Ezekielchapter 11
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Key verse
And the glory of the Lord went up from the midst of the city, and stood upon the mountain which is on the east side of the city.
It stands in scene C of the chapter, verses 22 to 25.
The chapter
Chapter summary
At the east gate stand twenty-five men, Jaazaniah and Pelatiah among them, devising iniquity and saying, 'This city is the caldron, and we are the flesh': safe meat in a strong pot. Ezekiel prophesies against them, and Pelatiah dies as he speaks; the prophet falls on his face crying out for the remnant. Then the counter-promise to the exiles the city despised: though scattered among the countries, 'I will be to them a sanctuary for a little while': a temple without walls. 'I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh.' Then the glory departs the city and stands on the mountain to the east.
Context
Prophecy · Ezekiel · Ezekiel overview
Where the chapter sits
Ezekiel 11 falls in Symbolic acts and judgment on Jerusalem (chapters 4–24). Lying on his side for 430 days; shaving the head with a sword; eating food in anxiety; the glory departs in stages (8–11); the prophet survives his wife's death without mourning (24).
Before it: Call and wheels-vision, chapters 1–3. After it: Oracles against the nations, chapters 25–32.
The whole shape of Ezekiel→The world behind this chapter
Ezekiel 11The history
The men at the gate are named, Jaazaniah son of Azzur and Pelatiah son of Benaiah, and the city gate is where their kind of business was done. Gates in a walled city were deep chambered structures with stone benches, and they served as the courthouse, the council room and the marketplace. To sit in the gate was to govern.
The rest of the history, and what it meant to them
Their slogan is a cooking proverb. This city is the pot and we are the meat. A cauldron protects the choice cuts from the fire; the meat inside is the good stuff, and the walls are the metal. They meant it as reassurance, we are safe in here, we are the ones that matter. God turns it inside out: the ones they killed are the meat, and the survivors will be dragged out of the pot and judged at the border of the land, not inside it.
The second slogan is about property. The people left in Jerusalem were saying of the deportees, they have gone far from the LORD; the land is given to us as a possession. Deportation left estates empty, and the neighbours moved onto them. Jeremiah records the same land grab. It was a legal claim as much as an insult, the exiles were being written out of their inheritance.
God's answer includes a phrase that would have been startling to a priest: I have been a sanctuary to them for a little while in the countries where they have gone. Sanctuary was a place with walls and an altar. Here it is not a place at all.
What it meant to them
This is the chapter where the exiles find out which side of the line they are on. The people with the temple, the city and the land are the ones under sentence. The people by the canal, written off by their own countrymen, are the ones God says He will gather.
And then comes the promise that the rest of the book will keep returning to: one heart, a new spirit, the heart of stone taken out and a heart of flesh given. Their problem had never been the address. It was the organ, and God says He will replace it Himself.
Sources cited
- Roland de Vaux, Ancient Israel: Its Life and Institutions
- John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament
A. The cauldron and the flesh: princes who plot evil
1. (vv. 1-4)
a.five and twenty men: The Spirit carries the prophet to the east gate and shows him twenty five men gathered at its door, named leaders among them Jaazaniah and Pelatiah, princes of the people rather than strangers off the street. Their counsel is given in the very next verse's own words, that Jerusalem is a safe caldron and they the meat inside it, a boast that the coming siege will only cook the flesh already gathered rather than touch the city's leaders. Henry notes the irony that these men sit at the gate where the glory itself will soon depart, plotting safety in the shadow of the throne's exit. The Lord orders Ezekiel to prophesy against them by name, the charge repeated twice for weight, before a single word of judgment is spoken.
Ezekiel 11:1, 2 voicesWhat preachers and commentators have said about these verses, in their own words.
