Ezekielchapter 44
31 verses · KJVEzekiel book hub →
Key verse
But the priests the Levites, the sons of Zadok, that kept the charge of my sanctuary when the children of Israel went astray from me, they shall come near to me to minister unto me, and they shall stand before me to offer unto me the fat and the blood, saith the Lord God:
It stands in scene D of the chapter, verses 15 to 31.
The chapter
Chapter summary
The outer east gate is shut and stays shut, 'because Jehovah, the God of Israel, hath entered in by it': only the prince may sit in it to eat bread before Jehovah. Then a reform of the priesthood. Foreigners uncircumcised in heart and flesh had been brought into the sanctuary; that ends. The Levites who went astray after idols will bear their iniquity and serve at the gates but not come near as priests. The sons of Zadok, who kept the charge when Israel went astray, come near to minister. Rules follow: linen garments and no wool, no wine in the inner court, marriage limits, teaching the difference between the holy and the common. And no inheritance, for 'I am their inheritance.'
Context
Prophecy · Ezekiel · Ezekiel overview
Where the chapter sits
Ezekiel 44 falls in The Temple vision (chapters 40–48). Detailed architectural and liturgical vision. Literal-millennial (dispensational), symbolic-of-the-Church (Reformed), typological (amill) readings all surfaced. The glory returns; the city's name is YHWH Shammah (48:35).
Before it: Gog and Magog, chapters 38–39.
The whole shape of Ezekiel→The world behind this chapter
Ezekiel 44The history
The east gate is closed permanently because the LORD entered by it, and only the prince may sit in its vestibule to eat bread before the LORD. Reserved royal entrances were a real feature of ancient palaces; a door that only the king used marked the difference between him and everyone else. Here the door belongs to God, and even the prince only sits in the porch of it.
The rest of the history, and what it meant to them
The complaint that follows concerns temple staffing. Foreigners uncircumcised in heart and flesh had been brought in to keep charge of the sanctuary. Temple servants of foreign origin were a real institution, the Gibeonites had been assigned to woodcutting and water-carrying for the sanctuary centuries earlier, but here the charge is that the arrangement had been abused and the holy things handed to men with no covenant at all.
The Levites who went astray after idols are demoted: they keep the gates, slaughter the offerings for the people, and serve the house, but they do not come near the holy things. The sons of Zadok, who kept charge of the sanctuary when Israel went astray, come near to minister. Zadok was Solomon's priest, and the rival line of Abiathar had been removed from office in Solomon's day, so this ruling settles a dispute with a long history.
The rules for the ministering priests are practical and physical. They wear linen and no wool anywhere they would sweat, because sweat was treated as defiling. They do not shave their heads or let their hair grow long, but keep it trimmed. No wine before entering the inner court. They marry a virgin of Israel or a priest's widow. They do not go near a dead body except for the closest family, and after that must wait seven days.
Two duties are named that are not about ritual at all. They shall teach my people the difference between the holy and the common, and show them how to distinguish clean from unclean. And in a dispute they shall act as judges. The priest is a teacher and a magistrate, which is precisely what chapter twenty-two said the old priesthood had stopped being.
What it meant to them
This chapter answers the question a priest in exile would ask first: when the house stands again, who gets to serve in it? The answer sorts by record, not by birth alone.
For a community that had watched its clergy collapse, the message in the demotions was accountability without abolition. The Levites who failed keep a place and lose their access. Nobody is discarded, and nobody's failure is forgotten.
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 east gate shut, because the LORD entered by it
1. (vv. 1-3)
a.brought me back the way of the gate: The gate that faces east is shut and is never to be opened again, because the Lord, the God of Israel, entered the house by it; only the prince may sit in its porch to eat bread before the Lord, entering and leaving by the porch without ever passing through the gate itself. The commentators name the reading many have made of a gate closed because a greater than any priest has already passed it once, alongside the plainer reading that the gate is simply reserved from common use because it now marks where the glory came home. Either way the text keeps the distinction sharp: what the glory used, no man uses again, and even the prince eats in the porch rather than the gate proper.
Ezekiel 44:1, 1 voiceWhat preachers and commentators have said about this verse, in their own words.
