Ezekiel 6:13

13 "Then they will know that I am the Lord. Their people will lie dead among the statues of their gods around their altars. Their bodies will lie on every high hill and every mountaintop. They will lie under every green tree and leafy oak tree. They used to offer sweet-smelling incense to all of their gods at those places.

Ezekiel 6:13 Meaning and Commentary

Ezekiel 6:13

Then shall ye know that I [am] the Lord
Whom they had denied, by serving other gods; but now by those punishments their eyes would be opened to see, and be obliged to acknowledge, that there was no God but the Lord: when their slain [men] shall be among their idols round about their
altars;
as is threatened, ( Ezekiel 6:5 ) ; by which it will appear that the idols whom they worshipped could not save them; since they should fall just by them, round about the altars on which they sacrificed unto them; which idols were placed, and altars for their worship built, upon every high hill, in all the tops of the mountains:
mountains and high hills were usual places of idolatry among the Heathens, in which the Jews imitated them, and particularly Herodotus F5 says of the Persians, that, going up to the highest parts of mountains, they offered sacrifice to Jupiter; so they called the whole circle of the heavens: and under every green tree, and under every thick oak;
see ( 1 Kings 14:23 ) ( 2 Kings 16:4 ) ( Jeremiah 2:20 ) ( 3:6 ) ; here their slain were to fall, where they committed their idolatry: even in the place where they did offer sweet savour to all their idols;
or dunghill gods; yet, though they were such, sweet savour or incense was offered to them; wherefore, in righteous judgment, here their carcasses should fill and lie, and rot and stink.


FOOTNOTES:

F5 Clio, sive l. 1. c. 131.

Ezekiel 6:13 In-Context

11 The LORD and King said to me, "Clap your hands. Stamp your feet. Cry out, 'How sad!' Do it because the people of Israel have done so many evil things. I hate those things. Israel will be destroyed by war, hunger and plague.
12 Those who are far away will die of the plague. Those who are near will be killed with swords. Those who are left alive and are spared will die of hunger. And my burning anger toward them will come to an end.
13 "Then they will know that I am the Lord. Their people will lie dead among the statues of their gods around their altars. Their bodies will lie on every high hill and every mountaintop. They will lie under every green tree and leafy oak tree. They used to offer sweet-smelling incense to all of their gods at those places.
14 I will reach out my powerful hand against them. The land will become dry and empty. Those people will live from the desert all the way to Diblah. They will know that I am the Lord."
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