Ezekiel 11:1
“The gate - The gate of the templecourt. The gate was the place of judgment. Five and twenty men - Not the same men as in Eze 8:16. There they were representatives of the “priests,” here of the “princes.” The number is, no doubt, symbolic, made up, probably, of 24 men and the king. The number 24 points to the tribes of undivided Israel. Jaazaniah ... Pelatiah - We know nothing more of these men. The former name was probably common at that time Eze 8:”
Ezekiel 11:1
“The judgment on the representatives of the priesthood naturally follows here, just as the sin of the priests had followed in the description (Eze 8:12, 16) after the sin of the elders. Jaazaniah--signifying "God hears." son of Azur--different from Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan (Eze 8:11).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 11:2, 1 voice
Ezekiel 11:2
“Lastly, men always throw off all blame from themselves, under pretense of error or ignorance. Hence the Prophet now shows that the city was not free from God's wrath, since it was corrupted by its leaders and rulers; nay, that this was a cause of its destruction, since the people were too easily led astray by perverse examples.”
John Calvin· Commentaries (1554)reformed
Ezekiel 11:3, 2 voices
Ezekiel 11:3
“It is not near - In contradiction to Eze 7:2. Let us build houses - “To build houses” implies a sense of security. Jeremiah bade the exiles “build houses” in a foreign land because they would not soon quit it Jer 29:5; Jer 35:7. These false counselors promised to their countrymen a sure and permanent abode in the city which God had doomed to destruction. No need, they said, to go far for safety; you are perfectly safe at home.”
Ezekiel 11:3
“It is not near--namely, the destruction of the city; therefore "let us build houses," as if there was no fear. But the Hebrew opposes English Version, which would require the infinitive absolute.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
2. (vv. 5-7)
a.the things that come into your mind: The Spirit falls on Ezekiel and answers the princes' own boast with the very words they used, thus have ye said, because the Lord knows every thought that comes into their mind without needing to be told it. He turns the caldron image against them, the true flesh in the pot is not these leaders but the slain they have multiplied and filled the streets with, the victims of their own violence and misrule. Their proverb promised the caldron's meat safety inside the pot, and the Lord answers instead that he will bring them out of the midst of it, reversing the very shelter they claimed. Gill reads the reversal as a pattern the book uses more than once, a wicked proverb quoted back to its makers and turned into its own refutation.
Ezekiel 11:6, 2 voices
Ezekiel 11:6
“Ye - Many murders have you committed yourselves, and you are accountable to God for all those whom the Chaldeans have slain, seeing you persuaded them, thus obstinately to stand out.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 11:6
“Note, Those who are either unrighteous or imprudent in beginning or carrying on a war bring upon themselves a great deal of the guilt of blood; and those who are slain in the battles or sieges which they, by such a reasonable peace as the war aimed at, might have prevented, will be called their slain. Now these slain are the only flesh that shall be left in this caldron,”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 11:7, 2 voices
Ezekiel 11:7
“All that shall remain in the city are the buried dead. Bloodshed and murder were at this time rife in Jerusalem, and these were among the chief crimes that were bringing down judgment upon the city. All the inhabitants that should yet survive were destined to be carried away into exile.”
Ezekiel 11:7
“There shall none remain to keep possession of the city but those that are buried in it. There shall be no inhabitants of Jerusalem but the inhabitants of the graves there, no freemen of the city but the free among the dead.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
3. (vv. 8-12)
a.Ye have feared the sword: The judgment matches the fear exactly, ye have feared the sword and I will bring a sword upon you, the princes delivered into the hands of the very strangers they thought their walls would keep out. Twice in five verses the recognition formula lands, ye shall know that I am the Lord, the book's stated purpose for every stroke of judgment it records. The caldron image is denied them outright, this city shall not be your caldron, and the ground given for the sentence is plain rather than mysterious, they have not walked in God's statutes but have done after the manners of the heathen around them. Clarke notes that the charge is imitation of the nations rather than mere neglect of the law, the sin the earlier history of Israel's kings already diagnosed.
Ezekiel 11:8, 1 voice
Ezekiel 11:8
“Ye have feared the sword,.... Of the Chaldeans; and therefore they sent to the Egyptians for help. The Targum is, "ye have been afraid of them that kill with the sword;'' and not afraid of the Lord; see Mat 10:28; and I will bring a sword upon you, saith the Lord God; or those that kill with the sword, as the Targum; meaning the Chaldeans, who were sent by the Lord, and, when they took the city, put many to death by the sword, and carried captive others.”
