Ezekielchapter 36
38 verses · KJVEzekiel book hub →
Key verse
A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.
It stands in scene D of the chapter, verses 24 to 32.
The chapter
Chapter summary
The mountains of Israel are addressed directly, because the enemy claimed the ancient high places for his own. They will shoot forth branches and yield fruit to a people at hand to come; cities inhabited, waste places built, and God doing better for them than at their beginnings. But the reason is stripped of flattery: they had profaned his holy name among the nations: 'I do not this for your sake, O house of Israel, but for my holy name.' Then the new covenant in its clearest Old Testament form: 'I will sprinkle clean water upon you… A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you' (36:25-27), the passage behind Jesus' 'ye must be born anew.'
Context
Prophecy · Ezekiel · Ezekiel overview
Where the chapter sits
Ezekiel 36 falls in Restoration promised (chapters 33–37). The watchman's charge renewed; false shepherds denounced (34); the new heart and new spirit (36:26–27); the valley of dry bones (37); one stick, one shepherd.
New heart, new spirit. ‘A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you.’
Before it: Oracles against the nations, chapters 25–32. After it: Gog and Magog, chapters 38–39.
The whole shape of Ezekiel→The world behind this chapter
Ezekiel 36The history
Speaking to mountains is not a poetic flourish here; the hill country was the country. Israel's farming was terraced hillside, vines and olives on stone-walled steps cut into the slopes, with grain in the valleys. Terraces need constant maintenance, and a generation of neglect brings the walls down and the soil with them. God promises the mountains will shoot out branches and yield fruit, and that towns will be inhabited and ruins rebuilt.
The rest of the history, and what it meant to them
The taunt behind the chapter is a theological one, and it was standard in that world. When a nation was defeated, everyone concluded that its god was weak, or had abandoned it, or had been defeated by the winner's gods. The nations were saying of Israel: these are the people of the LORD, and yet they had to leave his land. God's answer is startlingly frank, He is not acting for their sake but for the sake of His holy name, which they profaned among the nations.
The cleansing image comes straight out of priestly practice. I will sprinkle clean water on you and you shall be clean. Under the Law, a person defiled by contact with a corpse was purified by being sprinkled with water mixed with the ashes of a red heifer on the third and seventh day. Ezekiel the priest reaches for the ritual his hearers knew and applies it to the whole nation at once.
Then the promise of the new heart, stated more fully than anywhere else in the book: a new heart and a new spirit, the heart of stone removed and a heart of flesh given, and God's own Spirit put within them so that they walk in His statutes. Stone does not respond to anything; flesh does. The problem is diagnosed as an organ transplant, not a training programme.
The last paragraph adds a comparison the exiles would have felt in their bones: the ruined cities filled with people like the flocks of Jerusalem at her appointed feasts, when the pilgrim crowds packed the city.
What it meant to them
The exiles had been shamed in public. Their disaster was, to everyone watching, proof that their God was small. This chapter says God agrees the shame is real and intends to end it, for His own name's sake, in the sight of the same nations.
And the honesty in it is what makes it usable. God says plainly: it is not for your sake that I am about to act, be ashamed and confounded for your ways. Restoration is offered without pretending the exile was undeserved, which is exactly the kind of hope a guilty community can actually receive.
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
- C. F. Keil and F. Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Prophecies of Ezekiel
A. The mountains of Israel mocked by the nations
1. (vv. 1-3)
a.prophesy unto the mountains of Israel: After Edom's judgment in chapter 35, the prophet turns to address the mountains of Israel themselves, the land personified as chapter 6 addressed it earlier, answering the enemy's boast that the ancient high places are ours in possession. The land had become an infamy of the people, taken up in the lips of talkers, mocked as much as the people it belonged to.
Ezekiel 36:1, 2 voicesWhat preachers and commentators have said about this verse, in their own words.
