Chapter Thirty-Two

A Lamentation over Egypt

This lamentation in form is rather a prophetic threat; in it there are fewer elegiac motifs than in the lamentation over Tyre (especially in the 1st speech). It consists of 2 speeches: verses 1–16, where there is more about Pharaoh, and verses 17–32 – about his army and people. The second is more like a funeral song. The second speech or song describes the descent of Pharaoh and his army into Hades. Therefore, this song is very important as a monument of Old Testament concepts of Sheol, its divisions, and inhabitants. Unfortunately, the text of it is transmitted with great disagreement between the Masoretic and LXX; in some codices of LXX the arrangement of verses is quite different: 20, 21, 19.

Ezekiel 32:1. In the twelfth year, in the twelfth month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came to me: February 586 BC, one year and 7 months after the destruction of Jerusalem, consequently, at the time of the murder of Gedaliah and the flight to Egypt of the remaining Jews in Palestine. Perhaps this “lamentation” was suggested by the contemporary “lamentation” of Jeremiah over Israel. LXX: the 10th or 11th year (varies in different codices): Peshitta and 9 Hebrew manuscripts: the 11th year; in correspondence with which the number of the month instead of 12 – 10 or 11; but this variant probably arose from the great proximity to the date 1/XII 12 the date of verse 17, 15/XII 12, and by consideration of the dates Ezek 30:20 and Ezek 31:1.

Ezekiel 32:2. Son of man! Raise a lamentation over Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and say to him: You consider yourself a lion among the nations, but you are like a dragon in the seas; you thrust about in your rivers, and trouble the waters with your feet, and foul their rivers. “Lamentation.” Isaiah in chapter XIV raises a lamentation over Babylon: Ezekiel one over Tyre, and another over Egypt. – “A lion among the nations.” He is compared to it for his land power, and to a sea monster – for his naval power. – “A dragon” – Hebrew tannin Ezek 29:3, where it is translated crocodile; LXX and Vulgate there and here: “serpent,” δρακων, draco; some features in the further description of the “monster” allow thinking that Ezekiel to the image of a crocodile adds the image of a hippopotamus. – “You thrust about” – literally “you blow foam,” that is, from the nostrils; LXX: “you smote with horns,” εξεκρατιζες. When a crocodile surfaces from the depths, it spurts water from its nostrils. Ezekiel borrows the image from this for Pharaoh’s pride. Egypt was proud of abundant irrigation and, moving many armies across all its waters, thereby muddied them. Egypt’s passion for conquest troubled its own forces and agitated the neighboring peoples.

Ezekiel 32:3. Thus says the Lord God: I will spread My net over you with a company of many peoples; and they will haul you up in My net. To catch a crocodile with a net, one can imagine what size it must be and how many people (“a company of many peoples”) would be needed for it, but, in general, crocodiles are not caught this way. Hippopotamuses, though (see verse 2), are. Besides, this is a favorite image with Ezekiel of God’s judgment over the wicked kings and kingdoms: Ezek 12:13. Many peoples must be witnesses to God’s judgment over Pharaoh: Ezek 23:24 and others.

Ezekiel 32:4. And I will leave you on the ground, cast you out on the open field, and let all the birds of the sky settle on you, and let the beasts of the whole earth gorge themselves on you. A sea monster (crocodile, hippopotamus) can only be killed easily on land, where it is deprived of its element. Agatharchus (p. 27 and ff. Smend) and Diodorus (III, 14, 40; cf. Herodotus II, 69 and others) relate that ichthyophagae in Africa feed on sea monsters cast onto the shore; cf. Ps 73:14 according to LXX. The image of Leviathan or a sea monster serving as food to beasts and birds became from Ezekiel a favorite one in Hebrew apocalyptic: 3Ezr 6:49 and others. A dying kingdom will be torn to pieces by neighboring peoples, like a carcass by predatory birds and beasts.

Ezekiel 32:5. And I will strew your flesh on the mountains and fill the valleys with your carcass. To the prophet’s mind are presented here the corpses of fallen Egyptian warriors covering the mountains and valleys. A hyperbola brought to staggering dimensions: the meat of the killed monster will be scattered not only on the shore, but even on distant mountains and valleys. – “With your carcass”; in Hebrew a word of not established meaning: rammut of the same root as rimma, worm, – properly, a seething, hence one can derive the meaning “carrion”; LXX read dam (similar in form), blood; therefore Vulgate: sanies, gore; if so, the image is even more frightening: gorges and valleys, like bowls, will be filled with gore. It is remarkable that in cuneiform inscriptions there are expressions so close to the present one that Ezekiel is supposed to have borrowed them; for example, in the inscription of Tiglat-Pileser I Coll. III, 53–56: “the corpses of his warriors I heaped on the heights of mountains and their blood I poured out in gorges” (Miller, Ez. – Stud. 56–58). The resemblance, as we see, is not literal and is sufficiently explained by the commonness of the content.

