Ezekiel 4:2

2 And you must build against it siege works, and you must build against it [a] bulwark, and you must heap against it a siege ramp, and you must set up against it camps and put against it a battering ram all around.

Ezekiel 4:2 Meaning and Commentary

Ezekiel 4:2

And lay siege against it
In his own person, as in ( Ezekiel 4:3 ) ; or draw the form of a siege, or figure of an army besieging a city; or rather of the instruments and means used in a siege, as follows: and build a fort against it:
Kimchi interprets it a wooden tower, built over against the city, to subdue it; Jarchi takes it to be an instrument by which stones were cast into the city; and so the Arabic version renders it, "machines to cast stones"; the Targum, a fortress; so Nebuchadnezzar in reality did what was here only done in type, ( 2 Kings 25:1 ) ; where the same word is used as here: and cast a mount about it;
a heap of earth cast up, in order to look into the city, cast in darts, and mount the walls; what the French call "bastion", as Jarchi observes: set the camp also against it;
place the army in their tents about it: and set [battering] rams against it round about;
a warlike instrument, that had an iron head, and horns like a ram, with which in a siege the walls of a city were battered and beaten down. Jarchi, Kimchi, and Ben Melech, interpret the word of princes and generals of the army, who watched at the several corners of the city, that none might go in and out; so the Targum seems to understand it F2. The Arabic version is, "mounts to cast darts"; (See Gill on Ezekiel 21:22).


FOOTNOTES:

F2 So R. Sol. Urbin. Ohel Moed, fol. 50. 9.

Ezekiel 4:2 In-Context

1 "Now, son of man, take for yourself a brick, and you must put it {before you}, and you must portray on it a city, Jerusalem.
2 And you must build against it siege works, and you must build against it [a] bulwark, and you must heap against it a siege ramp, and you must set up against it camps and put against it a battering ram all around.
3 And take for yourself a plate of iron, and you must place it [as] a wall of iron between you and the city, and you must set your face against it, and it must be {under siege}, and you must lay the siege against it; it is a sign for the house of Israel.
4 And you, lie down on your left side, and you must put the guilt of the house of Israel on it. You will carry their guilt the number of days that you will lie on it.
5 And I will give to you the years of their guilt according to [the] number of [the] days, three hundred and ninety days, and you must bear the guilt of the house of Israel.
Scripture quotations marked (LEB) are from the Lexham English Bible. Copyright 2012 Logos Bible Software. Lexham is a registered trademark of Logos Bible Software.