Ezekiel 19

19: 1, 2 MOREOVER, take thou up a lamentation for the princes of Israel, and say, What was thy mother? A lioness: she couched among lions, in the midst of the young lions she nourished her whelps. And she brought up one of her whelps; he became a young lion: and he learned to catch the prey, he devoured men. The nations also heard of him; he was taken in their pit: and they brought him with hooks unto the land of Egypt. Now when she saw that she had waited, and her hope was lost, then she took another of her whelps, and made him a young lion. And he went up and down among the lions, he became a young lion: and he learned to catch the prey, he devoured men. And he knew their palaces, and laid waste their cities; and the land was desolate, and the fulness thereof, because of the noise of his roaring. Then the nations set against him on every side from the provinces: and they spread their net over him; he was taken in their pit. And they put him in a cage with hooks, and brought him to the king of Babylon; they brought him into strong holds, that his voice should no more be heard upon the mountains of Israel. Thy mother was like a vine, in thy blood, planted by the waters: she was fruitful and full of branches by reason of many waters. And she had strong rods for the sceptres of them that bare rule, and their stature was exalted among the thick boughs, and they were seen in their height with the multitude of their branches. But she was plucked up in fury, she was cast down to the ground, and the east wind dried up her fruit: her strong rods were broken off and withered; the fire consumed them. And now she is planted in the wilderness, in a dry and thirsty land. And fire is gone out of the rods of her branches, it hath devoured her fruit, so that there is in her no strong rod to be a sceptre to rule. This is a lamentation, and shall be for a lamentation.

Chap. 19. The scope of this chapter is much the same with that of the 17th, to foretell and lament the ruin of the house of David, the royal family of Judah, in the calamitous exit of the four sons and grandsons of Josiah—Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, Jeconiah, and Zedekiah, in whom that illustrious line of kings was cut off, which the prophet is here ordered to lament (verse 1). And he does it by similitudes. The kingdom of Judah and house of David are here compared to a lioness, and those princes to lions that were fierce and ravenous, but were hunted down and taken in nets (verses 2-9). That kingdom and that house are here compared to a vine, and these princes to branches, which had been strong and flourishing, but were now broken off and burned (verses 10-14). This ruin of that monarchy was now in the doing, and this lamentation of it was intended to affect the people with it, that they might not flatter themselves with vain hopes of the lengthening out of their tranquillity. H.

This chapter sets before the exiles the fall of the royal house of Judah and ultimately of the nation. With high poetic beauty this is done by conceiving of the whole people as “thy mother;” of this mother as first a lioness who puts her young lions one after another on the throne: and next, as a vine whose strong shoots become sceptres for her kings, but which is finally itself plucked up in fury, dried by the east wind, and burned in the fire. So perish the kings of Judah, the people also, and the whole frame of organized society and government—a cluster of painful facts taken up here for a lamentation among the exiles of Chaldea. Some of these events had already transpired: the rest of them were near at hand. There was no hope of saving these exiles morally and spiritually without bringing to bear upon them the entire moral power of those judgments with which God was scourging and wasting their mother people and country. Hence these topics appear in Ezekiel “line upon line,” reiterated with wonderful variety of representation, and we might say, in forms which exhaust the entire wealth of symbols and figures known to Hebrew or Chaldean literature. H. C.

A dirge or lamentation for Jehoahaz and Jehoiachin. We have seen in chap. 17 that Ezekiel regarded Zedekiah as an interloper. It is in accordance with this view that here he passes over Jehoiakim and Zedekiah as mere creatures of Egypt and of Babylon, and recognizes Jehoahaz and Jehoiachin as the only legitimate sovereigns since the time of Josiah. But this dirge in referring to the past looks forward to the future, and warns the usurper Zedekiah of an approaching fate similar to that of the two earlier kings. B. C.

3,4. This first young lion-king was Jehoahaz, recognized by three marks. He was the first among the sons of Josiah to succeed him on his throne, and is the first in order here. He was put on the throne by the people, as the history specially affirms (2 K. 23:30; 2 Chron. 36:1). He and he only, having been deposed by Pharaoh Necho, was carried (as here stated) to Egypt, and died there. The figure is carried out to the life. This young lion caught the ways of lion-kings; he “learned to catch the prey and devoured men.” 5-9. This second young lion is not Jehoia-kim, the immediate successor of Jehoahaz, but is Jehoiachin, his son. For the former (the father) was put on the throne, not by the people, but by the king of Babylon; and he seems not to have been carried to Babylon, but to have died in disgrace at Jerusalem. (See Jer. 22:18, 19; 36:30.) On the other hand, Jehoiachin was in favor with the people, and for aught that appears was put on the throne by them; was taken captive to Babylon and remained there in captivity at least thirty-seven years; and finally his fall was specially afflictive to the exiles. They had many fond hopes of his restoration. (See Lam. 4:20.) The people hoped that Jehoahaz might be restored to them, till this hope perished (verse 5). H. C. 5. She took another. Jehoiachin, who was not appointed by a foreign prince out of order, like his father Jehoiakim, but succeeded regularly with the consent of the people (2 K. 24:6). The waiting of the people was during the absence of their rightful lord Jehoahaz, a captive in Egypt while Jehoiakim, whom they deemed an usurper, was on the throne. It was not till Jehoiachin succeeded that they seemed to themselves to have a monarch of their own. 6. Jehoiachin soon showed himself no less unworthy than Jehoahaz; he should have been a royal lion reposing in majesty and strength; he became a ravening beast of prey (2 K. 24:9).

8. Then the nations set against him. The nations are here the Chaldeans; Nebuchadnezzar was the instrument in God’s hands for punishing the wickedness of Jehoiachin, who in Ezekiel’s time still lived a captive in Babylon (2 K. 24:10 foll.). 10. The metaphor is changed. The excellency of a vine is in her fruitful branches; the glory of a mother in her noble children. For the sense in which Jeremiah is to write Jehoia-chin childless, see on Jer. 22:30. Ezekiel here takes a general view of the king and princes of the blood royal. B.C. 10-14. By a sudden change of figure the Jewish people become a vine-a figure of somewhat frequent occurrence in the Scriptures and recently used by Ezekiel himself. (See chap. 15:6; 17:6. See also Isa. 5:1-7; 27:2-7; Ps. 80:8-16; Jer. 2:21.) Her strong shoots are sceptres for kings, and virtually in the figure represent kings themselves. She rose to prominence among the nations, but she was suddenly plucked up by the fury of the Almighty. The east wind, terribly withering in that climate, dried up her roots; her strong rods (sceptres) were broken, and the fires of Divine judgments consumed both kings and people. A few of her people had been taken into captivity-a fact represented here by her being transplanted to a wilderness and set in a dry and thirsty ground. Her last king, Zedekiah, by his treachery to the king of Babylon, had brought down the final stroke of vengeance-corresponding to a fire going out from one of the rods (sceptres) of her foliage, which devoured her fruit, so that she had no successor for her throne. The royal house is utterly broken down. The throne of Judah is in ruins. To the Hebrew exiles this was and should still be “for a lamentation.” H.C.