A word against the mountains of Israel
36
📚“Also, son of man, prophesy to the mountains of Israel, and say, You mountains of Israel, hear the word of the LORD. 2 📚Thus says the Lord God: Because the enemy has said against you, ‘Aha! Even the ancient high places are ours to possess.’ 3 📚Therefore prophesy and say, Thus says the Lord God: Because they have made you desolate, and swallowed you up on every side, so that you might be possessed by the rest of the nations, and because you are taken up by the lips of talkers, and are slandered by the peoples,36:3 Israel had to endure such things through much of their history.⚜
4 📚therefore, you mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord God. Thus says the Lord God to the mountains, and to the hills, to the rivers, and to the valleys, to the desolate wastes, and to the cities that are forsaken, which became a prey and an object of derision to the rest of the surrounding nations: 5 📚Therefore thus says the Lord God: Surely in the fire of my jealousy I have spoken against the rest of the nations, and against all Edom, who have claimed my land for themselves as a possession, with whole-hearted joy, with spiteful minds, plundering its countryside. 6 📚Therefore prophesy concerning the land of Israel, and say to the mountains, and to the hills, to the rivers, and to the valleys, Thus says the Lord God: See, I have spoken in my jealousy 📖 and in my fury, because you have had to bear the scorn of the nations. 7 📚Therefore thus says the Lord God: I have lifted up my hand to swear, Surely the nations which are around you will have to bear their scorn.
36:7 God will deal with those nations as they dealt with Israel (Ezek 35:11).⚜
8 📚“But you, O mountains of Israel, will put out your branches, and yield your fruit to my people Israel; for they are about to come. 9 📚For, see, I am for you, and I will turn to you, and you will be tilled and sown. 10 📚And I will multiply men on you, all the house of Israel, all of it. And the cities will be inhabited, and the waste places will be built up. 11 📚And I will multiply man and beast in you, and they will increase and bear fruit. And I will settle people on you as in the past, and will do more good to you than at your beginnings; and you will know that I am the LORD. 12 📚Yes, I will cause men, my people Israel, to walk on you, and they will possess you, and you will be their inheritance, and from then on you will no longer bereave them of men.
13 📚“Thus says the Lord God: Because they say to you, ‘You, O land, devour men, and bereave your nation.’ 14 📚Therefore you will devour men no longer, nor bereave your nation any more, says the Lord God. 15 📚Nor will I any longer cause people to hear in you the insults of the nations, nor will you bear the reproach of the peoples any longer, nor will you cause your nation to fall any more, says the Lord God”.
36:8-15 A prophecy that the land of Israel would be restored. Observe the words “no longer” in v 12 and “any more” and “any longer” in vs 14,15. This was not fulfilled at the return of the Jews from Babylon, for after that return the land was again deprived of its children (in 70 AD when the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and scattered the Jews). Two comings of Christ are foretold in the Old Testament, and there is no indication that many centuries would elapse between them. So it is with two restorations of Israel.⚜
16 Moreover the word of the LORD came to me, saying, 17 📚“Son of man, when the house of Israel lived in their own land, they defiled 📖 it by their own way and by their deeds. To me their way was like the uncleanness of a woman in her monthly impurity. 18 📚Wherefore I poured my fury on them, because of the blood that they had shed on the land, and because of their idols, with which they had defiled it.
36:18 Two main ways in which Israel defiled God’s land – murder and false religion. The one meant the death of people, the other meant the death of truth there. Both were done in defiance of God’s laws (Exodus chapter 20).⚜
19 📚And I scattered them among the nations, and they were dispersed through the countries. I judged them in accordance with 📖 their way and their deeds. 20 📚And when they went among the nations, wherever they went, they profaned 📖 my holy name, when they said to them, ‘These are the people of the LORD, and have left his land.’ 21 📚But I had concern for my holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the nations where they went.
God will restore Israel and give them a new heart
22 📚“Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God: I do not do this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for my holy name’s sake, which you have profaned among the nations where you went.
36:22 God would act for the sake of His holy name. That is, He would bring Israel back to the land and make them a holy people in a restored land (vs 24-35), though they did not in any way deserve God’s favor. Compare God’s way with believers described in Eph 1:3-14 which results in praise of His glorious grace. Observe here in Ezekiel that God’s reputation is bound up with His people. By observing them others will be influenced in their views of God.⚜
23 📚And I will show that my great name is holy, which name was profaned among the nations, which you have profaned among them. And the nations will know that I am the LORD, says the Lord God, when I am shown to be holy through you before their eyes.
36:16-23 The reasons for Israel’s ejection from the land.⚜
24 📚“For I will take you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land. 25 📚Then I will sprinkle 📖 clean water on you, and you will be clean. I will cleanse you from all your filthiness, and from all your idols. 26 📚Also I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you, and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh.
27 📚And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes; and you will keep my judgments, and do them.
36:25-27 This speaks of a complete change in the people similar to that described in Jer 31:31-34 and Isa 1:25; 4:3-4. God promises to give this fallen people exactly what they needed – cleansing, a new heart, His own spirit and an inner strength to obey His word. All these He will give now also to the repenting sinner. Compare Ps 51:7-12.⚜
28 📚And you will live in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you will be my people, and I will be your God. 29 📚I will also save you from all your uncleanness. And I will call for the grain and increase it, and put no famine on you. 30 📚And I will multiply the fruit of the tree, and the crops of the field, that you will no longer receive reproach about famine among the nations. 31 📚Then you will remember your own evil ways, and your deeds that were not good, and will loathe yourselves in your own sight for your wicked deeds and for your abominations.
36:31 This is certain to happen when God grants true repentance to sinful men – Ezek 6:9; 16:63; 20:43; Ps 51:3-5; Luke 18:13.⚜
32 📚Let it be known to you that I do not do this for your sakes, says the Lord God. Be ashamed and feel disgraced for your own ways, O house of Israel.
33 📚“Thus says the Lord God: On the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities I will also cause you to live in the cities, and the ruins will be built up. 34 📚And the desolate land will be tilled, instead of lying desolate in the sight of all who passed by. 35 📚And they will say, ‘This land, which was desolate, has become like the garden of Eden; and the wasted and desolate and ruined cities are fortified, and are inhabited.’ 36 📚Then the nations that are left around you will know that I, the Lord, build the ruined places, and plant what was desolate. I, the LORD, have spoken, and I will do it.
36:36 This will be done in such a way that the nations will know it is God’s work, not Israel’s.⚜
37 📚“Thus says the Lord God: I will also let the house of Israel inquire of me for this, to do it for them: I will increase them with men like a flock,
38 📚like the holy flock, like the flock of Jerusalem in her solemn feasts. So the ruined cities will be filled with flocks of men; and they will know that I am the LORD”.
36:1-38 A prophecy in four parts – vengeance against the nations that ruined Israel (vs 1-7), restoration of the land itself (vs 8-15), the reason for Israel’s ejection from the land (vs 16-23), the return of the people of Israel to the land (vs 24-38).⚜