Ezekiel 27

Tyre, thus perished and gone, never to rise in her glory again, the Lord promises to make the land of His own people Israel once more the glory of the earth. H. C.

20. Compare Isa. 14: 9, where Babylon, represented by her king, is depicted as going down to join in Hades the departed monarchs of old time. It is remarkable that the image which is used by Isaiah and Jeremiah of Babylon is by Ezekiel applied to Tyre, as if to show that Tyre and Babylon alike represent the world-power, and so in the Apocalypse Babylon is the kingdom of Antichrist. Here the prophet unites the figure with that of a desolate and uninhabited city.

I shall set glory in the land of the living. The land of the living is the land of the true God, as opposed to the land of the dead, to which is gathered the glory of the world. Here then, together with the utter ruin of Tyre, rises the vision of renewed glory to Jerusalem. The coming Messiah is thus prophetically pointed out. The overthrow of God’s enemies shall be accompanied by the establishment of His true kingdom.

Chap. 27. The dirge of Tyre. Tyre is compared to a fair vessel, to whose equipment the various nations of the world contribute their stores, launching forth in majesty, to be wrecked and to perish. The nations enumerated point out Tyre as the centre of commerce between the eastern and western world. This position, occupied for a short time by Jerusalem, was long maintained by Tyre, till, after successive sieges, the erection of Alexandria to supplant her in this traffic completed the ruin which war had begun. This dirge is grounded upon the dirge of Babylon (Isa. 14: 3-21); the connection shows that in each case the city named represents the world-power antagonistic to God. B. C.

This remarkable chapter is a sort of inventory of the wealth, greatness and glory of ancient Tyre, showing the sources whence she drew her materials and men for the commerce and the carrying trade of the world. No ancient historian has ever approximated toward the statement so full and complete as this of the business relations which existed in that age among the nations of the world. Here is Tyre, the commercial centre of the world, reaching forth her arms in every direction to make every land contribute its best products in men, in wisdom, martial prowess, nautical skill, and in every sort of material to stock her markets, or to minister to her facilities for transportation. It is a wonderful description; yet it stands here, not to give us the barren facts of so much commerce and so much splendor in the arts, but to show how much human greatness and glory went down in one fearful fall when the Almighty arose in His wrath to smite her bulwarks and sink all her glory in the depths of ruin. By how much the more sublime the height of her glory, by so much the more astounding was the crash of her fall! The revelator John had his eye on this chapter in his magnificent description of the fall of Babylon the Great (Rev. 18). H. C.

Tyre itself, Tzôr of the Hebrew, Sur of the modern Arabs, signifying “rock,” is first mentioned in Scripture among the cities of the district of Asher, “the strong city Tyre,” but does not occur again till the time of David. It was up to this period probably the dependent, as it was certainly the daughter city of Zidon. It was originally a rocky islet, separated from the main-land, on which also stood another city, called Palætyros, or Old Tyre. The main city continued thus insular until united to the mainland by a mole, by Alexander the Great.

Tyre scarcely occurs again in Bible history as distinct from Zidon, till the times of the later prophets, when the relations of the kingdoms had much changed (Joel 3; Amos 1), when we find Tyre denounced for its cruel trade in Hebrew captives to the neighboring nations and to the Greeks. After the overthrow of the kingdom of Israel by Assyria, Shalmaneser vainly attempted the siege of Tyre, then the chief city of Phœnicia, and blockaded it for five years. This is probably referred to by Isaiah (chap. 23). It soon recovered its prosperity, until Nebuchadnezzar again laid siege to it. It resisted his arms for the long space of thirteen years, during which it was blockaded by land. As Ezekiel says (29: 18), “Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon caused his army to serve a great service against Tyrus.” Yet it does not clearly appear that he actually stormed it. The passage in Ezekiel (29: 18-20) would seem rather to imply the contrary. It seems probable that without an actual capitulation Tyre submitted to the supremacy of Babylon, and thus purchased her commercial freedom.

The 27th chapter of Ezekiel presents a wonderful picture of the vast trade, manufactures and commercial connection of Tyre, embracing every quarter of the then known world, and every commodity which wealth and luxury could command. Her trade extended from Persia, and perhaps India, to Spain: her mercenaries and mechanics were drawn alike from the three continents. Her merchandise embraced all the then known metals; gold from India; silver, iron, lead and tin from Spain; copper from Cyprus; wheat and cereals, honey, oil and balm from Palestine; wools from Arabia; ivory and ebony from the far East; linen fabrics from Egypt; dyes from Greece; wines from Syria, and every kind of jewelry from Damascus.

