Ezekiel 32 - Introduction

Chapter 32 The Final Oracles Against Egypt.

We may well wonder why seven oracles should be pronounced and recorded against Egypt. But it is a reminder to us that although God might wait a long time in the end He calls all to account. And when He does so He does so in full. In the words of the poet, ‘the mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceeding small'.

No ancient empire in the Near East compared with Egypt. Others came and went but Egypt seemed to go on and on. Always it was there, the one certainty in a changing world. At times it might have seemed somewhat weakened, but it would rise from its weakness and become strong again. It always had to be taken into account. It was like its own pyramids. It seemed bound to last for ever.

So the idea that this was at an end would shake the ancient world. And as far as Israel were concerned the point was that it was Yahweh Who was doing it. He alone was more permanent and more powerful than Egypt. He had watched it from the beginning and now He was calling an end to its ways. It would never again be the principle actor in events. Only Yahweh would go on for ever, He and the people whom He had chosen. The final restoration was in His hands. But even they did not realise just exactly how that would be accomplished. That awaited another prophet who would fix it finally as literally out of this world (Revelation 21-22).

The first part of the chapter (1-16), the sixth oracle, is a lament over Pharaoh. The seventh is a vivid description of Pharaoh's descent into Sheol to joint the great peoples of the past, all destroyed by Babylon.