Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary
Ezekiel 4:8

Bridgeway Bible Commentary

4:1-7:27 JUDGMENT AGAINST JERUSALEM

Siege and exile (4:1-17)

Prophets often acted their messages instead of, or in addition to, speaking them. Ezekiel drew a rough picture of Jerusalem on a brick, placed the brick on the ground, then with sticks, stones, clay and markings in the sand, he modelled a siege of the city. The message to the exiles was that they had no chance of an early return to Jerusalem. On the contrary, Jerusalem could expect further attack. God would not defend the city; rather he would cut himself off from it. The prophet symbolized the barrier between God and sinful Jerusalem by taking an iron cooking plate and holding it between himself (representing God) and the model of the besieged city (4:1-3).
The prophet’s next acted parable lasted more than a year. Each day he spent a period lying on his side facing his model of besieged Jerusalem. He was bound with cords so that he could not move, to symbolize that God’s people could not escape the judgment of their sins. However, his arm was left bare, to demonstrate God’s determination to fight against Jerusalem. The number of days he lay on his left side was for the number of years from the northern kingdom’s breakaway from Jerusalem to the end of the captivity. The number of days he lay on his right side was for the number of years from the fall of Jerusalem to the end of the captivity (4-8).
In the third acted parable, Ezekiel ate a starvation diet each day, to symbolize the scarcity of food and water in Jerusalem during the last great siege (9-11; see v. 16-17). He was told to cook the food on a fire of human dung. In this way he would picture the uncleanness of the food that the people would be forced to eat, both during the siege and later in the foreign countries to which they would be scattered (12-13). When Ezekiel complained that it was unfair to ask him to use human dung to make the fire, God allowed him to use cow’s dung instead. This was a fuel commonly used by people in that part of the world (14-17).

Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible

“Moreover lie thou upon thy left side, and lay the iniquity of the house of Israel upon it; according to the number of days thou shalt lie upon it, thou shalt bear their iniquity. For I have appointed the years of their iniquity to be unto thee a number of days, even three hundred and ninety days: so shalt thou bear the iniquity of the house of Israel. And again, when thou hast accomplished these, thou shalt lie on thy right side, and shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah, each day for a year, have I appointed it unto thee. And thou shalt set thy face toward the siege of Jerusalem, with thine arm uncovered; and thou shalt prophesy against it. And, behold, I lay hands upon thee; and thou shalt not turn thee from one side to the other till thou hast accomplished the days of thy siege.”

“Left side… right side” The ancient usage of such terminology was based upon the proposition that one faced the East (the rising sun); and thus the left stood for the North, the right stood for the South; and the East was always considered “the front.”International Critical Commentary, p. 61. Since Northern Israel (Samaria) lay north of Jerusalem, the “right” and “left” designation applied to the Ten Northern tribes and to Judah, respectively.

“The restrained position of the prophet was a symbol of the loss of freedom awaiting the people.”J. R. Dummelow’s Commentary, p. 494.

“And thou shalt set thy face toward the siege” This represented the intent purpose of God looking to the total destruction of the city.

“With thine arm uncovered” There is another echo of Jeremiah 21:5 in this. God’s arm was uncovered and outstretched to accomplish the destruction of the Jewish kingdom.

“Lay the iniquity of the house of Israel upon it (Ezekiel’s left side)… thou shalt bear their iniquity… so shalt thou bear the iniquity of the house of Israel... and again, thou shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah” Right here lies the “lost message of Ezekiel.” None of dozens of commentators we have consulted pays the slightest attention whatever to the colossal teachings of the vital messages in these dramatic clauses. Ezekiel represents God in the analogy here; and as God’s representative, he bears the iniquity of both Israel and Judah. The 390 years for one and the forty years for the other, therefore have no application whatever to the duration of the captivity, either of Northern Israel or of Southern Israel, nor of any one else. The absolute inability of all the commentators to come up with any rational or reasonable explanation of what these respective time periods really prophesied is the only proof needed that they have simply not understood what is meant by them.

Here Ezekiel is a type of the Son Man (the Christ) indeed; and he becomes the sin-bearer for all Israel. That is the bold, unequivocal message of this passage.

