3:20 “When a righteous person turns from his righteousness and commits iniquity, and I set an obstacle 1 before him, he will die. If you have not warned him, he will die for his sin. The righteous deeds he performed will not be considered, but I will hold you accountable for his death.
8:17 He said to me, “Do you see, son of man? Is it a trivial thing that the house of Judah commits these abominations they are practicing here? For they have filled the land with violence and provoked me to anger still further. Look, they are putting the branch to their nose! 6
14:9 “‘As for the prophet, if he is made a fool by being deceived into speaking a prophetic word – I, the Lord, have made a fool of 10 that prophet, and I will stretch out my hand against him and destroy him from among my people Israel.
17:24 All the trees of the field will know that I am the Lord.
I make the high tree low; I raise up the low tree.
I make the green tree wither, and I make the dry tree sprout.
I, the Lord, have spoken, and I will do it!’”
29:5 I will leave you in the wilderness,
you and all the fish of your waterways;
you will fall in the open field and will not be gathered up or collected. 23
I have given you as food to the beasts of the earth and the birds of the skies.
32:30 “All the leaders of the north are there, along with all the Sidonians; despite their might they have gone down in shameful terror with the dead. They lie uncircumcised with those killed by the sword, and bear their shame with those who descend to the pit.
48:1 “These are the names of the tribes: From the northern end beside the road of Hethlon to Lebo-hamath, as far as Hazar-enan (which is on the border of Damascus, toward the north beside Hamath), extending from the east side to the west, Dan will have one portion.
48:13 “Alongside the border of the priests, the Levites will have an allotment eight and a quarter miles 33 in length and three and one-third miles 34 in width. The whole length will be eight and a quarter miles 35 and the width three and one-third miles. 36
1 tn Or “stumbling block.” The Hebrew term refers to an obstacle in the road in Lev 19:14.
2 tn The words “they will realize” are not in the Hebrew text; they are added here for stylistic reasons since this clause assumes the previous verb “to remember” or “to take into account.”
3 tn Heb “how I was broken by their adulterous heart.” The image of God being “broken” is startling, but perfectly natural within the metaphorical framework of God as offended husband. The idiom must refer to the intense grief that Israel’s unfaithfulness caused God. For a discussion of the syntax and semantics of the Hebrew text, see M. Greenberg, Ezekiel (AB), 1:134.
4 tn Heb adds “in their faces.”
5 sn By referring to every high hill…all the mountaintops…under every green tree and every leafy oak Ezekiel may be expanding on the phraseology of Deut 12:2 (see 1 Kgs 14:23; 2 Kgs 16:4; 17:10; Jer 2:20; 3:6, 13; 2 Chr 28:4).
6 tn It is not clear what the practice of “holding a branch to the nose” indicates. A possible parallel is the Syrian relief of a king holding a flower to his nose as he worships the stars (ANEP 281). See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 1:145-46. The LXX glosses the expression as “Behold, they are like mockers.”
7 tn Apart from this context the Hebrew term occurs only in Gen 15:17 in reference to the darkness after sunset. It may mean twilight.
8 tn Or “land” (ASV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV).
9 sn See also Ezek 12:11, 24:24, 27.