Ezekiel 32:6. And I will drench the land with your flowing blood on the mountains, and the valleys shall be full of your blood. “The land of your swimming” – presumed and scarcely correct translation of Hebrew tzafa, which Symmachus translates ιχορ (indeed the blood of gods, lymph), Targum “fatty land,” that is, the land abundantly irrigated by the Nile, LXX “pus.” – “I will drench the land with your blood... to the very mountains.” Blood will be so abundant on the land that it, like the waters of the flood, will reach the peaks of mountains. A horrifying hyperbola. LXX soften: “and the land shall be drunk from the gore of you, from the multitude (of corpses) of you on the mountains.” – “And the valleys shall be full of you” – stronger than “with your blood” or “with your corpses.”

Ezekiel 32:7. When I blot you out, I will cover the heavens, and make their stars dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give its light. A customary in the Bible bringing together of great catastrophes on earth and upheavals in the starry world: cf. Isa 13:10, which perhaps is here in mind for Ezekiel, Joel 2:30-31; Matt 24:29 and others. The sky will grow dark out of compassion, just as Lebanon will grieve: Ezek 31:15. – “When you are extinguished.” Rationalists see a reference to the dragon of the world, with whom God is in a difficult struggle (Isa 51:9), more particularly – to the star of this dragon, rotating between the Big and Little Bears almost on half of the polar circle and causing, in the opinion of the ancients, a darkening of the sky. The prophet’s mind could also have been preceded by the darkness at the exodus of the Hebrews from Egypt.

Ezekiel 32:8. All the bright lights of the heavens I will darken over you, and put darkness on your land, says the Lord God. “Your land” – Egypt; darkness is limited to Egypt, as Exod 10:21 and ff.; therefore the Vatican codex unnecessarily intensifies the thought, not reading “your.”

Ezekiel 32:9. I will trouble the hearts of many peoples, when I carry your news to the nations, to lands which you have not known. “When I proclaim your fall among the nations,” when word of it spreads: but the LXX is better: “when I lead your captives into the nations,” a threat already made to Egypt Ezek 29:12. Through the captives, those nations will also learn of Egypt’s fall. — The captivity will be that much harsher because the captives will fall into lands “which you do not know,” the most distant lands, to the edge of the earth, to wild peoples with whom Egypt not only has no dealings, but on account of the extreme remoteness does not even know them.

Ezekiel 32:10. And I will fill many nations with terror at you, and their kings will shudder on account of you in fear, when I brandish My sword before their faces, and every moment they will tremble, each for his own life, on the day of your fall. “And I will fill many nations with terror at you,” with fear and for their own fate, all the more intense because the catastrophe clearly had a supernatural cause and was unexpected by human reckoning. “Every moment” is not in the LXX.

Ezekiel 32:11. For thus says the Lord GOD: the sword of the king of Babylon will come upon you. The previous figurative speech is rendered in plainer language. “Sword” — see chapter 21.

Ezekiel 32:12. By the swords of the mighty shall your people fall; all of them are the most fierce of the nations, and they will destroy the pride of Egypt, and all its multitude will perish. “The most fierce of the nations” — see the explanation Ezek 7:24. “His multitude” — Ezek 31:2.

Ezekiel 32:13. And I will destroy all his beasts beside the great waters, and no human foot will disturb them anymore, nor will the hooves of beasts disturb them. “Disturb them.” The prophet uses the murkiness of the Nile waters (which occurs because it flows through mud and carries it along, and on account of which part of it is called the Black Nile) for his image. There was little cattle then and is little now on the very banks of the Nile; it is raised in the drier parts of Egypt. But the prophet takes the Nile as representative of all Egypt.

Ezekiel 32:14. Then I will calm its waters, and make its rivers flow like oil, says the Lord GOD. The calm given to the Nile waters, that is, to Egypt, will immediately seem to come from the depopulation and lifelessness of the land (from the fact that the people and beasts that stirred up the river will be destroyed from it), but in a deeper sense — from the destruction of heathen vanity and sin in the land; consequently, here the prophecy concerns the Messianic times and the establishment and flourishing of Christianity in Egypt. In Scripture, oil is a symbol of God’s blessing and the grace of the Holy Spirit.

