17 And they will send up a song of grief for you, and say to you, What destruction has come on you, how are you cut off from the sea, the noted town, which was strong in the sea, she and her people, causing the fear of them to come on all the dry land!
How great is your fall from heaven, O shining one, son of the morning! How are you cut down to the earth, low among the dead bodies!
Take up now a song of grief for the ruler of Israel, and say,
How have the great ones been made low in the fight! Jonathan is dead on your high places. I am full of grief for you, my brother Jonathan: very dear have you been to me: your love for me was a wonder, greater than the love of women. How have the great ones been made low, and the arms of war broken!
Saying, Sorrow, sorrow for the great town, she who was clothed in delicate linen, and purple, and red; with ornaments of gold and stones of great price and jewels! For in one hour such great wealth has come to nothing. And every shipmaster, and all who are sailing on the sea, and sailors and all who get their living by the sea, were watching from far away, And crying out when they saw the smoke of her burning, saying, What town is like the great town? And they put dust on their heads, and were sad, weeping and crying, and saying, Sorrow, sorrow for the great town, in which was increased the wealth of all who had their ships on the sea because of her great stores! for in one hour she is made waste.
And the kings of the earth, who made themselves unclean with her, and in her company gave themselves up to evil, will be weeping and crying over her, when they see the smoke of her burning, Watching from far away, for fear of her punishment, saying, Sorrow, sorrow for Babylon, the great town, the strong town! for in one hour you have been judged.
Son of man, make a song of grief for Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and say to him, Young lion of the nations, destruction has come on you; and you were like a sea-beast in the seas, sending out bursts of water, troubling the waters with your feet, making their streams dirty.
And you, son of man, make a song of grief for Tyre; And say to Tyre, O you who are seated at the doorway of the sea, trading for the peoples with the great sea-lands, these are the words of the Lord: You, O Tyre, have said, I am a ship completely beautiful. Your builders have made your outlines in the heart of the seas, they have made you completely beautiful. They have made all your boards of fir-trees from Senir: they have taken cedars from Lebanon to make the supports for your sails. Of oak-trees from Bashan they have made your driving blades; they have made your floors of ivory and boxwood from the sea-lands of Kittim. The best linen with needlework from Egypt was your sail, stretched out to be a flag for you; blue and purple from the sea-lands of Elishah gave you shade. The people of Zidon and Arvad were your boatmen; the wise men of Zemer were in you; they were guiding your ships; The responsible men of Gebal and its wise men were in you, making your boards watertight: all the ships of the sea with their seamen were in you trading in your goods. Cush and Lud and Put were in your army, your men of war, hanging up their body-covers and head-dresses of war in you: they gave you your glory. The men of Arvad in your army were on your walls, and were watchmen in your towers, hanging up their arms on your walls round about; they made you completely beautiful. Tarshish did business with you because of the great amount of your wealth; they gave silver, iron, tin, and lead for your goods. Javan, Tubal, and Meshech were your traders; they gave living men and brass vessels for your goods. The people of Togarmah gave horses and war-horses and transport beasts for your goods. The men of Rodan were your traders: a great number of sea-lands did business with you: they gave you horns of ivory and ebony as an offering. Edom did business with you because of the great number of things which you made; they gave emeralds, purple, and needlework, and the best linen and coral and rubies for your goods. Judah and the land of Israel were your traders; they gave grain of Minnith and sweet cakes and honey and oil and perfume for your goods. Damascus did business with you because of the great amount of your wealth, with wine of Helbon and white wool. ... for your goods: they gave polished iron and spices for your goods. Dedan did trade with you in cloths for the backs of horses. Arabia and all the rulers of Kedar did business with you; in lambs and sheep and goats, in these they did business with you. The traders of Sheba and Raamah did trade with you; they gave the best of all sorts of spices and all sorts of stones of great price and gold for your goods. Haran and Canneh and Eden, the traders of Asshur and all the Medes: These were your traders in beautiful robes, in rolls of blue and needlework, and in chests of coloured cloth, corded with cords and made of cedar-wood, in them they did trade with you. Tarshish ships did business for you in your goods: and you were made full, and great was your glory in the heart of the seas. Your