Tyre submitted on easy terms to the Persian superiority, and assisted in building the second Temple, as it had the first (Ezra 3:7). After a practical independence of two hundred years, Tyre alone of the Phoenician cities refused submission to the third Greek empire, and cost Alexander the Great a siege of seven months before he took it, which he only accomplished by making a causeway from the main-land. He sold thirty thousand of the free women and children as slaves, and slaughtered its defenders.

The Romans gave Tyre municipal privileges, and it continued to flourish, and escaped destruction at the hands of the Mohammedan invaders on condition of its submission to the conquerors. It was taken by the Crusaders in A.D. 1124, and William of Tyre, the celebrated historian and a Frenchman, became its bishop. In A.D. 1291 it surrendered to the Saracens, and has ever since continued to decline. A century ago it had fallen so low that it contained but about ten fishermen, its only inhabitants; but has lately risen to a comparatively flourishing town of about four thousand inhabitants.

At present a desolate ridge of sand connects Tyre with the broad plain beyond, heaped by the sea-drift upon the causeway which Alexander made to connect the island with the main-land. Though Tyre has risen again within a century, yet the fifth and squalor of the little towns are unsurpassed in Syria. Scanty bazaars, about five feet wide, wattled over at intervals with decayed sticks and palm leaves; dilapidated, windowless hovels, raised among huge fragments of polished granite and porphyry columns prostrate in rubbish—such is modern Tyre. For half a mile the sea flows to the depth of a foot or two over flat rocks, covered by one mass of broken columns, leaning or prostrate, in bewildering confusion, as if pitched pell-mell into the water. This is insular Tyre, “the waters have covered her.” “She is a place for fishermen to spread their nets on.” The columns, blackened by the salt water, appear to have been smooth, and not fluted, but they are now fretted and perforated by ages of exposure to storm and tempest.

They are still quite sufficient to attest the grandeur of the later or Roman Tyre, to which, doubtless, they belong. Tristram.

3. “At the entry of the sea.” Tyre was the commercial port for the whole eastern shore of the Mediterranean. This vast body of water was practically in those times what its name indicates, the midland sea of the nations, begirt on every side with the civilization, the industry, and the wealth of the known world. The word rendered “merchant” implies that she had the carrying trade of the world, transporting the commodities of the great East to the West, and of the great West to the East. H. C.

Its geographic position of necessity made it the chief point of connection, commercially and otherwise, between the Eastern and the Western world. That position also constrained it to become a manufacturing and maritime rather than an agricultural State. Under such conditions it rose from century to century to a higher point of culture, wealth and influence than it was possible for either the nomadic peoples of Central Asia or the secluded States of Southern Europe to attain. Its commerce far surpassed that of any contemporaneous power, extending to India on the east, and to Spain, and possibly Gaul and Britain, on the west. Its manufactures of glass, of purple cloths, and other articles both useful and elegant, commanded the patronage of the known world. It became the prolific mother of numerous colonies in the East, in Cyprus and Sicily, and along both the northern and southern shores of the Mediterranean as far as Carthage and Tarshish. In literature, in art, and other kindred elements of a high civilization, it attained like eminence, and gained for itself a commanding influence among the peoples and nations of that early day. E. D. Morris.

10,11. The prophet here leaves the allegory of the ship to describe the military resources of the Tyrians. We note that their armies were composed of mercenary soldiers, as was the case with Carthage, and is common with all merchant States, with whom money is more plentiful than men.

10. Persia (Heb. Pâras). The name of this people does not occur in the more ancient books of the Old Testament. Their place is occupied by the Elamites; but in the books of the Exile and after the Exile it is frequent (Ezek. 38:5; 2 Chron. 36:20, 22; Ezra 4:5; 6:14; Esther 1:3, etc.). This exactly corresponds with the record of history. It was just at the time that Ezekiel wrote that the rude and warlike people of Persia were rising into notice, soon about to seize, under Cyrus, the empire of the Asiatic world. The name Pärsha occurs on the inscription of Behistan. B. C.

