And the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying
Ezekiel 13 opens the way many of his messages open. A word arrives from outside the prophet, and God tells him whom to address. What follows targets men who also called themselves prophets. The whole chapter turns on one difference: a message received, or a message invented.
The prophet was not part of Israel's standing arrangements. He appeared when the older links between God and His people broke down. That same gap gave the enemy his opening.
The priesthood was the first link between God and Israel. When it failed, God in His sovereign goodness raised up the prophet in an extraordinary way, to stand between the people and Himself. Later the kings failed too, and again the prophet came forward. He was a sign of how broken things were. He was also a sign of God's patience, waiting for possible recovery. Priest and king belonged to the settled order. Their office passed from father to son in the ordinary way. With the prophet it was otherwise. There was no provision for the continuance of the prophet. God in His goodness raised him up for that very purpose, as His messenger, to bring His word to the people... And here the adversary of God and man might find his opportunity. He could copy what is of God, putting forward prophets of his own invention to speak falsehood as from God.
The next verses name the target: prophets who speak from their own hearts. They were not harmless amateurs but a weapon aimed at God's people.
Ezekiel 13 takes up those in Israel who pretended to know the mind of Jehovah. They were men and women who prophesied with no commission from God. They were instruments of the enemy and opponents of His will, working the ruin of His people. This was one of the most painful trials to the spirit then, as false brothers and false prophets are to us in the church now. Their aim is self. Their means are flattery on one side, and on the other a domineering manner suited to the people they want to influence. They are always seeking to belittle and injure those who maintain the truth in the Lord's name.
Why does God deal so sharply with this? The offence is not only against the hearers. It is against Him.
To be a prophet out of your own heart is to make judgment from God certain. He is gracious and merciful, yet He must be jealous of His majesty and truth, which such prophesying completely misrepresents and profanes.
These men did not offer opinions under their own name. They copied the one thing that gave a real prophet weight — the claim that God had spoken.
The word a prophet spoke was not just something drawn out of a man's own "inner consciousness," as men describe it today... It was no human judgment that they claimed to bring, but the judgment of God Himself. So it was not their own saying, but Jehovah's saying. Israel knew this so well that the false prophets themselves had to make the same claim. If they saw nothing, they had to pretend that they saw.
Their message asked nothing hard of anyone. That is what drew the crowd.
False teachers would claim the path is not as narrow as Scripture makes it. The mark of the false prophets in Ezekiel 13 was this: they made it very easy for people to go along, because they prophesied out of their own heart. The serious thing was that they followed their own spirit and paid no attention to the words of God.
The same measure reaches any speaker in any age.
Every man who prophesies out of his own heart is a false prophet, a blind leader of the blind. He speaks his own mind, and his preaching and teaching does not follow the word of God. Like the false prophets in Israel, the false teachers in the Christian world are the cause of the spiritual state of the people who profess to be God's... They are self-called and self-sent.
The answer is not alarm but testing. Measure anyone who claims to speak for God by what God has already said.
This would be an alarming thing, if we did not already have what we know to be the word of God. Since we do have it, the simple question is this: do this spirit and the word of God agree? If not, we must reject the whole thing at once as not of God. Blessed be our God, who has given us His own word to test it by.
- Sent. The prophet exists because God raised him up in a broken situation — no family line, no office, only a word given to him.
- Self-sent. The men of Ezekiel 13 had no such sending. They spoke from their own hearts, self-called and self-sent.
- Stolen. They still spoke in God's name. Israel knew a real prophet brings Jehovah's word, so even the false ones had to pretend they saw.
- Soothing. Their appeal was ease: they made the road look wide and paid no attention to the words of God.
- Sifted. The test has not changed. God has given us His own word. Hold every claim beside it, and reject whatever does not agree.
Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel that prophesy, and say unto them that prophesy out of their own heart, Hear ye the word of Jehovah.
God tells Ezekiel to preach against Israel's own prophets — men who spoke their own minds and called it God's word. So how do you tell God's word from a message that only claims to be His?
The verse names the fault in one phrase: they prophesy from their own hearts. They had seen nothing from God.
