Jerome (Preface to Comm. on Ezek.) the Jewish youth were forbidden to read the mysterious first chapter (called the markaba, the “chariot”) and the concluding section (xl.-xlviii.) till they reached the age of thirty years.
The book divides itself naturally into three parts: the arraignment of Jerusalem (i.-xxiv.); denunciation of foreign enemies (xxv.-xxxii.); consolatory construction of the future (xxxiii.-xlviii.). The opening “vision” (i.), an elaborate symbolic picture, is of the nature of a general preface, and was composed probably late in the prophet’s life. Out of the north (the Babylonian sacred mountain) comes a bright cloud, wherein appear four Creatures (formed on the model of Babylonian composite figures), each with four faces (man, lion, bull, eagle) and attended by a wheel; the wheels are full of eyes, and move straight forward, impelled by the spirit dwelling in the Creatures (the spirit of Yahweh). Supported on their heads is something like a crystalline firmament, above which is a form like a sapphire throne (cf. Ex. xxiv. 10), and on the throne a man-like form (Yahweh) surrounded by a rainbow brightness. The wheels symbolize divine omniscience and control, and the whole vision represents the coming of Yahweh to take up his abode among the exiles. The prophet then receives his call (ii., iii.) in the shape of a roll of a book, which he is required to eat (an indication of the literary form now taken by prophecy). He is informed that the people to whom he is sent are rebellious and stiff-necked (this indicates his opinion of the people, and gives the keynote of the following discourses); he is appointed watchman to warn men when they sin, and is to be held responsible for the consequences if he fail in this duty. To this high conception of a preacher’s function the prophet was faithful throughout his career. Next follow minatory discourses (iv.-vii.) predicting the siege and capture of Jerusalem-perhaps revised after the event. There are several symbolic acts descriptive of the siege. One of these (iv. 4 ff.) gives the duration of the national punishment in loose chronological reckoning: 40 years (a round number) for Judah, and 150 more (according to the corrected text) for Israel, the starting-point, probably, being the year 722, the date of the capture of Samaria; the procedure described in v. 8 is not to be understood literally. In vi. the idolatry of the nation is pictured in darkest colours. Next follows (viii.-xi.) a detailed description, in the form of a vision, of the sin of Jerusalem: within the temple-area elders and others are worshipping beast-forms, Tammuz and the sun (probably actual cults of the time); [1] men approach to defile the temple and slay the inhabitants of the city (ix.). In ch. x. the imagery of ch. i. reappears, and the Creatures are identified with the cherubs of Solomon’s temple. This appears to be an independent form of the vision, which has been brought into connexion with that of i. by a harmonizing editor. There follow a symbolic prediction of the exile (xii.) and a denunciation of non-moral prophets and prophetesses (xiii.)—though Yahweh deceive a prophet, yet he and those who consult him will be punished; and so corrupt is the nation that the presence of a few eminently good men will not save it (xiv.).[2] After a comparison of Israel to a worthless wild vine (xv.) come two allegories, one portraying idolatrous Jerusalem as the unfaithful spouse of Yahweh (xvi.), the other describing the fate of Zedekiah (xvii.). The fine insistence on individual moral responsibility in xviii. (cf. Deut. xxiv. 16, Jer. xxxi. 29 f.), while it is a protest against a superficial current view, is not to be understood as a denial of all moral relations between successive generations. This latter question had not presented itself to the prophet’s mind; his object was simply to correct the opinion of the people that their present misfortunes were due not to their own faults but to those of their predecessors. A more sympathetic attitude appears in two elegies (xix.), one on the kings Jehoahaz and Jehoiachin, the other on the nation. These are followed by a scathing sketch of Israel’s religious career (xx. 1-26), in which, contrary to the view of earlier prophets, it is declared that the nation had always been disobedient. From this point to the end of xxiv. there is a mingling of threat and promise.[3] The allegory of xxiii. is similar to that of xvi., except that in the latter Samaria is relatively treated with favour, while in the former it (Aholah) is involved in the same condemnation as that of Jerusalem. At this point is introduced (xxv.-xxxii.) the series of discourses directed against foreign nations. The description of the king of Tyre (xxviii. 11-19) as dwelling in Eden, the garden of God, the sacred mountain, under the protection of the cherub, bears a curious resemblance to the narrative in Gen. ii., iii., of which, however, it seems to be independent, using different Babylonian material; the text is corrupt. The section dealing with Egypt is one of remarkable imaginative power and rhetorical vigour: the king of Egypt is compared to a magnificent cedar of Lebanon (in xxxi. 3 read: “there was a cedar in Lebanon”) and to the dragon of the Nile, and the picture of his descent into Sheol is intensely tragic. Whether these discourses were all uttered between the investment of Jerusalem and its fall, or were here inserted by Ezekiel or by a scribe, it is not possible to say. In xxxiii. the function of the prophet as watchman is described at length (expansion of the description in iii.) and the news of the capture of the city is received. The following chapters (xxxiv.-xxxix.) are devoted to reconstruction: Edom, the detested enemy of Israel, is to be crushed; the nation, politically raised from the dead, with North and South united (xxxvii.), is to be established under a Davidide king; a final assault, made by Gog, is to be successfully met,[4] and then the people are to dwell in their own land in peace for ever; this Gog section is regarded by some as the beginning of Jewish apocalyptic writing. In the last section (xl.-xlviii.), put as a vision, the temple is to be rebuilt, in dimensions and arrangements a reproduction of the temple of Solomon (cf. I Kings vi., vii.), the sacrifices and festivals and the functions of priests and prince are prescribed, a stream issuing from under the temple is to vivify the Dead Sea and fertilize the land (this is meant literally), the land is divided into parallel strips and assigned to the tribes. The prophet’s thought is summed up in the name of the city: Yahweh Shammah, “Yahweh is there,” God dwelling for ever in the midst of his people.
