Ezekiel 26

Ezekiel 26:1

E. Prophecy against Tyre (26:128:19)1. The Destruction of Tyre (Chap. 26)26:1, 2 The fifth object of God’s judgment is the seacoast city of Tyre. Its punishment extends from 26:1 to 28:19. Super-commercial Tyre rejoiced when it heard that its rival city, Jerusalem, had fallen, thinking that it would now get all the business! Jerusalem had controlled all the overland trade routes, and its fall meant freer traffic for Tyre with Egypt and other southern countries. 26:3-11 God would use many nations to chastise this city-state. The predictions of verses 4-6 have been literally fulfilled. First Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, king of kings, marched against Tyre from the north and attacked it (vv. 7-11). The siege was extremely longabout 587 B.C.574 B.C. Feinberg gives a vivid picture of the type of siege this renowned city endured: The forts, the mound and the buckler were all familiar features. The buckler or the testudo or roof of shields was used to protect against missiles thrown from the walls. The battering engines were the battering rams employed to breach the walls. The axes, literally, swords, were used in a figurative manner for all the weapons of warfare. Some have considered the first part of verse 10 a hyperbole, but it is not beyond the range of literal fulfillment. Because of the multitude of the enemy’s cavalry, they would cover the city with dust upon entering, at the same time shaking the walls with the noise of the horsemen and chariots.

Every street was to be commandeered and the people slain with the sword. The pillars spoken of were actually obelisks, and were probably those mentioned by the historian Herodotus as erected in the temple of Heracles at Tyre. One was of gold and the other of emerald, which shone brilliantly at night, and were dedicated to Melkarth, god of Tyre (cf. 1Ki_7:15). These impressive pillars would be demolished by the invader. 26:12-14 But the people fled with their possessions to an offshore island, also called Tyre. They remained secure there for 250 years. Then Alexander the Great built a causeway to the island by scraping clean the original city and throwing the rubble into the sea. This action by Alexander’s soldiers (332 B.C.) is described in this paragraph. Over a hundred years ago a traveler described the ruins of Tyre as being exactly as predicted: The island, as such, is not more than a mile in length. The part which projects south beyond the isthmus is perhaps a quarter of a mile broad, and is rocky and uneven. It is now unoccupied except by fishermen, as “a place to spread nets upon.” 26:15-21 News of the fall of Tyre would cause consternation among other nations. All her beauty which they had so admired would be destroyed. But God shall establish an everlasting glory in the land of the living, which is a part of the same kingdom we belong to. Tyre has never been rebuilta fulfillment of verse 21. In his book, Science Speaks, Peter Stoner says that this entire prophecy concerning Tyre, considering all the details, using the principle of probability, had a one-in-four hundred million chance of fulfillment.