©1997 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
10. Ezekiel had to cook a pot of stew (24:1–14). 11. Ezekiel could not mourn at the death of his wife (24:15–24). 12. Ezekiel was mute for a season (24:25–27). 13. Ezekiel put two sticks together and they became one (37:15–28). ©1997 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
EZEKIEL—NOTE ON 3:21 delivered your soul. The prophet had done his duty.
EZEKIEL—NOTE ON 3:23 the glory of the Lord. See Introduction: Historical and Theological Themes.
EZEKIEL—NOTE ON 3:24 shut yourself within your house. He was to fulfill much of his ministry at home (8:1; 12:1–7), thereby limiting it to those who came to hear him there.
EZEKIEL—NOTE ON 3:25 cords will be placed upon you. These were not literal, but spiritual. On one hand, they could be the inner ropes of depressing influence which the rebellious Jews exerted on his spirit. Their perversity, like ropes, would repress his freedom in preaching. More likely, they imply the restraint that God placed on him by supernatural power, so that he could only go and speak where and when God chose (cf. vv. 26–27).
EZEKIEL—NOTE ON 3:26–27 you shall be mute. He was not to speak primarily, but to act out God's message. The prohibition was only partial, for on any occasion (v. 27) when God did open his mouth, as he often did in chs. 5–7, he was to speak (3:22; 11:25; 12:10, 19, 23, 28). The end of such intermittent dumbness with regard to his own people closely synchronized with Ezekiel's receiving a refugee's report of Jerusalem's fall (24:25–27; 33:21–22). He also spoke with regard to judgments on other nations (chs. 25–32).
EZEKIEL—NOTE ON 4:1–7:27 Here is the first series of prophecies given over a year's time, of Jerusalem's conquest by the Babylonians in 586 B.C.
EZEKIEL—NOTE ON 4:1–3 engrave . . . Jerusalem. Ezekiel's object lesson was to use a soft tile to create a miniature city layout of Jerusalem with walls and siege objects to illustrate Babylon's final coming siege of Jerusalem (588–586 B.C.).
EZEKIEL—NOTE ON 4:4–6 lie on your left side . . . right side. Lying on his side, likely facing north, illustrated God's applying judgment to Israel, and facing