She hired her soldiers from Persia in the far East; and from Lud and Phut, countries of Northern Africa, lying west of Egypt, descendants of Ham. Shields and helmets were hung up when not in immediate use. These men were perhaps her standing army on garrison duty for home defence. They heightened her splendor (“comeliness”). In verse 11, “Gam-madim” is a common (not a proper) noun, meaning (by etymology) the brave warriors who cut down the enemy as the woodman fells trees.

12-16. “Tarshish,” Tartessus in Spain, supplied largely the minerals most used in the arts. So ancient history testifies. The last clause means: they replenished thy markets with these commodities. “Javan,” strictly ancient Ionia; “Tubal and Meshech,” also countries of Asia Minor, sold slaves in her market. “Togarmah” was a region yet farther north, supposed to be Armenia, peopled with descendants of Gomer through Torgom. They abounded in horses. Dedan on the Persian Gulf, far in the south, is supposed to have been an ancient Phoenician colony. The maritime places adjacent are referred to here as the “many isles” which supplied merchandise to the hand of Tyre. Ivory and ebony were their products.

17,18. Judah and Israel supplied the staple articles of food. The same view as to the nature of the trade between Tyre and Israel appears in the negotiations between Hiram and Solomon (1 K. 5:9-11). Hiram said, “Thou shalt accomplish my desire in giving food for my household.” “Solomon gave Hiram twenty thousand measures of wheat for food for his household and twenty measures of pure oil year by year.” Damascus was even then celebrated for her manufactures. Her skill in fine cloths and especially in silks has given the term “damasks” an enduring place in human language.

21,22. That herds and flocks were the commodities of Arabia and Kedar is in harmony with all antiquity. Isaiah sang of “the flocks of Kedar” (chap. 60:7), and in the same connection, of “the gold and incense of Sheba.” H. C.

25. The metaphor of the ship is here resumed. The break should be at the 25th, not at the 26th verse. The 25th verse represents the good ship Tyre, sailing in all her glory, in order to introduce by way of contrast her wreck and ruin. B. C.

26,27. Here the discourse turns from her glory and greatness to her fall. It was as if her rowers had brought her into great waters, to be sunk there with all her wealth by the mighty east winds of that inland sea. Then by how much the greater her freight of wealth, merchandise, mariners, mercenary soldiers, men of all business and population of every sort; by so much the more terrible the fearful fall that would engulf her in the mighty deep to rise no more! H. C.

29. As Tyre is figured by a large vessel, so are the subject States by smaller boats which accompany the great ship. These, terrified by the storm, approach the land, and their crews disembark to gaze in consternation on the wreck of their mistress. We are not to suppose that the sailors leave the ship which represents Tyre itself. That ship is hopelessly swallowed up, crew and all, in the midst of the sea. The small crafts escape to shore. Häcernick.

28-32. This is the mourning and the wailing over her fall. The prophet groups together all the usual Oriental symbols and modes of expressing the most intense grief. The last clause of verse 32 is specially expressive, where instead of, “like the destroyed,” etc., I would read, “as one hushed to dead silence in the midst of the sea,” in contrast with the hum and noise of her busy commerce and the myriad sounds of a great city of trade. H. C.

35. The dirge of the neighbors ends with verse 34; but the news of Tyre’s ruin shall reach farther, to distant isles, to merchant cities who trade with her. These, in their selfish love of gain, shall rejoice over her who was once paramount over them, hissing out against her not lamentations, like her neighbors, but curses and scorn. Thou shalt be a terror, and shalt never be any more. Nearly the same words which the prophet spoke (26:21) are now put in the mouth of exulting foes. B. C.

33-36. Once so great, enriching kings from thy stores of wealth; now broken, impoverished; the isles astonished at thy fall; the kings of the earth appalled before such retribution, and the merchants of the earth, once joyous in thy traffic, now hissing contemptuously over thy ruin—what a scene is this! How fraught with impressive lessons on the frailty of human wealth and grandeur, and the folly of human pride! No securities are too substantial to be utterly broken down. No guarantee for the permanence of wealth and glory will stand when God arises to call men to their moral account! H. C.

