Verse 1
Thou also, son of man, take thee a tile ,.... Or "brick" F26 לבנה "laterem", V. L. Pagninus, Montanus, Junius & Tremellius, Polanus. Piscator. . The Targum renders it, a "stone"; but a tile or brick, especially one that is not dried and burned, but green, is more fit to cut in it the figure of a city. Some think that this was ordered because cities are built of brick; or to show the weakness of the city of Jerusalem, how easily it might be demolished; and Jerom thinks there was some design to lead the Jews to reflect upon their making bricks in Egypt, and their hard service there; though perhaps the truer reason may be, because the Babylonians had been used to write upon tiles. Epigenes F1 Apud Plin. Nat. Hist. l. 7. c. 56. says they had celestial observations of a long course of years, written on tiles; hence the prophet is bid to describe Jerusalem on one, which was to be destroyed by the king of Babylon;
and lay it before thee : as persons do, who are about to draw a picture, make a portrait, or engrave the form of anything they intend:
and portray upon it the city; even Jerusalem ; or engrave upon it, by making incisions on it, and so describing the form and figure of the city of Jerusalem.
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