And when thou hast accomplished them
The three hundred and ninety days, by lying so long on the left side, bearing the sins of the house of Israel in this way; or, as Cocceius renders the words, "and thou shall accomplish them, and thou shalt lie" F7, that is, thou shalt so accomplish these days, that thou mayest lie through forty days on the right hand, and then make bare thine arm, and prophesy against Jerusalem; for he thinks the forty days are part of the three hundred and ninety, as before observed: and so Piscator's note is, "when thou shalt accomplish" namely, when there shall remain yet forty days, as appears by comparing ( Ezekiel 4:9 ) with this verse and ( Ezekiel 4:5 ) ; so Polanus interprets the passage: then lie again on thy right side;
that is, for Judah; which tribe, as Jarchi observes, lay to the south, and so to the right of Jerusalem; see ( Ezekiel 16:46 ) ; or rather the prophet lay on the right side for Judah, because more honourable, and in greater esteem with the Lord; nor were their sins so many, or continued in so long as those of the ten tribes; and therefore they, and the punishment of them, are borne a less time by the prophet, as follows: and thou shall bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days:
which some think answers to the forty years of Manasseh's evil reign; others reckon from the thirteenth of Josiah to the end of Zedekiah, and others from the eighteenth of Josiah to the destruction of Jerusalem, which was five years after the carrying of Zedekiah captive: I have appointed thee each day for a year;
which is not only the key for the understanding of the forty days, but also the three hundred and ninety.