Ezekiel 44
Summary for Ezek 44:1-31: 44:1-31 a Now that the glory of the Lord had returned to the Temple, questions of access were critical. Who could approach this holy God? Like ch 43 b, this chapter is concerned with the Temple’s entrances and exits, as well as the duties and procedures associated with its use.44:2 c The outer east gate must remain perpetually closed because the Lord had now returned to his Temple and would never again leave it. He had also sanctified this gate by going through it, and no one else was ever to use it.
44:3 d Though the prince had the significant privilege of being the only one allowed to feast in the Lord’s presence inside the east outer gateway, he was restricted to entering and leaving the portico from the outer court. He was not to enter from outside the Temple complex by going through the gate, as the Lord had; the earthly ruler is a man, not God, and he must submit to God. The prince must also never forget that the Temple is God’s palace, not his own private chapel.
Summary for Ezek 44:6-8: 44:6-8 e The people of Israel were called rebels because they had failed to control access to the sanctuary in the past; they had hired uncircumcised foreigners to come into the sanctuary and probably employed them as Temple guards and gatekeepers. This task should not have been delegated to foreigners; it should have been performed by the Levites, whom the Lord had assigned to perform it (cp. 44:10 f).
44:9 g No foreigners: This was not a blanket prohibition against non-Israelite access to the sanctuary. It only affected those who had not been circumcised and have not surrendered themselves to the Lord. Genuine converts could be part of the new Israel (see 47:22-23 h).
44:10 i when Israel strayed away from me to worship idols: The people had a long history of failing to follow God’s plan for worship, including the specific sin of employing foreigners as temple guards (44:8 j).
Summary for Ezek 44:12-14: 44:12-14 k The Levites had encouraged ... Israel to fall into deep sin by abandoning the Lord and worshiping idols. One of the consequences of that sin was that they could no longer enter the inner court of the Temple like the priests. However, by God’s grace, they would still have a significant ministry in serving the people and slaughtering their sacrifices.
• The people as a whole were placed at a greater distance from God because of their idolatry. Prior to the Exile they would have slaughtered their own sacrifices (see Lev 1:5 l, 11 m); now they must hand them over to the Levites to be slaughtered on their behalf.
Summary for Ezek 44:15-16: 44:15-16 n In contrast to the Levites and the people who abandoned the Lord for idols, the Levitical priests of the family of Zadok remained faithful to the Lord. Zadok was the high priest of Solomon’s day. His family’s reward was renewed access to the inner courtyard, where they were to perform the crucial sacrificial rituals nearer to the presence of God. A repeated theme in these chapters is that those who were faithful in the past would be rewarded with closer access to God and greater privilege in his presence, while those who were unfaithful would be kept at a greater distance.
Summary for Ezek 44:17-19: 44:17-19 o The privileged access of the priests carried heightened responsibilities for holiness. Their behavior was far more restricted than that of the people in general. They had to wear linen rather than wool so that their bodies would not be defiled by sweat (see study note on 36:17), and they were to maintain a separate wardrobe of sacred garments.
• endanger ... by transmitting holiness to them: Holiness was a contagious quality that could be conveyed to anything with which it came into contact. The problem with this is that if a sacred object transmitted holiness to a profane object or person, there could be fatal consequences (cp. Lev 10:1-3 p; 1 Sam 6:19 q; 2 Sam 6:6-7 r).
Summary for Ezek 44:20-27: 44:20-27 s The priests were to avoid contact with death, either by being in the presence of a dead person or through the ritual mourning practices in which they would shave their heads or let their hair grow completely free. They must not drink wine before entering the inner courtyard to avoid the risk of potentially fatal alcohol-induced errors (see Lev 10:9 t). The priests were restricted in marriage to virgins of Israel or to widows of the priests to ensure the continuing purity of the priestly line. In all of these ways, the priests were to model the radical distinction between holy and common and between the ceremonially clean and unclean for the people.
Summary for Ezek 44:28-30: 44:28-30 u Because the priests belonged to the Lord and were provided for through a share of the sacrificial offerings of the Temple, they would not have any property or possession of land. The Lord was their inheritance, and their temporal needs were to be supplied by the firstfruits of the people’s harvests and the various offerings made at the Temple.
44:31 v In their radical separation from the realm of death, they could not eat any bird or animal that died a natural death or was attacked by another animal.