Ezekiel 32:15. When I make the land of Egypt a desolation, and when the land is deprived of all that fills it; when I strike all who dwell in it, then they will know that I am the Lord. The establishment of a peaceful future for Egypt must, as in other lands, be preceded by a punitive and purifying judgment of God.

Ezekiel 32:16. This is a lamentation, and they will chant it; the daughters of the nations will chant it; over Egypt and over all her multitude will they chant it, says the Lord GOD. A subscription to the song that shows it applies not only to Pharaoh (v. 2) but to the whole land, with all it contains. — “They will chant” — the Slavonic is more precise: “and you will lament over him” (as if the prophet personally is entrusted to chant it with the daughters of nations). — “The daughters of the nations” — the Slavonic is stronger: “the daughters of the heathen.” Mourning for the dead was ordinarily performed by women: Jer 9:17 and following 2 Sam 1:24.

Ezekiel 32:17. In the twelfth year, on the fifteenth day of the same month, the word of the Lord came to me: The month is not indicated; this indication could have been omitted by copyists most likely if the month was the same as for the preceding speech: the 12th; then the present speech would be separated from the preceding one only by 15 days, which is natural given their close connection in content. But the LXX place the 1st month (and in the date of v. 1 they correct the 12th year to 10 or 11, since at the 12th year it is not clear why — the second speech would be earlier than the first).

Ezekiel 32:18. Son of man! lament over the multitude of Egypt, and cast him down, him and the daughters of the renowned nations into the abyss, with those who descend into the pit. “Multitude” — the Slavonic says “multitude,” see explanation Ezek 31:2. Pharaoh is no longer spoken of. — “Cast him down... into the abyss” by your prophetic word, to which Scripture imparts real power, as the word of God, since it is at the same time the very deed: Amos 9:9; Jer 1:10 and others. — “And the daughters of the renowned nations,” that is, these nations which are enumerated in vv. 22, 24 and following — “Into the abyss,” “into the pit” — Ezek 26:20.

Ezekiel 32:19. Whom do you surpass? Go down, and be laid with the uncircumcised. “Whom do you surpass?” — in death, in the kingdom at its fall. Egypt and Pharaoh have undergone the same fate as all people and the smallest kingdoms. In the LXX this expression is transferred to v. 21: “whom are you better than,” and here: “from the waters of beauty (or beautiful?), go down,” from the Nile into Hades — the dry land. — “Go down” is not added where; a figure of reticence. — “Be laid,” the Slavonic “sleep” — a poetic designation of death. — “With the uncircumcised,” see explanation Ezek 28:10.

Ezekiel 32:20. They will fall in the midst of those slain by the sword, and he is delivered to the sword; drag him and all his multitude. “They” — the kingdoms before which Egypt was proud. — “Slain by the sword” — and therefore deprived of burial, “uncircumcised” after death, see explanation Ezek 28:10. — “Drag him” to death and destruction. The LXX instead of the sword read according to v. 21 she slept, “he slept.” “Him” — Pharaoh, Egypt. “Multitude,” Heb. hamon, see explanation Ezek 31:2.

Ezekiel 32:21. In the depths of the abyss they will speak of him and of his allies; the first of the mighty fell, and they lie there among the uncircumcised, slain by the sword. “In the depths of the abyss,” Heb. sheol, the LXX is stronger: “in the depths of the chasm”; and these words they introduce into the speech of the “mighty” to Pharaoh: “in the depths of the chasm (in the abyss), be.” — “And of his allies,” in Hebrew the same word which in Ezek 30:8 is translated: “supports” — see there. The LXX do not have it. — “First,” Heb. elim, plural from el, same as in Ezek 31:1; see explanation there. “Of the mighty,” Heb. gibborim, Greek γιγαντες, Slavonic “giants,” also in Gen 6:4; Num 13:33. These giants, inhabitants also of the abyss, sheol, mock Pharaoh, that he fell like an uncircumcised one, slain by the sword and, consequently, deprived of burial (cf. explanation Ezek 28:10), whereas they, according to v. 27, can be proud of an honorable military burial — with weapons, with swords under their heads, so they occupy in sheol as it were a better, higher section, inaccessible to the uncircumcised, the killed and unburied, and among them to Pharaoh and his army. Although these giants from a moral standpoint are characterized in v. 27 not entirely favorably, with traits reminiscent of the giants of Genesis, with which, as well as with the aborigines of Palestine repeatedly mentioned in Scripture, they are supposed to be identical, but they seem to be the better inhabitants of sheol, below whom stand along with Pharaoh all the later peoples descended into Hades, of which v. 22-30 counts 7 (Assyria, Elam, and so on), — better, perhaps, by their ancient simplicity, courage, immediacy, uncorruptedness. The passage, as well as the entire this section of the chapter, is important for the details it gives about the subdivisions of sheol in the Old Testament conception of it. — “They fell and lie.” The LXX is stronger: “go down and sleep.” — “Among the uncircumcised, slain by the sword,” see explanation Ezek 28:10.

