▼sn Ezek 21:1 in the English Bible is 21:6 in the Hebrew text (BHS). See the note at 20:45.

▼tn Heb “set your face toward.”

▼tn Heb “the land of Israel.”

▼tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) draws attention to something and has been translated here as a verb.

▼tn Or “I challenge you.” The phrase “I am against you” may be a formula for challenging someone to combat or a duel. See D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 1:201-2, and P. Humbert, “Die Herausforderungsformel ‘hinnenî’êlékâ’” ZAW 45 (1933): 101-8.

▼sn This is the sword of judgment; see Isa 31:8; 34:6; 66:16.

▼sn Ezekiel elsewhere pictures the Lord’s judgment as discriminating between the righteous and the wicked (9:4-6; 18:1-20; see as well Pss 1 and 11) and speaks of the preservation of a remnant (3:21; 6:8; 12:16). Perhaps here he exaggerates for rhetorical effect in an effort to subdue any false optimism. See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 2:25-26; D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 1:669-70; and W. Zimmerli, Ezekiel (Hermeneia), 1:424-25. The words do not require all the people in each category to be cut off.

▼tn Heb “all flesh” (also in the following verse).

▼tn Heb “Negev.” The Negev is the south country.

▼tn Heb “breaking loins.”

▼tn Heb “every spirit will be dim.”

▼sn This expression depicts in a very vivid way how they will be overcome with fear. See the note on the same phrase in 7:17.

▼tn Heb “Or shall we rejoice, scepter of my son? It despises every tree.” The translation understands the subject of the verb “despises,” which is a feminine form in the Hebrew text, to be the sword (which is a feminine noun) mentioned just before this. Alternatively, the line may be understood as “Let us not rejoice, O tribe of my son; it despises every tree.” The same word in Hebrew may be either “rod,” “scepter,” or “tribe.” The word sometimes translated as “or” or taken as an interrogative particle may be a negative particle. See D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 1:672, n. 79.

▼sn The people of Judah should not place false hope in their king, symbolized by his royal scepter, for God’s judgment (symbolized by fire and then a sword) would destroy every tree (see 20:47), symbolizing the righteous and wicked (see 21:3-4).

▼sn This physical action was part of an expression of grief. Cf. Jer 31:19.

▼tn Heb “For testing (will come), and what if also a scepter it despises will not be?” The translation understands the subject of the verb “despises,” which is a feminine form in the Hebrew text, to be the sword (which is a feminine noun) mentioned in the previous verses. The text is very difficult, and any rendering is uncertain.

▼tn Heb “Put to.”

▼tn Heb “face.”

▼tc The MT reads “Judah in fortified Jerusalem,” a geographic impossibility. The translation follows the LXX, which assumes בְּתוֹכָהּ (betokhah, “in it”) for בְּצוּרָה (betsurah, “fortified”).

▼sn As the Babylonians approached from the north, one road would branch off to the left and lead down the east side of the Jordan River to Ammon. The other road would veer to the right and lead down west of the Jordan to Jerusalem.

▼tn Heb “mother.”

▼sn Mesopotamian kings believed that the gods revealed the future through omens. They employed various divination techniques, some of which are included in the list that follows. A particularly popular technique was the examination and interpretation of the livers of animals. See R. R. Wilson, Prophecy and Society in Ancient Israel, 90-110.

▼tn This word refers to personal idols that were apparently used for divination purposes (Gen 31:19; 1 Sam 19:13, 16).

▼tn Heb “sees.”

▼tn Heb “the liver.”

▼tn Or “on the right side,” i.e., the omen mark on the right side of the liver.

▼tn Heb “to open the mouth” for slaughter.

▼tn Heb “to raise up a voice in a battle cry.”

▼tn Heb “they”; the referent (the people in Jerusalem) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

▼sn When the people of Judah realized the Babylonians’ intentions, they would object on grounds that they had made a treaty with the Babylonian king (see 17:13).

▼tn Heb “he”; the referent (the king of Babylon) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

▼tn Or “iniquity.”

▼tn Heb “and he will remind of guilt to be captured.” The king would counter their objections by pointing out that they had violated their treaty with him (see 17:18), thus justifying their capture.

▼tn Heb “caused to be remembered.”

▼tn Heb “Because you have brought to remembrance your guilt when your transgressions are uncovered so that your sins are revealed in all your deeds—because you are remembered, by the hand you will be seized.”

▼tn This probably refers to King Zedekiah.

▼tn Elsewhere in the Bible the turban is worn by priests (Exod 28:4, 37, 39; 29:6; 39:28, 31; Lev 8:9; 16:4), but here a royal crown is in view.

▼tn Heb “This not this.”

▼tn Heb “the high one.”