Ezekiel 11:9, 1 voice
Ezekiel 11:9
“And I will bring you out of the midst thereof,.... Jerusalem, the cauldron, as they said it was, and where they thought they should be safe; this is repeated, to express the certainty of it, and to excite their attention to it, and remove their vain confidence: and deliver you into the hands of strangers; the Chaldeans: and will execute judgments among you; punishments for sin, such as famine, pestilence, sword, and captivity.”
Ezekiel 11:10, 1 voice
Ezekiel 11:10
“In the border of Israel - Hamath was the northern border of Israel (margin reference). At Riblah in Hamath the king of Babylon judged and condemned Zedekiah and the princes of Judah Jer 52:9-10.”
Ezekiel 11:11, 1 voice
Ezekiel 11:11
“Judge you - I will do more against you at Riblah, where the captive king had his children, and others with them, first murdered before his eyes, and then his own eyes put out; Riblah is called the border of Israel: for Syria was adjoining to Israel on the north, and Riblah was on the frontiers of Syria.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
4. (v. 13)
a.Pelatiah the son of Benaiah died: As Ezekiel prophesies, one of the twenty five named princes, Pelatiah, drops dead on the spot, the word acting as visibly as any of the prophet's sign acts. Ezekiel falls on his face and cries aloud, wilt thou make a full end of the remnant of Israel, the same intercessory posture he has taken earlier in the book when the people's ruin seemed total. Henry reads the outcry as proof that judgment on the wicked never numbs a true prophet to the fate of the remnant, grief and obedience holding together in the same breath. Keil notes that Pelatiah's death, immediate and visible, functions as a pledge that the sentence just spoken against the princes will indeed be carried out.
Ezekiel 11:13, 3 voices
Ezekiel 11:13
“The death of Pelatiah was communicated in this vision, which represented ideally the idolatry in which Pelatiah had actually been foremost.”
Ezekiel 11:13
“The people regarded Pelatiah as a mainstay of the city. His name (derived from a Hebrew root, "a remnant," or else "God delivers") suggested hope. Is that hope, asks Ezekiel, to be disappointed?”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 11:13
“The death of Pelatiah was an earnest of the complete accomplishment of this prophecy. Note, God is pleased often-times to single out some sinners, and to make them monuments of his justice, for warning to others of what is coming; and some that thought themselves very safe and snatched away suddenly, and drop down dead in an instant, as Ananias and Sapphira at Peter's feet when he prophesied.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
B. A sanctuary for the scattered, a heart of flesh promised
1. (vv. 14-16)
a.Again the word of the Lord came unto me: Those still in Jerusalem have written off the exiles already gone, telling Ezekiel's own brethren and kindred, get you far from the Lord, as though the land itself and not the Lord's presence were the mark of his favor. The Lord answers that claim directly, though he has scattered them far among the nations, he will be to them a little sanctuary in the very countries where they have come. Gill and Fairbairn both take the phrase as a promise of God's presence detached from any building, the Lord himself standing in for the temple the exiles no longer have access to. The remnant left behind mistakes possession of Jerusalem's ground for possession of God, while the exiles who have lost the ground keep the greater thing.
Ezekiel 11:14, 1 voice
Ezekiel 11:14
“Again the word of the Lord came unto me, saying,.... In answer to his prayer. The Targum calls it, "the word of prophecy from the Lord;'' this was by way of comfort to the captives in Babylon, as the former was by way of threatening to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.”
Ezekiel 11:15, 2 voices
Ezekiel 11:15
“Son of man, thy brethren, even thy brethren, the men of thy kindred,.... Or, "of thy redemption" (l); to whom the right of redemption of his lands and possessions belonged, as it did to those that were next akin. The Septuagint, by a mistake of the word, render it, "the men of thy captivity"; and so the Syriac and Arabic versions, following them.”
Ezekiel 11:15
“Thy kindred - The original word is derived from a root, suggesting the ideas of “redeeming” and “avenging” as connected with the bond of “kindred.” The word, therefore, conveys here a special reproach to the proud Jews, who have been so ready to cast off the claims of blood-relationship, and at the same time a hope of restoration to those who have been rudely thrown aside.”