They prophesied out of their own hearts. The words could also be translated, "Who prophesy from their own mind without having seen." … Every man who prophesies out of his own heart speaks his own mind. His preaching and teaching is not according to the oracles of God. Such a man is a false prophet, a blind leader of the blind. … They are self-called and self-sent.
The prophet had no fixed place in Israel's order. God raised him up when things went wrong, and that is where the enemy found his opening.
When the priesthood failed — the first link between God and Israel — God raised up the prophet. He did it outside the normal order, in sovereign goodness, to stand between the people and Himself. … There was no way for the office to pass on. God raised him up by His own goodness, as His messenger… Sadly, the enemy of God and man could find his opportunity in this very thing. He could imitate what is of God. He brought forward prophets of his own invention to speak lies as if from God, and so lead their followers further astray.
They did not offer their opinions as opinions. They put God's name on them. Israel knew that a prophet spoke for God, so these men had to claim they had seen something.
It was no human judgment that they professed to bring, but the judgment of God Himself. So it was not their own saying, but Jehovah's saying. Everyone in Israel understood this, so the false prophets had to carry their pretence that far. If they saw nothing, they had to pretend that they saw. But the true heart of a prophet did not show in them, and so people did not hear the true voice of Jehovah.
Speaking in God's name without God's word is not a small fault. It misrepresents Him, and He will not let that stand.
To be a prophet out of your own heart is to guarantee God's judgment. He is gracious and merciful, yet He must be jealous of His majesty and truth. These men utterly misrepresented and profaned both. What could the end be for themselves and for those who followed them but destruction? They were like foxes among the ruins, full of craft and mischief. No wonder no one went up to the gaps in the wall. No one built a fence around the house of Israel to stand in the battle in the day of Jehovah.
These men did not appear at random. They showed up when God's judgment was closing in, and they always had comforting news.
Among their own nation Israel there were false prophets. They appeared mostly, if not entirely, when judgment was hanging over the nation. We learn this from the prophecies of Jeremiah and Ezekiel. These false prophets opposed the true prophets of God, who preached the God-given message. The false prophets rejected the word of the Lord and belittled it. They spoke out of their own hearts and spoke empty things and lies (Ezek. 13:2, 8). Their message was "peace" when there was no peace.
One writer sees the same thing in the church today. The marks are self-interest, flattery, and hostility toward anyone who still holds the truth.
This chapter takes up those who pretended to know the mind of Jehovah in Israel. They were men and women who prophesied without divine authority. They were instruments of the enemy and opponents of His will, and they ruined His people. This was one of the most painful trials to the spirit then, and false brothers and false prophets are the same trial to us now in the church. Their aim is self. Their methods are flattery on one side and an overbearing manner on the other, whichever suits the people they want to influence. They always seek to belittle and damage those who uphold the truth in the Lord's name.
- Source. A true prophet has seen something from God. These men "prophesy from their own mind without having seen," so their teaching is not according to the oracles of God.
- Imitation. God alone raised up the prophet, and no family line held the office. So the enemy could plant prophets of his own invention.
- Pretension. No one would listen unless they said "Jehovah says." If they saw nothing, they pretended they saw.
- Timing. They showed up when judgment was closing in on the nation. Their message was always "peace" when there was no peace.
- Outcome. Speaking out of your own heart secures God's judgment. He must be jealous of His majesty and truth when men misrepresent them.
Thus saith the Lord Jehovah Woe unto the foolish prophets, that follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing!
The woe here falls on Israel's own prophets, not on the nation's worst sinners. Two questions run through the chapter: where does a message come from, and what happens to people who trust words God never spoke?
One writer traces where the prophet's office came from, and why it was so open to imitation.
The priesthood was the first link between God and Israel. When it failed, God in His sovereign goodness raised up the prophet in an extraordinary way, to stand between the people and Himself. When the kings failed later, the prophet came forward again. He was a sign of how broken things were, and also a sign of God's patience, waiting for possible recovery. Priest and king belonged to the established order, so their office passed from father to son. With the prophet it was otherwise. There was no provision for the continuance of the prophet... The adversary of God and man might find his opportunity in this very opening. He could imitate what is of God, putting forward prophets of his own invention to speak falsehood as from God, and so lead their followers even further astray.