Ezekiel 32:22. There is Assyria and all her host; round about her are her graves; all of them slain, fallen by the sword. Ezekiel 32:23. Her graves are set in the uttermost parts of the pit, and her host is round about her grave; all of them slain, fallen by the sword, who caused terror on the land of the living. A enumeration of the nations now in the abyss begins, of course an incomplete one; those recently descended or only descending from the world stage are chosen; the sacred number 7 is taken. The order of enumeration does not follow the time of destruction, nor the degree of significance, but rather a geographical one; first the northern: Assyria, Elam, Meshech and Tubal (the Medes); then the southern (Enosh), finally the western and the far north (v. 30). “Assyria” perished in 608–607 BC with the taking of Nineveh by the Babylonian Nabopolassar and the Median Kyaxares (Zeph 2:13; Nah 2:2), calling it first, perhaps, as the most significant enemy of Israel. — “Her hosts,” Heb. kegal, whereas of other nations (Elam and so on) hamon — multitude, perhaps as a sign of the special multitude of peoples subject to Assyria. A grave, a tomb we represent to ourselves as a place on earth; for the Hebrew the conceptions of a grave and sheol (Hades, the underworld) often almost coincide (cf. for example Isa 14:11). Sheol, as this passage shows, is a large grave in which many graves are united; it seems as if in Hades all the graves of the world are united. But although sheol is conceived approximately as a great cemetery, the souls also outside their graves have intercourse. A conception, pleasantly striking for its immediacy, concreteness, living connection with reality, the absence of any intellectual speculation about something which intellectual efforts are useless for (about the afterlife, which no efforts of earthly mind can conceive, because it occurs not under the conditions of earthly existence). — The grave of a king or dominant nation is surrounded (“round about her”) by the graves of his warriors and subjects. Remarkably, according to the view of the prophet even in the afterworld each nation lives together by itself, crowding with the multitude of its graves around one grave of its king or leader. “In the uttermost parts of the abyss” — or on account of the antiquity of this nation, the antiquity of its descent into Hades, or because the depth of the fall corresponds to the height from which it fell. — “Who caused terror on the land of the living.” This indicates not so much as a cause of afterlife condemnation (cf. v. 32; Ezek 26:17), as for the strengthening of the thought of the wretched misery of Assyria’s present position — at the bottom of Hades. — V. 23 contains much repetition (doublets) from v. 22, so with good reason the majority of the LXX codices read in it only the last sentence, and the expression “in the uttermost parts of the abyss” transfer to the middle of v. 22 and place before the words: “round about her graves.”

Ezekiel 32:24. There is Elam and all her multitude round about her grave; all of them slain, fallen by the sword, who went down uncircumcised into the abyss, who caused terror on the land of the living, and bore their shame with those who go down into the pit. “Elam,” Assyr. Elamtu, Gr. Elymais, Susiana, a strong nation of Western Asia, excellent archers, subject to Assyria (Isa 11:11; Ezra 4:9) by Ashurbanipal (only after 5 campaigns); in the army of Sennacherib at Jerusalem were Elamites (Isa 22:6); with the fall of Assyria they regained independence, which they enjoyed probably in Ezekiel’s time, successfully maintaining it against the Babylonians and Medes (Str. XVI, 744), by the latter of whom, perhaps, they were finally subjugated (Jer 49:34). “Uncircumcised.” This is not said of Assyria. — “And bore their shame.” The same.

Ezekiel 32:25. Among the slain he made a bed for him with all his multitude; round about her grave, all of them uncircumcised, slain by the sword; and as they caused terror on the land of the living, so they bear their shame with those who go down into the pit and are placed among the slain. “Among the slain” — Ezek 28:10. “With multitude” — Ezek 31:2. — “Round about her graves” v. 22. The verse contains repetitions not only from vv. 22 and 23, which is natural, but also from v. 24, which is probably dittography. Many LXX codices read from it only the first 3 or last 3 words.

