Expository Notes on the Bible (Constable)

• Future blessings following imminent judgment 16:14-21
  The following three pericopes bracket assurance of imminent judgment for Judah with promises of distant blessing for Israel and the nations. This passage promises deliverance from the captivity for the Israelites. It appears ...
• Zedekiah's request and Jeremiah's response 21:1-10
  This passage probably dates from the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem in 588-586 B.C. (vv. 2, 4; cf. 2 Kings 25). King Zedekiah sought advice from Jeremiah more than once (cf. 37:3-10, 17-21; 38:14-28). This passage consists of ...
• Jeremiah's prediction of Nebuchadnezzar's invasion of Egypt 43:8-13
  43:8 The Lord continued to give prophetic messages to Jeremiah in Egypt.43:9 Yahweh instructed Jeremiah to perform another symbolic act (cf. 13:4-7; 19:1-13; 27:1-28:16; Ezek. 4:1-12; 5:1-4; 12:3-6, 18; 37:15-17). He was to h...
• Audience and Purpose
  Ezekiel ministered to the Jews in exile. He probably wrote this book for the benefit of the exiles and the other Jewish communities of his day and beyond his day. In some of his visions (e.g. chs. 8 and 11) the Lord carried t...
• Structure
  There are two major structural peculiarities that set Ezekiel off as distinctive.First, the book is a collection of prophecies arranged in almost consistent chronological order. No other prophetical book is as consistently ch...
• Message42
  Ezekiel began prophesying when he was 30 years old, and he had gone into captivity five years before that. Thus Ezekiel was familiar with Jeremiah's preaching and ministry. Ezekiel shows quite a bit of similarity to Jeremiah ...
• Outline
  I. Ezekiel's calling and commission chs. 1-3A. The vision of God's glory ch. 11. The setting of the vision 1:1-32. The vision proper 1:4-28B. The Lord's charge to Ezekiel chs. 2-31. The recipients of Ezekiel's ministry 2:1-52...
• 3. The nature of Ezekiel's ministry 2:8-3:11
  This pericope contains 10 commands, and it is the center of the chiasm in chapters 1-3."The Lord's charge to Ezekiel emphasized the absolute necessity of hearing, understanding, and assimilating God's message prior to going f...
• C. Yahweh's reply to the invalid hopes of the Israelites chs. 12-19
  "The exiles had not grasped the serious consequences of Ezekiel's warnings. They still hoped for an early return to Palestine, for they viewed the continued preservation of Jerusalem and Judah as signs of security. After all,...
• 1. The dramatic tragedy of exile 12:1-20
  This section contains three messages from the Lord all of which deal with the inevitability of another deportation of Jews from Jerusalem and Judah (vv. 1-7, 8-16, 17-20). Jerusalem would be overthrown and the Jews still ther...
• The sign of the departing deportee 12:1-7
  12:1-2 The Lord came to Ezekiel with another message.190He told His servant that the people among whom he lived, the house of Israel, were rebellious against Him (cf. 2:3-8). Their blindness to the things that they saw and th...
• The explanation of the sign of the departing deportee 12:8-16
  12:8-9 The morning after Ezekiel had performed this little drama the Lord spoke to him again. He reminded His servant that the Jews had asked him to interpret his symbolic acts.12:10 Ezekiel was to explain to them that the or...
• The sign of the anxious eater 12:17-20
  12:17-18 The Lord also instructed Ezekiel to eat his bread and drink his water while trembling and visibly anxious. The prophet appears to have been eating still the symbolic rations that God had prescribed for him earlier (4...
• 2. The present judgment as evidence of divine faithfulness 12:21-28
  This section contains two prophecies (vv. 21-25 and 26-28). The first one deals with the objection of some of the exiles that the prophecies of Jerusalem's overthrow would never come to pass. The second addresses the view of ...
• The validity of prophecies about Jerusalem's destruction 12:21-25
  12:21-22 The Lord asked Ezekiel about a proverb that the Jews were reciting among themselves. They were saying that the days were long and that every vision failed. They meant that the captivity that the true prophets (includ...