The phrase points to where a message comes from. One writer gives another rendering of it, then applies it far beyond ancient Israel.
They prophesied out of their own hearts; or as it might be rendered, "Who prophesy from their own mind without having seen."... Every man who prophesies out of his own heart is a false prophet, a blind leader of the blind. He utters his own mind, and his preaching and teaching is not according to the oracles of God. Like the false prophets in Israel, false teachers in the Christian world are the cause of the spiritual condition of the professing people of God. They are self-called and self-sent.
The claim a prophet made was far bigger than sharing a personal insight.
The word the prophet spoke was not simply something drawn out of a man's "inner consciousness," as men present it today. It was not a spiritual mind divining the future from what he saw in front of him. On the contrary, what they claimed to bring was no human judgment, but the judgment of God Himself. So it was not their own saying, but Jehovah's saying. And this was so thoroughly understood in Israel that the false prophets themselves had to go this far in their pretension. If they saw nothing, they had to pretend that they saw.
One writer draws out of the verse a test for anyone who speaks today.
Put quite simply, the Seer sees something (Ezek. 13:3); and the Prophet tells something... Suppose the risen and exalted Christ fills our soul's vision. Suppose the Spirit's power spreads out before us that new world of life and glory, of which He is the Centre and the Sun. Then we have something to tell. In that case, "we speak of what we know, and bear witness to what we have seen" (John 3:11).
One commentator names what is at stake when a man signs God's name to his own thoughts.
To be a prophet out of one's own heart is to ensure judgment from God. However gracious and merciful He is, He must be jealous of His majesty and truth, which are here completely misrepresented and profaned. What could be the end, for themselves and for those who followed them, but destruction? They were like foxes among the ruins, full of craft and mischief.
These prophets kept their audience because their message asked nothing of it. One writer, writing on the narrow path, shows how such teaching feels from the inside.
False teachers would claim that the path is not as narrow as Scripture lays it down. The false prophets in Ezekiel 13 made it very easy for people to go along, for they prophesied out of their own heart. The serious thing was that they followed their own spirit and paid no attention to the words of God.
And that ease did more damage than any pressure from outside.
It is painful but useful to trace how religious corruption grows. It does not come from outside, but from within. No outward temptation seems to have made the people of Judah rebel as boldly as corrupt prophets and a corrupt priesthood did.
- Sent — God's goodness raised the prophet up when priest and king had failed. The office had no line of succession, and that openness is where an imitator slips in.
- Source — to prophesy "out of your own heart" is to speak your own mind and stamp God's name on it. Such men are self-called and self-sent.
- Sight — a seer must first see something. Men who saw nothing still had to pretend they had, because people expected a prophet to bring God's verdict, not his own.
- Sweetness — they kept a crowd by making the road easy. That kind of corruption grows inside the people of God, not from pressure outside.
- Sentence — God is jealous for His own majesty and truth. Misrepresenting Him ends in destruction, for the speakers and for everyone who followed them.
O Israel, thy prophets have been like foxes in desert places.
God tells Ezekiel to prophesy against the prophets of Israel. His verdict lands in one picture: scavengers picking over rubble. What does a false teacher do to God's people, and how do you spot one? The chapter answers both.
The picture has two halves: where these men live, and what they live on.
"Your prophets have been like jackals among ruins, O Israel" — a telling picture of men who preyed on the corruption around them. They hid from the light in the barren wilderness, the only place that gave them the cover they wanted.
The picture points to character as well as place. Another writer links it to the sin named just before it: prophesying out of your own heart.
To be a prophet out of one's own heart guarantees judgment from God. He is gracious and merciful, but He must be jealous of His majesty and truth when men misrepresent and profane them so completely. What could the end be, for themselves and for those who followed them, but destruction? They were like foxes in the ruins, full of craft and mischief.
Scripture uses this animal elsewhere for a man who turns a nation's collapse into his own advantage. Commenting on Jesus calling Herod "that fox," and on the line in Lamentations about foxes walking on desolate Zion, one writer describes exactly the behaviour Ezekiel condemns.