boatmen have taken you into great waters: you have been broken by the east wind in the heart of the seas. Your wealth and your goods, the things in which you do trade, your seamen and those guiding your ships, those who make your boards watertight, and those who do business with your goods, and all your men of war who are in you, with all who have come together in you, will go down into the heart of the seas in the day of your downfall. At the sound of the cry of your ships' guides, the boards of the ship will be shaking. And all the boatmen, the seamen and those who are expert at guiding a ship through the sea, will come down from their ships and take their places on the land; And their voices will be sounding over you, and crying bitterly they will put dust on their heads, rolling themselves in the dust: And they will have the hair of their heads cut off because of you, and will put haircloth on their bodies, weeping for you with bitter grief in their souls, even with bitter sorrow. And in their weeping they will make a song of grief for you, sorrowing over you and saying, Who is like Tyre, who has come to an end in the deep sea? When your goods went out over the seas, you made numbers of peoples full; the wealth of the kings of the earth was increased with your great wealth and all your goods. Now that you are broken by the seas in the deep waters, your goods and all your people will go down with you. All the people of the sea-lands are overcome with wonder at you, and their kings are full of fear, their faces are troubled. Those who do business among the peoples make sounds of surprise at you; you have become a thing of fear, you have come to an end for ever.
Be shamed, O Zidon: for the sea, the strong place of the sea has said, I have not been with child, or given birth; I have not taken care of young men, or kept watch over the growth of virgins.
In that day this saying will be said about you, and this song of grief will be made: The heritage of my people is measured out, and there is no one to give it back; those who have made us prisoners have taken our fields from us, and complete destruction has come to us.
And the limit goes round to Ramah and the walled town of Tyre and Hosah, ending at the sea by Heleb and Achzib;
If thieves came, attacking you by night, (how are you cut off!) would they not go on taking till they had enough? if men came cutting your grapes would they take them all?
Son of man, make a song of grief for the king of Tyre, and say to him, This is what the Lord has said: You are all-wise and completely beautiful; You were in Eden, the garden of God; every stone of great price was your clothing, the sardius, the topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the emerald and the carbuncle: your store-houses were full of gold, and things of great price were in you; in the day when you were made they were got ready. I gave you your place with the winged one; I put you on the mountain of God; you went up and down among the stones of fire. There has been no evil in your ways from the day when you were made, till sin was seen in you. Through all your trading you have become full of violent ways, and have done evil: so I sent you out shamed from the mountain of God; the winged one put an end to you from among the stones of fire. Your heart was lifted up because you were beautiful, you made your wisdom evil through your sin: I have sent you down, even to the earth; I have made you low before kings, so that they may see you. By all your sin, even by your evil trading, you have made your holy places unclean; so I will make a fire come out from you, it will make a meal of you, and I will make you as dust on the earth before the eyes of all who see you. All who have knowledge of you among the peoples will be overcome with wonder at you: you have become a thing of fear, and you will never be seen again.
Son of man, say to the ruler of Tyre, This is what the Lord has said: Because your heart has been lifted up, and you have said, I am a god, I am seated on the seat of God in the heart of the seas; but you are man and not God, though you have made your heart as the heart of God: See, you are wiser than Daniel; there is no secret which is deeper than your knowledge: By your wisdom and deep knowledge you have got power for yourself, and put silver and gold in your store-houses: By your great wisdom and by your trade your power is increased, and your heart is lifted up because of your power: For this cause the Lord has said: Because you have made your heart as the heart of God, See, I am sending against you strange men, feared among the nations: they will let loose their swords against your bright wisdom, they will make your glory a common thing. They will send you down to the underworld, and your death will be the death of those who are put to the sword in the heart of the seas. Will you say, in the face of those who are taking your life, I am God? but you are man and not God in the hands of those who are wounding you. Your death will be the death of those who are without circumcision, by the hands of men from strange lands: for I have said it, says the Lord.
