Ezekiel 36:3 - Exposition

Therefore . Ewald calls attention to the fivefold repetition of this conjunction, saying, "It repeats itself five times, the reasons [for God's judgments] against these enemies thrusting themselves forward, before the discourse calmly dwells upon the mountains of Israel, of which it is strictly intended to treat." As it were, the prophet's emotion is so strong, and his indignation against Israel's enemies so vehement, that, though he three times in succession begins to prophesy to the mountains of Israel, he on each occasion breaks off before he can get his message told, to expatiate upon the wickedness of Israel's foes. In the prophet's estimation that wickedness was so heinous as to inevitably carry in its bosom appropriate retribution. Because —literally, because and because , or even because , a reduplication for the sake of emphasis, as in Ezekiel 13:10 and Le 26:43— they have made you desolate , and swallowed you up on every side ; literally, wasting of and panting after you (are) round about . Fairbairn, Ewald, and Smend, deriving שַׁמוֹת from נָשַׁם , "to pant," rather than from שָׁמַם , "to lay waste," translate, "because there is snapping and puffing at you round about," which Plumptre thinks "falls in better with the context," since "the prophet's spirit seems to dwell throughout on the derision rather than the desolation to which his country, the mountains of Israel, had been subject." And ye are taken up ; literally, ye are made to come, if וַתֵּעֲלוּ be an imperf; niph. of עָלַה , "to go up "(Rosenmüller, Schroder); or, ye are come , if it be imperf; kal of עָלַל , "to press, or go in" (Ewald, Havernick); or, ye are gone up , if it be second pers. kal of עָלַה (Hitzig, Smend). In the lips of talkers ; literally, upon the lip of the tongue—the lip being regarded as the instrument or organ with which the tongue speaks. Havernick unnecessarily takes "the tongue" as equivalent to "people" in the parallel clause—a signification לָשׁוֹן has only in Isaiah 66:18 ; while Kliefoth views it as synonymous with "slander," as in Psalms 140:11 , and translates, "upon the lip of slander and of the evil report of the people." Keil sees in "the tongue" a personification for the "tongue-man" or talker of Psalms 140:11 ; and Gesenius considers the two clauses as tautological.