Ezekiel 4 - Introduction

Chapter 4. Ezekiel's First Message - Judgment Is Coming On Jerusalem.

In this chapter we have an acted out prophecy against Jerusalem. The people had been brought into captivity but Jerusalem still stood. They still had hopes of returning. But they must be made to recognise that God's anger against Israel was such that nothing could avert the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple. Rather than the holy city and the temple being a guarantee of Israel's preservation by God they had become a hindrance, and must go. Their superstitious reliance on the holy city and the temple as the proof of their favour (Jeremiah 7:4), even in the midst of their sinfulness, must be destroyed. This would now be Ezekiel's continual stress, along with judgment on the nations (25-32), until the actual destruction of Jerusalem and the temple (Ezekiel 33:21), a destruction which would outwardly be the end of all their hopes.

In the days of Hezekiah Yahweh had promised through Isaiah the prophet, “I will defend this city to save it for My own sake and for My servant David” (Isaiah 37:35). Israel had interpreted that to mean that whatever they did God would never allow the city to be destroyed. But they were wrong. That promise had been made because Hezekiah was genuinely seeking to please and obey Yahweh. But now things were very different. Sin and disobedience was rife, God was being marginalised, and the promise would no longer apply. Jerusalem was not inviolable. And that message would be repeated by Ezekiel again and again, although derided and rejected by his hearers, until the event itself took place.

In this chapter we have first the depiction of the siege of Jerusalem in miniature (Ezekiel 4:1), then the duration of the iniquity of Israel and Judah which has brought this on them (Ezekiel 4:4), then the depiction of the coming famine conditions in Jerusalem and of their exile in ‘uncleanness' (Ezekiel 4:9), and finally an acted out description of the fate of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, whom the exiles probably looked back on with envy (Ezekiel 5:1).

The Fate of Jerusalem.