Eze 14:6 | KD | STEP | In these verses the divine threat, and the summons to repent, are repeated, expanded, and uttered in the clearest words. - Eze 14:6. Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Repent, and turn away from your idols; and turn away your face from all your abominations. V.7. For every one of the house of Israel, and of the foreigners who sojourn in Israel, if he estrange himself from me, and let his idols rise up in his heart, and set the stumbling-block to his sin before his face, and come to the prophet to seek me for himself; I will show myself to him, answering in my own way. Eze 14:8. I will direct my face against that man, and will destroy him, for a sign and for proverbs, and will cut him off out of my people; and ye shall learn that I am Jehovah. - לכן in is co-ordinate with the לכן in , so far as the thought is concerned, but it is directly attached to : because they have estranged themselves from God, therefore God requires them to repent and turn. For God will answer with severe judgments every one who would seek God with idols in his heart, whether he be an Israelite, or a foreigner living in the midst of Israel. שׁוּבוּ, turn, be converted, is rendered still more emphatic by the addition of פניכם... השׁיבוּ. This double call to repentance corresponds to the double reproof of their idolatry in , viz., שׁוּבוּ, to על לב 'העלה גל; and השׁיבוּ פניכם, to their setting the idols נכח פּניהם. השׁיבוּ is not used intransitively, as it apparently is in , but is to be taken in connection with the object פניכם, which follows at the end of the verse; and it is simply repeated before פניכם for the sake of clearness and emphasis. The reason for the summons to repent and give up idolatry is explained in , in the threat that God will destroy every Israelite, and every foreigner in Israel, who draws away from God and attaches himself to idols. The phraseology of is adopted almost verbatim from , ,Lev 17:13. On the obligation of foreigners to avoid idolatry and all moral abominations, vid., ; ; ; , etc. The ו before ינּזר and יעל does not stand for the Vav relat. , but simply supposes a case: “should he separate himself from my followers, and let his idols rise up, etc.” לדרשׁ־לו בּי does not mean, “to seek counsel of him (the prophet) from me,” for לו cannot be taken as referring to the prophet, although דּרשׁ with ל does sometimes mean to seek any one, and ל may therefore indicate the person to whom one goes to make inquiry (cf. ; ; ), because it is Jehovah who is sought in this case; and Hävernick’s remark, that “דּרשׁ with ל merely indicates the external object sought by a man, and therefore in this instance the medium or organ through whom God speaks,” is proved to be erroneous by the passages just cited. לו is reflective, or to be taken as a dat. commodi , denoting the inquirer or seeker. The person approached for the purpose of inquiring or seeking, i.e., God, is indicated by the preposition בּ, as in (דּרשׁ ); and also frequently, in the case of idols, when either an oracle or help is sought from them ( ; 2Ki 1:2.). It is only in this way that לו and בּי can be made to correspond to the same words in the apodosis: Whosoever seeks counsel of God, to him will God show Himself answering בּי, in Him, i.e., in accordance with His nature, in His own way, - namely, in the manner described in Eze 14:8. The threat is composed of passages in the law: 'נתתּי and 'הכרתּי וגו, after , ; and 'וחשׁמותיהוּ וגו, though somewhat freely, after ('היה לשׁמּה למשׁל). There is no doubt, therefore, that השׁמותי is to be derived from שׁמם, and stands for השׁמּותי, in accordance with the custom in later writings of resolving the Dagesh forte into a long vowel. The allusion to , compared with היה in v. 46 of the same chapter, is sufficient to set aside the assumption that השׁמותי is to be derived from שׂים, and pointed accordingly; although the lxx, Targ., Syr., and Vulg. have all renderings of שׂים (cf. ). Moreover, שׂים in the perfect never takes the Hiphil form; and in we have אשׁמּם in a similar connection. The expression is a pregnant one: I make him desolate, so that he becomes a sign and proverbs.