But even now, give ear to the word of the Lord, O you women; let your ears be open to the word of his mouth, training your daughters to give cries of sorrow, everyone teaching her neighbour a song of grief.
Let your hair be cut off, O Jerusalem, and let it go, and let a song of grief go up on the open hilltops; for the Lord is turned away from the generation of his wrath and has given them up.
By whom was this purposed against Tyre, the crowning town, whose traders are chiefs, whose business men are honoured in the land?
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Ezekiel 26
Commentary on Ezekiel 26 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 26
Eze 26:1-21. The Judgment on Tyre through Nebuchadnezzar (TWENTY-SIXTH THROUGH Twenty-eighth Chapters).
In the twenty-sixth chapter, Ezekiel sets forth:—(1) Tyre's sin; (2) its doom; (3) the instruments executing it; (4) the effects produced on other nations by her downfall. In the twenty-seventh chapter, a lamentation over the fall of such earthly splendor. In the twenty-eighth chapter, an elegy addressed to the king, on the humiliation of his sacrilegious pride. Ezekiel, in his prophecies as to the heathen, exhibits the dark side only; because he views them simply in their hostility to the people of God, who shall outlive them all. Isaiah (Isa 23:1-18), on the other hand, at the close of judgments, holds out the prospect of blessing, when Tyre should turn to the Lord.
1. The specification of the date, which had been omitted in the case of the four preceding objects of judgment, marks the greater weight attached to the fall of Tyre.
eleventh year—namely, after the carrying away of Jehoiachin, the year of the fall of Jerusalem. The number of the month is, however, omitted, and the day only given. As the month of the taking of Jerusalem was regarded as one of particular note, namely, the fourth month, also the fifth, on which it was actually destroyed (Jer 52:6, 12, 13), Rabbi David reasonably supposes that Tyre uttered her taunt at the close of the fourth month, as her nearness to Jerusalem enabled her to hear of its fall very soon, and that Ezekiel met it with his threat against herself on "the first day" of the fifth month.
2. Tyre—(Jos 19:29; 2Sa 24:7), literally, meaning "the rock-city," Zor; a name applying to the island Tyre, called New Tyre, rather than Old Tyre on the mainland. They were half a mile apart. "New Tyre," a century and a half before the fall of Jerusalem, had successfully resisted Shalmaneser of Assyria, for five years besieging it (Menander, from the Tyrian archives, quoted by Josephus, Antiquities, 9.14. 2). It was the stronger and more important of the two cities, and is the one chiefly, though not exclusively, here meant. Tyre was originally a colony of Zidon. Nebuchadnezzar's siege of it lasted thirteen years (Eze 29:18; Isa 23:1-18). Though no profane author mentions his having succeeded in the siege, Jerome states he read the fact in Assyrian histories.
Aha!—exultation over a fallen rival (Ps 35:21, 25).
she … that was the gates—that is, the single gate composed of two folding doors. Hence the verb is singular. "Gates" were the place of resort for traffic and public business: so here it expresses a mart of commerce frequented by merchants. Tyre regards Jerusalem not as an open enemy, for her territory being the narrow, long strip of land north of Philistia, between Mount Lebanon and the sea, her interest was to cultivate friendly relations with the Jews, on whom she was dependent for corn (Eze 27:17; 1Ki 5:9; Ac 12:20). But Jerusalem had intercepted some of the inland traffic which she wished to monopolize to herself; so, in her intensely selfish worldly-mindedness, she exulted heartlessly over the fall of Jerusalem as her own gain. Hence she incurred the wrath of God as pre-eminently the world's representative in its ambition, selfishness, and pride, in defiance of the will of God (Isa 23:9).
she is turned unto me—that is, the mart of corn, wine, oil, balsam, &c., which she once was, is transferred to me. The caravans from Palmyra, Petra, and the East will no longer be intercepted by the market ("the gates") of Jerusalem, but will come to me.
