Ezekiel 37:9

But why, my beloved, was it that those dead did not rise because of the one word [spoken] through Ezekiel, and why was not their resurrection, both of bones and spirit, accomplished [through that one word]? For look! By one word the bones were fitted together, and by another the Spirit came. It was in order that full perfection might be left for our Lord Jesus Christ, who with one utterance and one word will raise up at the last day every human body. For it was not the word that was insufficient but its bearer was inferior.

The hope of resurrection is the root of every kind of good work, for the expectation of reward braces the soul to productive toil. And whereas every worker is ready to sustain his toil if he can look forward to being repaid for his labors, where toil has no recompense the soul is soon discouraged and the body flags with it. A soldier who expects his share of the spoils is ready for war. But no one is prepared to die serving a king so undiscerning that he does not provide rewards for labors. In the same way, any soul that believes in resurrection takes care for itself, as is right, but any soul that disbelieves the resurrection abandons itself to destruction. A person who believes that the body survives to rise again is careful of this garment and does not soil it by fornicating. But a person who does not believe in the resurrection gives himself up to fornication, abusing his own body as if it were nothing to him. A mighty message and teaching of the holy Catholic church is belief about the resurrection of the dead; mighty and most indispensable. While many deny it, the truth claims credence for it. Greeks deny it, Samaritans disbelieve, while heretics tear away the half. Truth never appears but in one shape, while contradiction assumes a hundred.

(Chapter 37, verses 1 onwards) The hand of the Lord was upon me, and He brought me out in the Spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. And He led me around among them, and behold, there were very many on the surface of the valley, and behold, they were very dry. And He said to me, 'Son of man, can these bones live?' And I answered, 'O Lord God, you know.'

Note how the prophet shows that there was hearing and movement in the bones before the Spirit of life was poured on them. For, above, both the dry bones are bidden to hear, as if they had the sense of hearing, and that on this each of them came to its own joint is pointed out by the words of the prophet.…Great is the lovingkindness of the Lord, that the prophet is taken as a witness of the future resurrection, that we, too, might see it with his eyes. For all could not be taken as witnesses, but in that one all we are witnesses, for neither does lying come on a holy person or error on so great a prophet.

If there is some excellent glory in the eye, it is particularly in this: that either it is the leader of the body or it is not abandoned by the functions of the other members. I think this is what is taught to us through that vision of the prophet Ezekiel.

The mystery of the resurrection is great and difficult for many of us to understand. It is mentioned also in many other passages of the Scriptures and is proclaimed no less through these words in Ezekiel.

But we call in vain, still they are dead, still they are very dry; we must therefore be earnest with God in prayer for the working of the Spirit with the word: Come, O breath! and breathe upon them. God's grace can save souls without our preaching, but our preaching cannot save them without God's grace, and that grace must be sought by prayer.

Then said he unto me, prophesy unto the wind,....

The wind - Rather, as in the margin and as in Eze 37:5. The bones are the bones of the “slain,” because the scene was one which was likely to occur in the time of the Chaldaean invasion, and the fact of violent death reminded the prophet of the miserable condition of the people.

THIS vision has been used, from the time of Jerome onwards, as a description of the resurrection and certainly it may be so accommodated with much effect. What a vision of the great day the words picture before the mind's eye! The great army of the quick, who once were dead, seem to start up as we read. Here, too, we have a very fit and appropriate question to be asked in a tomb—"Son of man, can these bones live?"

ACCORDING to some commentators, this vision in the valley of dry bones may refer to three forms of resurrection. Holy Scripture is so marvelously full of meaning that one interpretation seldom exhausts its message to us. The chapter before us is an excellent example of this fact and supplies an illustration of several Scriptural Truths of God. Some think they see, here, a parable of the resurrection of the dead. Assuredly, Ezekiel's vision pictures what will happen in the day when "the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised."

wind--rather, the spirit of life or life-breath (Margin). For it is distinct from "the four winds" from which it is summoned. from the four winds--implying that Israel is to be gathered from the four quarters of the earth (Isa 43:5, 6;

quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — starts-lowercase+unbalanced-parens

THIS vision has been used, from the time of Jerome onwards, as a description of the resurrection and certainly it may be so accommodated with much effect. What a vision of the great day the words picture before the mind's eye! The great army of the quick, who once were dead, seem to start up as we read. Here, too, we have a very fit and appropriate question to be asked in a tomb—"Son of man, can these bones live?" Looking down into the dark grave, or watching the sexton as he throws up the moldering relics, once infused with life, well may unbelief suggest the enquiry—"Can these bones live?" Faith cannot at all times give a more satisfactory answer than this—"O Lord God, You know." But while this interpretation of the vision may be very proper as an accommodation, it must be quite evident to any thinking person that this is not the meaning of the passage. There is no allusion made by Ezekiel to the resurrection and such a topic would have been quite apart from the design of the Prophet's speech. I believe he was no more thinking of the resurrection of the dead than of the building of St. Peter's at Rome, or the emigration of the Pilgrim Fathers! That topic is altogether foreign to the subject at hand and could not by any possibility have crept into the Prophet's mind. He was talking about the people of Israel and prophesying concerning them. And evidently the vision, according to God's own interpretation of it, was concerning them and them alone, for, "these bones are the whole house of Israel." It was not a vision concerning all men, nor, indeed, concerning any men as to the resurrection of the dead—it had a direct and special bearing upon the Jewish people. This passage, again, has been very frequently and I dare say very properly, used to describe the revival of a decayed Church.

ACCORDING to some commentators, this vision in the valley of dry bones may refer to three forms of resurrection. Holy Scripture is so marvelously full of meaning that one interpretation seldom exhausts its message to us. The chapter before us is an excellent example of this fact and supplies an illustration of several Scriptural Truths of God. Some think they see, here, a parable of the resurrection of the dead. Assuredly, Ezekiel's vision pictures what will happen in the day when "the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised." No matter how dry the bones may be, the bodies of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall rise again. That which was sown shall spring up from the grave and, in the case of the children of God, it shall wear a new glory. At the Word of Christ it shall come to pass—"For the hour is coming, in which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil unto the resurrection of damnation." Others see here the resurrection of the almost destroyed host of Israel which had been divided into two companies and carried away captive into Babylon. Plague and pestilence and the sword of the Chaldean had gone far to cut off the chosen nation, but God promised to restore His people, thus mingling mercy with judgment, and again setting in the cloud the bow of His Everlasting Covenant. A partial fulfillment of this promise was given when, for a while, the Lord set up, again, the tribes of Israel at Jerusalem and they had a happy rest before the coming of Christ. But Israel's full restoration is yet to be accomplished.

Prophesy unto the wind - רוח ruach. Address thyself to the soul, and command it to enter into these well-organized bodies, that they may live. Come from the four winds - Souls, come frown all parts where ye are scattered; and reanimate these bodies from; which ye have been so long separated. The four winds signify all parts - in every direction. Literally it is, “Souls, come from the four souls;” “Breath, come from the four breaths;” or, “Wind, come from the four winds.” But here רוח ruach has both of its most general meanings, wind or breath, and soul.