Reblert de les perforacions

1 In the ninth year, in the tenth month on the tenth day, the word of the Lord came to me:

2 "Son of man, record this date, this very date, because the king of Babylon has laid siege to Jerusalem this very day.

3 Tell this rebellious house a parable and say to them: ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: "‘Put on the cooking pot; put it on and pour water into it.

4 Put into it the pieces of meat, all the choice pieces — the leg and the shoulder. Fill it with the best of these bones; 5 take the pick of the flock. Pile wood beneath it for the bones; bring it to a boil and cook the bones in it.

6 "‘For this is what the Sovereign Lord says: "‘Woe to the city of bloodshed, to the pot now encrusted, whose deposit will not go away! Empty it piece by piece without casting lots for them.

7 "‘For the blood she shed is in her midst: She poured it on the bare rock; she did not pour it on the ground, where the dust would cover it.

8 To stir up wrath and take revenge I put her blood on the bare rock, so that it would not be covered.

9 "‘Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord says: "‘Woe to the city of bloodshed! I, too, will pile the wood high. 10 So heap on the wood and kindle the fire. Cook the meat well, mixing in the spices; and let the bones be charred. 11 Then set the empty pot on the coals till it becomes hot and its copper glows so its impurities may be melted and its deposit burned away.

12 It has frustrated all efforts; its heavy deposit has not been removed, not even by fire.

13 "‘Now your impurity is lewdness. Because I tried to cleanse you but you would not be cleansed from your impurity, you will not be clean again until my wrath against you has subsided.

14 "‘I the Lord have spoken. The time has come for me to act. I will not hold back; I will not have pity, nor will I relent. You will be judged according to your conduct and your actions, declares the Sovereign Lord.’"

The Wycliffe Bible Commentary states about the date, the “ninth year ... tenth month ... tenth day of the

month”: “The day of the commencement of the siege of Jerusalem (2 Kings 25:1; Jer 30:1; 52:4). January 587 (or 588) B.C. During the Exile and till 518 B.C., this day was observed as a fast (Zech 8:19).” Barnes’ Notes observes: “The prophecies in this chapter were delivered two years and five months after those of the previous section (Ezek 20:1).”

The Pulpit Commentary adds: “We pass from the date of … Ezekiel 20:1 (B.C. 593) to B.C. 590, and the

very day is identified with that on which the army of Nebuchadnezzar besieged Jerusalem (… Jeremiah 39:1; … 2 Kings 25:1-12). To the prophet’s vision all that was passing there was as plain as though he saw it with his own eyes. The siege lasted for about two years. The punishments threatened in Ezekiel 23, had at last come near. We may probably infer that a considerable interval of silence had followed on the Aholah and Aholibah discourse. Now the time had come to break that silence, and it was broken, after the prophet’s manner, by a parable. In the ‘rebellious house’ we find, as in … Ezekiel 2:3 and elsewhere, primarily Ezekiel’s immediate hearers, secondarily the whole house of Israel as represented by them.”

It is not clear whether Ezekiel had to enact the parable by putting a cooking pot on a wood fire and boiling pieces of meat in it, or whether he merely drew a word picture. Some Bible scholars believe that the prophet actually gave a life demonstration.

The image of a boiling pot is used elsewhere. When Jeremiah received his call, he saw the coming Babylonian invasion as “a boiling pot, tilting away from the north.”1 In an earlier prophecy Ezekiel indicated that the people of Jerusalem themselves had used the image of meat cooking in a pot as a pictures of safety and protection.2 Here this same picture is turned against them.

Ezekiel had had earlier experiences in which he witnessed events that occurred in Jerusalem, although not being there physically. The Holy Spirit had transported him in visions to the city and the temple.3 Here, the prophet is simply told what happened. The prophet Elisha was an eye witness of his servant’s deception, although he was not physically present.4

John B. Taylor, in Ezekiel, observes about vv.3-5: “Some think that the imperative verbs are addressed to the prophet and that this is therefore another of Ezekiel’s acted parables, but if that were so one would expect a concluding phrase such as ‘And I did as the Lord commanded me …’ Nevertheless the poem is an allegory and has its detailed application to the circumstances of the day, as any acted parable would. The cauldron is Jerusalem, the fire underneath and around it is the siege, the pieces of flesh are the inhabitants of Jerusalem. The word for cauldron (Heb. sîr) normally refers to any large wide-mouthed pottery utensil used for washing or cookery, though in this instance we find in verse 11 that it is made of copper. In verse 5 there are a number of textual emendations which RSV has followed. The first reference to bones (`aºâmîm) should probably read logs (`eºîm); the otherwise unknown cognate accusative in ‘boil its boilings’ (retâhêhâ) is best altered, as in two MSS, to its pieces (netâhêhâ), a word

specially used of joints of meat; and the final verb can easily be altered to an imperative, seethe its bones, but this is less necessary. JB has ‘until even the bones are cooked.’”

