Ezekiel 36:16--37:28

36:16 The word of the Lord came to me: 36:17 “Son of man, when the house of Israel was living on their own land, they defiled it by their behavior ¹  and their deeds. In my sight their behavior was like the uncleanness of a woman having her monthly period. 36:18 So I poured my anger on them ²  because of the blood they shed on the land and because of the idols with which they defiled it. ³  36:19 I scattered them among the nations; they were dispersed throughout foreign countries. In accordance with their behavior and their deeds I judged them. 36:20 But when they arrived in the nations where they went, they profaned my holy name. It was said of them, ‘These are the people of the Lord, yet they have departed from his land.’ 36:21 I was concerned for my holy reputation ⁴  which the house of Israel profaned among the nations where they went.

36:22 “Therefore say to the house of Israel, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: It is not for your sake that I am about to act, O house of Israel, but for the sake of my holy reputation ⁵  which you profaned among the nations where you went. 36:23 I will magnify ⁶  my great name that has been profaned among the nations, that you have profaned among them. The nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the sovereign Lord, when I magnify myself among you in their sight.

36:24 “‘I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries; then I will bring you to your land. 36:25 I will sprinkle you with pure water ⁷  and you will be clean from all your impurities. I will purify you from all your idols. 36:26 I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. I will remove the heart of stone ⁸  from your body and give you a heart of flesh. ⁹  36:27 I will put my Spirit within you; ¹⁰  I will take the initiative and you will obey my statutes ¹¹  and carefully observe my regulations. ¹²  36:28 Then you will live in the land I gave to your fathers; you will be my people, and I will be your God. ¹³  36:29 I will save you from all your uncleanness. I will call for the grain and multiply it; I will not bring a famine on you. 36:30 I will multiply the fruit of the trees and the produce of the fields, so that you will never again suffer the disgrace of famine among the nations. 36:31 Then you will remember your evil behavior ¹⁴  and your deeds which were not good; you will loathe yourselves on account of your sins and your abominable deeds. 36:32 Understand that ¹⁵  it is not for your sake I am about to act, declares the sovereign Lord. Be ashamed and embarrassed by your behavior, O house of Israel.

36:33 “‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: In the day I cleanse you from all your sins, I will populate the cities and the ruins will be rebuilt. 36:34 The desolate land will be plowed, instead of being desolate in the sight of everyone who passes by. 36:35 They will say, “This desolate land has become like the garden of Eden; the ruined, desolate, and destroyed cities are now fortified and inhabited.” 36:36 Then the nations which remain around you will know that I, the Lord, have rebuilt the ruins and replanted what was desolate. I, the Lord, have spoken – and I will do it!’

36:37 “This is what the sovereign Lord says: I will allow the house of Israel to ask me to do this for them: ¹⁶  I will multiply their people like sheep. ¹⁷  36:38 Like the sheep for offerings, like the sheep of Jerusalem ¹⁸  during her appointed feasts, so will the ruined cities be filled with flocks of people. Then they will know that I am the Lord.”

The Valley of Dry Bones

37:1 The hand ¹⁹  of the Lord was on me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the Lord and placed ²⁰  me in the midst of the valley, and it was full of bones. 37:2 He made me walk all around among them. ²¹  I realized ²²  there were a great many bones in the valley and they were very dry. 37:3 He said to me, “Son of man, can these bones live?” I said to him, “Sovereign Lord, you know.” 37:4 Then he said to me, “Prophesy over these bones, and tell them: ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. 37:5 This is what the sovereign Lord says to these bones: Look, I am about to infuse breath ²³  into you and you will live. 37:6 I will put tendons ²⁴  on you and muscles over you and will cover you with skin; I will put breath ²⁵  in you and you will live. Then you will know that I am the Lord.’”

37:7 So I prophesied as I was commanded. There was a sound when I prophesied – I heard ²⁶  a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to bone. 37:8 As I watched, I saw ²⁷  tendons on them, then muscles appeared, ²⁸  and skin covered over them from above, but there was no breath ²⁹  in them.

37:9 He said to me, “Prophesy to the breath, ³⁰  – prophesy, son of man – and say to the breath: ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these corpses so that they may live.’” 37:10 So I prophesied as I was commanded, and the breath came into them; they lived and stood on their feet, an extremely great army.

37:11 Then he said to me, “Son of man, these bones are all the house of Israel. Look, they are saying, ‘Our bones are dry, our hope has perished; we are cut off.’ 37:12 Therefore prophesy, and tell them, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: Look, I am about to open your graves and will raise you from your graves, my people. I will bring you to the land of Israel. 37:13 Then you will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and raise you from your graves, my people. 37:14 I will place my breath ³¹  in you and you will live; I will give you rest in your own land. Then you will know that I am the Lord – I have spoken and I will act, declares the Lord.’”

37:15 The word of the Lord came to me: 37:16 “As for you, son of man, take one branch, and write on it, ‘For Judah, and for the Israelites associated with him.’ Then take another branch and write on it, ‘For Joseph, the branch of Ephraim and all the house of Israel associated with him.’ 37:17 Join ³²  them as one stick; ³³  they will be as one in your hand. 37:18 When your people ³⁴  say to you, ‘Will you not tell us what these things mean?’ 37:19 tell them, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: Look, I am about to take the branch of Joseph which is in the hand of Ephraim and the tribes of Israel associated with him, and I will place them on the stick of Judah, ³⁵  and make them into one stick – they will be one in my hand.’ ³⁶  37:20 The sticks you write on will be in your hand in front of them. 37:21 Then tell them, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: Look, I am about to take the Israelites from among the nations where they have gone. I will gather them from round about and bring them to their land. 37:22 I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel, and one king will rule over them all. They will never again be two nations and never again be divided into two kingdoms. ³⁷  37:23 They will not defile themselves with their idols, their detestable things, and all their rebellious deeds. I will save them from all their unfaithfulness ³⁸  by which they sinned. I will purify them; they will become my people and I will become their God.