Ezekiel 45
Summary for Ezek 45:1-8: 45:1-8 w The division of the restored Promised Land among the tribes is described in detail in chs 47–48 x, but the central sacred section is described here because it included the area set aside for the priests to live in. Regaining a share in the land was a pressing concern for the exiles at a time when they had none. Ezekiel’s interest, however, was not simply in promising that the land would be divided among them in a fair way. He wanted to remind them of what the Promised Land was about in the first place. It was a land in which God would dwell among his people. At the outset, therefore, the central part of the land would be assigned to the Lord as his holy portion. The main purpose of this was to provide a zone of holiness and protection around the Temple.Summary for Ezek 45:3-4: 45:3-4 y Within this holy portion, the Temple complex would form the Most Holy Place at the heart of a sacred square. Just as the Most Holy Place in the Temple was protected by an inner court that only the priests could enter, the Temple complex was surrounded by a section reserved only for priests.
Summary for Ezek 45:5-6: 45:5-6 z To the north of this priestly strip was an area reserved for the Levites; to the south (48:15 aa), the city was located on a half-size strip. The result was a square that was 81/3 miles on a side.
45:7 ab On both sides of the larger sacred area (45:1-6 ac), the remainder of the holy portion was assigned to the prince. The same principle of graded access that operated in the Temple was applied more broadly to the surrounding land. The Temple would be the geographical and spiritual heart of the new Israel. The land would be divided into strips running east to west, orienting the whole nation along the sacred east–west axis of the Temple. The city and the prince would still be important in the new economy, but they would no longer be at the center. The Lord was Israel’s King, and his dwelling place would be the hub of their existence.
Summary for Ezek 45:8-9: 45:8-9 ad One tangible expression of the Lord’s kingly rule was that he distributed the land to the prince as well as to the people. The prince was assigned a large enough piece of his own land to meet his needs and to allow him to support the ministry of the Temple without having to oppress and rob the people.
Summary for Ezek 45:10-12: 45:10-12 ae When the prince gathered the offerings of the people for the Temple (see 45:13-17 af), he was not to adjust the scales so that he profited from the difference between what he took in from the people and what he gave out for the ministry of the Temple.
Summary for Ezek 45:13-17: 45:13-17 ag The people were to provide for the regular daily offerings that will make atonement at the new Temple by means of a tax paid to the prince. The prince was to provide all of the offerings for special occasions, such as the religious festivals, the new moon celebrations, and the Sabbath days. Both the regular daily offerings and the special festival offerings functioned to purify the people of Israel, making them right with the Lord.
Summary for Ezek 45:21-25: 45:21-25 ah Like the offerings, the annual festivals in the new Temple had a purifying purpose. Instead of the three distinctive festivals of the Mosaic order (the feasts of Passover, Harvest, and Shelters), there were now only two virtually identical festivals, Passover and Shelters, spaced six months apart. The Passover feast still took place on the fourteenth day of the first month and resembled the earlier festival in many ways, though the number of sacrificial offerings was significantly higher than those prescribed in Num 28 ai. The Festival of Shelters, however, is not even explicitly named in the Hebrew text and has lost anything distinctive about its celebration except for the provision that the prince will provide the same sacrifices as for the Passover. It still occurs in the seventh month. The land’s constant purification from sin emerges as a central theme.
Ezekiel 46
Summary for Ezek 46:1-15: 46:1-15 aj Ezekiel continued to outline the responsibilities of the prince at the special celebrations by specifying his duties on Sabbath days and at new moon celebrations. The prince would be the representative worshiper on behalf of the people. He would pass through the Temple in procession with them, and he would also be uniquely able to approach the realm of the sacred on their behalf. 46:1 ak The east gateway between the inner and outer courtyards would open once a week for the Sabbath, once a month for new moon celebrations, and when the prince offered voluntary burnt offerings or peace offerings (46:12 al). The east gate between the outer courtyard and the outside world was never to be opened again (44:2-3 am).46:2 an The prince would have the unique privilege of going through the eastern gateway to the inner courtyard as far as the entry room to worship. This symbolized that God regarded him as more significant than the common people, but that he was still not fit to stand in God’s presence apart from mediation by the priests.
46:3 ao The ordinary Israelites, the common people, would be allowed to climb the stairs to the threshold to offer their worship when the gate was open on the Sabbath and the first day of the month; only then would they be able to see into the inner court. Otherwise, they were kept away from it.