Ezekiel 44:1
“Outward sanctuary - The court of the priests, as distinguished from the temple itself. This gate was reserved for the prince, to whom it was opened on certain days. Only a prince of the house of David might sit down in the priests’ court (compare Eze 46:1-2).”
Ezekiel 44:2, 4 voices
Ezekiel 44:2
“For before the Savior assumed a human body and humbled himself, taking on the form of a servant, the Law and the Prophets, and all the knowledge of the Scriptures, were closed, and paradise was closed.”
Jerome· written before 420· Commentary on Ezekielpatristic
Ezekiel 44:2
“Then said the Lord unto me, this gate shall be shut,.... In time to come, as Jarchi interprets it, in the latter day; it was shut, and it should continue to be shut: it shall not be opened; any more; though it has been, yet hereafter no more: and no man shall enter in by it, into the house of the Lord, because the Lord the God of Israel hath entered in by it; the same with the glory of the God of Israel, Eze 43:2, therefore it shall be shut; no one being to enter after him.”
Ezekiel 44:2
“This gate shall be shut - It was not to be opened on ordinary occasions, nor at all on the week days: but only on the Sabbaths and the new moons. See the account of the gates (4) in the explanation of the plan. This verse has been adduced by the Roman Catholics to prove the perpetual virginity of the mother of our Lord; and it may be allowed to be as much to the purpose as any other that has been brought to prove this very precarious point, on which no stress should ever be laid by any man.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 44:2
“But such an account is given of this gate's being shut as puts honour, 1. It is for the honour of him that the gate of the inner court, at which his glory entered when he took possession of the house, was ever after kept shut, and no man was allowed to enter in by it,”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 44:3, 4 voices
Ezekiel 44:3
“Such is the greatness of his goodness and the prince of his mercy, that even though he alone sits at the closed door and eats bread before the Lord, he desires to have more companions at his table and feast, and says: 'Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone opens to me, I will enter in and dine with him, and he with me' (Rev. 3:20). But he alone eats bread in the presence of the Lord, because his substance and divine nature are separate from all the substances of creatures.”
Jerome· written before 420· Commentary on Ezekielpatristic
Ezekiel 44:3
“The prince - Foretold under the name of David Eze 34:24. The rabbis understood this to be the Messiah. To eat bread - See Lev 2:3; Lev 24:9; according to the old Law these feasts belonged only to the priests; none of the rest of the congregation, not even the king, might partake of them.”
Ezekiel 44:3
“The Lord - That glory which was the visible sign of his presence. He - The king might sit before the Lord, others might not. Bread - That part of the sacrifice, which was allowed to the offerer.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 44:3
“Some by the prince here understand the high priests, or the sagan or second priest; and that he only was allowed to enter by this gate, for he was God's representative. Christ is the high priest of our profession, who entered himself into the holy place, and opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
B. No one uncircumcised in heart shall come in
1. (vv. 4-9)
a.the way of the north gate: The prophet is brought by the north gate before the house and again sees the glory filling it, and again falls on his face, the vision repeating chapter 43's own scene as if to fix it a second time before the hard word that follows. The Lord's charge is aimed at the house of Israel's past failure named plainly: they let strangers uncircumcised in heart and in flesh into the sanctuary to pollute it even while offering the Lord's own bread, fat and blood, breaking the covenant by the very abominations that filled the earlier chapters. The command going forward is exact rather than vague, no stranger uncircumcised in heart or in flesh may enter the sanctuary of any stranger among Israel, holiness defined by relation to the covenant rather than by birth alone.
Ezekiel 44:4, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:4
“Admonition to the ministering priests, grounded upon former neglect. Eze 44:4 The north gate before the house - The north gate of the inner court. God expostulates with His people in the seat of their former idolatries Eze 8:3. Eze 44:5 Mark well - The careful arrangements made had all been intended to keep the temple and its surroundings from profanation. Hence, attention to these particulars is enjoined. Eze 44:7 Strangers - This refers especially to the sin of unauthorized and unfaithful priests ministering in the services of the temple. Compare marginal references.”