37:24 “‘My servant David will be king over them; there will be one shepherd for all of them. They will follow ³⁹  my regulations and carefully observe my statutes. ⁴⁰  37:25 They will live in the land I gave to my servant Jacob, in which your fathers lived; they will live in it – they and their children and their grandchildren forever. David my servant will be prince over them forever. 37:26 I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be a perpetual covenant with them. ⁴¹  I will establish them, ⁴²  increase their numbers, and place my sanctuary among them forever. 37:27 My dwelling place will be with them; I will be their God, and they will be my people. 37:28 Then, when my sanctuary is among them forever, the nations will know that I, the Lord, sanctify Israel.’” ⁴³ 

[36:17]  ¹ tn Heb “way.”

[36:18]  ² sn See Ezek 7:8; 9:8; 14:19; 20:8, 13, 21; 22:22; 30:15.

[36:18]  ³ sn For the concept of defiling the land in legal literature, see Lev 18:28; Deut 21:23.

[36:21]  ⁴ tn Heb “name.”

[36:22]  ⁵ sn In Ezek 20:22 God refrained from punishment for the sake of his holy name. Here God’s reputation is the basis for Israel’s restoration.

[36:23]  ⁶ tn Or “sanctify,” Heb “make holy.”

[36:25]  ⁷ sn The Lord here uses a metaphor from the realm of ritual purification. For the use of water in ritual cleansing, see Exod 30:19-20; Lev 14:51; Num 19:18; Heb 10:22.

[36:26]  ⁸ sn That is, a heart which symbolizes a will that is stubborn and unresponsive (see 1 Sam 25:37). In Rabbinic literature a “stone” was associated with an evil inclination (b. Sukkah 52a).

[36:26]  ⁹ sn That is, a heart which symbolizes a will that is responsive and obedient to God.

[36:27]  ¹⁰ tn Or “in the midst of you.” The word “you” is plural.

[36:27]  ¹¹ tn Heb “and I will do that which in my statutes you will walk.” The awkward syntax (verb “to do, act” + accusative sign + relative clause + prepositional phrase + second person verb) is unique, though Eccl 3:14 contains a similar construction. In the last line of that verse we read that “God acts so that (relative pronoun) they fear before him.” However, unlike Ezek 36:27, the statement has no accusative sign before the relative pronoun.

[36:27]  ¹² tn Heb “and my laws you will guard and you will do them.” Jer 31:31-34 is parallel to this passage.

[36:28]  ¹³ sn This promise reflects the ancient covenantal ideal (see Exod 6:7).

[36:31]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “ways.”

[36:32]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “Let it be known.”

[36:37]  ¹⁶ tn The Niphal verb may have a tolerative function here, “Again (for) this I will allow myself to be sought by the house of Israel to act for them.” Or it may be reflexive: “I will reveal myself to the house of Israel by doing this also.”

[36:37]  ¹⁷ sn Heb “I will multiply them like sheep, human(s).”

[36:38]  ¹⁸ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[37:1]  ¹⁹ tn Or “power.”

[37:1]  ²⁰ tn Heb “caused me to rest.”

[37:2]  ²¹ tn Heb “and he made me pass over them, around, around.”

[37:2]  ²² tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something and is here translated as “I realized” because it results from Ezekiel’s recognition of the situation around him. In Hebrew, the exclamation is repeated in the following sentence.

[37:5]  ²³ tn Heb “I am about to bring a spirit.”

[37:6]  ²⁴ tn The exact physiological meaning of the term is uncertain. In addition to v. 8, the term occurs only in Gen 32:33; Job 10:11; 40:17; and Jer 48:4.

[37:6]  ²⁵ tn Or “a spirit.”

[37:7]  ²⁶ tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something and has been translated here as a verb.

[37:8]  ²⁷ tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something and has been translated here as a verb.

[37:8]  ²⁸ tn Heb “came up.”

[37:8]  ²⁹ tn Or “spirit.”

[37:9]  ³⁰ tn Or “spirit,” and several times in this verse.

[37:14]  ³¹ tn Or “spirit.” This is likely an allusion to Gen 2 and God’s breath which creates life.

[37:17]  ³² tn Heb “bring near.”

[37:17]  ³³ tn Heb “one to one for you for one stick.”

[37:18]  ³⁴ tn Heb “the sons of your people.”

[37:19]  ³⁵ tn Heb “I will place them on it, that is, on the stick of Judah.”

[37:19]  ³⁶ sn The reunification of Israel and Judah is envisioned as well in Ezek 33:23, 29; Jer 3:18; 23:5-6; Hos 1:11; Amos 9:11.

[37:22]  ³⁷ sn Jeremiah also attested to the reuniting of the northern and southern kingdoms (Jer 3:12, 14; 31:2-6).

[37:23]  ³⁸ tc Heb “their dwellings.” The text as it stands does not make sense. Based on the LXX, a slight emendation of two vowels, including a mater, yields the reading “from their turning,” a reference here to their turning from God and deviating from his commandments. See BDB 1000 s.v. מְשׁוּבָה, and D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 2:407.

[37:24]  ³⁹ tn Heb “walk [in].”

[37:24]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “and my statutes they will guard and they will do them.”

[37:26]  ⁴¹ sn See Isa 24:5; 55:3; 61:8; Jer 32:40; 50:5; Ezek 16:60, for other references to perpetual covenants.

[37:26]  ⁴² tn Heb “give them.”

[37:28]  ⁴³ sn The sanctuary of Israel becomes the main focus of Ezek 40-48.