Ezekiel 27:4
in Ezekiel 27Your borders are in the heart of the seas; your builders perfected your beauty.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
Thy borders are in the heart of the seas; thy builders have perfected thy beauty.
KJV
Thy borders are in the midst of the seas, thy builders have perfected thy beauty.
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This verse in Ezekiel 27
Commentary
8 notes on this verse(Verse 4, 5.) Your neighbors who built you have filled your beauty. They built you with Sanir fir trees and all the planks of the sea. They brought cedar from Lebanon to make harm to you. For what reason, I do not know, they translated it thus in the Septuagint: The sons of Beelim surrounded your beauty; the cedar of Sanir was built for you; they brought thin cypress planks from Lebanon to make harm to you with fir.
This site's exposition
your builders perfected your beauty
on Ezekiel 27:4-7
The chapter's long central section pictures Tyre itself as a magnificent ship, built from the resources of the whole known world: fir boards from Senir. The sail is fine linen from Egypt. Keil reads the ship figure as deliberate, a trading city pictured as its own finest export.
The record, by era
The Puritans and the Awakening4 voices
Thy borders are in the midst of the seas, Fixed by the Lord himself, and which could never be removed. Tyre stood about half a mile from the continent, surrounded with the waters of the sea, till it was made a peninsula by Alexander: thy builders have perfected thy beauty.
The Tyrians are thought to be the first that invented the art of navigation; at least they improved it, and brought it to as great a perfection perhaps as it could be without the loadstone. [1.] They made the boards, or planks, for the hulk of the ship, of fir-trees fetched from Senir, a mount in the land of Israel, joined with Hermon, Cant. iv.
We therefore of this island must own that he who determines the bounds of men's habitations has determined well for us. (2.) It was curiously built, according as the fashion then was; and, being a city on a hill, it made a glorious show and tempted the ships that sailed by into her ports (
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — unbalanced-parens
), which is designed to make its ruin the more lamentable. A prediction of its fall and ruin, and the confusion and consternation which all its neighbours shall thereby be put into,
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation+unbalanced-parens
The Nineteenth Century1 voice
Thy builders have perfected thy beauty - Under the allegory of a beautiful ship, the prophet, here and in the following verses, paints the glory of this ancient city. Horace describes the commonwealth of Rome by the same allegory, and is as minute in his description, Carm. lib. 1. Od. xiv: - O navis, referent in mare te novi Fluctus? O quid agis? Fortiter occupa Portum.
1 more voice on this verse
The Nineteenth Century1 voice
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
Tyre, in consonance with her seagirt position, separated by a strait of half a mile from the mainland, is described as a ship built of the best material, and manned with the best mariners and skilful pilots, but at last wrecked in tempestuous seas (Eze 27:26).
The words behind it
6 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| בְּלֵ֥ב | belev | [were] in [the] heart of | H3820 → | 595 times |
| יַמִּ֖ים | yamim | [the] seas | H3220 → | 396 times |
| גְּבוּלָ֑יִךְ | gevulayikh | territories your | H1366 → | 240 times |
| בֹּנַ֕יִךְ | bonayikh | builders your | H1129 → | 376 times |
| כָּלְל֖וּ | kalu | they perfected | H3634 → | |
| יָפְיֵֽךְ׃ | yafeyekh | beauty your | H3308 → | 19 times |
בְּלֵ֥ב[were] in [the] heart of
belevH3820 →595 times
יַמִּ֖ים[the] seas
yamimH3220 →396 times
גְּבוּלָ֑יִךְterritories your
gevulayikhH1366 →240 times
בֹּנַ֕יִךְbuilders your
bonayikhH1129 →376 times
כָּלְל֖וּthey perfected
kaluH3634 →
יָפְיֵֽךְ׃beauty your
yafeyekhH3308 →19 times
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
5 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Ezekiel 26:5She will become a place to spread nets in the sea, for I have spoken, declares the Lord GOD. She will become plunder for the nations,
it leads to
- Ezekiel 29:19
Therefore this is what the Lord GOD says: I will give the land of Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, who will carry off its wealth, seize its spoil, and remove its plunder. This…
- Ezekiel 47:10
Fishermen will stand by the shore; from En-gedi to En-eglaim they will spread their nets to catch fish of many kinds, like the fish of the Great Sea.
- Ezekiel 27:32
As they wail and mourn over you, they will take up a lament for you: ‘Who was ever like Tyre, silenced in the middle of the sea?
- Ezekiel 26:19
For this is what the Lord GOD says: ‘When I make you a desolate city like other deserted cities, and when I raise up the deep against you so that the mighty waters cover…
- Ezekiel 25:7
therefore I will indeed stretch out My hand against you and give you as plunder to the nations. I will cut you off from the peoples and exterminate you from the countries. I will…
- Ezekiel 29:19
Where this verse is studied
On this page
About Ezekiel
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Carl Friedrich Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Prophecies of Ezekiel; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, Commentary on Ezekiel; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.