• The imminent fulfillment of prophecies of Jerusalem's destruction 12:26-28
  12:26-27 Some of the people were saying that the prophecies about coming judgment were true, but they would not come to pass for a long time."Rebelliousness (v. 25) can take many forms, some of them even quite pious (How do I...
• 3. The condemnation of contemporary false prophets ch. 13
  This chapter follows quite naturally from the previous one. There God corrected the mistaken views of His people, and here He rebuked those who were responsible for those views. In this section God pronounced judgment on the ...
• 9. The importance of individual righteousness ch. 18
  This chapter, like 12:21-28, corrected a common proverb. This one dealt with the people's false view of the reason for their judgment by God."In Chapters 18 and 33 are contained some of the most thorough, carefully expressed,...
• 10. A lament for the kings of Israel ch. 19
  This prophecy shows that there were no more rulers left in Judah who could restore the nation to its former glory. Evidently the exiles hoped that some Davidic descendant would prove successful in overcoming the Babylonians a...
• III. Oracles against foreign nations chs. 25--32
  It is appropriate that this section appears at this point in Ezekiel, between the messages announcing judgment on Judah and Jerusalem for sin (chs. 4-24) and the messages announcing future blessings for Israel (chs. 33-48). I...
• IV. Future blessings for Israel chs. 33--48
  "This last major division of the book focuses on the restoration of Israel's blessing. Israel would be judged for her sin (chaps. 1-24) as would the surrounding nations (chaps. 25-32). But Israel will not remain under judgmen...
• A. A warning to the exiles 33:1-20
  Since this message is undated, it may have come to Ezekiel about the same time as the previous two in chapter 32, namely, in the last month of 585 B.C. If so, Ezekiel received it about two months after God gave him the six me...
• 1. An exhortation to heed the watchman 33:1-9
  This part of Ezekiel's message of warning to the exiles is similar to 3:16-21. Yahweh recommissioned Ezekiel to his prophetic task (cf. chs. 2-3)."Now that Ezekiel's original ministry of judgment was completed, God appointed ...
• 5. Reunification in the Promised Land 37:15-28
  37:15-17 The Lord also commanded Ezekiel to take two sticks (cf. Zech. 11:7-14). He was to write on one of them "For Judah and for the sons of Israel, Judah's companions."He was to write on the other stick "For Joseph and for...
• C. Ezekiel's vision of the return of God's glory chs. 40-48
  The Book of Ezekiel begins with a vision of God's glory (ch. 1), records the departure of God's glory (chs. 8-11), and ends with another vision of God's glory (chs. 40-48). This is the longest vision outside the Book of Revel...
• Bibliography
  Ackroyd, Peter R. Exile and Restoration. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1968.Alexander, Ralph H. Ezekiel. Everyman's Bible Commentary series. Chicago: Moody Press, 1976._____. "Ezekiel."In Isaiah-Ezekiel. Vol. 6 of The Expo...
• 1. The temple in Jerusalem 11:1-2
  11:1 "And"(Gr. kai) ties this chapter closely to the previous one. John's first prophetic assignment after receiving his fresh commission was to provide this information.Again John became an active participant in his vision (...

Expositions Of Holy Scripture (Maclaren)

• II. We Have The Flight And Fate Of Zedekiah And His Evil Advisers (Jer. 39:4-7).
  His weakness of character shows itself to the end. Why was there no resistance? It would have better beseemed him to have died on his palace threshold than to have skulked away in the dark between the shelter of the two walls...
• As Sodom'
  Zedekiah was one and twenty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. And his mother's name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah. 2. And he did that which was evil in the eyes of th...
• A Common Mistake And Lame Excuse
  "He prophesieth of the times that are far off.'--Ezekiel 12:27.HUMAN nature was very much the same in the exiles that listened to Ezekiel on the banks of the Chebar and in Manchester to-day. The same neglect of God's message ...