What about the 390 years and the forty years? “Forty” throughout the Old Testament is the symbolical word for punishment; and the Ten Northern Tribes deserved ten times forty (four hundred stripes, days, years, whatever; but as the Jews always administered that “forty” as “forty stripes save one” it would mean that the Ten Tribes deserved 390 years of the wrath of God. Judah, the principal tribe of the Southern Israel also would receive “forty,” it not being considered necessary to add the limitation of “save one” here, as it may be understood. As we see it, God’s “beating the iniquity of all the tribes of earth in the person of his “Only Begotten Son,” is the sum total of what is indicated in this passage which all scholars have labeled, “impossible of understanding,” “unintelligible,” “subject to no satisfactory explanation,” etc. Some may think that our explanation is also unsatisfactory; but to us it makes more sense than anything else we have ever encountered.

In the quadruple statement in this paragraph that Ezekiel is to “bear the sins” of both houses of Israel, how can a scholar like Taylor assert that, “This is a symbol of the weight of the punishment to be borne by Israel!”J. B. Thompson, p. 78. Ezekiel, as a type of Christ. is the one doing the bearing, according to the holy text.

At first, we considered adopting the position on this paragraph mentioned by Pearson, who said, “With the data at our disposal, it appears unwise to be dogmatic as to how the forty and the 390 years are to be reckoned.”Anton T. Pearson in Wycliffe Bible Commentary (Chicago: Moody Press, 1962), p. 714. However, the thundering remarks about Ezekiel’s being the sin-bearer here point so clearly in the direction which we have chosen, that we are offering what seems (to us) a reasonable and logical understanding of it.

Thus all of the inconvenience, humiliation, painful physical constraint, the unclean diet, etc. are an eloquent portrayal of the sufferings, humiliation, even death, of the great Sin-Bearer, Christ, of whom Ezekiel was merely a type.

There is no device for discovering an easy solution to these numbers. The years of Israel’s sins were actually far more than 390, and the same is true of the sins of Judah. There is no evidence that the sins of Israel were ten times as much as those of Judah (except upon the premise of their being far greater in number). The device of choosing the Septuagint (LXX) over the the Hebrew text of the Old Testament here gives only 150 years, but that doesn’t work either.

Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible

I will lay bands upon thee - Contrast margin reference. The Lord will put constraint upon him, to cause him to exercise his office. In the retirement of his house, figuratively bound and under constraint, he shall not cease to proclaim the doom of the city.

The days of thy siege - Those during which he should thus foretell the approaching calamity.

Smith's Bible Commentary

Chapter 4

Now thou also, Son of man, take a tile ( Ezekiel 4:1 ),

Now this is a brick, and it's about twelve inches by fourteen inches. The archeologists have uncovered thousands of these bricks there in the area of Babylon. This is what they wrote their records on. And their libraries were full of these tiles or bricks. They were a clay brick and they would write, they would scratch in these clay bricks. And so the Lord is telling him to take one of these drawing boards, one of these drawing pads, and draw a picture of Jerusalem and then draw a siege against Jerusalem.

casting up a mount against it; and set the camp also against it, and set battering rams around it. And take unto thee an iron pan [or an iron plate], and set it for a wall of iron between you and the city: and set thy face against this iron plate, and it shall be besieged, and thou shalt lay siege against it. And this shall be a sign to the house of Israel ( Ezekiel 4:2-3 ).

So he's going to give them now a little illustrated sermon. He takes this clay tile, clay brick, and he draws the picture of Jerusalem. And draws these armies camped against it. And he draws these battering rams knocking down the wall. And then he takes this iron plate and he puts the plate there and pushes it against between him and the city, as the city is in siege, and of course, he is there showing how that God Himself is coming against the city. God is destined to turn it over into the hands of their enemies.

Now, the false prophets were saying to the people, "Don't worry, Jerusalem is going to conquer the Babylonians. They're going to destroy them and then they're going to come and take us home." Ezekiel's saying, "Not so," and he's drawing these pictures and saying, "This is the way it's going to happen. This is the way it's going to be."

Now the second illustration. And there are four ways by which he is to illustrate the truth to them. The second is a little more difficult.

