Ezekiel 22:27

22:23-31 All orders and degrees of men had helped to fill the measure of the nation's guilt. The people that had any power abused it, and even the buyers and sellers find some way to oppress one another. It bodes ill to a people when judgments are breaking in upon them, and the spirit of prayer is restrained. Let all who fear God, unite to promote his truth and righteousness; as wicked men of every rank and profession plot together to run them down.

Her princes in the midst thereof are like wolves ravening the prey,.... The king and his nobles, those of the first rank and quality, who ought to have protected the persons and property of the meaner sort; these were like "wolves" themselves, subtle, voracious, and cruel, preying upon harmless persons, as those creatures do upon the sheep and lambs: to shed blood; innocent blood, as the Targum: and to destroy souls; take away lives, under a pretence of treasonable practices, and all with a view to get dishonest gain; that their estates may be forfeited, their goods confiscated, and got into their hands.

Ezekiel 22:27-28 . Her princes are like wolves — The chief officers of state stick at no method of injustice and oppression whereby they may increase their substance, though it be by taking away the lives and estates of the innocent: see the margin. And her prophets have daubed them, &c. — Have daubed over the evil practices of the great men, by palliating devices: or, have flattered them in their ways of sin and violence, and encouraged them to proceed therein with promises, which, like ill-tempered mortar, will deceive them, though all seems at present smooth and safe.

Her princes, as before, Ezekiel 22:25,26 . Princes; rulers of all sorts, who should have crushed oppressors and defended the oppressed. Wolves; creatures greedy, bloody, and crafty, resembling dogs that men make use of to defend their folds; so the authority which God had given to defend is by these hypocrites perverted to satisfy the bloody and greedy appetite of tyrannical governors among the Jews: possibly the prophet may tax the degeneracy and baseness of these rulers hereby. Shed blood; innocent blood; a crying sin in princes, who have God’s power committed to them to preserve the innocent. Destroy souls; undo and ruin families, cutting off the fathers, and impoverishing the widow and fatherless. Get dishonest gain; confiscating estates not forfeited.

The corrupt state of all classes in the kingdom is the immediate cause of its destruction. - Ezekiel 22:23 . And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Ezekiel 22:24 . Son of man, say to it, Thou art a land which is not shined upon, nor rained upon in the day of anger. Ezekiel 22:25 . Conspiracy of its prophets is within it; like a roaring lion, which rends in pieces the prey, they devour souls, take possessions and money; they multiply its widows within it. Ezekiel 22:26 . Its priests violate my law and profane my holy things; they make no distinction between holy and unholy, and do not teach the difference between clean and unclean, and they hide their eyes from my Sabbaths, and I am profaned among them. Ezekiel 22:27 . Its princes in the midst of it are like wolves, which rend prey in pieces, that they may shed blood, destroy souls, to acquire gain. Ezekiel 22:28 . And its prophets plaster it with cement, seeing what is worthless, and diving lies for them, saying, "Thus saith the Lord Jehovah," when Jehovah hath not spoken. Ezekiel 22:29 . The common people offer violence and commit theft; they crush the wretched and the poor, and oppress the foreigner against right. Ezekiel 22:30 . I seek among them for a man who might build a wall and step into the breach before me on behalf of the land, that I might not destroy it, but I find none. Ezekiel 22:31 .

Therefore I pour out my anger upon them; I destroy them in the fire of my wrath, I give their way upon their head, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah. - To show the necessity for the predicted judgment still more clearly, in the third word of God contained in this chapter a description is given of the spread of deep corruption among all classes of the people, and the impossibility of saving the kingdom is plainly shown. The words אמר־להּ, "say unto her," are taken by most of the commentators as referring to Jerusalem, the abominations of which the prophet is commanded to declare. But although the clause, "thou art a land," etc. ( Ezekiel 22:24 ), could unquestionably be made to harmonize with this, yet the words of Ezekiel 22:30 , "I sought for a man who might stand in the gap before Jehovah for the land," indicate most unquestionably that this word of God is directed against the land of Judah, and consequently להּ must be taken as referring to ארץ which follows, the pronoun is this case being placed before the noun to which it refers, as in Numbers 24:17 . Any allusion to the city of Jerusalem would therefore be somewhat out of place, inasmuch as in the preceding word of God the object referred to was not the city, but the house of Israel, or the nation generally, from which a transition is here made to the land, or the kingdom of Judah.