Ezekiel 36:1
“Prophesy unto the mountains of Israel - This is a part of the preceding prophecy though it chiefly concerns the Jews. In it they are encouraged to expect a glorious restoration, and that none of the evil wishes of their adversaries should take place against them.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:1
“And sanctification, 25-38 Commentary on Chapter XXXVI 1. The mountains - The inhabitants being in captivity, speak to the mountains, that is, the land of Judah, and Israel, which was a country full of mountains.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:2, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:2
“Because the enemy hath said - The Idumeans thought they would shortly be put in possession of all the strong places of Israel; the ancient high places shall be ours.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:3, 3 voices
Ezekiel 36:3
“The residue of the pagan - Those of the surrounding nations which had survived Jerusalem’s fall, and may have profited by it.”
Ezekiel 36:3
“Literally, "Because, even because." swallowed you up--literally, "panted after" you, as a beast after its prey; implying the greedy cupidity of Edom as to Israel's inheritance (Ps 56:1, 2). lips of talkers--literally, "lips of the tongue," that is, of the slanderer, the man of tongue.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 36:3
“There are some that are noted for talkers, that have something to say of every body, but cannot find in their hearts to speak well of any body; God's people, among such people, were sure to be a reproach when the crown had fallen from their head. Thus it was the lot of Christianity, in its suffering days, to be every where spoken against.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2. (vv. 4-7)
a.hear the word of the Lord God: God's jealousy is provoked chiefly by the heathen's contempt of the land rather than by pity for it as such; I have lifted up mine hand is the oath gesture of a sworn verdict. The heathen who mocked shall bear their own shame in turn, the same talion principle chapter 35 used against Edom now turned toward every nation that scorned Israel's ruin.
Ezekiel 36:4, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:4
“Therefore - thus saith the Lord God to the mountains, etc. - They shall neither possess mountain nor valley, hill nor dale, fountain nor river; for though in my justice I made you desolate, yet they shall not profit by your disasters. See Eze 36:5-7.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:4
“Inanimate creatures are addressed, to imply that the creature also, as it were, groans for deliverance from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God (Ro 8:19-21) [POLANUS]. The completeness of the renewed blessedness of all parts of the land is implied. derision-- (Ps 79:4).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 36:5, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:5
“For hence it is that under the figure of the Idumaeans, who allowed themselves to be vanquished by their own prosperity, those who rejoice in the successes of this world are rebuked, when it is said, "They have given my land to themselves for an inheritance with joy, and with their whole heart and mind." In which words it is to be observed, that they are smitten with severe rebuke, not merely because they rejoice, but because they rejoice with their whole heart and mind.”
Gregory the Dialogist· written before 604· Pastoral Rule, Part 3, Chapter 26patristic
Ezekiel 36:5
“Having a love for both as strong as death, he has a jealousy for both as cruel as the grave. They spoke in their malice against God's people, and he will speak in his jealousy against them; and it is easy to say which will speak most powerfully.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:6, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:6
“The earth abides for ever. Now, to show the mercy God had in reserve for the people, he is to speak of him as having a dormant kindness for the place, which, if the Lord had been pleased for ever to abandon, he would not have called upon to hear the word of the Lord, nor would he as at this time have shown it such things as these.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:6
“Fury is not in God; but he will exert his power against them and handle them as severely as men do when they are in a fury. He will so speak to them in his wrath as to vex them in his sore displeasure. What he says he will stand to, for it is backed with an oath.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:7, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:7
“I have lifted up mine hand - i. e., I have sworn. Compare marginal reference. Their shame - They shall find their taunts come home to themselves.”
Ezekiel 36:7
“The promises of God's favour to his Israel and assurances given of great mercy God had in store for them. God takes occasion from the outrage and insolence of their enemies to show himself so much the more concerned for them and ready to do them good, as David hoped that God would recompense him good for Shimei's cursing him.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
B. Branches and fruit for my people, and soon
1. (vv. 8-12)
a.ye shall shoot forth your branches: The reversal begins: mountains that lay under a curse are promised fruitfulness to my people of Israel, for they are at hand to come, the return named as near to the vision though the felt years still stretched ahead. Population and cultivation are restored better than at your beginnings, and the recognition formula lands again, the pattern the whole book repeats, that judgment and restoration alike teach who the Lord is.
