Ezekiel 29:5

5 And I shall cast thee forth into desert, (thee) and all the fishes of thy flood; on the face of (the) earth thou shalt fall down, thou shalt not be gathered [up], neither shalt be gathered together (to thy people); to the beasts of (the) earth, and to the volatiles of the air, I gave thee to be devoured. (And I shall throw thee forth into the wilderness, thee and all the fish of thy River; thou shalt fall down upon the face of the earth, thou shalt not be gathered up, nor shalt thou be gathered to thy people, or buried; I shall give thee to be devoured by the beasts of the field, and by the birds of the air.)

Ezekiel 29:5 Meaning and Commentary

Ezekiel 29:5

And I will leave thee thrown into the wilderness, thee, and
all the fish of thy rivers
Where fish in common cannot live, but die as soon almost as out of the water, and on dry land, excepting those that are of the amphibious kind. This wilderness designs the deserts of Lybia and Cyrene, where the battle was fought between Hophra and Amasis; and where the Egyptian army perished, only their king, before compared to a crocodile, which lives on land, as well as in water, escaped. The Targum is,

``I will cast thee into a wilderness, and all the princes of thy strength:''

thou shalt fall upon the open fields thou shalt not be brought
together, nor gathered,
this is to he understood of his army; for what is proper to an army is sometimes ascribed to the head or general of it; which fell by the sword in the fields of Lybia and Cyrene and was so discomfited, that the remains of it could not be brought and gathered together again: or the sense is, that those that were slain were left in the open fields, and had no burial; they were not gathered to the grave, as Kimchi interprets it; and so the Targum,

``upon the face of the field thy carcass shall be cast; it shall not be gathered, nor shall it be buried:''

this was only true of the carcasses of the soldiers slain in battle, not of the king, who fled, and afterwards in another battle was taken by Amasis, and strangled in the city of Sais, where he was buried among his ancestors, as Herodotus ^F8 relates: I have given thee for meat to the beasts of the field and to the fowls
of the heaven;
that is, his army; as the armies of the kings, beast, and false prophet, will be at the battle of Armageddon, when the two latter will be taken and cast alive into the burning lake, of which this monarch was an emblem, ( Revelation 19:17-20 ) .

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FOOTNOTES:

F8 Euterpe, sive l. 2. c. 169.

Ezekiel 29:5 In-Context

3 Speak thou, and thou shalt say, The Lord God saith these things, Lo! I to thee, thou Pharaoh, king of Egypt, thou great dragon, that liest in the midst of thy floods, and sayest, The flood is mine, and I made (it for) myself. (Speak thou, and thou shalt say, The Lord God saith these things, Lo! I am against thee, O Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, O great dragon, that liest in the midst of the River, that is, the Nile, and sayest, The River is mine, and I made it for myself.)

4 And I shall set a bridle in thy cheeks, and I shall glue the fishes of thy floods to thy scales; and I shall draw thee out of the midst of thy floods, and all thy fishes shall cleave to thy scales. (And I shall put a bridle on thy cheeks, or a hook in thy jaw, and I shall glue the fish of the River to thy scales; and I shall draw thee out of the midst of the River, and all thy fish shall cleave to thy scales.)

5 And I shall cast thee forth into desert, (thee) and all the fishes of thy flood; on the face of (the) earth thou shalt fall down, thou shalt not be gathered [up], neither shalt be gathered together (to thy people); to the beasts of (the) earth, and to the volatiles of the air, I gave thee to be devoured. (And I shall throw thee forth into the wilderness, thee and all the fish of thy River; thou shalt fall down upon the face of the earth, thou shalt not be gathered up, nor shalt thou be gathered to thy people, or buried; I shall give thee to be devoured by the beasts of the field, and by the birds of the air.)

6 And all the dwellers of Egypt shall know, that I am the Lord (And all the inhabitants of Egypt shall know, that I am the Lord). For that that thou were a staff of (a) reed to the house of Israel,

7 (and) when they took (hold of) thee with (their) hand(s), and thou were broken (thou were broken), and rentest each shoulder of them, and when they rested on thee, thou were made less, and thou hast loosed, either discomforted, all the reins of them;