Summary for Ezek 46:9-10: 46:9-10 ap During religious festivals, the people were to present themselves before the Lord by proceeding through the Temple from north to south or vice versa, with the prince in their midst. Their motion was to follow the profane north–south axis rather than the sacred east–west axis along which the priests’ activities took place.
46:12 aq The voluntary burnt offering or peace offering was in addition to the regular daily offerings of meat, grain, and oil that symbolized the regular table fellowship and communion that had now been restored between God and his people.
Summary for Ezek 46:16-18: 46:16-18 ar Because the land assigned to the prince was the Lord’s gift to him and to his family, he could not give it permanently to one of his servants. Each Year of Jubilee, the fiftieth year when all land in Israel reverted to its original family owners, this land would revert to the crown. This provision was intended to remove the temptation for the king to acquire more and more land with which to reward his faithful servants, resulting in less land for the ordinary people. The land belonged to the Lord, and he divided it among his people. No one, not even the king, was permitted to tamper with the people’s inheritance.
Summary for Ezek 46:19-24: 46:19-24 as The vision of the Temple proper (chs 40–46 at) concludes with a return to the point at which the tour began. The prophet began his tour in the outer court, and having traveled to the center and back out again twice, he completed it at the edges of the outer court, in the kitchens where the various sacrifices offered by the people were to be cooked. Some sacrifices were burned whole on the altar, while others were only partially burned, with portions being returned so that the worshiper could feast with his family in the Lord’s presence.
Ezekiel 47
Summary for Ezek 47:1-12: 47:1-12 au Once the Temple was restored to its central place among God’s people, its beneficial influence, pictured here as a river, would spread outward, transforming death to life. 47:1 av The source of the stream was within the Temple.• to the right of the altar on its south side: This location in Solomon’s Temple was occupied by the Sea, a massive bronze pool that provided the water needed for cleansing (1 Kgs 7:23 aw, 39 ax). It also symbolized the subjugation of the forces of chaos (often represented by the sea) in the ordered cosmos of the Temple. In Ezekiel’s vision, the static Sea had been transformed into a dynamic, life-giving river (cp. Gen 2:10-14 ay; Ps 46 az).
Summary for Ezek 47:3-5: 47:3-5 ba At first, the stream was a mere trickle coming out from the gate of the Temple, but as it flowed out it became deeper and deeper until it was too deep to walk through. The exiles needed to be reminded that God often works from small beginnings that miraculously blossom into full flower.
Summary for Ezek 47:6-9: 47:6-9 bb The river grew as it went, bringing life to everything it touched, even the salty waters of the Dead Sea.
47:10 bc From En-gedi, a town on the west side of the Dead Sea, to En-eglaim, a town on the east side, the Dead Sea would be brought from death to life. This water, so full of salt and other minerals that it is devoid of life, would teem with enough fish to support a major fishing industry.
47:11 bd The useful salt deposits previously gathered from the Dead Sea area would not be lost—the marshes and swamps would still be salty.
47:12 be Alongside this river of life, fruit trees of all kinds will grow. Like the righteous of Ps 1 bf, their leaves will not wither, and they will bear their fruit in season. They will be so full of life that they will bear a new crop every month, and the leaves will be medicinal. The river’s fertility brings concrete blessings to all of God’s people. Wherever the waters of this river flow, there will be life.
Summary for Ezek 47:13-48:35: 47:13–48:35 bg The book of Ezekiel’s final section charts the boundaries and the distribution of the land. Theology is expressed here through geography; issues of space, access, and position relative to the Temple are of crucial significance.
Summary for Ezek 47:15-20: 47:15-20 bh The boundaries of the new Promised Land were approximately those assigned in Num 34:1-12 bi, from Lebo-hamath in the north to the Brook of Egypt in the south, and from the Mediterranean in the west to the Jordan River in the east. The people would now possess the entirety of this promised land, something they had never before done. Absent from this land was Transjordan, the area east of the Jordan River, which was the historic home of Reuben, Gad, and half of the tribe of Manasseh. It lay outside the boundaries promised to Moses and was therefore not part of the original promise, although historically many Israelites had lived there.
