SIGNS WITH SWORDS

“Tell her [Israel], ‘This is what the Lord says: I am your enemy, O Israel, and I am about to unsheath my sword to destroy your people—the righteous and the wicked alike.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭21‬:‭3‬ ‭NLT‬‬ (circa 593 BC)

“Yes, the sword is now being sharpened and polished; it is being prepared for the executioner.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭21‬:‭11‬ ‭NLT‬‬

We don’t know what kind of sword Ezekiel used to act out this prophecy but it was likely closest to the first one; a double-edged blade with an inlaid hilt. Overall length around 12-13in (32-33cm).

“Son of man, prophesy to them and clap your hands. Then take the sword and brandish it twice, even three times, to symbolize the great massacre, the great massacre facing them on every side.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭21‬:‭14‬ ‭NLT‬‬

😐 So… Ezekiel gets a dagger and starts swinging? 🗡️

That’s what the text seems to be saying.

😐 So… He has been tied up in his house and not able to speak unless God allows him to. He has laid in his yard staring at a Jerusalem siege model for over a year while eating his Ezekiel bread cooked over cow chips. He has shaved his head with a sword then burned and chopped up the hairs. He has gone into trances and says he saw God on a flying wheely-throne. He dug through the wall of his house and had someone carry him off blindfolded. He eats and drinks with shaking hands. He sings funeral songs while not at a funeral and now he’s slashing the air with a dagger and putting up road signs.

Yup. That’s a fair summary.

😐 He was either a real prophet or a total nut-job.

The sword-enactment is very similar to something we saw a prophet do earlier… Remember the time when King Joash of Israel went to visit the elderly and dying Elisha?

“And he [Elisha] said, “Take the arrows,” and he [Joash] took them. And he said to the king of Israel, “Strike the ground with them.” And he struck three times and stopped. Then the man of God was angry with him and said, “You should have struck five or six times; then you would have struck down Syria until you had made an end of it, but now you will strike down Syria only three times.””
‭‭2 Kings‬ ‭13‬:‭18‬-‭19‬ ‭ESV‬‬

The king was asked to act out a symbolic striking with the arrows. Ezekiel was asked to act out a symbolic striking with a sword; not just a couple slashes, but three times.

😐 K. But I got a question.

Okay. Shoot.

🤔 Didn’t God just say back in chapter 18 that a righteous guy would not die because of his father’s sins?

Yes.

🤔 So why in this chapter does God say He’s going to kill both the righteous and the wicked?

Good question.

The Greek Septuagint has 21:3-4 as “the UNrighteous and the wicked,” so it may be a mistranslation. Or, it may be that a closer look would help.

Let’s look at the Hebrew (Masoretic) text. This is the text behind the KJV OT and nearly all OT translations. For most of us, this is gonna look like hieroglyphics, but we’re gonna be brave and at least try.

The Hebrew word translated as “righteous” is tsedek; sometimes spelled sedeq or sadiq.

😐 How on earth do ya say that?

Well it starts by making a sound kinda like a drop of water in a hot skillet. Tssss. Then add the word “say.”

🤨 Tsay

Now add on a deck.

🤨 Tsay-deck.

You got it.

Here it is in modern Hebrew letters with their equivalent English sounds beneath. Remember to sound it out right to left.

Ok. Now let’s look very closely at the text of Ezekiel 21:3.

That last highlighted word (on the far left) is tsedek. Righteous. But the word right before it is very important. It’s mimmek.

“The word of the Lord came to me: “Son of man, set your face toward Jerusalem and preach against the sanctuaries. Prophesy against the land of Israel and say to the land of Israel, Thus says the Lord: Behold, I am against you and will draw my sword from its sheath and will cut off from you both righteous and wicked.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭21‬:‭1‬-‭3‬ ‭ESV‬‬

This word is not to people. It is TO the land. God says to the land – the dirt, the buildings, the real estate – that He is about remove everybody – both the righteous and the wicked. They will be “cut off from thee.” The righteous – like Daniel and his friends, Jeremiah and Ezekiel – have not been “cut off from the land” by death but by exile. Some of the wicked have also been cut off by exile.

🤨 Like those jokers in the last chapter who came to Ezekiel looking for a message from Yahweh.

☝🏼🤓 And the hoodlums who will shanghai Jeremiah and haul him off to Egypt.

Yes. But some of the wicked will be “cut off” from the land by death.

This word is the same as Ezekiel’s sign-act of shaving his head with a sword. His skin represented the land. The hairs are the people. They ALL got shaved off but they were not all destroyed. Some were burned. Some were chopped up. Some were scattered to the wind and a few were sewn into the hem of his robe.

The LORD is not saying that He’s going to raise His sword to slaughter the righteous along with the wicked (see Gen. 18:23-26). He is raising His sword to cut off (remove) from the land both righteous and wicked. The land is going to be empty.

The reason I spent considerable time on this (probably 2min for you to read, but over two three hours for me to study) is because of how important it is that we read scripture carefully and that we understand that sound interpretation will be in harmony with the whole counsel of God (the whole Bible).

So, when I read the NLT translation of Eze. 21:3-4 I was like, “Hold on. That feels wonky.” Because I have Gen. 18:23-26 and Eze. 18 floating around in my head.

Here’s the NLT version (which I generally enjoy and find helpful but I think this wording is problematic).