3, 4. nations … as the sea … waves—In striking contrast to the boasting of Tyre, God threatens to bring against her Babylon's army levied from "many nations," even as the Mediterranean waves that dashed against her rock-founded city on all sides.
scrape her dust … make her … top of … rock—or, "a bare rock" [Grotius]. The soil which the Tyrians had brought together upon the rock on which they built their city, I will scrape so clean away as to leave no dust, but only the bare rock as it was. An awful contrast to her expectation of filling herself with all the wealth of the East now that Jerusalem has fallen.
5. in the midst of the sea—plainly referring to New Tyre (Eze 27:32).
6. her daughters … in the field—The surrounding villages, dependent on her in the open country, shall share the fate of the mother city.
7. from the north—the original locality of the Chaldeans; also, the direction by which they entered Palestine, taking the route of Riblah and Hamath on the Orontes, in preference to that across the desert between Babylon and Judea.
king of kings—so called because of the many kings who owned allegiance to him (2Ki 18:28). God had delegated to him the universal earth-empire which is His (Da 2:47). The Son of God alone has the right and title inherently, and shall assume it when the world kings shall have been fully proved as abusers of the trust (1Ti 6:15; Re 17:12-14; 19:15, 16). Ezekiel's prophecy was not based on conjecture from the past, for Shalmaneser, with all the might of the Assyrian empire, had failed in his siege of Tyre. Yet Nebuchadnezzar was to succeed. Josephus tells us that Nebuchadnezzar began the siege in the seventh year of Ithobal's reign, king of Tyre.
9. engines of war—literally, "an apparatus for striking." "He shall apply the stroke of the battering-ram against thy walls." Havernick translates, "His enginery of destruction"; literally, the "destruction (not merely the stroke) of his enginery."
axes—literally, "swords."
10. dust—So thick shall be the "dust" stirred up by the immense numbers of "horses," that it shall "cover" the whole city as a cloud.
horses … chariots—As in Eze 26:3-5, New Tyre on the insular rock in the sea (compare Isa 23:2, 4, 6) is referred to; so here, in Eze 26:9-11, Old Tyre on the mainland. Both are included in the prophecies under one name.
wheels—Fairbairn thinks that here, and in Eze 23:24, as "the wheels" are distinct from the "chariots," some wheelwork for riding on, or for the operations of the siege, are meant.
11. thy strong garrisons—literally, "the statutes of thy strength"; so the forts which are "monuments of thy strength." Maurer understands, in stricter agreement with the literal meaning, "the statues" or "obelisks erected in honor of the idols, the tutelary gods of Tyre," as Melecarte, answering to the Grecian Hercules, whose temple stood in Old Tyre (compare Jer 43:13, Margin).
12. lay thy stones … timber … in … midst of … water—referring to the insular New Tyre (Eze 26:3, 5; Eze 27:4, 25, 26). When its lofty buildings and towers fall, surrounded as it was with the sea which entered its double harbor and washed its ramparts, the "stones … timbers … and dust" appropriately are described as thrown down "in the midst of the water." Though Ezekiel attributes the capture of Tyre to Nebuchadnezzar (see on Eze 29:18), yet it does not follow that the final destruction of it described is attributed by him to the same monarch. The overthrow of Tyre by Nebuchadnezzar was the first link in the long chain of evil—the first deadly blow which prepared for, and was the earnest of, the final doom. The change in this verse from the individual conqueror "he," to the general "they," marks that what he did was not the whole, but only paved the way for others to complete the work begun by him. It was to be a progressive work until she was utterly destroyed. Thus the words here answer exactly to what Alexander did. With the "stones, timber," and rubbish of Old Tyre, he built a causeway in seven months to New Tyre on the island and so took it [Curtius, 4, 2], 322 B.C.