‏ Ezekiel 14:6

In these verses the divine threat, and the summons to repent, are repeated, expanded, and uttered in the clearest words. - Eze 14:6. Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Repent, and turn away from your idols; and turn away your face from all your abominations. V.7. For every one of the house of Israel, and of the foreigners who sojourn in Israel, if he estrange himself from me, and let his idols rise up in his heart, and set the stumbling-block to his sin before his face, and come to the prophet to seek me for himself; I will show myself to him, answering in my own way. Eze 14:8. I will direct my face against that man, and will destroy him, for a sign and for proverbs, and will cut him off out of my people; and ye shall learn that I am Jehovah. - לכן in Eze 14:6 is co-ordinate with the לכן in Eze 14:4, so far as the thought is concerned, but it is directly attached to Eze 14:5: because they have estranged themselves from God, therefore God requires them to repent and turn. For God will answer with severe judgments every one who would seek God with idols in his heart, whether he be an Israelite, or a foreigner living in the midst of Israel. שׁוּבוּ, turn, be converted, is rendered still more emphatic by the addition of פניכם... השׁיבוּ. This double call to repentance corresponds to the double reproof of their idolatry in Eze 14:3, viz., שׁוּבוּ, to על לב 'העלה גל; and השׁיבוּ פניכם, to their setting the idols נכח פּניהם. השׁיבוּ is not used intransitively, as it apparently is in Eze 18:30, but is to be taken in connection with the object פניכם, which follows at the end of the verse; and it is simply repeated before פניכם for the sake of clearness and emphasis. The reason for the summons to repent and give up idolatry is explained in Eze 14:7, in the threat that God will destroy every Israelite, and every foreigner in Israel, who draws away from God and attaches himself to idols. The phraseology of Eze 14:7 is adopted almost verbatim from Lev 17:8, Lev 17:10,Lev 17:13. On the obligation of foreigners to avoid idolatry and all moral abominations, vid., Lev 20:2; Lev 18:26; Lev 17:10; Exo 12:19, etc. The ו before ינּזר and יעל does not stand for the Vav relat., but simply supposes a case: “should he separate himself from my followers, and let his idols rise up, etc.” לדרשׁ־לו בּי does not mean, “to seek counsel of him (the prophet) from me,” for לו cannot be taken as referring to the prophet, although דּרשׁ with ל does sometimes mean to seek any one, and ל may therefore indicate the person to whom one goes to make inquiry (cf. 2Ch 15:13; 2Ch 17:4; 2Ch 31:21), because it is Jehovah who is sought in this case; and Hävernick’s remark, that “דּרשׁ with ל merely indicates the external object sought by a man, and therefore in this instance the medium or organ through whom God speaks,” is proved to be erroneous by the passages just cited. לו is reflective, or to be taken as a dat. commodi, denoting the inquirer or seeker. The person approached for the purpose of inquiring or seeking, i.e., God, is indicated by the preposition בּ, as in 1Ch 10:14 (דּרשׁ ); and also frequently, in the case of idols, when either an oracle or help is sought from them (1Sa 28:7; 2Ki 1:2.). It is only in this way that לו and בּי can be made to correspond to the same words in the apodosis: Whosoever seeks counsel of God, to him will God show Himself answering בּי, in Him, i.e., in accordance with His nature, in His own way, - namely, in the manner described in Eze 14:8. The threat is composed of passages in the law: 'נתתּי and 'הכרתּי וגו, after Lev 20:3, Lev 20:5-6; and 'וחשׁמותיהוּ וגו, though somewhat freely, after Deu 28:37 ('היה לשׁמּה למשׁל). There is no doubt, therefore, that השׁמותי is to be derived from שׁמם, and stands for השׁמּותי, in accordance with the custom in later writings of resolving the Dagesh forte into a long vowel. The allusion to Deu 28:37, compared with היה in v. 46 of the same chapter, is sufficient to set aside the assumption that השׁמותי is to be derived from שׂים, and pointed accordingly; although the lxx, Targ., Syr., and Vulg. have all renderings of שׂים (cf. Psa 44:16). Moreover, שׂים in the perfect never takes the Hiphil form; and in Eze 20:26 we have אשׁמּם in a similar connection. The expression is a pregnant one: I make him desolate, so that he becomes a sign and proverbs.