10 tn The translation is uncertain due to difficulty both in determining the meaning of the verb’s stem and its conjugation in this context. In the Qal stem the basic meaning of the verbal root פָּתַה (patah) is “to be gullible, foolish.” The doubling stems (the Pual and Piel used in this verse) typically give such stative verbs a factitive sense, hence either “make gullible” (i.e., “entice”) or “make into a fool” (i.e., “to show to be a fool”). The latter represents the probable meaning of the term in Jer 20:7, 10 and is followed here (see L. C. Allen, Ezekiel [WBC], 1:193; R. Mosis “Ez 14, 1-11 - ein Ruf zur Umkehr,” BZ 19 [1975]: 166-69 and ThWAT 4:829-31). In this view, if a prophet speaks when not prompted by God, he will be shown to be a fool, but this does not reflect negatively on the Lord because it is God who shows him to be a fool. Secondly, the verb is in the perfect conjugation and may be translated “I have made a fool of him” or “I have enticed him,” or to show determination (see IBHS 439-41 §27.2f and g), or in certain syntactical constructions as future. Any of these may be plausible if the doubling stems used are understood in the sense of “making a fool of.” But if understood as “to make gullible,” more factors come into play. As the Hebrew verbal form is a perfect, it is often translated as present perfect: “I have enticed.” In this case the Lord states that he himself enticed the prophet to cooperate with the idolaters. Such enticement to sin would seem to be a violation of God’s moral character, but sometimes he does use such deception and enticement to sin as a form of punishment against those who have blatantly violated his moral will (see, e.g., 2 Sam 24). If one follows this line of interpretation in Ezek 14:9, one would have to assume that the prophet had already turned from God in his heart. However, the context gives no indication of this. Therefore, it is better to take the perfect as indicating certitude and to translate it with the future tense: “I will entice.” In this case the Lord announces that he will judge the prophet appropriately. If a prophet allows himself to be influenced by idolaters, then the Lord will use deception as a form of punishment against that deceived prophet. A comparison with the preceding oracles also favors this view. In 14:4 the perfect of certitude is used for emphasis (see “I will answer”), though in v. 7 a participle is employed. For a fuller discussion of this text, see R. B. Chisholm, Jr., “Does God Deceive?” BSac 155 (1998): 23-25.
11 tn The Hebrew word occurs only here in the OT.
12 tn See the note at 2:3.
13 tn Heb “you have brought near your days.” The expression “bring near your days” appears to be an adaptation of the idiom “days draw near,” which is used to indicate that an event, such as death, is imminent (see Gen 27:41; 47:29; Deut 31:14; 1 Kgs 2:1; Ezek 12:23). Here “your days” probably refers to the days of the personified city’s life, which was about to come to an end through God’s judgment.
14 tn Heb “and you have come to your years.” This appears to mean that she has arrived at the time when her years (i.e., life) would end, though it may mean that her years of punishment will begin. Because “day” and “time” are so closely associated in the immediate context (see 21:25, 29) some prefer to emend the text and read “you have brought near your time.” See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 2:31, as well as the translator’s note on verse 3.
15 tn The Hebrew verb is a prophetic perfect, emphasizing that the action is as good as done from the speaker’s perspective.
16 tn Or “between the consecrated and the common.”
17 tn Heb “hide their eyes from.” The idiom means to disregard or ignore something or someone (see Lev 20:4; 1 Sam 12:3; Prov 28:27; Isa 1:15).
18 tn Heb “the pride of your strength” means “your strong pride.”
19 sn Heb “the delight of your eyes.” Just as Ezekiel was deprived of his beloved wife (v. 16, the “desire” of his “eyes”) so the Lord would be forced to remove the object of his devotion, the temple, which symbolized his close relationship to his covenant people.
20 tn Heb “the object of compassion of your soul.” The accentuation in the traditional Hebrew text indicates that the descriptive phrases (“the source of your confident pride, the object in which your eyes delight, and your life’s passion”) modify the preceding “my sanctuary.”
21 tn Heb “fall.”
22 tc The translation here follows the marginal reading (Qere) of the Hebrew text. The consonantal text (Kethib) is meaningless.
23 tc Some Hebrew
24 tn Heb “and they will not stand to them in their height, all the drinkers of water.”
25 tn Heb “for death, to the lower earth.”
26 tn Heb “the sons of men.”
27 tn Heb “around him her graves,” but the expression is best emended to read “around her grave” (see vv. 23-24).
28 tn The term shepherd is applied to kings in the ancient Near East. In the OT the
29 tn Or “sanctify,” Heb “make holy.”
30 tn Heb “look with your eyes, hear with your ears, and set your mind on.”
31 tn Heb “in order to show (it) to you.”
32 sn A similar attitude toward non-Israelites is found in Isa 56:3-8.
33 tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).
34 tn Heb “ten thousand cubits” (i.e., 5.25 kilometers).
35 tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).
36 tn Heb “ten thousand cubits” (i.e., 5.25 kilometers).