Ezekiel 5:12-17

12 A third of your people will die of the plague or perish by famine inside you; a third will fall by the sword outside your walls; and a third I will scatter to the winds and pursue with drawn sword.

13 “Then my anger will cease and my wrath against them will subside, and I will be avenged. And when I have spent my wrath on them, they will know that I the LORD have spoken in my zeal.

14 “I will make you a ruin and a reproach among the nations around you, in the sight of all who pass by.

15 You will be a reproach and a taunt, a warning and an object of horror to the nations around you when I inflict punishment on you in anger and in wrath and with stinging rebuke. I the LORD have spoken.

16 When I shoot at you with my deadly and destructive arrows of famine, I will shoot to destroy you. I will bring more and more famine upon you and cut off your supply of food.

17 I will send famine and wild beasts against you, and they will leave you childless. Plague and bloodshed will sweep through you, and I will bring the sword against you. I the LORD have spoken.”

Ezekiel 5:12-17 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO EZEKIEL 5

This chapter is of the same argument with the former; and contains a type of Jerusalem's destruction; an explanation of that type; what were the reasons of God's judgments on that city; and the nature, rise, and end of them. The type is in Eze 5:1-4; the explanation of that type is in Eze 5:5; the reasons of the severe judgments threatened are changing the statutes of the Lord, and not walking in them, and defiling the sanctuary with their abominations, Eze 5:6-11; an account of the judgments of God, answerable to each of the parts in the type, Eze 5:12; the ends of these judgments are, with respect to God, the accomplishment of his anger, and the satisfaction of his justice; with respect to the Jews, bringing them to an acknowledgment that he had spoken in his zeal; and, with respect to the nations, their instruction and astonishment, Eze 5:13-15; and the chapter is concluded with an assurance that these judgments would be sent, Eze 5:16,17.

Cross References

• 1. ver 10; Jeremiah 13:24
• 2. S ver 2,17; S Psalms 107:39; S Jeremiah 15:2; S Jeremiah 21:9; Ezekiel 6:11-12; Ezekiel 7:15; Ezekiel 12:14; Amos 9:4; Zechariah 13:8; Revelation 6:8
• 3. S 2 Chronicles 12:7; S Job 20:23; Ezekiel 21:17; Ezekiel 24:13; Ezekiel 36:6
• 4. S Isaiah 1:24
• 5. S Isaiah 59:17; Ezekiel 16:42; Ezekiel 38:19; Hosea 10:10; Zechariah 6:8
• 6. S Leviticus 26:32; Nehemiah 2:17; Psalms 74:3-10; Psalms 79:1-4; Isaiah 64:11; Ezekiel 6:6; Ezekiel 22:4; Daniel 9:16; Micah 3:12
• 7. S Isaiah 43:28
• 8. S Deuteronomy 28:46
• 9. S Deuteronomy 28:20; S 1 Kings 9:7; S Jeremiah 22:8-9; Jeremiah 24:9; Ezekiel 14:8
• 10. S Jeremiah 23:40; Ezekiel 25:17
• 11. S Leviticus 26:26; S Deuteronomy 32:24
• 12. Ezekiel 14:15
• 13. Ezekiel 38:22
• 14. S ver 12; S Leviticus 26:25; Ezekiel 14:21; Ezekiel 28:23