Yehezkiel 30:3

30:3 For the day is near,

the day of the Lord is near;

it will be a day of storm clouds, ¹ 

it will be a time of judgment ²  for the nations.

Yehezkiel 10:3

10:3 (The cherubim were standing on the south side ³  of the temple when the man went in, and a cloud filled the inner court.)

Yehezkiel 32:7

32:7 When I extinguish you, I will cover the sky;

I will darken its stars.

I will cover the sun with a cloud,

and the moon will not shine. ⁴ 

Yehezkiel 38:9

38:9 You will advance; ⁵  you will come like a storm. You will be like a cloud covering the earth, you, all your troops, and the many other peoples with you.

Yehezkiel 10:4

10:4 Then the glory of the Lord arose from the cherub and moved to the threshold of the temple. The temple was filled with the cloud while the court was filled with the brightness of the Lord’s glory.

Yehezkiel 30:18

30:18 In Tahpanhes the day will be dark ⁶ 

when I break the yoke of Egypt there.

Her confident pride will cease within her;

a cloud will cover her, and her daughters will go into captivity.

Yehezkiel 31:3

31:3 Consider Assyria, ⁷  a cedar in Lebanon, ⁸ 

with beautiful branches, like a forest giving shade,

and extremely tall;

its top reached into the clouds.

Yehezkiel 1:4

1:4 As I watched, I noticed ⁹  a windstorm ¹⁰  coming from the north – an enormous cloud, with lightning flashing, ¹¹  such that bright light ¹²  rimmed it and came from ¹³  it like glowing amber ¹⁴  from the middle of a fire.

Yehezkiel 31:10

31:10 “‘Therefore this is what the sovereign Lord says: Because it was tall in stature, and its top reached into the clouds, and it was proud of its height,

Yehezkiel 1:28

1:28 like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds after the rain. ¹⁵  This was the appearance of the surrounding brilliant light; it looked like the glory of the Lord. When I saw ¹⁶  it, I threw myself face down, and I heard a voice speaking.

Yehezkiel 38:16

38:16 You will advance ¹⁷  against my people Israel like a cloud covering the earth. In the latter days I will bring you against my land so that the nations may acknowledge me, when before their eyes I magnify myself ¹⁸  through you, O Gog.

Yehezkiel 31:14

31:14 For this reason no watered trees will grow so tall; their tops will not reach into the clouds, nor will the well-watered ones grow that high. ¹⁹  For all of them have been appointed to die in the lower parts of the earth; ²⁰  they will be among mere mortals, ²¹  with those who descend to the pit.

Yehezkiel 34:12

34:12 As a shepherd seeks out his flock when he is among his scattered sheep, so I will seek out my flock. I will rescue them from all the places where they have been scattered on a cloudy, dark day. ²² 

Yehezkiel 1:5

1:5 In the fire ²³  were what looked like ²⁴  four living beings. ²⁵  In their appearance they had human form, ²⁶ 

Yehezkiel 30:2

30:2 “Son of man, prophesy and say, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says:

“‘Wail, “Alas, the day is here!” ²⁷ 

Yehezkiel 19:11

19:11 Its boughs were strong, fit ²⁸  for rulers’ scepters; it reached up into the clouds.

It stood out because of its height and its many branches. ²⁹ 

Yehezkiel 38:15

38:15 and come from your place, from the remote parts of the north, you and many peoples with you, all of them riding on horses, a great company and a vast army.

Yehezkiel 17:22

17:22 “‘This is what the sovereign Lord says:

“‘I will take a sprig ³⁰  from the lofty top of the cedar and plant it. ³¹ 

I will pluck from the top one of its tender twigs;

I myself will plant it on a high and lofty mountain.

[30:3]  ¹ tn Heb “a day of clouds.” The expression occurs also in Joel 2:2 and Zeph 1:15; it recalls the appearance of God at Mount Sinai (Exod 19:9, 16, 18).

[30:3]  ² tn Heb “a time.” The words “of judgment” have been added in the translation for clarification (see the following verses).

[10:3]  ³ tn Heb “right side.”

[32:7]  ⁴ tn Heb “will not shine its light.” For similar features of cosmic eschatology, see Joel 2:10; 4:15; Amos 5:18-20; Zeph 1:5.

[38:9]  ⁵ tn Heb “go up.”

[30:18]  ⁶ sn In Zeph 1:15 darkness is associated with the day of the Lord.

