Ezekiel 36:11

Will multiply upon you. — The promises of abundant blessing of this, with the previous and following verses, certainly received a partial fulfilment at the time following the return from the exile, and in the subsequent Maccabean period; yet one cannot but feel that the language of promise, if taken only in a literal sense, goes far beyond the historic fulfilment, and hence that these earthly blessings are the shadow and type by which is set forth the higher spiritual blessing given to the Church without stint.

Settle you after your old estates. — This does not mean that particular families are to have again each their own former inheritance — though, doubtless, this was true, as far as circumstances allowed, of the comparatively small number of families who returned — but that they shall in general be settled and prosperous, as of old. And even this promise is eclipsed by the next clause: “I will do better unto you than at your beginnings,” which can only be considered as fulfilled in the spiritual blessings, far higher and better than anything of earth, of the Messianic kingdom.