Ezekiel 5

When the sons of Asaph wanted to describe the city of Jerusalem, they wrote, “Beautiful in elevation, the joy of the whole earth, is Mount Zion on the sides of the north, the city of the great King” (Ps. 48: nkjv). The Babylonian Talmud says, “Of the ten measures of beauty that came down to the world, Jerusalem took nine” (Kidushin 49b), and, “Whoever has not seen Jerusalem in its splendor has never seen a lovely city” (Succah 51b). Of modern Jerusalem, Samuel Heilman wrote, “It is a place in which people actually live; it is a place that lives in them.” One of the Jewish exiles in Babylonian wrote: “If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her skill! If I do not remember you, let my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth—if I do not exalt Jerusalem above my chief joy” (Ps. 137:5–6 nkjv). When Jewish families around the world celebrate Passover, they conclude the meal with, “Next year in Jerusalem!”

The Jewish exiles wouldn’t be happy with the three messages Ezekiel would bring them from the Lord, for he was going to announce the destruction of Jerusalem and the ravaging of the Promised Land. It was bad enough that the Jews were exiles in a pagan land, but to be told that they would have no city to return to was more than they could bear. No wonder they preferred the encouraging messages of the false prophets.

Most of the Jewish people had become so calloused they could no longer hear God’s word, so the Lord commanded Ezekiel to take a different approach. The prophet stayed home for the most part and didn’t take part in the everyday conversation of the people. He remained silent at all times except when he had a message to deliver from the Lord. That made people want to listen. Furthermore, the prophet often “preached” his messages silently through “action sermons” that aroused the interest of the people. In this way, he was a visible sign to the “spiritually deaf” people (4:3; 12:6, 11; 24:24). Word got around that Ezekiel occasionally did strange things, and he soon became a curiosity and a celebrity among the exiles. People stood before his house and waited to see what he would do next (4:12). These two chapters record four “action sermons” that conveyed startling news to the Jewish people in Babylon.

The siege of Jerusalem (4:1–3). This “tile” was probably an unbaked brick or a soft clay tablet, both of which were commonplace in Babylon. On it, Ezekiel drew a sketch of the city of Jerusalem, which the people would easily recognize, and then he set it on the ground and began to “play soldier” as he acted out the siege of Jerusalem. Using earth and various objects, he set up fortifications around the city so nobody could get in or get out. He built a ramp to facilitate scaling the walls, and he provided battering rams for breaking down the gates and the walls. This, of course, was what would happen at Jerusalem in 588 BC when the Babylonian army began the siege of the city.

Imagine how shocked the spectators were when Ezekiel’s face became hard and resolute and he placed a flat, iron griddle between his face and the besieged city. It was the kind of utensil that the priests used in the temple for preparing some of the offerings (Lev. 2:5; 6:21; 7:9). The iron griddle symbolized the wall that stood between God and the sinful Jewish nation so that He could no longer look on them with approval and blessing. Ezekiel the priest could not pronounce on them the priestly blessing of Numbers 6:24–26, for God’s face was not shining on them with blessing. God was against them (Ezek. 5:8; Isa. 59:1–3) and would permit the pagan Babylonians to destroy the city and the temple. Years later, Jeremiah would write, “You have covered yourself with a cloud, so that no prayer can get through” (Lam. 3: niv; and see Ezek. 3:8–9).

During all this activity, Ezekiel didn’t say a word, but the spectators surely got the message. It’s possible for people to rebel against God such a long time that all God can do is allow them to reap the consequences of their own sins. The Jews were sinning against a flood of light. They knew the terms of the covenant, and they knew that God had sent prophet after prophet to rebuke their idolatry (2 Chron. 36:11–21), yet they had persisted in disobeying His will. Now it was too late. “Ephraim is joined to idols, let him alone” (Hos. 4: nkjv).

The judgment of Judah (4:4–8). At specified times each day (v. 10 niv), Ezekiel was commanded to lie on the ground, facing the model he constructed of the siege of Jerusalem. He was to be bound (v. 8), his arm was to be bared, and he had to eat the meager food described in verses 9–17. He was to lie on his left side for 390 days and then on his right side for 40 days. This symbolic act told the Jewish exiles why the Lord was allowing their Holy City to be ravaged and ruined: the nation had sinned and their sins had caught up with them. Of course, Ezekiel didn’t “bear their sins” in the sense of atoning for them, for only the Son of God can do that (1 Peter 2:24). But “bearing the iniquity” of the nation before God was one of the ministries of the priesthood, and Ezekiel was a priest (Ex. 28:36–38; Num. 18:1). The binding of the prophet and the baring of his arm spoke of the future binding of the prisoners and the baring of God’s arm in judgment.