Ezekiel 32:26. There are Meshech and Tubal and all their multitude; round about them are their graves, all of them uncircumcised, slain by the sword, because they caused terror on the land of the living. “Meshech and (and Heb. “and” is not there) Tubal” — see explanation Ezek 27:13. They also appear as the chief allies of Gog (Ezek 38:2). If these are Scythians, then the prophet could have had in mind the great campaign of the Scythians into Western Asia, which Herodotus recounts (I, 103 and foll. cf. IV, 11 and foll.) and which seems to be pointed to more than once in the book of Zephaniah and Jer 4 – Jer 6. In Ps 119:5 Meshech means the barbarians of the farthest north, and it is certain that the Scythians then lived between the Black and Caspian Seas. According to Herodotus, they ravaged Western Asia for 28 years and devastated it terribly; their invasion forced Kyaxares, among other things, to lift the siege of Nineveh. The rest, see v. 23.

Ezekiel 32:27. And are they not laid with the fallen mighty, uncircumcised, who went down to the abyss with their weapons of war, who placed their swords under their heads and whose iniquities remain upon their bones, though they were the terror of the mighty in the land of the living. “Are they not laid,” in Heb. and Vulgate. “are not.” These robber nations cannot be in the “abyss,” sheol (it is remarkable that this word in the enumeration of the nations of Hades appears here for the first time; earlier — grave), together with the renowned ones, those who have received honorable military burial — with weapons, the giants, even if uncircumcised, all the more so if circumcised, because the bones of them, that is, of Meshech and Tubal, are defiled with iniquity (robberies and banditries). The LXX do not have the negation: “and they slept with the fallen giants from of old”; consequently the society of giants in sheol for them is represented as shameful; “from of old” instead of “uncircumcised”: meolam instead of meaelim. Instead of “fallen” — the newest propose reading according to Gen 6:4 nephilim, giants.

Ezekiel 32:28. And you will be broken among the uncircumcised and will lie with those slain by the sword. “You” — Pharaoh. The verse interrupts the enumeration of the inhabitants of the abyss and separates the 4 named, more powerful nations from the 3 further, less important ones.

Ezekiel 32:29. There is Edom, her kings and all her princes, who for all their might are placed among those slain by the sword; they will lie with the uncircumcised and with those who go down into the pit. “Edom” is taken as an ancient enemy of Israel. Ezekiel predicted its destruction in Ezek 25:12-14 and apparently expected it before Egypt’s destruction, if Pharaoh finds Edom already in Hades (as Edom should have suffered after the battle of Carchemish, clearly from Jer 27:3). — “Her kings and all her princes,” each tribe had a prince, who perhaps elected a king from among themselves; cf. Gen 36:31 and following. “Who” — asher. The LXX read “Assyria’s.” — “For all their might.” The warlike character of the Idumaeans is testified to already by Gen 36:31. Here this epithet replaces the addition about the previous 4 great nations: “with all her multitude,” “her hosts,” because the Idumaeans were a small nation. There is also no addition about them: “caused terror on the land of the living,” because they were not world conquerors.

Ezekiel 32:30. There are the princes of the north, all of them, and all the Sidonians, who have gone down in shame with the slain, despite the terror they caused by their might, and they lie with the uncircumcised, those slain by the sword, and bear their shame with those who go down into the pit. “Princes,” Heb. nessikey only Josh 13:21; Ps 82:13 and Mic 5:5 from nasok, to anoint (χρηστος), similarly also with Assyr. nasiku, prince, from the root “to establish” (Ak. καθεσταμεναι). Slavonic “princes.” — “Of the north.” With such an indefinite designation the prophet could only mean the north nearest to the Edom mentioned in v. 29 and in this verse the Sidonians (Phoenicians), that is, Syria (the farthest north is already named in v. 26). — “All the Sidonians.” This name here has undoubtedly that broad sense of Phoenicia which it had in antiquity: Judg 18:7; Isa 23:2: “all the commanders of Assyria,” reading again asher, “who,” as “Assyria.” Ezekiel could have had in mind the wars of the Syrians and Phoenicians with the Chaldeans, the siege of Tyre by N. — “Pharaoh and on earth should have had good familiarity with these inhabitants of Hades” (Bertholet.). “Ashamed” is absent in some LXX codices.

Ezekiel 32:31. Pharaoh will see them and be comforted in regard to all his multitude, Pharaoh and all his army, says the Lord GOD. “Will be comforted.” A sad comfort! Irony. Cf. Ezek 14:22. — “Multitude” — Ezek 31:2.

Ezekiel 32:32. For I will spread My terror in the land of the living, and Pharaoh and all his multitude will be placed among the uncircumcised, with those slain by the sword, says the Lord GOD. “For I will spread My terror in the land of the living,” a terror which the warlike nations of vv. 23–25 unlawfully claimed. But of course this terror will be of a different, saving nature; it will not be “in terror.” — “Among the uncircumcised.” A repetition of the most important expressions of the speech, which contain its whole thought.