Ezekiel 36:8, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:8
“For they are at hand to come - The restoration of the Jews is so absolutely determined that you may rest assured it will take place; and be as confident relative to it, as if you saw the different families entering into the Israelitish borders. It was near at hand in God’s determination, though there were about fifty-eight of the seventy years unelapsed.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:8
“It was a type of the heavenly Canaan, to which all God's children are heirs, every Israelite indeed, and into which they shall shortly be all brought together, out of the countries where they are now scattered.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:9, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:9
“As the curse of God reaches the ground for man's sake, so does the blessing. Now that which is promised is, 1. That their rightful owners should return to the possession of them: My people Israel are at hand to come,”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:11, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:11
“I will multiply upon you man and beast - The agriculturalist and the beast of burden. And will do better unto you than at your beginnings - I agree with Calmet, that it would be difficult to show the literal fulfillment of this prophecy from the days of Zerubbabel to the birth of Christ. The colouring is too high for that period; and the whole falls in better with Gospel than with Jewish times.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:11
“Their own sin had unsettled them, but now God's favour shall resettle them. When the prodigal son has become a penitent he is settled again in his father's house, according to his former estate.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2. (vv. 13-15)
a.Thou land devourest up men: A specific slander is answered: the land had been called one that devours men, a reproach the commentators trace to the plagues, famine and war that had emptied it before and during the exile. God promises the reproach will end together with the emptying that gave it a foothold, so the land bears the shame of the heathen no more.
Ezekiel 36:13, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:13
“The judgments which God sent upon the land, had so destroyed the inhabitants that men deemed it a fatal land, which brought destruction to all that should occupy it (compare 2Ki 17:25).”
Ezekiel 36:13
“Like an unnatural mother it devoured, that is, it was the grave of its people; of the Canaanites, its former possessors, through mutual wars, and finally by the sword of Israel; and now, of the Jews, through internal and external ills; for example, wars, famine (to which Eze 36:30, "reproach of famine among the heathen," implies the allusion here is).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 36:14, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:14
“Therefore thou shalt devour men no more,.... Or they shall be no more destroyed in thee by pestilence, famine, sword, or other means: neither bereave that nations any more, saith the Lord; or, "thou shalt not cause them to fall any more" (k), for so it is written, as in Eze 36:15, though the marginal reading is, "thou shalt not bereave", which we follow; and both are to be received, since miscarriages often come by falls. (k) לא תכשלי "non impingere facies", Montanus, Vatablus; "non offendere facies", Starckius.”
Ezekiel 36:14
“But the inhabitants shall live to a good old age, and not have the number of their months cut off in the midst. Compare this with that promise, Zech. viii. Note, God will take away the reproach of his people by taking away that which was the occasion of it.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:15, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:15
“Hear in thee the shame of the pagan - Hear the pagan putting thee to shame by their contemptuous words. The reproach of the people - “Thy people” (thy rightful possessors) shall have no cause to reproach thee for want of fertility. Were the blessings promised here merely temporal they could not be said to be fulfilled. The land is still subject to pagan masters. The words must point to blessings yet future, spiritual blessings.”
Ezekiel 36:15
“And, the restoration of that people being typical of our redemption by Christ, this is intended further to show that the ultimate end aimed at in our salvation, to which all the steps of it were made subservient, was the glory of God.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
C. Not for your sake, but for my holy name
1. (vv. 16-21)
a.the word of the Lord came unto me, saying: The word comes again, turning from land to people, tracing the cause of exile: Israel's own defilement, likened to the ceremonial uncleanness of a woman's monthly separation, the blood shed in the land, and the idols that polluted it. The scattering carried an unlooked-for result among the nations, who read Israel's exile not as due judgment but as proof its God could not keep his own people in his own land, these are the people of the Lord, and are gone forth out of his land, profaning rather than honoring the name the judgment was meant to vindicate.
