Ezekiel 32:16

16 This is the lament that they will raise; the daughters of the nations will use it to mourn; they will chant it for Egypt and all its hordes,' says Adonai ELOHIM."

Ezekiel 32:16 Meaning and Commentary

Ezekiel 32:16

This is the lamentation with which they shall lament her
The Egyptians themselves, or rather they that are after mentioned. The Targum is,

``the prophet said, a lamentation is this prophecy, and it shall be for a lamentation;''

he was bid at the beginning of it to take up a lamentation, and now at the end of it he pronounces it to be one, and that it should be sung as such: the daughters of the nations shall lament for her;
either literally understood, it being the business and custom of women to say or sing the funeral dirge, or the lamentation at the interment of the deceased; or figuratively, the inhabitants of other nations. So Ben Melech and the Targum, ``the villages of the people shall lament her''; that is, the inhabitants of them, who were in alliance with Egypt, and under its protection: they shall lament for her, even for Egypt, and for all her multitude;
for the desolation of the land, and for the vast numbers of people that should be slain with the sword, or carried captive: saith the Lord God;
which is added for the confirmation of it; for what he has spoken shall be done.

Ezekiel 32:16 In-Context

14 Then I will make their water clear and cause their streams to flow like oil,' says Adonai ELOHIM.

15 'When I make the land of Egypt a ruined waste, a land stripped of all that filled it; when I strike all those who live there; they will know that I am ADONAI.

16 This is the lament that they will raise; the daughters of the nations will use it to mourn; they will chant it for Egypt and all its hordes,' says Adonai ELOHIM."

17 On the fifteenth day of the month in the twelfth year, the word of ADONAI came to me:

18 "Human being, wail for the hordes of Egypt; send them with the daughters of mighty nations down to the underworld, with those who descend to the pit.