The Lord explained to Ezekiel that each day represented a year in the sinful history of the Jewish nation, and somehow he conveyed this fact to the people who watched him each day. But why did the Lord choose the numbers 390 and 40? Since one day was the equivalent of one year of Israel’s rebellion, the Lord was undoubtedly looking back at the nation’s past sins and not ahead at future disobedience. The forty years probably represented Israel’s rebellion during their forty-year journey from Egypt to the Promised Land, but what is the starting point for the 390 years? The ministry of Ezekiel focused primarily on Jerusalem, the desecration of the temple by idolatry, and the departing of God’s glory. It’s likely that the 390–year period begins with Solomon’s son Rehoboam who became king in 930 (1 Kings 14:21ff.). When you add the years of the reigns of the kings of Judah from Rehoboam, to Zedekiah, as recorded in 1 and 2 Kings, you have a total of 394 years. Since during three of the years of his reign Rehoboam walked with God (2 Chron. 11:16–17), we end up with a number very close to Ezekiel’s 390 years.

However we calculate the mathematics of this sign, the message is clear: God had been longsuffering toward the sinful people of Judah, warning them and chastening them, but they would not remain true to Him. Some of their kings were very godly men and sought to bring the people back to God, but no sooner did these kings die than the people returned to idolatry. Eventually, there came a time when their sins caught up with them and God’s patience had come to an end. God would rather see His land devastated, the city of Jerusalem ruined, His temple destroyed, and His people killed and exiled, than to have them give such a false witness to the Gentile nations. Judgment begins with the people of God, not with the godless pagans (1 Peter 4:17–19), and it behooves believers and congregations today to walk in the fear of the Lord.

The famine in the city (4:9–17). In the first two “action sermons,” Ezekiel showed the Jewish people the reality of the siege of Jerusalem and reason for it, and in the next two, he will display the horror of it, beginning with famine. The Lord commanded him to combine three grains (wheat, barley, and spelt) and two vegetables (beans and lentils) and grind them into flour and bake bread. This combination would produce the very poorest kind of bread and therefore represented the scarcity of food during the siege of Jerusalem. The people would eat almost anything, including one another (Deut. 28:49–57). God had warned them of this judgment in His covenant, so they shouldn’t have been shocked.

The Jews sometimes cooked over fires made from cow dung mixed with straw, and this was not against the law of Moses; but the use of human excrement was a sign of abject poverty and want. Of course, no priest would defile himself and his food by using human excrement for cooking his food (Deut. 14:3; 23:12–14), so the Lord allowed Ezekiel to use cow dung. His protest reminds us of that of Peter in Acts 10:14. Each day, the prophet would eat about eight ounces of bread and drink about two-thirds of a quart of water, reminding the spectators that the people within Jerusalem’s walls would be starving and thirsting for water, but there would be no relief (see Lam. 1:11, 19; 2:11–12, 19). In His covenant, God had warned them about this judgment, but the people didn’t listen (Lev. 26:26). Ezekiel was careful to obey the dietary laws, but the Jews scattered among the Gentile nations would be forced to eat defiled bread or else die of starvation.

God gave His chosen people a land of milk and honey and promised to bless their crops, their flocks and herds, and their families, if they obeyed His covenant. But they took their blessings for granted and turned away from the Lord and worshipped idols, so God cursed their blessings (Mal. 2:2). The land of milk and honey and the rich city of Jerusalem became places of scarcity and hunger, to the extent of parents eating their own children to stay alive during the siege (Ezek. 5:10; Deut. 29:22–28).

The destiny of the people (5:1–17). The prophet Isaiah compared the invasion of an enemy to the shaving of a man’s head and beard (Isa. 7:20), so Ezekiel used that image for his fourth “action sermon.” Shaving could be a part of a purification ritual (Num. 6:5; 8:7), but the Jews had to be careful how they dressed their hair and their beards (Lev. 19:27; Deut. 14:1), and the priests had to be especially careful (Lev. 21:5–6). When Ezekiel, a priest, publicly shaved his head and his beard, the people must have been stunned; but it took extreme measures to get their attention so they would get the message. The shaving of the head and the beard would be a sign of humiliation and great sorrow and mourning, and that’s the way the Lord felt about the impending destruction of Jerusalem and the holy temple. By using a sword and not a razor, Ezekiel made the message even more dramatic: an army was coming whose swords would “cut down” the people of the land.

