Ezekiel 6 Study Notes

6:8-9 Here is the first explicit reference in Ezekiel to leaving a remnant (ytr). See 12:16; 14:22; 39:28.

6:10 The expression threaten to bring this disaster on them occurs outside this passage only in the account of the golden calf (Ex 32:14).

6:11-12 Ezekiel was commanded to sing a number of taunt songs against Israel’s enemies (e.g., chaps. 27-28; 31-32).

6:13 The phrases on every high hill, on all the mountaintops, and under every green tree and every leafy oak echo Dt 12:2 and Hs 4:13 (1Kg 14:23; Jr 2:20). In the pagan belief system of the ancient Near East, people sought the assistance of gods and goddesses of nature to bless themselves and make themselves productive.

6:14 On desolation as punishment, see Lv 26:32-35,43; Dt 29:23. Most of the Hebrew manuscripts read Diblah here, although a minority, including the Septuagint, read Riblah, which represented the northern border of Israel (47:15-17). If the reading Diblah is correct, this is the only reference to this city in the Bible. The Hebrew name may mean “cake of figs.” Riblah was a city in Syria (2Kg 23:33; 25:21; Jr 39:5; 52:9,27) that served as the headquarters of Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon during his third expedition against Jerusalem in 588-586 BC.