“Tell her, ‘This is what the Lord says: I am your enemy, O Israel, and I am about to unsheath my sword to destroy your people—the righteous and the wicked alike. Yes, I will cut off both the righteous and the wicked! I will draw my sword against everyone in the land from south to north.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭21‬:‭3‬-‭4‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Ouch.

The choice of the word “destroy” to convey “cut off” is usually not a bad translation choice. But in this case, I think it suggests something that God recently contradicted in Ezekiel 18: that he does not slay the righteous for the sins of the wicked. And the wording of the NLT here (in my opinion) doesn’t sit comfortably with the character of God as revealed in the rest of scripture.

I hope that was helpful for someone besides me. Moving on…

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The Signpost For the Sword 🪧🗡️

In Ezekiel 21:18-27, Yahweh tells Ezekiel to basically put up one of these:

Help out the king of Babylon (and his sword) by putting up signage. He makes a map showing two routes: the way to Jerusalem and the way to Rabbah, the capital of Israel’s wicked neighbors the Ammonites.

And the king will follow Ezekiel’s route (whether or not he even knows he is doing so) and he will stop at the fork in the road.

“The king of Babylon now stands at the fork, uncertain whether to attack Jerusalem or Rabbah. He calls his magicians to look for omens. They cast lots by shaking arrows from the quiver. They inspect the livers of animal sacrifices. The omen in his right hand says, ‘Jerusalem!’ With battering rams his soldiers will go against the gates, shouting for the kill. They will put up siege towers and build ramps against the walls.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭21‬:‭21‬-‭22‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Nebuchadnezzar’s magicians do their pagan rituals to “read the tea leaves” and determine what the gods want them to do. I suspect that the “shaking of the arrows from the quiver” might have looked like the game we call Pick-Up-Sticks, Jackstraws, or Spillikins. But with arrows. And depending on how they landed, it was supposed to mean something mystical which the magicians could interpret.

🤨 Sounds like a lot of hooey to me.

Indeed it was. But…in this instance, the LORD made sure that all the “dice” turn up for Jerusalem.

“We may throw the dice, but the Lord determines how they fall.”
‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭16‬:‭33‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Ammon doesn’t actually escape. They just get put off til later. The final verses of Ezekiel 21 announce the sword against the Ammonites.

🗡️🗡️🗡️

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Chapter 22

There are 3 sections in chapter 22:

• The Judge’s Verdict, v 1-16
• The Crucible, v 17-22
• The Broken Wall, v 23-31

The Judge’s Verdict

From the Tudor period until 1973 when the death penalty was abolished there, the judges in Great Britain would put a square of black silk on their heads (called a “black cap”) before passing a death sentence. It was not a sign of mourning but a symbol of the solemnity and moral weight of what they were doing.

Ezekiel 22:1-16 feels as if the prophet has solemnly placed a black cap on his head as he reads out the death sentence. The list of charges is shocking. The majestic KJV wording may obscure (to our modern minds) just what is going on in Jerusalem. Here’s a translation that is more blunt.

“Every leader in Israel who lives within your walls is bent on murder. Fathers and mothers are treated with contempt. Foreigners are forced to pay for protection. Orphans and widows are wronged and oppressed among you. You despise my holy things and violate my Sabbath days of rest. People accuse others falsely and send them to their death. You are filled with idol worshipers and people who do obscene things. Men sleep with their fathers’ wives and force themselves on women who are menstruating. Within your walls live men who commit adultery with their neighbors’ wives, who defile their daughters-in-law, or who rape their own sisters. There are hired murderers, loan racketeers, and extortioners everywhere. They never even think of me and my commands, says the Sovereign Lord.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭22‬:‭6‬-‭12‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Murder. Extortion. Rape. Incest. It was a regular sin-city.

Verdict: guilty.

Sentence: death.

The Crucible

Here’s an exposition on this whole passage in one image:

I think that pretty much sums it up.

The Broken Wall

There are 4 groups addressed in this section:

• Princes
• Priests
• Leaders
• Prophets

They were supposed to create a protective wall to guard the people by setting the example of righteous living.

😐 Well, THAT didn’t happen.

Correct. And because of their bad example, even the common people – the middle class – took advantage of those beneath them, the poor and destitute.

Righteousness was meant to create a protective barrier around the land. It does that. Loving God and neighbor creates a shield against oppression. You can’t love God and neighbor while simultaneously turning people into objects to be used or disposed at will.

So the LORD describes the failed leadership and failed society as a broken wall; an open border. Even many animal groups instinctively form a protective perimeter around their calves when predators approach. If you’re in a hostile environment, you establish a protective perimeter around your group. But Israel’s leaders had lost the ability to discern what the dangers were. They left the doors wide open and rolled out the red carpet for ideologies that caused people to victimize each other. They left their people defenseless and even became predators themselves.

“I looked for someone who might rebuild the wall of righteousness that guards the land. I searched for someone to stand in the gap in the wall so I wouldn’t have to destroy the land, but I found no one.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭22‬:‭30‬ ‭NLT‬‬

The wall is broken. The wickedness has flooded the land. The people have become utterly depraved. And when people’s sensitivity to sin is dulled to total numbness, it takes a LOT to get their attention.

In the next chapter, Yahweh is going to give Ezekiel an allegory about two sisters that represent Israel (Samaria) and Judah (Jerusalem). And it’s one of the most uncomfortable parts of the Bible for me to read. It’s very bluntly sexual and it’s intended to shock the dulled readers to get their attention. And it does just that.