Ezekiel 36:16, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:16
“The defilement of the people described in order to its removal. Eze 36:20 They profaned my holy name - Caused it to be dishonored by the pagan who said in scorn, “This is the people of God.” The pagan, seeing the miserable state of the exiles, fancied that Yahweh was no more than a national god, powerless to protect his subjects.”
Ezekiel 36:17, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:17
“When the house of Israel dwelt in their own land - Had they continued faithful to me, they had never been removed from it: but they polluted it with their crimes; and I abhorred the land on that account, and gave both them and it up to the destroyers.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:18, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:18
“For this God poured out his fury upon them, scattered them among the heathen. Their own land was sick of them, and they were sent into other lands. Herein God was righteous, and was justified in what he did; none could say that he did them any wrong, nay, he did justice to his own honour, for he judged them according to their way and according to their doings,”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:19, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:19
“Their neighbours considered them rather as a holy people than as a sinful people, and therefore took occasion from the calamities they were in, instead of glorifying God, as they might justly have done, to reproach him and put contempt upon him; and God's name was continually every day blasphemed by their oppressors, Isa. lii.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:20, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:20
“These, &c.--The Israelites gave a handle of reproach to the heathen against God, who would naturally say, These who take usury, oppress, commit adultery, &c., and who, in such an abject plight, are "gone forth" as exiles "out of His land," are specimens of what Jehovah can or will effect, for His people, and show what kind of a God this so-called holy, omnipotent, covenant-keeping God must be!”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 36:21, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:21
“I had pity for mine holy name--that is, I felt pity for it; God's own name, so dishonored, was the primary object of His pitying concern; then His people, secondarily, through His concern for it [FAIRBAIRN].”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 36:21
“But I had pity - For these sins I had just cause to cut them off; but I had pity, for the glory of my name: had I destroyed them, the heathen would have concluded against my omnipotence, and my truth.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
2. (vv. 22-23)
a.I do not this for your sakes: The motive clause is the chapter's hinge, restated later at verse 32: restoration comes not for your sakes but for mine holy name's sake, a phrase that forecloses any reading of national merit and grounds everything that follows in God's own character rather than Israel's. I will sanctify my great name answers directly the profaning named in the previous unit, and the recognition formula appears again, now extended to the heathen who witness it.
Ezekiel 36:22, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:22
“But, one way or other, God will make all his favourites to know and own that it is his grace, and not their goodness, his mercy, and not their merit, that made them so; and that therefore not unto them, not unto them, but unto him, is all the glory due. (2.) They must repent of the sin of their own evil ways.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:23, 3 voices
Ezekiel 36:23
“I will sanctify my great name - They gave the heathen occasion to think meanly of me, but I will shew I am as great as good. When God performs what he hath sworn by his holiness, then he sanctifies his name.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:23
“And this was in part fulfilled in that wonderful effect which the captivity in Babylon had upon the Jews there, that it effectually cured them of their inclination to idolatry. But it is further intended as a draught of the covenant of grace, and a specimen of those spiritual blessings with which we are blessed in heavenly things by that covenant.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:23
“We cannot sanctify God's name unless he sanctify our hearts, nor live to his glory, but by his grace. That God would give them a new heart, a disposition of mind excellent in itself and vastly different from what it was before.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
D. Clean water, a new heart, and a new spirit
1. (vv. 24-26)
a.gather you out of all countries: The action unfolds in the order the vision gives it: regathering from the nations, then a washing in clean water the bench sets beside the ceremonial sprinklings of the law and, further on, beside the water that opens John 3's born of water and of the Spirit, and then, verified in full, the new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you, replacing the stony heart out of your flesh. The three stand as one continuous promise in the text, land and cleansing and inward change together, and the exposition keeps the whole paragraph in view rather than lifting the new heart out of it.
