Ezekiel 5:1-6

Ezekiel Dramatizes Jerusalem's Fall

1 "Now you, son of man, take a sharp sword, use it as you would a barber's razor, and shave your head and beard. Then take a pair of scales and divide the hair.
2 You are to burn up one third [of it] in the city when the days of the siege have ended; you are to take one third and slash [it] with the sword all around the city; and you are to scatter one third to the wind, for I will draw a sword [to chase] after them.
3 But you are to take a few strands from the hair and secure them in the folds of your [robe].
4 Take some more of them, throw them into the fire, and burn them in it. A fire will spread from it to the whole house of Israel.
5 "This is what the Lord God says: I have set this Jerusalem in the center of the nations, with countries all around her.
6 But she has rebelled against My ordinances with more wickedness than the nations, and against My statutes more than the countries that surround her. For her people have rejected My ordinances and have not walked in My statutes.

Ezekiel 5:1-6 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO EZEKIEL 5

This chapter is of the same argument with the former; and contains a type of Jerusalem's destruction; an explanation of that type; what were the reasons of God's judgments on that city; and the nature, rise, and end of them. The type is in Eze 5:1-4; the explanation of that type is in Eze 5:5; the reasons of the severe judgments threatened are changing the statutes of the Lord, and not walking in them, and defiling the sanctuary with their abominations, Eze 5:6-11; an account of the judgments of God, answerable to each of the parts in the type, Eze 5:12; the ends of these judgments are, with respect to God, the accomplishment of his anger, and the satisfaction of his justice; with respect to the Jews, bringing them to an acknowledgment that he had spoken in his zeal; and, with respect to the nations, their instruction and astonishment, Eze 5:13-15; and the chapter is concluded with an assurance that these judgments would be sent, Eze 5:16,17.

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