Summary for Ezek 47:21-23: 47:21-23 bj The land within these boundaries was to be divided among the tribes of Israel. Instead of the divided preexilic kingdoms, the future would see a single kingdom formed from the diverse unity of the twelve tribes and incorporating even resident foreigners and their families, provided that they had joined Israel as converts. These people were to receive an allotment, just like the native-born Israelites, and they could pass this inheritance on to their children. In view of the significance of the land to Ezekiel, this was a high privilege.
Ezekiel 48
Summary for Ezek 48:1-8: 48:1-8 bk The land assigned to the tribes was arranged in strips running east to west through the land, rather than piecemeal as it was before the Exile. This was more than simply a way of ensuring that each tribe received equal access to the various resources of the land. It aligned the land with the sacred east–west axis that was so prominent in the Temple. As in the Temple, the size and shape of the central areas were clearly defined, while those on the margins were less closely determined (see study note on 40:17-19). The four tribes most distant from the central sacred section (Dan, Asher, Naphtali, and Gad), and therefore in the least privileged position, were descended from the four sons of Jacob by Zilpah and Bilhah, the maidservants of his wives, Leah and Rachel. The eight sons from Leah and Rachel would receive the strips immediately north and south of the holy portion that contained the Temple. Immediately next to the holy portion were the tribes of Benjamin and Judah, which historically surrounded Jerusalem. Judah received the strip immediately to the north of the holy portion, as if to stress that whereas in the past the land had been divided into north and south—Israel and Judah—now Judah would be in the north.Summary for Ezek 48:9-14: 48:9-14 bl The holy portion was not quite at the exact center of the land; there were seven tribal strips to the north and only five to the south of it. While it was still not exactly central geographically, the spiritual center had apparently moved a significant distance north from where it used to be in Jerusalem.
• The importance of the holy portion set aside for the Lord’s Temple is underlined by the detailed description of its dimensions and makeup, in contrast with the brevity of the descriptions of the tribal allocations. This special portion was devoted to God and was never to be sold or traded or used by others. It was made up of strips that ran from east to west and were allocated to the Levites, the priests, and the city. The area for the ordained priests immediately surrounded the Temple and protected it from anything unholy. It was flanked by an area to the north for the Levites.
Summary for Ezek 48:15-20: 48:15-20 bm To the south was a narrower strip for public use where the city was located. The overall shape of the central area was thus a square. The city was a visible symbol and focus of unity for the twelve tribes, and home to residents from the various tribes.
Summary for Ezek 48:21-29: 48:21-29 bn The area filling out the rest of the central portion to the east and west of the holy square was assigned to the prince. The prince was more important than the rest of the laity, but he was below the priests and Levites. The same message was delivered by the architecture of the Temple complex.
Summary for Ezek 48:30-31: 48:30-31 bo At the end of the book, Ezekiel focuses attention on the exits to the city, highlighting once again the theme of access that runs throughout chs 40–48 bp. Like the Temple, the city was a measured square with twelve gates, one for each of the tribes, which established a focus of tribal unity. Unusually, the three most important gates, named for Reuben (the oldest of the sons of Israel), Judah (the royal tribe), and Levi (the priestly tribe), faced north rather than east. This is because the most important direction was northward toward the Temple, the center of the renewed land. South was the second most important side because it was on the axis that pointed toward the Temple.
Summary for Ezek 48:32-34: 48:32-34 bq The east-facing gates were assigned to the children of Rachel—Joseph, Benjamin, and (through her maidservant) Dan. The south ... gates were assigned to Simeon, Issachar, and Zebulun, Leah’s sons, whose lands would be south of the holy square. The least favored west ... gates were assigned to the descendants of the maidservants Bilhah and Zilpah, Gad, Asher, and Naphtali.
48:35 br To cap off the whole vision, the city was given a new name, The Lord Is There. Although the Lord had once departed from Jerusalem and ordered its destruction because of its gross idolatry and bloodshed, the new city was so much a part of the new order of things that it could receive that name. This also implied that the bloody city condemned in earlier chapters had now been replaced by a holy city, fit for God to dwell among representatives of all twelve of Israel’s tribes (cp. Isa 4:2-6 bs; Zech 14:20-21 bt). Thus the prophecy of Ezek 37:26-27 bu finally reaches its conclusion and its fulfillment, as God establishes his sanctuary in the midst of his people forever, just as he promised.
Copyright information for
TNotes