The prophet was commanded to weigh the hair carefully and divide it into three parts. One part he burned on the “siege brick” to symbolize the people who died of famine or pestilence in Jerusalem. A second part was hacked to bits with the sword, symbolizing those slain by the Babylonian soldiers. The third part was thrown to the winds, picturing the Jews scattered among the Gentiles and the exiles taken to Babylon. However, before Ezekiel threw the hair to the winds, he took a small portion of it and hid it in the hem of his garment, a symbol of God’s special care for a remnant of the people who would be spared to return to the land. The Lord in His covenant promised the sparing of a remnant (Lev. 26:36–39), for Israel still had a work to do in the world. But Ezekiel 5: indicates that anyone who was spared must not take his or her safety for granted, for more fire could come out from God’s judgment of Jerusalem. This prophecy was fulfilled in the days after the siege of the city when innocent Jewish people were killed by scheming criminals (Jer. 40—44).

In Ezekiel 5:5–6, the Lord explained why He would permit His chosen people to suffer and die so shamefully at the hands of the Babylonians. As far as His eternal purposes were concerned, Jerusalem was His city and the center of the nations (38:12). “Salvation is of the Jews” (John 4:22). Israel was a privileged people, but privilege involves responsibility and accountability. The day of reckoning had come and there was no escape. Israel was called to be a light to the Gentiles, to lead them to the true and living God (Isa. 42:6; 49:6); but instead, they adopted the wicked ways of the Gentiles and became greater sinners than their neighbors.

The Lord drew some telling conclusions or applications from this fact (Ezek. 5:7–11). God would punish Israel openly, in the sight of the nations whose evil practices they followed. This would not only chasten Israel, but it would be a warning to the Gentiles that the God of Israel is a God of justice. Whereas before, God had been with and for His people, now He would be against them,which reminds us of the iron skillet Ezekiel held between his face and the city of Jerusalem (4:3). The leaders had defiled the temple with their idols, a theme we’ll hear more about later in Ezekiel’s prophecy; the Lord responded by withdrawing His favor and refusing to pity His people in their great distress. “I will also diminish thee” in 5: can be translated “I myself will shave you,” taking us back to Ezekiel’s fourth “action sermon.”

In verses 12–17, the Lord explains again the awfulness of the judgment coming to the people left in the city and the land. Pestilence and famine will take onethird of them; another one-third will be killed by the Babylonian army; the remainder will be scattered. Why? Because God was “spending His wrath” and “accomplishing His fury” upon His sinful people. God’s anger against sin is a holy anger, not a temper tantrum, for He is a holy God. “Our God is a consuming fire” (Deut. 4:24; Heb. 12:29). There could be no doubt that these great judgments would come, because it was the Lord Himself who had spoken (Ezek. 5:13). The whole land would be devastated and people would perish from famine and the pestilence that often accompanies famine, as well as bloodshed from enemy soldiers and hungry wild beasts. But as terrible as these judgments were, perhaps the greatest tragedy was that Israel would cease to bring glory to Jehovah God (v. 14) and would become a shameful reproach among the nations (Deut. 28:37; Jer. 18:15–17; 48:27; 2 Chron. 7:19–22).

Jesus Christ warned the church of Ephesus that they would lose their light if they refused to repent and obey His instructions (Rev. 2:6). What a tragedy it is when a local assembly openly disobeys God’s Word and begins to act like the unsaved people of the world! Once a church has lost its witness for the Lord, is there anything left?

Throughout Old Testament history, the presence of a “faithful remnant” in Israel was important to the fulfillment of God’s plan. The entire nation of Israel accepted God’s covenant at Mount Sinai (Ex. 20:18–21), but most of them failed to obey the Lord and died in the wilderness. In the years that followed the nation’s entrance into the Promised Land, the people gradually declined spiritually, and it was the remnant that prayed, obeyed God’s Word, and remained faithful to the Lord. It is this remnant that will play an important role in the future of Israel (Isa. 1:9; 10:20–23; 11:11, 16; 37:31; Joel 2:32; Mic. 2:12; 5:7; Zeph. 2:4–7; Zech. 8:1–8; Mal. 3:16; Rom. 9:27; 11:5). According to the letters to the seven churches of Asia Minor, there is a faithful remnant in the professing church today (Rev. 2:24; 3:4–6; and note our Lord’s words to the “overcomers”).

The First Spoken Message: The Judgment of the