person: Tyre was a type of antichrist, who will express a like joy at the death of the witnesses; thinking that the merchandise of Rome will be increased greatly, and there will be nothing to interrupt it, Rev 11:10, but God will show his displeasure, and bring sudden destruction on it:
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and will cause many nations to come up against thee, as the sea causeth his waves to come up; the Chaldean army, consisting of soldiers of many nations; who for their number, noise, and fury, are compared to the raging waves of the sea. So the Targum,
"I will bring up against thee an army of many people, as the sea ascendeth in the raging of its waves;''
the ten kings shall hate the whore, and destroy her, even those very people she reigns over, compared to many waters, Rev 17:15.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 3. Will cause many nations to come up…
Verse 3. Will cause many nations to come up against thee] We have already seen that the empire of the Chaldeans was composed of many different provinces, and that Nebuchadnezzar's army was composed of soldiers from different nations: these may be the people meant; but I doubt whether this may not refer to the different nations which in successive ages fought against Tyre. It was at last finally destroyed in the sixteenth century of the Christian era.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Up. Nabuchodonosor besieged the city for thirteen years. The…
Up. Nabuchodonosor besieged the city for thirteen years. The profane historians read by St. Jerome took no notice of this; but Josephus quotes several. (Antiquities x. 11., and contra Apion i.) (Calmet)
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).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain nations . . . as the sea . .…
nations . . . as the sea . . . waves--In striking contrast to the boasting of Tyre, God threatens to bring against her Babylon's army levied from "many nations," even as the Mediterranean waves that dashed against her rock-founded city on all sides.
scrape her dust . . . make her . . . top of . . . rock--or, "a bare rock" [GROTIUS]. The soil which the Tyrians had brought together upon the rock on which they built their city, I will scrape so clean away as to leave no dust, but only the bare rock as it was. An awful contrast to her expectation of filling herself with all the wealth of the East now that Jerusalem has fallen.
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 3. As the sea causeth his waves to come…
3. As the sea causeth his waves to come up — This figure would be particularly vivid and frightful to the inhabitants of an island city. (See Eze_28:2.)
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 3. The punishment of Tyre. Many nations shall be…
3. The punishment of Tyre. Many nations shall be brought up against her (Eze_26:3); her dust shall be scraped from her into the sea, leaving her a naked rock, a place for drying nets (Eze_26:4-5), and her dependent cities on the mainland shall be laid waste (Eze_26:6).
3. the sea causeth his waves] The comparison is powerful. It is not the succession, but the multitude and overwhelming power of the waves that is referred to.
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 (3) Many nations.—The prophet here, at the outset, glances…
(3) Many nations.—The prophet here, at the outset, glances down through the ages of Tyre’s future history. He has in mind not merely the conquest by Nebuchadnezzar, of which he will speak more particularly presently (Eze_26:7-11), but all the successive conquests until the proud city should be reduced to utter desolation. Most appropriate to the situation and habits of Tyre is the illustration, “as the sea causeth his waves to come up”: God will bring nation after nation to the destruction of Tyre as the sea throws wave after wave against her rock.
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 As the sea causeth, etc. We note the special…
As the sea causeth, etc. We note the special appropriateness of the comparison to the position of the island city.
Divine antagonism.
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I IT IS POSSIBLE FOR GOD TO BE IN ANTAGONISM TO MEN. We have come to regard the quarrel between man and God as one-sided. Now, it is one-sided in its origin, its evil, and its malice. God never wishes to be at war with men, and never originates any breach of the peace. His conduct throughout is just, considerate, marvelously long-suffering. Even when the conflict is forced on to an extremity, God never ceases to love his foolish, fallen children. He is ever waiting to be gracious, longing for signs of contrition and a door of reconciliation. The origin of the quarrel, its evil, and its malice are all on our side. But this does not mean that God takes no part in it, that he only stands before us as an impassive and immobile granite wall that we may dash our heads against, but that never moves an inch against us; much less that he gives way before our rebellious onslaught, and weakly yields to willful opposition on our part. We can provoke the Lord to anger. (Psa_78:58) "God is angry with the wicked every day". (Psa_7:11) As Lord and Judge, he executes sentence. By necessity of righteousness, he sets himself in array against his sinful creatures.
II SIN PROVOKES THE ANTAGONISM OF GOD. God was angry with Tyre for its wickedness, and his anger was not mitigated by the fact that the greedy were rejoicing over the calamities of their neighbors. All sin rouses the anger and active opposition of God. He is not opposed to any one from prejudice, as men are too often opposed to their neighbors. But sin, which is opposition to the will of God, must needs be opposed by him if that will is to be done on earth as it is in heaven. This, then, is not a question for a few rare souls in the awful condition of victims of Divine displeasure. Every sinner has God for his opponent. The fatal punishment of others ought to be a warning. It was not so taken by Tyre. Instead of seeing a dreadful lesson in the ruin of Jerusalem, the Tyrians rejoiced over it. Such wickedness the more stirred up the antagonism of God. Now, these Tyrians were heathen people, judged only according to their light. Yet they were condemned, for the ground of judgment was moral evil, not defective theology. But much more must God be in antagonism to those who have fuller light and yet rebel against him. "Therefore thou art inexcusable," etc.. (Rom_2:1)
III CHRIST HAS COME TO PUT AN END TO THE DIVINE ANTAGONISM. This does not mean that God is reluctant to sheathe his sword, till Christ succeeds in persuading him to do so; for our Lord was sent by his Father for the express purpose of making peace. But the cause of the antagonism had to be removed, and Christ came to effect that end by making his great atonement for sin. Through this also he brought men into a new state of repentance, and reconciled them to God. Now, we are under the doom of Divine antagonism, so long as we live in unrepented sin. But the offer of the gospel shows the way of escape from it in free forgiveness and perfect restoration to the favor of God.