Ezekiel 36:24, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:24
“I will take you from among the heathen - This does not relate to the restoration from Babylon merely. The Jews are at this day scattered in all Heathen, Mohammedan, and Christian countries. From these they are to be gathered, and brought to repossess their own land.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:25, 4 voices
Ezekiel 36:25
“Ezekiel the priest has in view the purifying rites prescribed by the Law, the symbolic purport of which is exhibited in Heb 9:13-14; Heb 10:22. As the Levites were consecrated with sprinkling of water, so should the approved rite “sprinkling of water” thus prescribed by the Law and explained by the prophets, give occasion to the use of water at the admission of proselytes in later days, and so to its adoption by John in his baptism unto repentance.”
Ezekiel 36:25
“THIS is one of the opening words of the glorious Covenant of Grace. Ezekiel's copy of the Covenant is full and clear and deserves to be written in letters of gold and hung up in the best chamber of every Believer's dwelling This is the Magna Charta of saints—the title deed of the land of our inheritance! Glorious Covenant of Grace, our heart delights in every line of promise wherewith you are enriched! You perceive that this promise deals with sin and it deals with sin because sin broke the first Covenant and thus ruined us all.”
Ezekiel 36:25
Sprinkle - "This signifies both the blood of Christ sprinkled upon their conscience, to take away their guilt, as the water of purification was sprinkled, to take away their ceremonial uncleanness and the grace of the spirit sprinkled on the whole soul, to purify it from all corrupt inclinations and dispositions."
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:25
“Christ was himself clean, else his blood could not have been cleansing to us; and it is a Holy Spirit that makes us holy: From all your filthiness and from all your idols will I cleanse you.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:26, 5 voices
Ezekiel 36:26
“And it is to be considered that a new heart and a new spirit are given through the effusion and sprinkling of water. When, however, a new heart and a new spirit are given, then all hardness, which is compared to stone, will be removed from the Jewish heart, so that the heart may be a fleshy, soft, and tender one, which can receive the spirit of God within itself and be inscribed with saving words.”
Jerome· written before 420· Commentary on Ezekielpatristic
Ezekiel 36:26
“A new heart also will I give you - I will change the whole of your infected nature; and give you new appetites, new passions; or, at least, the old ones purified and refined. The heart is generally understood to mean all the affections and passions. And a new spirit will I put within you - I will renew your minds, also enlighten your understanding, correct your judgment, and refine your will, so that you shall have a new spirit to actuate your new heart.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:26
IT is a peculiar feature in our holy religion that it begins its work within and acts first upon the heart. Other religions, like that of the Pharisees, begin with outward forms and ceremonies, perhaps hoping to work inwardly from without, although the process never ends, for though the outside of the cup and of the platter is made clean, the inside still remains full of rottenness as before. No Truth of God is more sure than this concerning all the sons of men, "You must be born again."
Ezekiel 36:26
“In Eze 18:31 they are commanded, "Make you a new heart, and a new spirit." Here God says, "A new heart will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you." Thus the responsibility of man, and the sovereign grace of God, are shown to be coexistent.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 36:26
“A new heart - A new frame of soul, a mind changed, from sinful to holy, from carnal to spiritual. A heart in which the law of God is written, Jer. xxxi, 33. A sanctified heart, in which the almighty grace of God is victorious, and turns it from all sin to God.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
2. (vv. 27-28)
a.cause you to walk in my statutes: I will put my spirit within you completes what the new heart begins, an indwelling that produces obedience rather than a law only imposed from outside. The covenant formula that closes the unit, ye shall be my people, and I will be your God, echoes the same words given at Leviticus 26:12 and repeated across the prophets, land and people held in the one promise as the text gives it.
Ezekiel 36:27, 3 voices
Ezekiel 36:27
“But if they repent and I am sanctified in their midst, then all the multitude of the nations will know that I will remove them from the lands where they were dispersed and bring them back to the land of the Church, and I will pour out upon them not the waters of saving Baptism, but the waters of teaching and the word of God; and I will cleanse them from all their uncleannesses, and from all the idols and errors which they had secretly conceived in their hearts.”