▼tn Heb “A ruin, a ruin, a ruin I will make it.” The threefold repetition of the noun “ruin” is for emphasis and draws attention to the degree of ruin that would take place. See IBHS 233 §12.5a and GKC 431-32 §133.k. The pronominal suffix (translated “it”) on the verb “make” is feminine in Hebrew. The probable antecedent is the “turban/crown” (both nouns are feminine in form) mentioned in verse 26. The point is that the king’s royal splendor would be completely devastated as judgment overtook his realm and brought his reign to a violent end.

▼tn The pronoun “this” is feminine, while the following negated verb (“will not be”) is masculine. Some emend the verb to a feminine form (see BHS), In this case the statement refers to the destiny of the king’s turban crown (symbolizing his reign). See the previous note. It ultimately denotes kingship in Israel, as with “not this” in v. 26.

▼tn Horace D. Hummel, Ezekiel (Concordia Commentary), 2:642, states that the suffixed object of the Hebrew verb for “give” (נָתַן, natan) can be indirect: “to him,” while the direct object (“it”) is understood from the preceding “right.” However, a more likely candidate for the understood object would be “this,” the turban/crown and the kingship it implies. The one who comes already has the “right.”

▼tn Hummel, Ezekiel, 2:658, states that “very early” interpreters saw similarity between this verse and Gen 49:10. Early Christian scholars like Jerome interpreted Ezek 21:27 of Jesus Christ, as did the majority of Christian scholars until rather recent times. The phrase “until he comes to whom it belongs” in Gen 49:10 resembles the words here. “Until” and “comes” are the same in both verses. In both verses there follows a relative pronoun like “who,” the preposition “to,” a prepositional object “him,” and an understood linking verb “is.” An allusion would favor those Hebrew words having the same meaning in both verses, with “right, legal claim” as the sense for מִשְׁפָּט, (mishpat) rather than “judgment,” since it is more compatible with an allusion.

▼sn A popular alternative view of this verse takes “right” as “judgment,” views the one who comes as Nebuchadnezzar, and translates “until” (עַד, ‘ad) as “when.” The basis for this unique translation of עַד (which rarely can mean “while”) is that here it would refer to the period during which the devastation is realized rather than to its termination point. See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 2:19, 21. Ezekiel often has מִשְׁפָּט as “judgment” and does not use it elsewhere as “right.” God promises to “give” “judgment” to the Babylonians in 23:24, as he would here. However, “right” is a normal sense for מִשְׁפָּט, and even most who see Nebuchadnezzar as the one who comes find an allusion to Gen 49:10 here, though inverted. However, this verse can alter the idea of Gen 49:10 even without Allen’s view, since Gen 49:10 promises that the scepter will not depart from Judah until the Messiah comes, while Ezek 21:27 promises that the royal turban/crown will be a ruin until Messiah comes. Robert W. Jenson, Ezekiel (Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible), 173, favors the traditional view “because of the eschatological rhetoric of the whole poem,” adding that “ending merely with Nebuchadnezzar would be a poetically disastrous anticlimax.” For Ezek 34:23-24 and 37:22, 24-25 promise the restoration of Davidic kingship in the Messiah.

▼tn Heb “their reproach.”

▼tn Heb “to contain, endure,” from כוּל (khul). Since that sense is difficult here, most take the text to read either “to consume” or “for destruction.” GKC 186 §68.i suggests that the form represents the Hiphil of אָכַל (’akhal, “consume”). The ’alef (א) would have dropped out, as it sometimes does and might do with אָכַל in Ezek 42:5. D. I. Block (Ezekiel [NICOT], 1:693) prefers seeing כוּל as a byform of כָּלָה (kalah, “be complete”), with a meaning like “consume” in the Hiphil. The weakness of Block’s suggestion is that כָּלָה does not elsewhere exhibit a Hiphil.

▼tn Heb “in the seeing concerning you falsehood, in divining concerning you a lie.” This probably refers to the attempts of the Ammonites to ward off judgment through prophetic visions and divination.

▼tn The antecedent for you is the sword mentioned in v. 28.

▼sn The second half of the verse appears to state that the sword of judgment would fall upon the wicked Ammonites, despite their efforts to prevent it.

▼sn Once the Babylonian king’s sword (vv. 19-20) has carried out its assigned task, the Lord commands a halt. The resheathed sword will return to the land where it was created, and there itself face judgment. The pronouns continue to be second person feminine singular. The sword figuratively represents the Babylonian nation, whose land is the locus of judgment.

▼tn In the Hebrew text of vv. 30-32 the second person verbal and pronominal forms are generally feminine singular. This continues the address of the personified Babylonian sword from verse 29 (the Hebrew word for “sword” is feminine). “Return” is masculine, either due to the Hebrew preference for the masculine gender, or to the fact that soldiers were men.

▼sn The imagery of blowing on the sword with fire and putting it in the hands of skillful men can evoke the work of smithies.

▼tn Heb “your blood will be in the middle of the land.”

▼sn This can be the blood that covered the sword in its great slaughter (v. 14), figuratively representing the end of Babylon. The pronouns are still second person feminine singular.