Ezekiel 44:6, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:6
“Note, It is time for those that have continued long in sin to reckon it long enough, and too long, and to begin to think of taking up in time, and leaving off their evil courses. " Let the time past of your lives suffice, for by this time, surely, you have surfeited upon your abominations and have become sick of them," 1 Pet. iv.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 44:7, 2 voices
Ezekiel 44:7
“The fat and the blood - These never went into common use; they were wholly offered to God. The blood was poured out; the fat consumed. Because of all your abominations - Several MSS. of Kennicott’s and De Rossi’s read their abominations, referring to the strangers mentioned before.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 44:7
“When they came to offer sacrifice they brought these with them to feast with them upon the sacrifice, because they were fond of their company, and this was one of their abominations, wherewith they polluted God's sanctuary; it was giving that which was holy unto dogs, Matt. vii.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
C. Levites who went astray bear their shame
1. (vv. 10-14)
a.Levites that are gone away far from me: The Levites who went far from the Lord when Israel went astray after idols bear their own iniquity: they remain ministers with charge at the gates and at the slaughter of the people's offerings, but they may not come near to do a priest's office, touch the most holy things, or approach the most holy place, because they served the people before their idols and caused the house of Israel to fall. The commentators read the demotion as discipline that still finds a place of service rather than exile from it, the Levites made keepers of the charge of the house for all its service even while barred from the altar itself. The distinction drawn here between Levite and priest, general service against the office of approaching the Lord directly, becomes law for the whole vision's priesthood, not only a memory of one generation's failure.
Ezekiel 44:10, 2 voices
Ezekiel 44:10
“How is it that in the book of Ezekiel, where a description is given of the future church and of the heavenly Jerusalem, the priests who have sinned are degraded to the rank of sacristans and doorkeepers, and although they are in the temple of God, that is, on the right hand, they are not among the rams but among the poorest of the sheep?”
Jerome· written before 420· Against Jovinianus 2.28patristic
Ezekiel 44:10
“And the Levites that are gone away far from me - This refers to the schism of Jeroboam, who, when he set up a new worship, got as many of the priests and Levites to join him in his idolatry as he could. These, on the return from the captivity, should not be permitted to perform the functions of priests in the new temple; but they might be continued as keepers of all the charge of the house - be treasurers, guards of the temple, porters, etc.; see Eze 44:11-”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 44:11, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:11
“They are deprived but in part, ab officio--of their office, and, it should seem, not at all à beneficio--of their emoluments. They shall help to slay the sacrifice, which the Levites were permitted to do, and which in this temple was done, not at the altar, but at the tables, ch. xl.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 44:12, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:12
“For certainly no one does more harm in the Church than one who has the name and rank of sanctity, while he acts perversely. For him, when he transgresses, no one presumes to take to task; and the offence spreads forcibly for example, when out of reverence to his rank the sinner is honoured.”
Gregory the Dialogist· written before 604· Pastoral Rule, Part 1, Chapter 2patristic
Ezekiel 44:13, 2 voices
Ezekiel 44:13
“And they shall not come near unto me, to do the office of priest unto me,.... To bring the sacrifice to the altar, and offer it there; to sprinkle the blood, or burn the fat, or the incense; to intercede for the people, or bless them; see Hos 4:6, nor to come near to any of my holy things in the most holy place; to do any business, either in the holy or in the most holy place; to offer holy things, or eat of them.”
Ezekiel 44:13
“Note, those who have robbed God of his honour will justly be deprived of their honour. And it is really a great punishment to be forbidden to come near to God; and justly might those who have once gone away from him be rejected as unworthy ever to come near to him and put at an everlasting distance. Yet there is a mixture of mercy in this sentence.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 44:14, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:14
“But I will make them keepers of the charge of the house,.... To be watchmen or porters in it; to open and shut the doors of it; to sweep and keep it clean; to repair and mend it, and to do such like works, as it follows: for all the service thereof, and for all that shall be done therein; in a servile way; but not as priests or ministers of the word.”