Lie also upon your left side, and lay the iniquity of the house of Israel upon it: according to the number of days that thou shalt lie upon it thou shalt bear their iniquity. For I have laid upon thee the years of their iniquity, according to the number of days, three hundred and ninety days: so shalt thou bear the iniquity of the house of Israel. And when you have accomplished them, then turn on your right side, and you shall bear the iniquity of the house of Judah for forty days: I have appointed thee each day for a year ( Ezekiel 4:4-6 ).

So the Lord says, "Lie there on your left side for three hundred and ninety days in which you bear the iniquity of the house of Israel. This is how many years they were filled with iniquity against Me." So he had to lie there for three hundred and ninety days on his left side, bearing the iniquity of the house of Israel. A day for a year. Then after that, turned over--I bet it felt good--over on his right side. And then another forty days lying on his right side.

Now, I don't think that he lay there the whole while. Probably each day would go down and lie out there on his side. But I do feel that he probably got up and moved around and so forth, but he was always... whenever the people would see him, he was lying there on his left side, going out every morning and assuming the position and then just saying, "I'm bearing the iniquity of the house of Israel. This is how many years." And then forty years for the house of Judah.

Therefore thou shalt set thy face toward the siege of Jerusalem, and your arm shall be uncovered, and ye shall prophesy against it. And, behold, I will lay bands upon thee, and thou shalt not turn thee from one side to another, till you have ended the days of the siege. Now take also ( Ezekiel 4:7-9 )

And this is the third way by which he was going to illustrate to these people what was going to happen to Jerusalem. It wasn't going to conquer the Babylonian army, but it was going to be defeated.

Take unto you wheat, barley, beans, lentils, millet, and fitches [which is a kind of a corn], and put them in one vessel, and make thee the bread [by these mixed grains] ( Ezekiel 4:9 ),

So he had multiple grained bread.

according to the number of days that you shall lie on your side; three hundred and ninety days shalt thou eat thereof ( Ezekiel 4:9 ).

So, for this period that he's lying there, he's got to be eating this bread.

And thy meat which thou shalt eat by weight, twenty shekels a day: from time to time you shall eat it. And thou shalt drink also thy water by measure ( Ezekiel 4:10-11 ),

In other words, measure out the water.

a sixth part of a hin ( Ezekiel 4:11 ):

So it's about a quart of water a day that he's allowed.

And thou shalt eat it as barley cakes, and thou shalt bake it with the dung that comes from man, in their sight ( Ezekiel 4:12 ).

Now this is to show the siege that is going to happen to Jerusalem, how that the people who were in Jerusalem are going to be suffering from famine. There is going to be a water shortage. They'll be measuring out the water. There is going to be a shortage of grains, so that they'll be mixing their grains together for their bread, gathering whatever they can to make the bread. And there is going to be a shortage of food and the people are going to be starving to death, and this is to be a picture to these people in Babylon. "Look, Jerusalem is not going to be victorious. They're going to be destroyed. The people are going to be starving to death there within the city."

And the LORD said, Even thus shall their children of Israel eat the defiled bread [they will be defiled; they'll eat defiled bread] among the Gentiles, where I'm going to drive them ( Ezekiel 4:13 ).

I'm going to drive them out of the land and they're going to be eating this defiled bread.

Then said I, Ah Lord, GOD! behold, my soul hath not been polluted: for from my youth up even till now have I not eaten of that which dies of itself, or is torn in pieces; neither came there abominable flesh into my mouth ( Ezekiel 4:14 ).

Lord, I've been kosher all my life, and now you're telling me to be non-kosher. Lord, I can't do that.

And he said unto me, Lo, I have given thee cow's dung for the man's dung, and thou shalt prepare thy bread with it. Moreover he said unto me, Son of man, I am going to break the staff of bread in Jerusalem: and they shall eat bread by the weight, and with carefulness; and they shall drink water by measure, and with astonishment: That they may want bread and water, and be astonished one with another, and they will be consumed away for their iniquity ( Ezekiel 4:15-17 ). "

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

Lying on the side 4:4-8

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

The Lord promised to help Ezekiel lie on his sides by restraining his movements, as though ropes bound him in his positions. Some interpreters believed that God had someone bind Ezekiel with ropes each day, but I do not think the text requires this. Again, it appears that the prophet acted out his drama for only a few hours each day, and it was during this time that God enabled him to lie quietly.

