Ezekiel 14:19

19 "If I send an epidemic on that country and in my anger take many lives, killing people and animals,

Ezekiel 14:19 Meaning and Commentary

Ezekiel 14:19

Or [if] I send a pestilence into that land
Or the plague, which is the destruction that wastes at noon day; this is from the Lord, and a sore judgment it is: and pour out my fury upon it in blood;
or, "by blood" ^F25; by corrupting the blood, which is done when a man is seized with the pestilence. The Targum renders it, "with slaughter"; by slaying a great number of persons by that disease, as a token of fury and wrath, because of their transgressions. It may be rendered, "because of blood" ^F26; and so express the cause and reason of the judgment, the shedding of innocent blood: to cut off from it man and beast;
man by the pestilence, and beast by some contagious distemper or another.

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FOOTNOTES:

F25 (Mdb) "per sanguinem", Piscator.
F26 "Propter sanguinem", Vatablus.

Ezekiel 14:19 In-Context

17 "Or I might bring war on that country and send destructive weapons to wipe out people and animals alike,

18 and even if those three men lived there - as surely as I, the Sovereign Lord, am the living God - they would not be able to save even their children, but only their own lives.

19 "If I send an epidemic on that country and in my anger take many lives, killing people and animals,

20 even if Noah, Danel, and Job lived there - as surely as I, the Sovereign Lord, am the living God - they would not be able to save even their own children. Their goodness would save only their own lives."

21 This is what the Sovereign Lord is saying: "I will send my four worst punishments on Jerusalem - war, famine, wild animals, and disease - to destroy people and animals alike.