D. The sons of Zadok and the rules of their service
1. (vv. 15-16)
a.the priests the Levites, the sons of Zadok: Against the Levites who went astray stand the priests the Levites, the sons of Zadok, named as the ones who kept the charge of the sanctuary when the rest of Israel went astray, and to them alone is given the nearness the previous verses withheld: they come near to minister, stand before the Lord, offer the fat and the blood, and come near to his table. Zadok's line was already marked out for this role at 40:46, and the commentators trace the historical Zadok to his faithfulness at Solomon's accession (1 Kings 2:35) against Abiathar's failure, a single family's loyalty generations earlier becoming the vision's standard for who may approach. Faithfulness in one crisis is rewarded with nearness in the next, the pattern the chapter draws without needing to state it as a lesson.
Ezekiel 44:15, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:15
“Zadok, according to his name (which means "righteous") and his line, were to succeed (1Ki 2:35; 1Ch 24:3), as they did not take part in the general apostasy to the same degree, and perhaps [FAIRBAIRN] the prophet, referring to their original state, speaks of them as they appeared when first chosen to the office.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 44:16, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:16
“They shall enter into my sanctuary,.... Both to officiate, and to participate, which strangers and uncircumcised persons might not do, Eze 44:9, and they shall come near to my table to minister unto me; which some understand of the altar of burnt offering, which was as a table, and the sacrifice on it was the food of the Lord, Lev 3:11, others, the altar of incense; see Eze 41:”
2. (vv. 17-19)
a.clothed with linen garments: The priests who minister in the inner court wear linen only, no wool, because wool causes sweat and sweat has no place on a body serving at the altar, a rule of plain hygiene made into holiness. Before they go out to the people in the outer court they change out of their ministering garments and lay them in the holy chambers chapter 42 already built for exactly this purpose, putting on other clothes so that the people are never sanctified by contact with what only the priest may wear. The garment rule keeps the same principle chapter 42 named directly, that the holy and the common are never allowed to trade places, carried here from architecture into clothing.
Ezekiel 44:17, 2 voices
Ezekiel 44:17
“Regulations as to the priests’ services. The garments of the priests are defined and various rules prescribed in the Law are repeated with some additions in order to denote additional care to avoid uncleanness. Eze 44:18 The material of which the four vestments of the ordinary priest were made was “linen,” or, more accurately, “byssus,” the cotton stuff of Egypt. The two special qualities of the byssus - white and shining - are characteristic, and on them part of the symbolic meaning depended. Compare Rev 19:”
Ezekiel 44:17
“And they must dress themselves clean and sweet, and avoid every thing that was sweaty and filthy, to signify the purity of mind with which the service of God is to be attended to. Sweat came in with sin and was part of the curse.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 44:19, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:19
“They must not go among the people with their holy garments on, lest they should imagine themselves sanctified by the touch of them; or, They shall sanctify the people, that is (as it is explained, ch. xlii. 14 ), they shall approach to those things which are for the people, in their ordinary garments.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
3. (vv. 20-27)
a.shave their heads, nor suffer their locks: The priests neither shave their heads nor let their locks grow long, but poll them, a middle course between the shaved heads of pagan mourning rites and unkempt hair, and they drink no wine when they enter the inner court, the same caution Leviticus 10 already tied to Nadab and Abihu's death before the Lord. Marriage is restricted to a maiden of Israel or a widow who had a priest before, and the priests' teaching office is stated plainly, to teach the difference between the holy and the profane and to judge Israel's controversies by the Lord's own statutes. Corpse defilement is avoided except for the closest kin, father, mother, son, daughter, brother or an unmarried sister, and even then seven days and an offering restore the priest to his ministry, the same structure of controlled contact and required cleansing that has governed the whole chapter.