No one can visit Tyre without being reminded at every step of the prophecies uttered against the city by the Hebrew prophets, and especially by Ezekiel—her walls are “broken down;” her “pleasant houses” destroyed; her stones and timber lay “in the midst of the water;” it is a place “for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea;” and we may well exclaim with Ezekiel, “What city is like Tyrus, like the destroyed in the midst of the sea?” or, “How art thou destroyed, that wast inhabited of seafaring men, the renowned city which wast strong in the sea?” Wilson.

There yet remains one solitary specimen of Tyre’s great sea wall, that mighty bulwark which no enemy could overthrow. At the extreme northern end of the island, a stone nearly seventeen feet long and six and a half thick rests just where Tyrian architects placed it thousands of years ago. As in every case that I have examined, the foundation laid for these gigantic blocks is made with stone comparatively small. Should any one ask where are the stones of ancient Tyre—where, at least, the remains of those lofty towers and triple walls which so excited the wonder and admiration of the Crusaders only some seven centuries ago, there is a satisfactory reply. They are found in this depth of ruins, spread over the island, and over the causeway of Alexander. They are found in her choked-up harbor, and at the bottom of her sea. They are at Acre, and Joppa, and Beirût, and in the rubbish of all those cities. In fact, the only wonder is that so much still remains to reveal and confirm the ancient greatness of this Phœnician capital. W. M. Thomson.

The blow which levelled insular Tyre was to terminate its maritime glory forever. What uninspired writer could have foreseen such a consequence? It had rallied once, and why not rally again? No! The commerce of the whole world must be changed; and a new port and mart be founded in a land the least accessible to strangers—the most averse to maritime affairs, and which must first be conquered, in order to complete the maritime ruin of Tyre. But all this was done. The erection of the port and city of Alexandria did, in fact, accomplish it; and henceforth the supremacy of Tyre disappeared. Pliny, in describing it a few centuries later, after extolling the ancient renown, observes: “But at this day all the glory and reputation thereof standeth upon the dye of purple and crimson colors.” Tyre continued still to be a frequented port; but its commerce was ever after limited and provincial. Beldam.

Since first the dominion of men was asserted over the ocean, three thrones, of mark beyond all others, have been set up on its sands: the thrones of Tyre, Venice and England. Of Tyre, the first of these great powers, only the memory remains; of the second, the ruin; the third, which inherits their greatness, if it forget their example, may be led through prouder eminence to less-pitied destruction. The exaltation, the sin, and the punishment of Tyre have been recorded for us in perhaps the most touching words ever uttered by the prophets of Israel against the cities of the stranger. But we read them as a lovely song, and close our ears to the sternness of their warning; for the very depth of the fall of Tyre has blinded us to its reality, and we forget, as we watch the bleaching of the rocks between the sunshine and the sea, that they were once “as in Eden, the garden of God.” Ruskin.

Chap. 28. In this chapter judgments on Tyre continue through verses 1–19; then on Zidon through verses 20–26. The judgments against Tyre are specially directed to “the prince of Tyrus” (verse 2), and to “the king” (verse 12) for his great pride. The king is probably a representative man; first, the embodiment of the nation’s pride; then the symbol of her doom. H. C.

2. I sit in the seat of God. The words are put in the mouth of the speaker to denote his arrogant pride, but the situation of the island-city, full of luxury and beauty, in the midst of the blue water of the Mediterranean, gives force to the expression. So there is a fitness in describing the lot of Tyre as having been in Eden, the garden of God, though the words are mainly chosen to denote the glory of man in his primal innocence. B. C.

3. Behold, thou art wiser than Daniel. In thy own conceit. Bp. Hall.—The fame of Daniel’s wisdom was quickly spread over Chaldea upon his being advanced to several posts of honor and dignity by Nebuchadnezzar. (See Dan. 2:48.) The Phœnicians, of whom the Tyrians were a colony, valued themselves for their wisdom and ingenuity, as being the inventors of navigation, of letters and sciences. (Cf. Zech. 9:2.) W. Lowth.

6–8. These “strangers,” “the terrible of the nations,” are primarily the Chaldeans, whose fearful onslaught and siege of thirteen years’ duration brought death to multitudes of her sons and daughters, and ruin over her fair city. “Against the beauty of thy wisdom” is beauty in the arts, such as manifests peculiar skill, “wisdom.” In verse 8 the sense is, Thou Tyrus, although in the midst of the seas,

and therefore supposing thyself safe, shalt yet die the death of those who are pierced through with the sword. H. C.