6 For this cause the Lord has said: Like the vine-tree among the trees of the woods which I have given to the fire for burning, so will I give the people of Jerusalem.
Let me make a song about my loved one, a song of love for his vine-garden. My loved one had a vine-garden on a fertile hill: And after working the earth of it with a spade, he took away its stones, and put in it a very special vine; and he put up a watchtower in the middle of it, hollowing out in the rock a place for the grape-crushing; and he was hoping that it would give the best grapes, but it gave common grapes. And now, you people of Jerusalem and you men of Judah, be the judges between me and my vine-garden. Is there anything which might have been done for my vine-garden which I have not done? why then, when I was hoping for the best grapes did it give me common grapes? And now, this is what I will do to my vine-garden: I will take away the circle of thorns round it, and it will be burned up; its wall will be broken down and the beasts of the field will go through it; And I will make it waste; its branches will not be touched with the knife, or the earth worked with the spade; but blackberries and thorns will come up in it: and I will give orders to the clouds not to send rain on it.
For this cause, as the waste of the grain is burned up by tongues of fire, and as the dry grass goes down before the flame, so their root will be like the dry stems of grain, and their flower will go up in dust: because they have gone against the law of the Lord of armies, and have given no honour to the word of the Holy One of Israel. For this reason the wrath of the Lord has been burning against his people, and his hand has been stretched out against them in punishment, and the hills were shaking, and their dead bodies were like waste in the open places of the town.
And like the bad figs which are so bad that they are of no use for food, so I will give up Zedekiah, king of Judah, and his chiefs and the rest of Jerusalem who are still in this land, and those who are in the land of Egypt: I will give them up to be a cause of fear and of trouble among all the kingdoms of the earth; to be a name of shame and common talk and a cutting word and a curse in all the places wherever I will send them wandering. And I will send the sword, and need of food, and disease, among them till they are all cut off from the land which I gave to them and to their fathers.
See, I will send and take all the families of the north, says the Lord, and Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon, my servant, and make them come against this land, and against its people, and against all these nations on every side; and I will give them up to complete destruction, and make them a cause of fear and surprise and a waste place for ever. And more than this, I will take from them the sound of laughing voices, the voice of joy, the voice of the newly-married man, and the voice of the bride, the sound of the stones crushing the grain, and the shining of lights. All this land will be a waste and a cause of wonder; and these nations will be the servants of the king of Babylon for seventy years.
The perfumes which you have been burning in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, you and your fathers and your kings and your rulers and the people of the land, had the Lord no memory of them, and did he not keep them in mind? And the Lord was no longer able to put up with the evil of your doings and the disgusting things you did; and because of this your land has become a waste and a cause of wonder and a curse, with no one living in it, as at this day. Because you have been burning perfumes, and sinning against the Lord, and have not given ear to the voice of the Lord, or gone in the way of his law or his rules or his orders; for this reason this evil has come on you, as it is today. Further, Jeremiah said to all the people and all the women, Give ear to the word of the Lord, all those of Judah who are living in Egypt: This is what the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said: You women have said with your mouths, and with your hands you have done what you said, We will certainly give effect to the oaths we have made, to have perfumes burned to the queen of heaven and drink offerings drained out to her: then give effect to your oaths and do them. And now give ear to the word of the Lord, all you of Judah who are living in the land of Egypt: Truly, I have taken an oath by my great name, says the Lord, that my name is no longer to be named in the mouth of any man of Judah in all the land of Egypt, saying, By the life of the Lord God. See, I am watching over them for evil and not for good: all the men of Judah who are in the land of Egypt will be wasted by the sword and by need of food till there is an end of them.
And say, This is what the Lord has said: A great eagle with great wings, full of long feathers of different colours, came to Lebanon, and took the top of the cedar: Biting off the highest of its young branches, he took it to the land of Canaan, and put it in a town of traders. And he took some of the seed of the land, planting it in fertile earth, placing it by great waters; he put it in like a willow-tree. And its growth went on and it became a vine, low and widely stretching, whose branches were turned to him and its roots were under him: so it became a vine, putting out branches and young leaves. And there was another eagle with great wings and thick feathers: and now this vine, pushing out its roots to him, sent out its branches in his direction from the bed where it was planted, so that he might give it water. He had it planted in a good field by great waters so that it might put out branches and have fruit and be a strong vine. Say, This is what the Lord has said: Will it do well? will he not have its roots pulled up and its branches cut off, so that all its young leaves may become dry and it may be pulled up by its roots? And if it is planted will it do well? will it not become quite dry at the touch of the east wind, drying up in the bed where it was planted?
And say to the woodland of the South, Give ear to the words of the Lord: this is what the Lord has said: See, I will have a fire lighted in you, for the destruction of every green tree in you and every dry tree: the flaming flame will not be put out, and all faces from the south to the north will be burned by it. And all flesh will see that I the Lord have had it lighted: it will not be put out.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Ezekiel 15
Commentary on Ezekiel 15 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
Jerusalem, the Useless Wood of a Wild Vine
As certainly as God will not spare Jerusalem for the sake of the righteousness of the few righteous men therein, so certain is it that Israel has no superiority over other nations, which could secure Jerusalem against destruction. As the previous word of God overthrows false confidence in the righteousness of the godly, what follows in this chapter is directed against the fancy that Israel cannot be rejected and punished by the overthrow of the kingdom, because of its election to be the people of God.
