Bible Commentaries
Ezekiel 30

Verse 2

Son of man, prophesy and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Howl ye, Woe worth the day!

Ye — Inhabitants of Egypt.

Verse 3

For the day is near, even the day of the LORD is near, a cloudy day; it shall be the time of the heathen.

A cloudy day — So times of trouble are called.

Of the heathen — The time when God will reckon with the Heathens.

Verse 4

And the sword shall come upon Egypt, and great pain shall be in Ethiopia, when the slain shall fall in Egypt, and they shall take away her multitude, and her foundations shall be broken down.

Ethiopia — The neighbour and ally to Egypt.

Take away — Into miserable captivity.

Her foundations — Their government, laws, and strong holds.

Verse 5

Ethiopia, and Libya, and Lydia, and all the mingled people, and Chub, and the men of the land that is in league, shall fall with them by the sword.

Lydia — Not the Asiatic, but the Africans placed between some part of Cyrene and Egypt.

The mingled people — The hired soldiers from all parts, a confused mixture of nations.

And Chub — The inhabitants of the inmost Libya; perhaps they may be the Nubians at this day.

The men — All the allies of Egypt.

With them — With the Egyptians.

Verse 6

Thus saith the LORD; They also that uphold Egypt shall fall; and the pride of her power shall come down: from the tower of Syene shall they fall in it by the sword, saith the Lord GOD.

Upheld — Those that favour and help her.

The pride — The glory of all her strength.

Verse 7

And they shall be desolate in the midst of the countries that are desolate, and her cities shall be in the midst of the cities that are wasted.

They — All those before mentioned.

Verse 8

And they shall know that I am the LORD, when I have set a fire in Egypt, and when all her helpers shall be destroyed.

Destroyed — The fire that consumes nations is of God’s kindling: and when he sets fire to a kingdom, all they that go about to quench the fire, shall be consumed by it.

Verse 9

In that day shall messengers go forth from me in ships to make the careless Ethiopians afraid, and great pain shall come upon them, as in the day of Egypt: for, lo, it cometh.

Messengers — Such as having escaped the sword, shall tell the news.

From me — By my permission and providence.

In ship’s — Messengers by ships might carry the news to both the Ethiopian, Asian, and African, by the Red-sea.

As in the day — During the mighty havock made by the Chaldeans.

It — A like storm.

Verse 11

He and his people with him, the terrible of the nations, shall be brought to destroy the land: and they shall draw their swords against Egypt, and fill the land with the slain.

His people — His own subjects, not hired soldiers.

Verse 12

And I will make the rivers dry, and sell the land into the hand of the wicked: and I will make the land waste, and all that is therein, by the hand of strangers: I the LORD have spoken it.

The rivers dry — Probably the Chaldeans diverted them, and so their fortified towns wanted one great defence.

Sell — Give it up entirely.

Verse 13

Thus saith the Lord GOD; I will also destroy the idols, and I will cause their images to cease out of Noph; and there shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt: and I will put a fear in the land of Egypt.

Noph — Memphis, now Grand Cairo, the chief city of the country.

A prince — Either an Egyptian born, or independent, and over all Egypt.

A fear — Consternation and cowardice.

Verse 14

And I will make Pathros desolate, and will set fire in Zoan, and will execute judgments in No.

In Zoan — Zoan shall be burnt down to ashes.

In No — A great and populous city situate on one of the mouths of the Nile.

Verse 15

And I will pour my fury upon Sin, the strength of Egypt; and I will cut off the multitude of No.

Sin — Pelusium, which was the key of Egypt, and therefore always well fortified, and strongly garrisoned.

Verse 16

And I will set fire in Egypt: Sin shall have great pain, and No shall be rent asunder, and Noph shall have distresses daily.

Shall be rent — Her walls, and towers, and fortresses broken through by the violence of engines, and by the assaults of the soldiers.

Verse 17

The young men of Aven and of Pibeseth shall fall by the sword: and these cities shall go into captivity.

Young men — ’Tis probable these might be a body of valiant youths, collected out of these ten cities.

Aven — Bethshemesh, or Heliopolis, an idolatrous city, in which was a stately temple of the sun: an hundred and fifty furlongs, that is six miles and three quarters in compass.

Phibeseth — Bubastus, sometimes called Hoephestus, not far from Aven.

Verse 18

At Tehaphnehes also the day shall be darkened, when I shall break there the yokes of Egypt: and the pomp of her strength shall cease in her: as for her, a cloud shall cover her, and her daughters shall go into captivity.

Tehaphnehes — A great and goodly city of Egypt; Tachapanes, Tachpanes, Tahapanes, Tahpanes, Chanes, and Hanes, are names given it, and this from a queen of Egypt of that name in Solomon’s time. It stood not far from Sin, or Pelusium.

Darkened — A night shall come upon it.

Break — I shall break the kingdom of Egypt, that it no more oppress with yokes, that is, burdens.

Her daughters — Her towns and villages.

Verse 20

And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the first month, in the seventh day of the month, that the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,

The eleventh year — Of Jeconiah’s captivity, three months and two days before Jerusalem was taken, about the time that the Egyptians attempted to raise the siege of Jerusalem.

Verse 21

Son of man, I have broken the arm of Pharaoh king of Egypt; and, lo, it shall not be bound up to be healed, to put a roller to bind it, to make it strong to hold the sword.

Have broken — Partly by the victory of the Chaldeans over Pharaoh-necho, partly by the victory of the Cyreneans over Pharaoh-hophra.

The sword — None can heal the wounds that God gives but himself. They whom he disables, cannot again hold the sword.

Verse 22

Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against Pharaoh king of Egypt, and will break his arms, the strong, and that which was broken; and I will cause the sword to fall out of his hand.

His arms — Both his arms.

The strong — That part of his kingdom which remains entire.

Broken — That which was shattered before.

Verse 25

But I will strengthen the arms of the king of Babylon, and the arms of Pharaoh shall fall down; and they shall know that I am the LORD, when I shall put my sword into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall stretch it out upon the land of Egypt.

Will strengthen — As judges on the bench like Pilate, so generals in the field, like Nebuchadrezzar, have no power but what is given them from above.