Ezekiel 4:1

PROPHECY OF JERUSALEM'S DESTRUCTION (Ezekiel 4-7)

VISIBLE PORTRAYAL OF FALL OF JERUSALEM

The absurd view that the events of this chapter existed only subjectively in the mind of Ezekiel, that it was all a vision of his, is here rejected. "The adoption of such an interpretation is not the act of an honest interpreter."[1]

What Ezekiel did here was only another example of what many of God's prophets throughout the ages also did. Zedekiah's "horns of iron" (1 Kings 22:11); Isaiah's walking "naked and barefoot" (Isaiah 22:2-3); Jeremiah's "yokes of wood" (Jeremiah 27:2); Hosea's marriage to Gomer (Hosea 1:1-3:10); Zechariah's breaking of Beauty and Bands (Zechariah 11); Agabus' binding himself with Paul's belt (Acts 21:10),, etc. are other examples of such enacted prophecies.

This chapter portrays (1) the visible model of Jerusalem's siege and capture (Ezekiel 4:1-3), the certainty of punishment awaiting both the northern and southern Israels (Ezekiel 4:4-8), the scarcity of food for the inhabitants of Jerusalem (Ezekiel 4:9-11), and the ceremonial uncleanness that would come to the besieged and to the captives (Ezekiel 4:12-17).

Regarding the time of the events recorded here, Canon Cook placed it in the fifth year of the captivity of Jehoiachin (592 B.C.). He also noted that the destruction of Jerusalem was contrary to all human expectations.

"It could scarcely have been expected that Zedekiah, the creature of the king of Babylon and ruling by his authority in the place of Jehoiachin would have been so infatuated as to provoke the anger of the powerful Nebuchadnezzar. It was indeed to infatuation that the historian ascribed that foolish act of Zedekiah (2 Kings 24:20).[2]

Ezekiel 4:1-3

"Thou also, son of man, take thee a tile, and lay it before thee, and portray upon it a city, even Jerusalem: and lay siege against it, and build forts against it, and cast up a mound against it, and plant battering rams against it round about. And take thou unto thee an iron pan, and set it for a wall of iron between thee and the city: and set thy face toward it, and it shall be besieged, and thou shalt lay siege against it. This shall be a sign to the house of Israel."

"Take thee a tile ..." (Ezekiel 4:1). The fact that he could draw a map on this tile identifies it as coming from Babylon, not Jerusalem, clearly indicating that Ezekiel was written from the land of Israel's captivity, despite the concentrated focus upon Jerusalem. This special concern for Jerusalem should not surprise us. "This requires no explanation. Jerusalem was the heart and the brain of the nation, the center of its life and its religion, and in the eyes of the prophets (all of them) the fountain-head of its sin."[3]

The necessity of the prophetic warning to Israel regarding the ultimate fall and total destruction of Jerusalem lay in the foolish and blind optimism of the people. "Even after they were carried into captivity, numbers of them were still engaging in false optimism,"[4] supposing that the captivity would soon end dramatically, and failing to understand that their dreadful servitude was nothing more than God's punishment of their consummate wickedness, a punishment they richly deserved.

This unexpected, totally improbable fall of Jerusalem is throughout this section of Ezekiel the almost constant subject. "The great theme of the first part of Ezekiel is the certainty of the complete downfall of the Jewish state."[5]

This model of the city of Jerusalem, with the deployment of all kinds of military installations and equipment all around it, "was a proper and powerful device for capturing attention, and it amounted to a prediction of the fall of Jerusalem."[6]

Ezekiel probably had many examples of this type of illustration to aid him in the fulfillment of God's command, because, "Assyrian bas-reliefs show in vigorous detail how a siege was carried out."[7]

In the analogy here, Ezekiel himself enacts the part of God as the true besieger of the city. It came to pass as Jeremiah prophesied, when God said, "I myself shall fight against you with outstretched hand and strong arm, in anger, and in fury, and in great wrath" (Jeremiah 21:5).

The iron barrier (represented by the cooking utensil) stood for the wall of separation which the sins of Israel had erected between themselves and the Lord. "Your iniquities have been a barrier between you and your God,' (Isaiah 59:2). "It meant the total severance of relation between Jerusalem and God, `You have screened yourself off with a cloud, that prayer may not pass through.'"[8]

It would appear from the overwhelmingly bad news of such an illustrated prophecy that Israel should have been filled with sorrow and consternation over it, "But there seems to have been little response to it. Ezekiel was being taught in the crucible of human experience the incredible resistance of men to the Word of God."[9]