The cooking pot on the fire with the pieces of meat boiling in it is a picture of the siege of Jerusalem and the people inside the city. The prophetic warning has passed the point of no return. From now on the outcome of suffering and destruction is unavoidable. In more than one sense the heat is on and Jerusalem with the people will fall apart as meat that is overcooked to the point where it separates from the bone. It is a picture of unimaginable suffering.

V.6 reads literally in Hebrew: “Wherefore, thus says the Lord God; Woe to the bloody city, to the pot whose scum is therein, and whose scum is not gone out of it! Piece by piece bring it out let no lot fall upon it.”

The Hebrew word rendered “scum” or “deposit” in The New International Version, is chel’ah, which is derived from the Hebrew word chala’, meaning “to be sick.” As such we find it in the verse: “In the thirty-ninth year of his reign Asa was afflicted with a disease in his feet.”5 This chapter in Ezekiel is the only place where chel’ah is found. John B. Taylor, in Ezekiel, comments here: “Here are two oracles dependent upon each other and on the poem of the cooking-pot. The first (6-8) deals with the blood-guiltiness of Jerusalem, harking back to the message of 22:1- 16, and introduces this by making play on the corrosion which the boiling of the cauldron has brought to light, probably in the form of a rusty scum … Out of this reddish mess the contents are to be removed piece by piece indiscriminately. That is to say, the inhabitants of the besieged Jerusalem are to be scattered in all directions. But Jerusalem’s guilt still remains, like blood spilled on the bare rock, uncovered by earth in burial and therefore still crying out to God for vengeance … The second oracle (9-14) deals with this question in a different way. In verse 5 the logs were piled under the cauldron to boil the contents of the stew; now the Lord intends to kindle a fire which will eventually melt the cauldron itself. To this end the contents are first disposed of (following RSV, boil well the

1.

flesh, and empty out the broth, 10), the bones of the meat are burnt, and then the empty pot is stood on the burning

coals so that it may become red-hot and all its filth and rust be melted away.”

In vv.6 and 9, Ezekiel borrows the words of Nahum about Nineveh: “Woe to the city of blood, full of lies, full of plunder, never without victims!”1 The Hebrew word used in “mixing in the spices” in v.10 is raqach, which usually refers to perfume. We find it in the chapter that deals with the preparation of the oil used for anointing2 and in the verse: “As dead flies give perfume a bad smell, so a little folly outweighs wisdom and honor.”3 Most Bible scholars do not know what to do with the expression. The Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown Commentary states: “Spice it well - that the meat may be the more palatable; i.e., I will make the foe delight in its destruction as much as one delights in well-seasoned savory meat. Grotius, needlessly departing from the obvious sense, translates, ‘let it be boiled down to a compound.’” The Pulpit Commentary observes: “We are reminded of the ‘bubble, bubble’ of the witches’ cauldron in ‘Macbeth.’”

The melting of the copper cooking pot depicts the destruction of the city and the temple as well as the slaughter of the people and the being led into captivity of the remnant. Vv.12 and 13 refer to God’s earlier efforts to get through to the people and bring about conviction of sin and repentance. None of the previous chastisements had resulted in contrition in any form. There had been no change of heart and turning back to God. As a matter of fact the people who survived the disaster blamed their bad luck on the fact that they had temporarily suspended their idolatry. They said to Jeremiah: “Ever since we stopped burning incense to the Queen of Heaven and pouring out drink offerings to her, we have had nothing and have been perishing by sword and famine.”4 The people’s spiritual blindness seemed to be absolute. God had said to Israel: “I am the Lord, who makes you holy.”5 But Israel had refused to be made holy. And God does not sanctify us against our will.