"God’s judgment of sin is inevitable. He is longsuffering (Ezekiel 4:1-8) and may wait for years, but ultimately he will dispense judgment. This judgment will include his people." [Note: Cooper, p. 95.]

"God’s servants may have to undertake tasks involving a lot of tedium, patiently carrying out responsibilities less than entirely pleasant, regularly doing things they would much rather not have to be involved in. Preparing for a Sunday school class week after week, leading a Bible study year by year, visiting shut-ins steadily as time goes by, patiently shaping the behavior of and caring for children as the years come and go, laboring to bring about social change; these sorts of things are hardly always enjoyable. Faithfulness involves sticking to tasks where the reward cannot necessarily be experienced right away. Loyal Christian servants may not see in this life the rewards of their steady labors, but we carry on because God’s work is never done in vain, no matter how hard it may be (1 Corinthians 15:58)." [Note: Stuart, p. 59.]

Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

And, behold, I will lay hands upon thee,.... Representing either the besieged, signifying that they should be taken and bound as he was; or rather the besiegers, the Chaldean army, which should be so held by the power and providence of God, that they should not break up the siege until they had taken the city, and fulfilled the whole will and pleasure of God; for these bands were an emblem of the firm and unalterable decree of God, respecting the siege and taking of Jerusalem; and so the Targum paraphrases it,

"and, lo, the decree of my word is upon thee, as a band of ropes;''

and to this sense Jarchi interprets it; and which is confirmed by what follows:

and thou shall not turn thee from one side to another till thou hast ended the days of thy siege; showing that the Chaldean army should not depart from Jerusalem until it was taken; for though, upon the report of the Egyptian army coming against them, they went forth to meet it; yet they returned to Jerusalem, and never left the siege till the city fell into their hands, according to the purpose and appointment of God. Kimchi that the word for siege is in the plural number, and signifies both the "siege" of Samaria and the siege of Jerusalem; but the former was over many years before this time: by this it appears that the siege of Jerusalem should last three hundred and ninety days; indeed, from the beginning to the end of it, were seventeen months, 2 Kings 25:1; but the siege being raised by the army of the king of Egypt for some time,

Jeremiah 37:5, may reduce it to thirteen months, or thereabout; for three hundred and ninety days are not only intended to signify the years of Israel's sin and wickedness, but also to show how long the city would be besieged; and so long the prophet in this symbolical way was besieging it.

Henry's Complete Commentary on the Bible

      1 Thou also, son of man, take thee a tile, and lay it before thee, and portray upon it the city, even Jerusalem:   2 And lay siege against it, and build a fort against it, and cast a mount against it; set the camp also against it, and set battering rams against it round about.   3 Moreover take thou unto thee an iron pan, and set it for a wall of iron between thee and the city: and set thy face against it, and it shall be besieged, and thou shalt lay siege against it. This shall be a sign to the house of Israel.   4 Lie thou also upon thy left side, and lay the iniquity of the house of Israel upon it: according to the number of the days that thou shalt lie upon it thou shalt bear their iniquity.   5 For I have laid upon thee the years of their iniquity, according to the number of the days, three hundred and ninety days: so shalt thou bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.   6 And when thou hast accomplished them, lie again on thy right side, and thou shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days: I have appointed thee each day for a year.   7 Therefore thou shalt set thy face toward the siege of Jerusalem, and thine arm shall be uncovered, and thou shalt prophesy against it.   8 And, behold, I will lay bands upon thee, and thou shalt not turn thee from one side to another, till thou hast ended the days of thy siege.

      The prophet is here ordered to represent to himself and others by signs which would be proper and powerful to strike the fancy and to affect the mind, the siege of Jerusalem; and this amounted to a prediction.

      I. He was ordered to engrave a draught of Jerusalem upon a tile, Ezekiel 4:1; Ezekiel 4:1. It was Jerusalem's honour that while she kept her integrity God had graven her upon the palms of his hands (Isaiah 49:16), and the names of the tribes were engraven in precious stones on the breast-plate of the high priest; but, now that the faithful city has become a harlot, a worthless brittle tile or brick is thought good enough to portray it upon. This the prophet must lay before him, that the eye may affect the heart.

