Ezekiel 31:10-14

B. The Downfall of the Tree 31:10-14

TRANSLATION

(10) Therefore, thus says the Lord CX)D: Because YOU were exalted in height, and he has set his top among the thick boughs, and his heart was lifted up in his height; (11) therefore, I will give him into the hand of the mighty one of the nations; he will surely deal with him in the midst of his wickedness; I have driven him out. (12) And strangers, the most ruthless of the nations, have cut him off, and have cast him down; upon the mountains and in all the valleys his branches have fallen, and his boughs are broken in all the channels of the land; and all the peoples of the earth have gone down from his shadow, and have left him. (13) Upon his carcass all the birds of the heavens shall dwell, and upon his boughs every beast of the field; (14) to the end that no tree by the waters shall exalt itself in its height, nor set its top among the thick boughs, nor their mighty ones stand up in their height, even all who drink water; for they are all given over to death, unto the lower parts of the earth, in the midst of the children of men, with those who go down to the pit.

COMMENTS

Because the Assyrian had manifested such arrogant pride (Ezekiel 31:10) God would deliver him into the hand of the mighty one of the nations, i.e., Nebuchadnezzar. The Assyrian would be driven out of the garden of God as surely as Adam had been driven out of primeval Eden (Ezekiel 31:11). The most ruthless of foreign invaders (cf. Ezekiel 28:7) would fell that cedar and abandon it as something useless. The boughs of that once glorious tree the Assyrian armies would be broken and dispersed about the countryside. Those vassal states which had resided in the protective shadow of Assyria would now desert their master (Ezekiel 31:12). The birds and beasts would feed upon the dead bodies of the Assyrian soldiers (Ezekiel 31:13). All of this would befall Assyria so that other trees (nations) in the world would not be tempted to follow her example. Nations, like men, are mortal; they die. They depart the scene of history to descend, as it were, into Sheol the pit the abode of the dead (Ezekiel 31:14).