Ezekiel 11:16, 3 voices
Ezekiel 11:16
“Yet will I be to them as a little sanctuary - Though thus exiled from their own land, yet not forgotten by their God. While in their captivity, I will dispense many blessings to them; and I will restore them to their own land, Eze 11:17, from which they shall put away all idolatry, Eze 11:18.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 11:16
“Scattered - Dispersed them in many countries which are under the king of Babylon: yet they are dear to me. A little sanctuary - A little one in opposition to that great temple at Jerusalem. To him they shall flee, and in him they shall be safe, as he was that took hold on the horns of the altar.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 11:16
“They shall there see God's power and his glory, as they used to see them in the sanctuary; they shall have the tokens of God's presence with them, and his grace in their hearts shall sanctify their prayers and praises, as well as ever the altar sanctified the gift, so that they shall please the Lord better than an ox or bullock.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2. (vv. 17-20)
a.gather you from the people: The promise of the little sanctuary opens straight into a fuller promise of return, gathering the scattered from the countries and giving them back the land of Israel, so that the exiles first strip the land of its old abominations before they resettle it. The heart promised here, one heart and a new spirit, the stony heart taken out and a heart of flesh given, is the same language chapter thirty six will use at greater length for the same people. Keil reads the two passages as one promise stated twice, first in brief here and then developed fully later in the book, rather than two separate oracles. The purpose clause names the whole aim of the change, that they may walk in my statutes, and closes on the covenant formula, they shall be my people, and I will be their God.
Ezekiel 11:17, 1 voice
Ezekiel 11:17
“If there be any thing in the change of the person from you to them, it may signify the posterity of those to whom the promise is made. " You shall have the title as the patriarchs had, and those that come after shall have the possession." 3. That God by his grace would part between them and their sins,”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 11:18, 2 voices
Ezekiel 11:18-19
“And when you have entered, you shall remove all idols, because of which you have offended God, and I will give you a unified heart of fear and servitude to God, so that you may not serve diverse idols, or any other than what you had before. And I will give a new spirit in your midst, according to what is written: Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me (Psalm 51:12).”
Jerome· written before 420· COMMENTARY ON EZEKIEL 3:11.17-21patristic
Ezekiel 11:18
“But still the Shekinah glory had departed, the ark was not restored, nor was the second temple strictly inhabited by God until He came who made it more glorious than the first temple (Hag 2:9); even then His stay was short, and ended in His being rejected; so that the full realization of the promise must still be future.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 11:19, 3 voices
Ezekiel 11:19-20
“This might lead one to suppose that it was God who gave the power to walk in his commandments and to keep his judgments, if it was he who removed the stony heart, which hindered them from keeping the commandments, and who implanted in them the better and more sensitive one, which is here called a heart of flesh.”
Origen of Alexandria· written before 253· ON FIRST PRINCIPLES 3:1.7patristic
Ezekiel 11:19
“Compare Rev. 21. The identity of thought and language in Ezekiel, predicting the new kingdom of Israel, and in John, foretelling the kingdom of heaven, forces upon us the conclusion that the prophecy of Ezekiel has an ultimate reference to that climax which John plainly indicates. Eze 11:19 One heart - So long as the Israelites were distracted by the service of many gods, such unity was impossible; but now, when they shall have taken away the “abominations” from the land, they shall be united in heart to serve the true God.”
Ezekiel 11:19
“All that are sanctified have a new spirit, quite different from what it was; they act from new principles, walk by new rules, and aim at new ends. A new name, or a new face, will not serve without a new spirit. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. [3.] That he will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, out of their corrupt nature.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 11:20, 1 voice
Ezekiel 11:20
“That they may walk in my statutes - The holiness of their lives shall prove the work of God upon their hearts. Then it shall appear that I am their God, because I have done such things in them and for them; and their holy conduct shall show that they are my people. See on Eze 36:25 (note), etc.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
3. (v. 21)
a.recompense their way upon their own heads: The new heart promised to the returning remnant is not given automatically to everyone who carries the name Israel, and the chapter sets a warning clause right beside the promise. Those whose heart still walks after their own detestable things receive their own way recompensed upon their own heads, the same principle of individual accountability chapter eighteen will argue at length. Wesley reads the warning as proof that the covenant renewal of the previous verses is offered rather than imposed, a heart change that still meets a real choice in the hearer. The promise and the warning stand in the same breath so that neither cancels the force of the other.
