Ezekiel 35:6 - Exposition

I will prepare thee unto blood . This peculiar expression was probably selected because of the suggestion of the name Edom ("red") contained in the term dam ("blood")—though Smend doubts this—and designed to intimate that Edom's name would eventually be verified in Edom's fate. And blood shall pursue thee . "As blood-guiltiness invariably pursues a murderer, cries for vengeance, and delivers him up to punishment" (Havernick), so should blood follow in the steps of Edom. The translation of Ewald, who reads מַעַשְׂךָ instead of אֶעֶשְׂךָ , "And because thy inclination is after blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee," is hardly an improvement, and is besides unnecessary. Sith thou hast not hated blood . So render Ewald, Keil, Kliefoth, Havernick, Schroder, Plumptre, and the Revised Version, meaning that Edom had loved bloodshed. Kimchi, Hitzig, Hengstenberg, Smend, and Fairbairn regard אִם־לֹא as a particle of strong affirmation, equivalent to "forsooth," "verily," and understand the prophet to say that 'Edom had hated blood. As to the precise import of this rendering, diversity of sentiment prevails. Some, with Theodoret, explain "blood" as an allusion to the blood-relationship of Esau and Jacob, Edom and Israel, and hold the charge to be that Edom had hated his "brother" Israel. Others, with Hengstenberg, take the blood Edom hated to be the blood he had shed. Hitzig and Fairbairn suppose the sense to be that Edom hated the idea of his own blood being shed. Even —better, therefore (Revised Version)— blood shall pursue thee . A parallel to this expression is supplied by Deuteronomy 28:22 , Deuteronomy 28:45 . According to the first or commonly accepted exposition of the preceding clause, the sense is that Edom would ultimately fall beneath the great law of retribution, and reap as she had sown—blood for blood; according to the second, the allusion is to the fact that what Edom now most dreaded, the shedding of his own blood, would be that which should ultimately overtake him (cf. Ezekiel 11:8 ; Job 3:25 ).