Literature.—For the older works see the Introductions of J.G. Carpzov (1757) and C.H.H. Wright (1890). For legends: Pseud.-Epiphan., De vit. prophet.; Benjamin of Tudela, Itin.; Hamburger, Realencycl.; Jew. Encycl. On the Hebrew text; C.H. Cornill, Ezechiel (1886) (very valuable for text and ancient versions); H. Graetz, Emendationes (1893).; C.H. Toy, “Text of Ezek.” (1899) in Haupt’s Sacred Books of the Old Test. Commentaries: F. Hitzig (1847); H. Ewald (1868); E. Reuss (French ed., 1876; Germ, ed., 1892); Currey (1876) in Speaker’s Comm.; R. Smend (revision of Hitzig) (1880) in Kurzgefasst. exeget. Handbuch; A.B. Davidson (1882) in Cambr. Bible for Schools; J. Skinner (1895) in Expos. Bible; A. Bertholet (1897) in Marti’s Kurz. Hand-Comm.; C.H. Toy (1899) in Haupt’s Sacr. Bks. (Eng. ed.); R. Kraetzschmar (1900) in W. Nowack’s Handkommentar. See also Duhm, Theol. d. Propheten (1875); A. Kuenen, Prophets and Prophecy (1877); Gautier, La Mission du prophète Ezéchiel (1891); Montefiore, Hibbert Lectures (1892); A. Bertholet, Der Verfassungsentwurf des Hesekiel (1896); articles in Herzog-Hauck, Realencykl.; Hastings, Bibl. Dict.; Cheyne, Encycl. Bibl., Jew. Encycl.; F. Bleek, Introd. (Eng. tr., 1875), and Bleek-Wellhausen (Germ.) (1878); Wildeboer, Letterkunde d. Oud. Verbonds (1893), and Germ, transl., Litt. d. Alt. Test.; Perrot and Chipiez, Hist. de l’art, &c. , in which, however, the restoration of Ezekiel’s temple (by Chipiez) is probably untrustworthy. (C. H. T.*)
EZRA (from a Hebrew word meaning “help”), in the Bible, the famous scribe and priest at the time of the return of the Jews in the reign of the Persian king Artaxerxes I. (458 B.C.). His book and that of Nehemiah form one work (see Ezra and Nehemiah, Books of), apart from which we have little trustworthy evidence as to his life. Even in the beginning of the 2nd century B.C., when Ben Sira praises notable figures of the exilic and post-exilic age (Zerubbabel, Jeshua and Nehemiah), Ezra is passed over (Ecclesiasticus xlix. 11-13), and he is not mentioned in a still later and somewhat fanciful description of Nehemiah’s work (2 Macc. i. 18-36). Already well known as a scribe, Ezra’s labours were magnified by subsequent tradition. He was regarded as the father of the scribes and the founder of the Great Synagogue. According to the apocryphal fourth book of Ezra (or 2 Esdras xiv.) he restored the law which had been lost, and rewrote all the sacred records (which had been destroyed) in addition to no fewer than seventy apocryphal works. The former theory recurs elsewhere in Jewish tradition, and may be associated with the representation in Ezra-Nehemiah which connects him with the law. But the story of his many literary efforts, like the more modern conjecture that he closed the canon of the Old Testament, rests upon no ancient basis.
See Bible, sect. Old Testament (Canon and Criticism); Jews (history, §21 seq.). The apocryphal books, called 1 and 2 Esdras (the Greek form of the name) in the English Bible, are dealt with below as Ezra, Third Book of, and Ezra, Fourth Book of, while the canonical book of Ezra is dealt with under Ezra and Nehemiah.
EZRA, THIRD BOOK OF [1 Esdras]. The titles of the various books of the Ezra literature are very confusing. The Greek,
the Old Latin, the Syriac, and the English Bible from 1560
- ↑ In viii. 17 the unintelligible expression “they put the branch to their nose” is the rendering of a corrupt Hebrew text; a probable emendation is: “they are sending a stench to my nostrils.”
- ↑ The legendary figure of Daniel (xiv. 14) is later taken by the author of the book of Daniel as his hero.
- ↑ For a reconstruction of the poem in xxi. 10, 11, see the English Ezekiel in Haupt’s Sacred Books.
- ↑ Gog probably represents a Scythian horde (though such an invasion never took place)—certainly not Alexander the Great, who would have been called “king of Greece,” and would have been regarded not as an enemy but as a friend.