And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Ezekiel 15:2. Son of man, what advantage has the wood of the vine over every wood, the vine-branch, which was among the trees of the forest? Ezekiel 15:3. Is wood taken from it to use for any work? or do men take a peg from it to hang all kinds of vessels upon? Ezekiel 15:4. Behold, it is given to the fire to consume. If the fire has consumed its two ends, and the middle of it is scorched, will it then be fit for any work? Ezekiel 15:5. Behold, when it is uninjured, it is not used for any work: how much less when the fire has consumed it and scorched it can it be still used for work? Ezekiel 15:6. Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, As the wood of the vine among the wood of the forest, which I give to the fire to consume, so do I give up the inhabitants of Jerusalem, Ezekiel 15:7. And direct my face against them. They have gone out of the fire, and the fire will consume them; that ye may learn that I am Jehovah, when I set my face against them. Ezekiel 15:8. And I make the land a desert, because they committed treachery, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah. - Israel is like the wood of the wild vine, which is put into the fire to burn, because it is good for nothing. From Deuteronomy 32:32-33 onwards, Israel is frequently compared to a vine or a vineyard (cf. Psalms 80:9.; Isa 5; Hosea 10:1; Jeremiah 2:21), and always, with the exception of Ps 80, to point out its degeneracy. This comparison lies at the foundation of the figure employed, in Ezekiel 15:2-5, of the wood of the wild vine. This wood has no superiority over any other kind of wood. It cannot be used, like other timber, for any useful purposes; but is only fit to be burned, so that it is really inferior to all other wood (Ezekiel 15:2 and Ezekiel 15:3 ). And if, in its perfect state, it cannot be used for anything, how much less when it is partially scorched and consumed (Ezekiel 15:4 and Ezekiel 15:5)! מה־יּהיה , followed by מן , means, what is it above ( מן , comparative)? - i.e., what superiority has it to כּל־עץ , all kinds of wood? i.e., any other wood. ' הזמורה אשׁר וגו is in apposition to עץ הנּפן , and is not to be connected with מכּל־עץ , as it has been by the lxx and Vulgate, - notwithstanding the Masoretic accentuation, - so as to mean every kind of fagot; for זמורה does not mean a fagot, but the tendril or branch of the vine (cf. Ezekiel 8:17), which is still further defined by the following relative clause: to be a wood-vine, i.e., a wild vine, which bears only sour, uneatable grapes. The preterite היה (which was ; not, “ is ”) may be explained from the idea that the vine had been fetched from the forest in order that its wood might be used. The answer given in Ezekiel 15:3 is, that this vine-wood cannot be used for any purpose whatever, not even as a peg for hanging any kind of domestic utensils upon (see comm. on Zechariah 10:4). It is too weak even for this. The object has to be supplied to לעשׂות למלאכה : to make, or apply it , for any work. Because it cannot be used as timber, it is burned. A fresh thought is introduced in Ezekiel 15:4 by the words ' את שׁני ק . The two clauses in Ezekiel 15:4 are to be connected together. The first supposes a case, from which the second is deduced as a conclusion. The question, “Is it fit for any work?” is determined in Ezekiel 15:5 in the negative. אף כּי : as in Ezekiel 14:21. נחר : perfect; and יחר : imperfect, Niphal , of חרר , in the sense of, to be burned or scorched. The subject to wa ויּחר is no doubt the wood, to which the suffix in אכלתהוּ refers. At the same time, the two clauses are to be understood, in accordance with Ezekiel 15:4 , as relating to the burning of the ends and the scorching of the middle. - Ezekiel 15:6-8. In the application of the parable, the only thing to which prominence is given, is the fact that God will deal with the inhabitants of Jerusalem in the same manner as with the vine-wood, which cannot be used for any kind of work. This implies that Israel resembles the wood of a forest-vine. As this possesses no superiority to other wood, but, on the contrary, is utterly useless, so Israel has no superiority to other nations, but is even worse than they, and therefore is given up to the fire. This is accounted for in Ezekiel 15:7 : “They have come out of the fire, and the fire will consume them” (the inhabitants of Jerusalem). These words are not to be interpreted proverbially, as meaning, “he who escapes one judgment falls into another” (Hävernick), but show the application of Ezekiel 15:4 and Ezekiel 15:5 to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. Out of a fire one must come either burned or scorched. Israel has been in the fire already. It resembles a wild vine which has been consumed at both ends by the fire, while the middle has been scorched, and which is now about to be given up altogether to the fire. We must not restrict the fire, however, out of which it has come half consumed, to the capture of Jerusalem in the time of Jehoiachin, as Hitzig does, but must extend it to all the judgments which fell upon the covenant nation, from the destruction of the kingdom of the ten tribes to the catastrophe in the reign of Jehoiachin, and in consequence of which Israel now resembled a vine burned at both ends and scorched in the middle. The threat closes in the same manner as the previous one. Compare Ezekiel 15:7 with Ezekiel 14:8 , and Ezekiel 15:8 with Ezekiel 14:15 and Ezekiel 14:13.