Yehezkiel 1:1

A Vision of God’s Glory

1:1 In the thirtieth year, ¹  on the fifth day of the fourth month, while I was among the exiles ²  at the Kebar River, ³  the heavens opened ⁴  and I saw a divine vision. ⁵ 

Yehezkiel 1:3

1:3 the word of the Lord came to the priest Ezekiel ⁶  the son of Buzi, ⁷  at the Kebar River in the land of the Babylonians. ⁸  The hand ⁹  of the Lord came on him there).

Yehezkiel 7:26

7:26 Disaster after disaster will come, and one rumor after another. They will seek a vision from a prophet; priestly instruction will disappear, along with counsel from the elders.

Yehezkiel 22:26

22:26 Her priests abuse my law and have desecrated my holy things. They do not distinguish between the holy and the profane, ¹⁰  or recognize any distinction between the unclean and the clean. They ignore ¹¹  my Sabbaths and I am profaned in their midst.

Yehezkiel 23:40

23:40 “They even sent for men from far away; when the messenger arrived, those men set out. ¹²  For them you bathed, ¹³  painted your eyes, and decorated yourself with jewelry.

Yehezkiel 40:45-46

40:45 He said to me, “This chamber which faces south is for the priests who keep charge of the temple, ¹⁴  40:46 and the chamber which faces north is for the priests who keep charge of the altar. These are the descendants of Zadok, from the descendants of Levi, who may approach the Lord to minister to him.”

Yehezkiel 41:8

41:8 I saw that the temple had a raised platform all around; the foundations of the side chambers were a full measuring stick ¹⁵  of 10½ feet ¹⁶  high.

Yehezkiel 42:13-14

42:13 Then he said to me, “The north chambers and the south chambers which face the courtyard are holy chambers where the priests ¹⁷  who approach the Lord will eat the most holy offerings. There they will place the most holy offerings – the grain offering, the sin offering, and the guilt offering, because the place is holy. 42:14 When the priests enter, then they will not go out from the sanctuary to the outer court without taking off their garments in which they minister, for these are holy; they will put on other garments, then they will go near the places where the people are.”

Yehezkiel 43:19

43:19 you will give a young bull for a sin offering to the Levitical priests who are descended from Zadok, who approach me to minister to me, declares the sovereign Lord.

Yehezkiel 43:24

43:24 You will present them before the Lord, and the priests will scatter salt on them ¹⁸  and offer them up as a burnt offering to the Lord.

Yehezkiel 43:26-27

43:26 For seven days they will make atonement for the altar and cleanse it, so they will consecrate it. ¹⁹  43:27 When the prescribed period is over, ²⁰  on the eighth day and thereafter the priests will offer up on the altar your burnt offerings and your peace offerings; ²¹  I will accept you, declares the sovereign Lord.”

Yehezkiel 44:13

44:13 They will not come near me to serve me as priest, nor will they come near any of my holy things, the things which are most sacred. They will bear the shame of the abominable deeds they have committed.

Yehezkiel 44:15

The Levitical Priests

44:15 “‘But the Levitical priests, the descendants of Zadok ²²  who kept the charge of my sanctuary when the people of Israel went astray from me, will approach me to minister to me; they will stand before me to offer me the fat and the blood, declares the sovereign Lord.

Yehezkiel 44:19-23

44:19 When they go out to the outer court to the people, they must remove the garments they were ministering in, and place them in the holy chambers; they must put on other garments so that they will not transmit holiness to the people with their garments. ²³ 

44:20 “‘They must not shave their heads ²⁴  nor let their hair grow long; ²⁵  they must only trim their heads. 44:21 No priest may drink wine when he enters the inner court. 44:22 They must not marry a widow or a divorcee, but they may marry a virgin from the house of Israel ²⁶  or a widow who is a priest’s widow. 44:23 Moreover, they will teach my people the difference between the holy and the common, and show them how to distinguish between the ceremonially unclean and the clean. ²⁷ 

Yehezkiel 44:25

44:25 “‘They must not come near a dead person or they will be defiled; ²⁸  however, for father, mother, son, daughter, brother or sister, they may defile themselves.