C. The glory leaves the city and rests on the mountain
1. (vv. 22-23)
a.lift up their wings: The vision resumes where chapter ten paused at the east gate, the cherubim lift their wings, the wheels move with them, and the glory that had stood at the threshold now rises clear of the city altogether. The glory of the Lord goes up from the midst of the city and comes to rest on the mountain on the city's east side, commonly identified with the Mount of Olives, the last stop before the vision ends. This is the second and further station of the itinerary the book has been tracing since chapter one, the glory that filled Solomon's temple at its dedication now standing outside the walls it once filled. Fairbairn reads this eastward departure as the necessary counterpart to the return that chapter forty three will finally record, the whole itinerary framed by the same gate and the same direction.
Ezekiel 11:22, 2 voices
Ezekiel 11:22
“Gradually, the glory of the Lord departed from Jerusalem. First leaving the temple, it stood in the courtyard or at the threshold of the house, and afterwards at the entrance of the Eastern Gate; finally, with its wings and accompanying wheels lifted up, it stood upon the mountain, which is towards the east of the city, no doubt signifying the Mount of Olives, from where the Savior ascended to the Father.”
Jerome· written before 420· COMMENTARY ON EZEKIEL 3:11.22-23patristic
Ezekiel 11:22
“Then did the cherubim lift up their wings,.... In order to remove, as in Eze 10:19; and the wheels beside them; which were lifted up also along with the cherubim: and the glory of the God of Israel was over them above; both cherubim and wheels.”
Ezekiel 11:23, 3 voices
Ezekiel 11:23
“The mountain which is on the east side of the city - The Mount of Olives. The rabbis commenting on this passage said the Shechinah retired to this Mount, and there for three years called in vain to the people with human voice that they should repent. On that mountain, Christ stood, when He wept over the fair city so soon to be utterly destroyed. From that mountain he descended, amid loud Hosannas, to enter the city and temple as a Judge.”
Ezekiel 11:23
“So it was from it that Jesus ascended to heaven when about to send His judgments on the Jews; and from it He predicted its overthrow before His crucifixion (Mt 24:3). It is also to be the scene of His return in person to deliver His people (Zec 14:4), when He shall come by the same way as He went, "the way of the east" (Eze 43:2).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 11:23
“It was from this mountain that Christ beheld the city and wept over it, in the foresight of its last destruction by the Romans. The glory of the Lord removed thither, to be as it were yet within call, and ready to return if now at length, in this their day, they would have understood the things that belonged to their peace.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2. (vv. 24-25)
a.brought me in a vision: The Spirit that carried Ezekiel into the temple in vision now carries him back out of it, returning him to the exiles in Chaldea by the same Spirit of God, and the vision that had held him lifts away. The whole temple tour, from the idols of chapter eight through the departing glory of chapter eleven, took place while the prophet's body sat among the elders of the captivity, exactly as chapter eight opened. Henry notes that the prophet's obedience closes the vision as it began it, an ordinary act of speech, he tells the captivity everything the Lord showed him, holding nothing back for himself. The whole section from chapter eight to eleven is thereby framed as one continuous vision, given and reported in a single sitting.
Ezekiel 11:25, 1 voice
Ezekiel 11:25
“Both of which signify not that the prophet was physically transported from Jerusalem to Babylon, but in spirit, the vision that had led him in spirit to Jerusalem was taken away, and he returned to himself and spoke to the transmigration all that had been shown to him, namely, about those of whom it is written above: I was sitting in my house, and the elders of Judah were sitting beside me, and there the hand of the Lord God fell upon me, and I saw.”
Jerome· written before 420· Commentary on Ezekielpatristic
Threads running through this chapter
- The glory departs and returnsPattern, v. 23
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Ezekiel 11. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
This page draws on 13 works. Open for the list.
This page draws on Adam Clarke; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); C. F. Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Prophecies of Ezekiel; Carl Friedrich Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Prophecies of Ezekiel; Jamieson Fausset and Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871); Jerome; John Calvin, Commentaries (1554); John Gill; John Wesley; Matthew Henry; Origen of Alexandria, ON FIRST PRINCIPLES 3:1.7 and Patrick Fairbairn, An Exposition of Ezekiel.
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