13. Instead of the joyousness of thy prosperity, a death-like silence shall reign (Isa 24:8; Jer 7:34).
14. He concludes in nearly the same words as he began (Eze 26:4, 5).
built no more—fulfilled as to the mainland Tyre, under Nebuchadnezzar. The insular Tyre recovered partly, after seventy years (Isa 23:17, 18), but again suffered under Alexander, then under Antigonus, then under the Saracens at the beginning of the fourteenth century. Now its harbors are choked with sand, precluding all hope of future restoration, "not one entire house is left, and only a few fishermen take shelter in the vaults" [Maundrell]. So accurately has God's word come to pass.
15-21. The impression which the overthrow of Tyre produced on other maritime nations and upon her own colonies, for example, Utica, Carthage, and Tartessus or Tarshish in Spain.
isles—maritime lands. Even mighty Carthage used to send a yearly offering to the temple of Hercules at Tyre: and the mother city gave high priests to her colonies. Hence the consternation at her fall felt in the widely scattered dependencies with which she was so closely connected by the ties of religion, as well as commercial intercourse.
shake—metaphorically: "be agitated" (Jer 49:21).
16. come down from their thrones … upon the ground—"the throne of the mourners" (Job 2:13; Jon 3:6).
princes of the sea—are the merchant rulers of Carthage and other colonies of Tyre, who had made themselves rich and powerful by trading on the sea (Isa 23:8).
clothe … with trembling—Hebrew, "tremblings." Compare Eze 7:27, "clothed with desolation"; Ps 132:18. In a public calamity the garment was changed for a mourning garb.
17. inhabited of seafaring men—that is, which was frequented by merchants of various sea-bordering lands [Grotius]. Fairbairn translates with Peschito, "Thou inhabitant of the seas" (the Hebrew literal meaning). Tyre rose as it were out of the seas as if she got thence her inhabitants, being peopled so closely down to the waters. So Venice was called "the bride of the sea."
strong in the sea—through her insular position.
cause their terror to be on all that haunt it—namely, the sea. The Hebrew is rather, "they put their terror upon all her (the city's) inhabitants," that is, they make the name of every Tyrian to be feared [Fairbairn].
18. thy departure—Isa 23:6, 12 predicts that the Tyrians, in consequence of the siege, should pass over the Mediterranean to the lands bordering on it ("Chittim," "Tarshish," &c.). So Ezekiel here. Accordingly Jerome says that he read in Assyrian histories that, "when the Tyrians saw no hope of escaping, they fled to Carthage or some islands of the Ionian and Ægean Seas" [Bishop Newton]. (See on Eze 29:18). Grotius explains "departure," that is, "in the day when hostages shall be carried away from thee to Babylon." The parallelism to "thy fall" makes me think "departure" must mean "thy end" in general, but with an included allusion to the "departure" of most of her people to her colonies at the fall of the city.
19. great waters—appropriate metaphor of the Babylonian hosts, which literally, by breaking down insular Tyre's ramparts, caused the sea to "cover" part of her.
20. the pit—Tyre's disappearance is compared to that of the dead placed in their sepulchres and no more seen among the living (compare Eze 32:18, 23; Isa 14:11, 15, 19).
I shall set glory in the land—In contrast to Tyre consigned to the "pit" of death, I shall set glory (that is, My presence symbolized by the Shekinah cloud, the antitype to which shall be Messiah, "the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father," Joh 1:14; Isa 4:2, 5; Zec 6:13) in Judah.
of the living—as opposed to Tyre consigned to the "pit" of death. Judea is to be the land of national and spiritual life, being restored after its captivity (Eze 47:9). Fairbairn loses the antithesis by applying the negative to both clauses, "and that thou be not set as a glory in the land of the living."
21. terror—an example of judgment calculated to terrify all evildoers.
thou shall be no more—Not that there was to be no more a Tyre, but she was no more to be the Tyre that once was: her glory and name were to be no more. As, to Old Tyre, the prophecy was literally fulfilled, not a vestige of it being left.