      II. He was ordered to build little forts against this portraiture of the city, resembling the batteries raised by the besiegers, Ezekiel 4:2; Ezekiel 4:2. Between the city that was besieged and himself that was the besieger he was to set up an iron pan, as an iron wall,Ezekiel 4:3; Ezekiel 4:3. This represented the inflexible resolution of both sides; the Chaldeans resolved, whatever it cost them, that they would make themselves masters of the city and would never quit it till they had conquered it; on the other side, the Jews resolved never to capitulate, but to hold out to the last extremity.

      III. He was ordered to lie upon his side before it, as it were to surround it, representing the Chaldean army lying before it to block it up, to keep the meat from going in and the mouths from going out. He was to lie on his left side 390 days (Ezekiel 4:5; Ezekiel 4:5), about thirteen months; the siege of Jerusalem is computed to last eighteen months (Jeremiah 52:4-6), but if we deduct from that five months' interval, when the besiegers withdrew upon the approach of Pharaoh's army (Jeremiah 37:5-8), the number of the days of the close siege will be 390. Yet that also had another signification. The 390 days, according to the prophetic dialect, signified 390 years; and, when the prophet lies so many days on his side, he bears the guilt of that iniquity which the house of Israel, the ten tribes, had borne 390 years, reckoning from their first apostasy under Jeroboam to the destruction of Jerusalem, which completed the ruin of those small remains of them that had incorporated with Judah. He is then to lie forty days upon his right side, and so long to bear the iniquity of the house of Judah, the kingdom of the two tribes, because the measure-filling sins of that people were those which they were guilty of during the last forty years before their captivity, since the thirteenth year of Josiah, when Jeremiah began to prophesy (Jeremiah 1:1; Jeremiah 1:2), or, as some reckon it, since the eighteenth, when the book of the law was found and the people renewed their covenant with God. When they persisted in their impieties and idolatries, notwithstanding they had such a prophet and such a prince, and were brought into the bond of such a covenant, what could be expected but ruin without remedy? Judah, that had such helps and advantages for reformation, fills the measure of its iniquity in less time than Israel does. Now we are not to think that the prophet lay constantly night and day upon his side, but every day, for so many days together, at a certain time of the day, when he received visits, and company came in, he was found lying 390 days on his left side and forty days on his right side before his portraiture of Jerusalem, which all that saw might easily understand to mean the close besieging of that city, and people would be flocking in daily, some for curiosity and some for conscience, at the hour appointed, to see it and to take their different remarks upon it. His being found constantly on the same side, as if bands were laid upon him (as indeed they were by the divine command), so that he could not turn himself from one side to another till he had ended the days of the siege, did plainly represent the close and constant continuance of the besiegers about the city during that number of days, till they had gained their point.