Yehezkiel 44:28-31

44:28 “‘This will be their inheritance: I am their inheritance, and you must give them no property in Israel; I am their property. ²⁹  44:29 They may eat the grain offering, the sin offering, and the guilt offering, and every devoted thing in Israel will be theirs. 44:30 The first of all the first fruits and all contributions of any kind ³⁰  will be for the priests; you will also give to the priest the first portion of your dough, so that a blessing may rest on your house. 44:31 The priests will not eat any bird or animal that has died a natural death or was torn to pieces by a wild animal. ³¹ 

Yehezkiel 45:4

45:4 It will be a holy portion of the land; it will be for the priests, the ministers of the sanctuary who approach the Lord to minister to him. It will be a place for their houses and a holy place for the sanctuary. ³² 

Yehezkiel 45:19

45:19 The priest will take some of the blood of the sin offering and place it on the doorpost of the temple, on the four corners of the ledge of the altar, and on the doorpost of the gate of the inner court.

Yehezkiel 46:2

46:2 The prince will enter by way of the porch of the gate from the outside, and will stand by the doorpost of the gate. The priests will provide his burnt offering and his peace offerings, and he will bow down at the threshold of the gate and then go out. But the gate will not be closed until evening.

Yehezkiel 46:19-20

46:19 Then he brought me through the entrance, which was at the side of the gate, into the holy chambers for the priests which faced north. There I saw ³³  a place at the extreme western end. 46:20 He said to me, “This is the place where the priests will boil the guilt offering and the sin offering, and where they will bake the grain offering, so that they do not bring them out to the outer court to transmit holiness to the people.”

Yehezkiel 48:10-11

48:10 These will be the allotments for the holy portion: for the priests, toward the north eight and a quarter miles ³⁴  in length, toward the west three and one-third miles ³⁵  in width, toward the east three and one-third miles ³⁶  in width, and toward the south eight and a quarter miles ³⁷  in length; the sanctuary of the Lord will be in the middle. 48:11 This will be for the priests who are set apart from the descendants of Zadok who kept my charge and did not go astray when the people of Israel strayed off, like the Levites did. ³⁸ 

Yehezkiel 48:13

48:13 “Alongside the border of the priests, the Levites will have an allotment eight and a quarter miles ³⁹  in length and three and one-third miles ⁴⁰  in width. The whole length will be eight and a quarter miles ⁴¹  and the width three and one-third miles. ⁴² 

Yehezkiel 48:21

48:21 “The rest, on both sides of the holy allotment and the property of the city, will belong to the prince. Extending from the eight and a quarter miles ⁴³  of the holy allotment to the east border, and westward from the eight and a quarter miles ⁴⁴  to the west border, alongside the portions, it will belong to the prince. The holy allotment and the sanctuary of the temple will be in the middle of it.

[1:1]  ¹ sn The meaning of the thirtieth year is problematic. Some take it to mean the age of Ezekiel when he prophesied (e.g., Origen). The Aramaic Targum explains the thirtieth year as the thirtieth year dated from the recovery of the book of the Torah in the temple in Jerusalem (2 Kgs 22:3-9). The number seems somehow to be equated with the fifth year of Jehoiachin’s exile in 1:2, i.e., 593 b.c.

[1:1]  ² sn The Assyrians started the tactic of deportation, the large-scale forced displacement of conquered populations, in order to stifle rebellions. The task of uniting groups of deportees, gaining freedom from one’s overlords and returning to retake one’s own country would be considerably more complicated than living in one’s homeland and waiting for an opportune moment to drive out the enemy’s soldiers. The Babylonians adopted this practice also, after defeating the Assyrians. The Babylonians deported Judeans on three occasions. The practice of deportation was reversed by the Persian conquerors of Babylon, who gained favor from their subjects for allowing them to return to their homeland and, as polytheists, sought the favor of the gods of the various countries which had come under their control.

[1:1]  ³ sn The Kebar River is mentioned in Babylonian texts from the city of Nippur in the fifth century b.c. It provided artificial irrigation from the Euphrates.

[1:1]  ⁴ sn For the concept of the heavens opened in later literature, see 3 Macc 6:18; 2 Bar. 22:1; T. Levi 5:1; Matt 3:16; Acts 7:56; Rev 19:11.

[1:1]  ⁵ tn Or “saw visions from God.” References to divine visions occur also in Ezek 8:3; 40:2

[1:3]  ⁶ sn The prophet’s name, Ezekiel, means in Hebrew “May God strengthen.”