[31:3]  ⁷ sn Either Egypt, or the Lord compares Egypt to Assyria, which is described in vv. 3-17 through the metaphor of a majestic tree. See D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 2:185. Like Egypt, Assyria had been a great world power, but in time God brought the Assyrians down. Egypt should learn from history the lesson that no nation, no matter how powerful, can withstand the judgment of God. Rather than following the text here, some prefer to emend the proper name Assyria to a similar sounding common noun meaning “boxwood” (see Ezek 27:6), which would make a fitting parallel to “cedar of Lebanon” in the following line. In this case vv. 3-18 in their entirety refer to Egypt, not Assyria. See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 2:121-27.

[31:3]  ⁸ sn Lebanon was know for its cedar trees (Judg 9:15; 1 Kgs 4:33; 5:6; 2 Kgs 14:9; Ezra 3:7; Pss 29:5; 92:12; 104:16).

[1:4]  ⁹ tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something and has been translated here as a verb.

[1:4]  ¹⁰ sn Storms are often associated with appearances of God (see Nah 1:3; Ps 18:12). In some passages, the “storm” (סְעָרָה, sÿ’arah) may be a whirlwind (Job 38:1, 2 Kgs 2:1).

[1:4]  ¹¹ tn Heb “fire taking hold of itself,” perhaps repeatedly. The phrase occurs elsewhere only in Exod 9:24 in association with a hailstorm. The LXX interprets the phrase as fire flashing like lightning, but it is possibly a self-sustaining blaze of divine origin. The LXX also reverses the order of the descriptors, i.e., “light went around it and fire flashed like lightning within it.”

[1:4]  ¹² tn Or “radiance.” The term also occurs in 1:27b.

[1:4]  ¹³ tc Or “was in it”; cf. LXX ἐν τῷ μέσῳ αὐτοῦ (en tw mesw autou, “in its midst”).

[1:4]  ¹⁴ tn The LXX translates חַשְׁמַל (khashmal) with the word ἤλεκτρον (hlektron, “electrum”; so NAB), an alloy of silver and gold, perhaps envisioning a comparison to the glow of molten metal.

[1:28]  ¹⁵ sn Reference to the glowing substance and the brilliant light and storm phenomena in vv. 27-28a echoes in reverse order the occurrence of these phenomena in v. 4.

[1:28]  ¹⁶ tn The vision closes with the repetition of the verb “I saw” from the beginning of the vision in 1:4.

[38:16]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “come up.”

[38:16]  ¹⁸ tn Or “reveal my holiness.”

[31:14]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “and they will not stand to them in their height, all the drinkers of water.”

[31:14]  ²⁰ tn Heb “for death, to the lower earth.”

[31:14]  ²¹ tn Heb “the sons of men.”

[34:12]  ²² sn The imagery may reflect the overthrow of the Israelites by the Babylonians in 587/6 b.c.

[1:5]  ²³ tc Heb “from its midst” (מִתּוֹכָהּ, mitokhah). The LXX reads ἐν τῷ μέσῳ (en tw mesw, “in the midst of it”). The LXX also reads ἐν for מִתּוֹךְ (mitokh) in v. 4. The translator of the LXX of Ezekiel either read בְּתוֹךְ (bÿtokh, “within”) in his Hebrew exemplar or could not imagine how מִתּוֹךְ could make sense and so chose to use ἐν. The Hebrew would be understood by adding “from its midst emerged the forms of four living beings.”

[1:5]  ²⁴ tn Heb “form, figure, appearance.”

[1:5]  ²⁵ tn The Hebrew term is feminine plural yet thirty-three of the forty-five pronominal suffixes and verbal references which refer to the living beings in the chapter are masculine plural. The grammatical vacillation between masculine and feminine plurals suggests the difficulty Ezekiel had in penning these words as he was overcome by the vision of God. In ancient Near Eastern sculpture very similar images of part-human, part-animal creatures serve as throne and sky bearers. For a discussion of ancient Near Eastern parallels, see L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 1:26-31. Ezekiel’s vision is an example of contextualization, where God accommodates his self-revelation to cultural expectations and norms.

[1:5]  ²⁶ sn They had human form may mean they stood erect.

[30:2]  ²⁷ tn Heb “Alas for the day.”

[19:11]  ²⁸ tn The word “fit” does not occur in the Hebrew text.

[19:11]  ²⁹ tn Heb “and it was seen by its height and by the abundance of its branches.”

[17:22]  ³⁰ sn The language is analogous to messianic imagery in Isa 11:1; Zech 3:8; 6:4 although the technical terminology is not the same.

[17:22]  ³¹ tc The LXX lacks “and plant it.”