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Ezekiel 35

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Prophecy Against Mount Seir 1–4

1
Moreover the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying,
2
Son of man, set thy face against mount Seir, and prophesy against it, ​
3
and say unto it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Behold, I am against thee, O mount Seir, and I will stretch out my hand against thee, and I will make thee a desolation and an astonishment.
4
I will lay thy cities waste, and thou shalt be desolate; and thou shalt know that I am Jehovah.

Edom's Perpetual Hatred 5–9

5
Because thou hast had a perpetual enmity, and hast given over the children of Israel to the power of the sword in the time of their calamity, in the time of the iniquity of the end; ​
6
therefore, as I live, saith the Lord Jehovah, I will prepare thee unto blood, and blood shall pursue thee: since thou hast not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue thee. ​
7
Thus will I make mount Seir an astonishment and a desolation; and I will cut off from it him that passeth through and him that returneth.
8
And I will fill its mountains with its slain: in thy hills and in thy valleys and in all thy watercourses shall they fall that are slain with the sword.
9
I will make thee a perpetual desolation, and thy cities shall not be inhabited; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah. ​

Edom's Boast and Final Desolation 10–15

10
Because thou hast said, These two nations and these two countries shall be mine, and we will possess it; whereas Jehovah was there: ​
11
therefore, as I live, saith the Lord Jehovah, I will do according to thine anger, and according to thine envy which thou hast showed out of thy hatred against them; and I will make myself known among them, when I shall judge thee. ​
12
And thou shalt know that I, Jehovah, have heard all thy revilings which thou hast spoken against the mountains of Israel, saying, They are laid desolate, they are given us to devour. ​
13
And ye have magnified yourselves against me with your mouth, and have multiplied your words against me: I have heard it.
14
Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: When the whole earth rejoiceth, I will make thee desolate.
15
As thou didst rejoice over the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was desolate, so will I do unto thee: thou shalt be desolate, O mount Seir, and all Edom, even all of it; and they shall know that I am Jehovah. ​

Bible text: American Standard Version (1901) · Public domain

Study Notes for Ezekiel 35

Verse 2

mount Seir — Seir is Edom’s land: ‘dwelt Esau in mount Seir: Esau is Edom’ (Gen 36:8), and the LORD told Israel, ‘I have given mount Seir unto Esau for a possession’ (Deut 2:5). ‘Set thy face against’ is Ezekiel’s formula for an oracle, as in 6:2 for the mountains of Israel. Ezekiel 36 turns back to the mountains of Israel, and names ‘all Idumea’ there (36:5).

Verse 5

a perpetual hatred — Eybah olam, enmity of long age; it occurs in only one other verse, against the Philistines (25:15). ‘The time of their calamity’ is the day Obadiah describes, ‘thou shouldest not have entered into the gate of my people in the day of their calamity’ (Obad 1:13); Psalm 137:7 recalls Edom’s cry, ‘Rase it, rase it’.

Verse 6

blood shall pursue thee — ‘Pursue’ is radaph, the verb of the persecutor. The sentence matches the crime, as Obadiah states: ‘as thou hast done, it shall be done unto thee’ (Obad 1:15). The same measure is stated in the Sermon on the Mount, ‘with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again’ (Matt 7:2).

Verse 9

perpetual desolations — ‘Perpetual’ (olam) is the word of ‘perpetual hatred’ in v.5, so the enmity and the ruin share it. ‘Desolations’ (shemamah) recurs in vv.3, 4, 7, 12, 14, 15. Malachi hears Edom say, ‘we will return and build the desolate places’, and the LORD answer, ‘They shall build, but I will throw down’ (Mal 1:4).

Verse 10

These two nations and these two countries shall be mine — The two nations are Israel and Judah, later made ‘one nation’ (37:22). Edom’s ‘we will possess it’ is answered in 36:2, ‘the ancient high places are ours in possession’. ‘Whereas the LORD was there’ recalls the name of the city, ‘The LORD is there’ (48:35), and the cry of Ps 83:12, ‘Let us take to ourselves the houses of God’.

Verse 11

according to thine anger, and according to thine envy — ‘Envy’ (qin’ah, not the qinah of a dirge) is the word of ‘the fire of my jealousy’ (36:5), and the LORD answers it with his own measure: ‘I will even do according to thine anger’. The judgment is how he is known: ‘The LORD is known by the judgment which he executeth’ (Ps 9:16). The oath ‘as I live’ is also in v.6.

Verse 12

I have heard all thy blasphemies — ‘Blasphemies’ is ne’atsah, contemptuous speech, the word of Hezekiah’s ‘day of trouble, and of rebuke, and blasphemy’ (2 Kgs 19:3). The scorn is aimed at the ‘mountains of Israel’, and v.13 adds, ‘I have heard them’. ‘He that planted the ear, shall he not hear?’ (Ps 94:9).

Verse 15

mount Seir, and all Idumea — ‘Idumea’ is the Greek form of the name Edom, used in Isa 34:5–6 for the land of the sword of the LORD. Obadiah forbade the rejoicing that this verse repays: ‘neither shouldest thou have rejoiced over the children of Judah in the day of their destruction’ (Obad 1:12). ‘Idumaea’ still appears among the regions in Mark 3:8.