17:11-12 Ezekiel was now to tell his rebellious hearers what this story represented.250The first eagle stood for the king of Babylon (cf. Jer. 48:40; 49:22; Dan. 7:4). His invasion of Jerusalem (the specific identity of the Lebanon in the riddle, v. 3) devastated the land like a hot east wind (v. 10).
In Scripture the eagle is often a figure used to describe God as a powerful being that comes swiftly to judge, as an eagle swoops down quickly to snatch in flight an unsuspecting mouse or fish (cf. Deut. 28:49; Isa. 46:11; Jer. 48:40; 49:22). In this case the eagle represented God's instrument of judgment, Nebuchadnezzar, who had invaded Jerusalem, cropped off the Judean king, Jehoiachin (the top of the cedar tree, v. 3), and his advisers (the topmost of its young twigs, v. 4) and carried them off to Babylon in 597 B.C. (cf. Dan. 7:4). Babylon was a city of traders in a land of merchants (v. 4; cf. 16:29; 1 Kings 10:27; 2 Kings 24:10-12; Jer. 22:15, 23). Elsewhere in Scripture the cedar tree (v. 3) is a figure used to describe the Davidic line of kings culminating in Messiah (Isa. 10:33-11:1). Cedar trees were beautiful and very hardy.
17:13-14 Nebuchadnezzar set up another king as his vassal, Zedekiah, one of the royal seed whom he planted in the fertile soil of Canaan (cf. v. 5). He deported the leaders of Judah to Babylon so Judah would be a docile servant and continue to exist with a measure of independence under his control (cf. 2 Kings 24:17; Jer. 37:1). Nebuchadnezzar made a binding covenant with Zedekiah obligating him to serve Babylon, and Zedekiah flourished for a time. The vine's roots remained under it, but it grew low and spreading rather than upward and fruitful, and it extended its branches toward the eagle, Nebuchadnezzar (cf. v. 6).
17:15-16 However, the vine rebelled against the eagle. Zedekiah rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar and sent to Egypt for arms and troops to resist the Babylonians. Pharaoh Hophra (Gr. Apries, 589-570 B.C.) is the second strong eagle in the riddle to which the vine sent out its roots and branches for sustenance, probably in 588 B.C. (v. 7).251Obviously Zedekiah could not escape Nebuchadnezzar's wrath since he had broken the covenant under which he served him, a covenant that he had sworn in God's name (cf. 5:7; 2 Chron. 36:13). An oath was a sacred thing in the ancient Near East, and even oaths made by fraud were normally honored (cf. Josh. 9; 2 Sam. 21:1-2). The Lord swore that Zedekiah would die in Babylon for breaking his covenant with Nebuchadnezzar (cf. v. 19).
"After judgment became inevitable, God's will for Judah was submission to their foreign conquerors as a sign of their submission to him (Jer 38:17-23)."252
17:17-18 Pharaoh would not come to Zedekiah's aid when Nebuchadnezzar invaded and besieged Jerusalem and slew many of the people. There was no way that Zedekiah could escape Nebuchadnezzar's wrath since he had broken the covenant in which he had pledged his allegiance to the Babylonian king.
17:19-21 The Lord also promised that because Zedekiah had broken Israel's covenant with Yahweh he would pay the penalty. The Lord would capture him like an animal in a net, bring him to Babylon, and judge him there for his covenant unfaithfulness to Yahweh. His best soldiers would die, and the survivors of the siege would scatter. When this happened everyone would know that Yahweh had ordained Jerusalem's destruction.