      IV. He was ordered to prosecute the siege with vigour (Ezekiel 4:7; Ezekiel 4:7): Thou shalt set thy face towards the siege of Jerusalem, as wholly intent upon it and resolved to carry it; so the Chaldeans would be, and neither bribed nor forced to withdraw from it. Nebuchadnezzar's indignation at Zedekiah's treachery in breaking his league with him made him very furious in pushing on this siege, that he might chastise the insolence of that faithless prince and people; and his army promised themselves a rich booty of that pompous city; so that both set their faces against it, for they were very resolute. Nor were they less active and industrious, exerting themselves to the utmost in all the operations of the siege, which the prophet was to represent by the uncovering of his arm, or, as some read it, the stretching out of his arm, as it were to deal blows about without mercy. When God is about to do some great work he is said to make bare his arm,Isaiah 52:10. In short, The Chaldeans will go about their business, and go on in it, as men in earnest, who resolve to go through with it. Now, 1. This is intended to be a sign to the house of Israel (Ezekiel 4:3; Ezekiel 4:3), both to those in Babylon, who were eye-witnesses of what the prophet did, and to those also who remained in their own land, who would hear the report of it. The prophet was dumb and could not speak (Ezekiel 3:26; Ezekiel 3:26); but as his silence had a voice, and upbraided the people with their deafness, so even then God left not himself without witness, but ordered him to make signs, as dumb men are accustomed to do, and as Zacharias did when he was dumb, and by them to make known his mind (that is, the mind of God) to the people. And thus likewise the people were upbraided with their stupidity and dulness, that they were not capable of being taught as men of sense are, by words, but must be taught as children are, by pictures, or as deaf men are, by signs. Or, perhaps, they are hereby upbraided with their malice against the prophet. Had he spoken in words at length what was signified by these figures, they would have entangled him in his talk, would have indicted him for treasonable expressions, for they knew how to make a man an offender for a word (Isaiah 29:21), to avoid which he is ordered to make use of signs. Or the prophet made use of signs for the same reason that Christ made use of parables, that hearing they might hear and not understand, and seeing they might see and not perceive,Matthew 13:14; Matthew 13:15. They would not understand what was plain, and therefore shall be taught by that which is difficult; and herein the Lord was righteous. 2. Thus the prophet prophesies against Jerusalem (Ezekiel 4:7; Ezekiel 4:7); and there were those who not only understood it so, but were the more affected with it by its being so represented, for images to the eye commonly make deeper impressions upon the mind than words can, and for this reason sacraments are instituted to represent divine things, that we might see and believe, might see and be affected with those things; and we may expect this benefit by them, and a blessing to go along with them, while (as the prophet here) we make use only of such signs as God himself has expressly appointed, which, we must conclude, are the fittest. Note, The power of imagination, if it be rightly used, and kept under the direction and correction of reason and faith, may be of good use to kindle and excite pious and devout affections, as it was here to Ezekiel and his attendants. "Methinks I see so and so, myself dying, time expiring, the world on fire, the dead rising, the great tribunal set, and the like, may have an exceedingly good influence upon us: for fancy is like fire, a good servant, but a bad master." 3. This whole transaction has that in it which the prophet might, with a good colour of reason, have hesitated at and excepted against, and yet, in obedience to God's command, and in execution of his office, he did it according to order. (1.) It seemed childish and ludicrous, and beneath his gravity, and there were those that would ridicule him for it; but he knew the divine appointment put honour enough upon that which otherwise seemed mean to save his reputation in the doing of it. (2.) It was toilsome and tiresome to do as he did; but our ease as well as our credit must be sacrificed to our duty, and we must never call God's service in any instance of it a hard service. (3.) It could not but be very much against the grain with him to appear thus against Jerusalem, the city of God, the holy city, to act as an enemy against a place to which he was so good a friend; but he is a prophet, and must follow his instructions, not his affections, and must plainly preach the ruin of a sinful place, though its welfare is what he passionately desires and earnestly prays for. 4. All this that the prophet sets before the children of his people concerning the destruction of Jerusalem is designed to bring them to repentance, by showing them sin, the provoking cause of this destruction, sin the ruin of that once flourishing city, than which surely nothing could be more effectual to make them hate sin and turn from it; while he thus in lively colours describes the calamity with a great deal of pain and uneasiness to himself, he is bearing the iniquity of Israel and Judah. "Look here" (says he) "and see what work sin makes, what an evil and bitter thing it is to depart form God; this comes of sin, your sins and the sin of your fathers; let that therefore be the daily matter of your sorrow and shame now in your captivity, that you may make your peace with God and he may return in mercy to you." But observe, It is a day of punishment for a year of sin: I have appointed thee each day for a year. The siege is a calamity of 390 days, in which God reckons for the iniquity of 390 years; justly therefore d they acknowledge that God had punished them less than their iniquity deserved,Ezra 9:13. But let impenitent sinners know that, though now God is long-suffering towards them, in the other world there is an everlasting punishment. When God laid bands upon the prophet, it was to show them how they were bound with the cords of their own transgression (Lamentations 1:14), and therefore they were now holden in the cords of affliction. But we may well think of the prophet's case with compassion, when God laid upon him the bands of duty, as he does on all his ministers (1 Corinthians 9:16, Necessity is laid upon me, and woe unto me if I preach not the gospel); and yet men laid upon him bonds of restraint (Ezekiel 3:25; Ezekiel 3:25); but under both it is satisfaction enough that they are serving the interests of God's kingdom among men.