Jerome· written before 420· Commentary on Ezekielpatristic
Ezekiel 36:27
“And I will put my Spirit within you - To keep the heart of flesh alive, the feeling heart still sensible, the loving heart still happy. I will put my Spirit, the great principle of light, life, and love, within you, to actuate the new spirit, and to influence the new affections and passions; that the animal spirit may not become brutish, that the mental powers become not foolish.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:27
“And cause you - Sweetly, powerfully, yet without compulsion; for our spirits, framed by God's spirit to a disposition suitable to his holiness, readily concurs. Ye shall keep - Be willing; and able to keep the judgments, and to walk in the statutes of God, which is, to live in all holiness.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:28, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:28
“Ye shall be my people - Wholly given up to me in body, soul, and spirit. And I will be your God - To fill you with love, joy, peace, meekness, gentleness, longsuffering, fidelity and goodness, to occupy your whole soul, and gratify your every desire.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:28
“Ye shall dwell - Observe: then, and not before, are these promises to be fulfilled to the house of Israel. And I will be your God - This is the foundation of the top-stone of a believer's happiness.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
3. (vv. 29-32)
a.save you from all your uncleannesses: The gifts multiply, no more famine and increased fruit, but the response the text names is not pride: Israel shall remember your own evil ways, and shall lothe yourselves. Grace received produces shame at the history it forgives rather than confidence in having earned it, and verse 32 repeats the chapter's hinge line word for word, not for your sakes do I this.
Ezekiel 36:29, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:29
“I will also save you - I will continue to save you. From all your uncleannesses - Salvation from all uncleannessess, includes justification, entire sanctification, and meetness for glory.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:29
“Sin is defiling, idolatry particularly is so; it renders sinners odious to God and burdensome to themselves. When guilt is pardoned, and the corrupt nature sanctified, then we are cleansed from our filthiness, and there is no other way of being saved from it. This God promises his people here, in order to his being sanctified in them,”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 36:30, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:30
“Ye shall receive no more reproach of famine - Ye shall be daily and hourly fed with the bread that endures unto eternal life. “But will not those get proud, who are thus saved, if there be any such? and will they not undervalue the blood of the covenant, for then they shall not need it?” Ans. Hear what the Lord saith: -”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:31, 3 voices
Ezekiel 36:31
“That penitents may have their due it is enough for them to feel shame instead of all other punishment.”
Jerome· written before 420· Against Jovinianus 2.31patristic
Ezekiel 36:31
“Then shall ye remember your own evil ways - Ye shall never forget that ye were once slaves of sin, and sold under sin; children of the wicked one; heirs to all God’s curses, with no hope beyond hell. Such cleansed people never forget the horrible pit and the miry clay out of which they have been brought. And can they then be proud? No; they loathe themselves in their own sight. They never forgive themselves for having sinned against so good a God, and so loving a Savior.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:31
“We noticed, in our reading, in what a kingly style the Lord speaks all through this chapter. He does not say "if or "but," but He says, "you will"and "you shall"and this teaches us that God is Omnipotent even in the regions of free agency. It would be preposterous to say that man is not a free agent!”
Charles Spurgeon· written before 1892· The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 2743: “Mistaken Notions About Repentance” (lightly modernized text, CCEL edition)Particular Baptist
Ezekiel 36:32, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:32
“There are two sins of man that are bred in the bone, and that continually come out in the flesh. One is self-dependence and the other is self-exaltation. It is very hard, even for the best of men, to keep themselves from the first error. The holiest of Christians, and those who understand best the gospel of Christ, find in themselves a constant inclination to look to the power of the creature, instead of looking to the power of God and the power of God alone.”
E. Cities rebuilt and the waste land like the garden of Eden
1. (vv. 33-36)
a.cleansed you from all your iniquities: Cleansing precedes rebuilding in the order the verses give it, and the desolate land becomes like the garden of Eden, the strongest image of restored blessing the Hebrew Bible has, naming the place forfeited at the beginning as the standard the end recovers. The recognition formula lands a final time in the unit, now heard by the heathen that are left round about, witnesses rather than participants in what is done.