Vers. 3-6. The fate of Type.
From such obscure peoples as the Ammonites, Moabites, and Edomites, who except for their occasional association with Israel are quite aside from the world"s history, the prophet passes to deal with Tyre, one of the greatest and most commanding cities whose deeds and fame adorn the annals of mankind. The Ruler of men does not, indeed, allow the meanest to defy his authority with impunity; his sway extends to the most insignificant of peoples, of tribes. But on the other hand, the proudest and the mightiest are subject to his control, and, when rebellious and defiant, must feel the weight of his irresistible hand.
I THE GREATNESS OF TYRE. The elements of this greatness, the causes which conspired to produce it, were many and various. There may be noticed:
1. Its commanding maritime situation. Partly upon a rock, partly upon the mainland, Tyre sat a queen. To the east, the north, the south, were countries which poured their produce into the Phoenician port; before her, to the west, were the waters of the great sea, upon whose shores lay the great states and cities of the ancient world. Tyre was thus the highway of the nations.
2. Its commerce. This was carried on with all the known countries accessible to the Tyrian fleets. Her supremacy upon the sea gave Tyre a foremost position among the nations; her adventurous mariners not only visited every port of the Mediterranean, they passed the Pillars of Hercules, and traded with "the islands of the West.
3. Its wealth. Every nation paid tribute to Tyre. The exchange, the mart, of the world, it acquired and retained riches scarcely equaled.
4. Its splendor such as is described by Ezekiel was the natural result of the opulence of its enterprising merchants and sea-captains.
5. Its political power was out of all proportion to its territory, its population; its alliance was sought, and its hostility was dreaded.
II THE ENEMIES OF TYRE. These were many and formidable. It is a sad symptom of human depravity that unusual prosperity should excite general dislike, jealousy, envy, and ill will. "Many nations came up against Tyre, as the sea causeth his waves to come up." But some of these adversaries Tyre could treat with derision or contempt. This was not so, however, with Babylon. A different type of civilization and national life was no doubt exhibited in the great kingdom of the East; but the population and armies of Babylonia were enormous, and the resources of the kingdom all but inexhaustible. When the King of Babylon turned his arms against Tyre, brave and powerful as was the regal city by the sea, there was no disguising the fact that the time of trial and of danger had come.
III THE SIEGE AND CONQUEST OF TYRE. It is matter of history that the prophet"s predictions were fulfilled. Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon came up against Tyre, and, notwithstanding its boasted impregnability, laid siege to it, and directed against it all the vast military resources of his kingdom. For long years the siege was maintained. The besieged, having open communication by sea, were able to withstand the assaults of the enemy; and it was only the patience and indomitable perseverance of the Babylonians that gave them the final victory.
IV THE DESTRUCTION AND DESOLATION OF TYRE. A more striking and detailed prediction than this was never uttered; and never was prediction more strikingly and literally fulfilled. The downfall of Tyre was complete. The walls and towers of the city were broken down. The rock upon which she stood a stronghold of defiance was left bare and desolate. The nets of the solitary fisher were spread where magnificence and revelry had reigned. Tyre became a spoil to the nations. Her dependencies were vanquished and destroyed with her; in her they had trusted, in her favor they had basked, and in her ruin they were overwhelmed. The destruction and desolation were in awful contrast to the light and glory, the splendor and power, of bygone days.
APPLICATION. The time of national greatness and prosperity is to any people a time of trial. Then especially does it behoove a nation to beware of pride and self-confidence. For the rebellious, contumacious, and ungodly there is assuredly retribution prepared. The King of all is God of hosts, and he never wants means and agencies to carry out his own righteous and judicial purposes. Resistance to God is vain; it can last but for a short time. And every nation must learn that the Lord is God alone. T.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 "Look!" or "Listen!" or "Pay attention to what I…
Behold!
"Look!" or "Listen!" or "Pay attention to what I am about to tell you!"
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I will raise up many nations against you like the sea raises its waves
Here the word "nations" refers to their armies. AT: "I will gather armies from many nations that will beat against you like the waves in the raging sea" (See: Metonymy and Simile)
I will sweep her dust away and make her like a bare rock
Yahweh speaks of how he will cause Tyre to be completely destroyed. AT: "I will cause the armies to completely destroy the city, and they will leave nothing there" (See: Simile)
translationWords
Lord Yahweh
raise
nation
watchtower
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 26:3-6 The many nations with which Tyre wanted to…
26:3-6 The many nations with which Tyre wanted to trade would instead come against her equipped for war, and like Jerusalem, she would become plunder for their armies. • waves of the sea crashing against your shoreline: This is a particularly apt metaphor for an assault on Tyre, which lay on a small coastal island.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.