[1:3]  ⁷ tn Or “to Ezekiel son of Buzi the priest.”

[1:3]  ⁸ tn Heb “Chaldeans.” The name of the tribal group ruling Babylon, “Chaldeans” is used as metonymy for the whole empire of Babylon. The Babylonians worked with the Medes to destroy the Assyrian Empire near the end of the 7th century b.c. Then, over the next century, the Babylonians dominated the West Semitic states (such as Phoenicia, Aram, Moab, Edom, and Judah in the modern countries of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Israel) and made incursions into Egypt.

[1:3]  ⁹ tn Or “power.”

[1:3]  sn Hand in the OT can refer metaphorically to power, authority, or influence. In Ezekiel God’s “hand” being on the prophet is regularly associated with communication or a vision from God (3:14, 22; 8:1; 37:1; 40:1).

[22:26]  ¹⁰ tn Or “between the consecrated and the common.”

[22:26]  ¹¹ tn Heb “hide their eyes from.” The idiom means to disregard or ignore something or someone (see Lev 20:4; 1 Sam 12:3; Prov 28:27; Isa 1:15).

[23:40]  ¹² tn Heb “to whom a messenger was sent, and look, they came.” Foreign alliances are in view here.

[23:40]  ¹³ tn The Hebrew verb form is feminine singular, indicating that Oholibah (Judah) is specifically addressed here. This address continues through verse 42a (note “her”), but then both sisters are described in verse 42b, where the feminine pronouns are again plural.

[40:45]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “the house.”

[41:8]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “reed.”

[41:8]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “six cubits” (i.e., 3.15 meters).

[42:13]  ¹⁷ sn The priests are from the Zadokite family (Ezek 40:6; 44:15).

[43:24]  ¹⁸ sn It is likely that salt was used with sacrificial meals (Num 18:19; 2 Chr 13:5).

[43:26]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “fill its hands.”

[43:27]  ²⁰ tn Heb “and they will complete the days.”

[43:27]  ²¹ sn The people also could partake of the food of the peace offering (Lev 3).

[44:15]  ²² sn Zadok was a descendant of Aaron through Eleazar (1 Chr 6:50-53), who served as a priest during David’s reign (2 Sam 8:17).

[44:19]  ²³ sn For a similar concept of the transmitting of holiness, see Exod 19:12-14; Lev 10:1-2; 2 Sam 6:7. Similar laws concerning the priest are found in Lev 10 and 21.

[44:20]  ²⁴ sn The shaving of the head was associated with mourning (Ezek 7:18).

[44:20]  ²⁵ sn Letting the hair grow was associated with the taking of a vow (Num 6:5; Acts 21:23-26).

[44:22]  ²⁶ tn Heb “from the offspring of the house of Israel.”

[44:23]  ²⁷ sn This task was a fundamental role of the priest (Lev 10:10).

[44:25]  ²⁸ sn This law was part of the legal code for priests (Lev 21:1-3).

[44:28]  ²⁹ sn See Num 18:20; Deut 10:9; 18:2; Josh 13:33; 18:7.

[44:30]  ³⁰ tn Heb has in addition “from your contributions,” a repetition unnecessary in English.

[44:31]  ³¹ tn The words “by a wild animal” are not in the Hebrew text, but have been supplied in the translation as a clarification of the circumstances.

[44:31]  sn For this law, see Lev 7:24; 17:15.

[45:4]  ³² tc The LXX apparently understood “open land” instead of “sanctuary.”

[46:19]  ³³ tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something and has been translated here as a verb.

[48:10]  ³⁴ tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).

[48:10]  ³⁵ tn Heb “ten thousand cubits” (i.e., 5.25 kilometers).

[48:10]  ³⁶ tn Heb “ten thousand cubits” (i.e., 5.25 kilometers).

[48:10]  ³⁷ tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).

[48:11]  ³⁸ tn Heb “strayed off.”

[48:13]  ³⁹ tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).

[48:13]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “ten thousand cubits” (i.e., 5.25 kilometers).

[48:13]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).

[48:13]  ⁴² tn Heb “ten thousand cubits” (i.e., 5.25 kilometers).

[48:21]  ⁴³ tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).

[48:21]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).