Ezekiel 36:35, 2 voices
Ezekiel 36:35
“This land that was desolate by sin, is become like the garden of Eden by righteousness - Satan’s blast is removed; God’s blessing has taken place.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:35
“Eden--as Tyre (the type of the world powers in general: so Assyria, a cedar "in the garden of God, Eden," Eze 31:8, 9), in original advantages, had been compared to "Eden, the garden of God" (Eze 28:13), from which she had fallen irrecoverably; so Israel, once desolate, is to be as "the garden of Eden" (Isa 51:3), and is to be so unchangeably.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 36:36, 1 voice
Ezekiel 36:36
“With us saying and doing are two things, but they are not so with God. He proposes these things to them, not as the recompence of their merits, but as the return of their prayers.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2. (vv. 37-38)
a.enquired of by the house of Israel: The chapter closes where it began, with a flock: Israel is promised to be increased with men like a flock, compared to the holy flock, as the flock of Jerusalem in her solemn feasts, the crowded pilgrim gatherings at the great festivals. The image answers chapter 34's scattered, shepherdless sheep with cities so full of returned exiles they read as one long feast day, and the recognition formula closes the chapter as it closes so many others in the book.
Ezekiel 36:37, 3 voices
Ezekiel 36:37
“Thus saith the Lord God, I will yet for this be inquired of by the house of Israel,.... Besought and prayed unto for the accomplishment of the above promises, as well as what follows: for though God has promised and will perform, yet he expects that his people will apply to him for it; it is our duty to put the Lord in mind of his promises, to plead them with him, and pray unto him for the fulfilment of them.”
Ezekiel 36:37
“Thus saith the Lord God - In answer to the question, “Who shall have such blessings?” we say, they that pray, that seek earnestly, that strive to enter in at the strait gate. “Thus saith the Lord, I will yet for this be inquired of by the house of Israel.” Neither Jew nor Gentile shall be thus saved who do not earnestly pray to God; and for this thing; for this complete salvation; this setting up of the kingdom of Christ upon earth, and particularly in their own souls.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:37
“MULTIPLICATION is a very ancient form of blessing. The first benediction pronounced upon man was of this sort, for we read in the first chapter of Genesis, "And God blessed them, and God said unto them: Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth." That same blessing was pronounced, again, when God accepted His servant Noah, and entered into covenant with him. We read in Genesis 9:1 that "God blessed Noah and his sons and said unto them, Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth." This also constituted a main part of the blessing promised to faithful Abraham.”
Ezekiel 36:38, 4 voices
Ezekiel 36:38
“And again the prophetic word exhorts the repentant, that even when they have returned to the Church, they should always seek the Lord, and find Him: so that the flocks of the Lord may multiply with the multitude of those who return: not of horses and brute animals, but of flocks of men, who are full of faith and reason, the holy flocks, the flocks of the city of Jerusalem, on all the solemnities, which they have received through the mercy of God; so that when the multitude of such flocks has filled the cities of the Lord, then all may know that He is the Lord.”
Jerome· written before 420· Commentary on Ezekielpatristic
Ezekiel 36:38
“As the holy flock - The Church of Christ, without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing. The flock of Jerusalem - The Jerusalem that is from above, the city of the living God, the place where his Majesty dwells. As they came in ancient times to the solemn national feasts so shall they come when they have fully returned unto the Lord, and received his salvation by Christ Jesus.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 36:38
“As the holy flock--the great flock of choice animals for sacrifice, brought up to Jerusalem at the three great yearly festivals, the passover, pentecost, and feast of the tabernacles.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 36:38
“Thus shall men multiply, and fill the cities of replanted Judea. And the increase of the numbers of men is then honourable, when they are all dedicated to God as a holy flock, to be presented to him for living sacrifices. Crowds are a lovely sight in God's temple.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Ezekiel 36. 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 12 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); Carl Friedrich Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Prophecies of Ezekiel; Charles Spurgeon; Gregory the Dialogist, Pastoral Rule, Part 3, Chapter 26; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871); Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome; John Gill; John Wesley; Matthew Henry and Patrick Fairbairn, An Exposition of Ezekiel.