Ezekiel 44:20, 3 voices
Ezekiel 44:20
“Neither shall they shave their heads - The priests of Isis shaved their heads close to the skin; the priests of Budhoo do so still, their ordinances oblige them to shave their heads every tenth day. To let the hair grow long would have been improper; therefore the Lord commands them to poll - cut the hair short, but not to shave.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 44:20
“Neither . . . shave . . . heads--as mourners do (Le 21:1-5). The worshippers of the Egyptian idols Serapis and Isis shaved their heads; another reason why Jehovah's priests are not to do so. nor suffer . . . locks to grow long--as the luxurious, barbarians, and soldiers in warfare did [JEROME].”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Ezekiel 44:20
“To grow long - Priding themselves in it, as Absalom. Shall only poll - When the hair is grown, they shall cut the ends of their hair, and keep it in moderate size.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 44:21, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:21
“Drink wine - Or any other strong liquor, when they go either to trim the lamps or set the shew-bread in order, or to offer incense in the temple, or when they go to the altar to offer a sacrifice, which stood in the inner court.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 44:22, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:22
“Neither shall they take for their wives a widow - This was prohibited to the high priest only, by Moses, Lev 21:13, Lev 21:14.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 44:24, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:24
“And herein they must go to the statute-book: They shall keep my statutes in all my assemblies. God calls the assemblies of his people his assemblies, because they are held in his name, to his glory. Ministers are the masters of those assemblies, are to preside in them, and in all their acts must keep close to God's laws.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 44:25, 2 voices
Ezekiel 44:25
“And they shall come at no dead person to defile themselves - Touching the dead defiles a Hindoo now, as it formerly did a Jew; and they must bathe to become clean again.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Ezekiel 44:25
“Decent expressions of a pious sorrow for dear relations, when they are removed by death, are not disagreeable to the character of a minister. Yet by this approach to the dead body of a relation they contracted a ceremonial pollution, from which they must be cleansed by a sin-offering before they went in again to minister,”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 44:26, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:26
“Cleansed - After for seven days he hath kept from the dead. They - The priests, who are about the house of God, shall appoint seven days more to this defiled person for his cleansing before he is admitted into the sanctuary.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
4. (vv. 28-31)
a.unto them for an inheritance: The priests receive no inheritance of land in Israel, because the Lord names himself their inheritance and their possession, the same principle already fixed for Levi under the older law (Numbers 18:20, Deuteronomy 18:1-2) carried forward into the vision unchanged. Their portion instead comes from the offerings themselves, the meat offering, the sin offering, the trespass offering, every dedicated thing, the firstfruits and the first of the dough, provision drawn from the altar rather than from the soil. The chapter's last word forbids the priests anything already dead of itself or torn by a beast, the same clean and common distinction that has run through the whole chapter now applied to their own table.
Ezekiel 44:28, 2 voices
Ezekiel 44:28
“And it shall be unto them for an inheritance,.... Either the sin offering, or the priesthood, and the perquisites belonging to it: or, they shall have an inheritance (r); but what shall it be?”
Ezekiel 44:28
“Some land was allowed them ( ch. xlviii. 10 ), but their principal subsistence was by their office. What God appropriated to himself they were the receivers of, for their own proper use and behoof; they lived upon the holy things, and so God himself was the portion both of their inheritance and of their cup.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 44:30, 3 voices
Ezekiel 44:30
“And the first - So soon as the first-fruits are ripe in the field, your vineyards, and olive yards. Every oblation - Whether free- will offering, or prescribed. The first of your dough - 'Tis conceived this was of every mass of dough they made, and of the first of the dough, which every year they first made of the new corn, as by the custom of the Jews at this day appears.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Ezekiel 44:30
“We have the law concerning them Lev. xxvii . (3.) They were to have the first of the dough when it was going to the oven, as well as the first of their fruits when they were going to the barn. God, who is the first, must have the first; and, if it belong to him, his priests must have it.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 44:30
“And the way to have the blessing of God abide upon our estates is to honour God with them, and to give him and his ministers, him and his poor, their share out of them. God blesses, he surely blesses, the habitation of those who are thus just, Prov. iii.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Ezekiel 44:31, 1 voice
Ezekiel 44:31
“The priests shall not eat of anything that is dead of itself, or torn,.... They shall have no need to eat of such things, being plentifully provided for with better; nor will it become them so to do through avarice, not allowing themselves to enjoy what is liberally given them.”
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Ezekiel 44. 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 10 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; Gregory the Dialogist, Pastoral Rule, Part 1, Chapter 2; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871); Jerome; John Gill; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765); Matthew Henry and Patrick Fairbairn, An Exposition of Ezekiel.
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