Ezekiel 10:15

10:15 The cherubim rose up; these were the living beings ¹  I saw at the Kebar River.

Ezekiel 32:14

32:14 Then I will make their waters calm, ² 

and will make their streams flow like olive oil, declares the sovereign Lord.

Ezekiel 32:2

32:2 “Son of man, sing a lament for Pharaoh king of Egypt, and say to him:

“‘You were like a lion ³  among the nations,

but you are a monster in the seas;

you thrash about in your streams,

stir up the water with your feet,

and muddy your ⁴  streams.

Ezekiel 1:1

A Vision of God’s Glory

1:1 In the thirtieth year, ⁵  on the fifth day of the fourth month, while I was among the exiles ⁶  at the Kebar River, ⁷  the heavens opened ⁸  and I saw a divine vision. ⁹ 

Ezekiel 3:23

3:23 So I got up and went out to the valley, and the glory of the Lord was standing there, just like the glory I had seen by the Kebar River, ¹⁰  and I threw myself face down.

Ezekiel 10:20

10:20 These were the living creatures ¹¹  which I saw at the Kebar River underneath the God of Israel; I knew that they were cherubim.

Ezekiel 10:22

10:22 As for the form of their faces, they were the faces whose appearance I had seen at the Kebar River. Each one moved straight ahead.

Ezekiel 31:4

31:4 The water made it grow;

underground springs made it grow tall.

Rivers flowed all around the place it was planted,

while smaller channels watered all the trees of the field. ¹² 

Ezekiel 1:3

1:3 the word of the Lord came to the priest Ezekiel ¹³  the son of Buzi, ¹⁴  at the Kebar River in the land of the Babylonians. ¹⁵  The hand ¹⁶  of the Lord came on him there).

Ezekiel 3:15

3:15 I came to the exiles at Tel Abib, ¹⁷  who lived by the Kebar River. ¹⁸  I sat dumbfounded among them there, where they were living, for seven days. ¹⁹ 

Ezekiel 31:15

31:15 “‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: On the day it ²⁰  went down to Sheol I caused observers to lament. ²¹  I covered it with the deep and held back its rivers; its plentiful water was restrained. I clothed Lebanon in black for it, and all the trees of the field wilted because of it.

Ezekiel 43:3

43:3 It was like the vision I saw when he ²²  came to destroy the city, and the vision I saw by the Kebar River. I threw myself face down.

[10:15]  ¹ tn Heb “it was the living creature.”

[32:14]  ² tn Heb “sink,” that is, to settle and become clear, not muddied.

[32:2]  ³ tn The lion was a figure of royalty (Ezek 19:1-9).

[32:2]  ⁴ tc The Hebrew reads “their streams”; the LXX reads “your streams.”

[1:1]  ⁴ sn The meaning of the thirtieth year is problematic. Some take it to mean the age of Ezekiel when he prophesied (e.g., Origen). The Aramaic Targum explains the thirtieth year as the thirtieth year dated from the recovery of the book of the Torah in the temple in Jerusalem (2 Kgs 22:3-9). The number seems somehow to be equated with the fifth year of Jehoiachin’s exile in 1:2, i.e., 593 b.c.

[1:1]  ⁵ sn The Assyrians started the tactic of deportation, the large-scale forced displacement of conquered populations, in order to stifle rebellions. The task of uniting groups of deportees, gaining freedom from one’s overlords and returning to retake one’s own country would be considerably more complicated than living in one’s homeland and waiting for an opportune moment to drive out the enemy’s soldiers. The Babylonians adopted this practice also, after defeating the Assyrians. The Babylonians deported Judeans on three occasions. The practice of deportation was reversed by the Persian conquerors of Babylon, who gained favor from their subjects for allowing them to return to their homeland and, as polytheists, sought the favor of the gods of the various countries which had come under their control.

[1:1]  ⁶ sn The Kebar River is mentioned in Babylonian texts from the city of Nippur in the fifth century b.c. It provided artificial irrigation from the Euphrates.

[1:1]  ⁷ sn For the concept of the heavens opened in later literature, see 3 Macc 6:18; 2 Bar. 22:1; T. Levi 5:1; Matt 3:16; Acts 7:56; Rev 19:11.

[1:1]  ⁸ tn Or “saw visions from God.” References to divine visions occur also in Ezek 8:3; 40:2

[3:23]  ⁵ tn Or “canal.”

[10:20]  ⁶ tn Heb “That was the living creature.”

[31:4]  ⁷ tn Heb “Waters made it grow; the deep made it grow tall. It (the deep) was flowing with its rivers around the place it (the tree) was planted, it (the deep) sent out its channels to all the trees of the field.”

[1:3]  ⁸ sn The prophet’s name, Ezekiel, means in Hebrew “May God strengthen.”

[1:3]  ⁹ tn Or “to Ezekiel son of Buzi the priest.”

[1:3]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “Chaldeans.” The name of the tribal group ruling Babylon, “Chaldeans” is used as metonymy for the whole empire of Babylon. The Babylonians worked with the Medes to destroy the Assyrian Empire near the end of the 7th century b.c. Then, over the next century, the Babylonians dominated the West Semitic states (such as Phoenicia, Aram, Moab, Edom, and Judah in the modern countries of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Israel) and made incursions into Egypt.

[1:3]  ¹¹ tn Or “power.”

[3:15]  ⁹ sn The name “Tel Abib” is a transliteration of an Akkadian term meaning “mound of the flood,” i.e., an ancient mound. It is not to be confused with the modern city of Tel Aviv in Israel.

[3:15]  ¹⁰ tn Or “canal.”

[3:15]  ¹¹ sn A similar response to a divine encounter is found in Acts 9:8-9.

[31:15]  ¹⁰ tn Or “he.”

[31:15]  ¹¹ tn Heb “I caused lamentation.” D. I. Block (Ezekiel [NICOT], 2:194-95) proposes an alternative root which would give the meaning “I gated back the waters,” i.e., shut off the water supply.

[43:3]  ¹¹ tc Heb “I.” The reading is due to the confusion of yod (י, indicating a first person pronoun) and vav (ו, indicating a third person pronoun). A few medieval Hebrew mss, Theodotion’s Greek version, and the Latin Vulgate support a third person pronoun here.