Herod was a man who took advantage of Zion's sorrow. Israel was dethroned. Her enemies had gained the upper hand, and Herod, the creature of the enemy, the ally and flatterer of Caesar, made his profit out of her misery. He was walking on the mountain, in the high places of Zion, because of her ruin. He played the fox instead of mourning over the wastes of Israel: he made his own gain out of their poverty.
Nothing on the outside would have given these men away.
Great as was their pretension, it was as far from the reality as possible... In pretension they were angels of light, as Satan's agents among God's people always are. But the evil that flourished around them was the true witness against them.
The test is not the label a man wears but the source of his message. One writer carries that test beyond Israel.
Every man who prophesies out of his own heart is a false prophet, a blind leader of the blind. He speaks his own mind, and his preaching and teaching does not follow the word of God. The false teachers in the Christian world do what the false prophets did in Israel. They are the cause of the spiritual state of the professing people of God... They are self-called and self-sent.
One writer traces the same trouble into the church, and names the methods it uses.
Ezekiel 13 takes up the pretenders to the mind of Jehovah in Israel. These were men and women who prophesied with no commission from God. They were tools of the enemy and opponents of His will, working to the ruin of His people. This was one of the sharpest trials to the spirit then, and false brothers and false prophets are the same trial to us in the church now. Their aim is self. Their method is flattery with some, and an overbearing manner with others, whichever suits the people they want to influence. They are always working to belittle and injure those who maintain the truth in the Lord's name.
- Ruin. These prophets show up where the nation is already broken. Jackals need waste places; false teachers need corruption to feed on.
- Craft. The fox takes advantage of collapse instead of mourning it. He makes his gain out of God's people's poverty.
- Pretence. They looked like angels of light. The evil flourishing around them was the evidence against them.
- Source. Anyone who speaks from his own heart and not from God is a false prophet. His claim may be high, but he is self-called and self-sent.
- Safeguard. In every age the only escape from such teaching is to have the mind of God (Morrish Bible Dictionary).
Ye have not gone up into the breaches, nor made up the fence for the house of Israel, to stand in the battle in the day of Jehovah.
God's charge against the prophets of Israel is not that they spoke badly, but that they did nothing. The nation's wall lay broken, and no one climbed into the gaps to stand there.
Commentators take this as the job description for anyone God raises up. The pattern comes from the priest, who carried the people's names on his heart before God:
The priest carried on his heart before God the interests of God's people, and so God's interests in His people. If the priest was now gone, and the king also, then anyone God raised up as His prophet had to be marked by these very characteristics. In Ezekiel's day, then, the prophets should have been men "gone up into the breaches." They should not have ignored the breaches, nor what had caused them. They should have proclaimed the faithful word of Jehovah. At the same time they should have sought, if it were possible, to build up the wall that had been broken down, so that it might stand in the battle, even in the day of Jehovah.
Two things go together: speak the truth about the breach and what caused it, and work to rebuild the wall. These prophets did neither. The writers quoted here use an older translation, which prints "Jehovah" where the ESV has "the LORD."
The gap is a dangerous place. To stand in it is to stand in the battle, so men who feared suffering never went there. One writer sets these prophets beside a later group who changed their message to escape it:
They were like foxes in the ruins, full of craft and mischief. No wonder there was no going up into the breaches, and no making up a fence round the house of Israel to stand in the battle in the day of Jehovah. They were like those at a later day who wanted to make a good outward show, and who forced the Gentiles to be circumcised. They did it only so that they themselves would not suffer persecution for the cross of Christ.
The shortage was never of preachers. It was of true ones:
This testimony of the Lord against the prophets increased as the apostasy set in. The nearer the ruin approached — such is the way of His grace — the more testimony He raised concerning it. But in proportion as God multiplied His witnesses, we find the prophets of the people multiplied also.
Later in the same book God tells us what He looked for and did not find. One writer notes the tenderness in that search:
In Ezekiel 22 Jehovah sums up the sins of what He now calls "the bloody city." He sums up the sins of the princes, the prophets, the priests, and the people of Israel. Yet He says, "And I sought for a man among them who should build up the wall and stand in the breach before me for the land, that I should not destroy it, but I found none" (Ezek. 22:30). Judgment must have its way. But we cannot help noticing the tenderness of God for His people before the blow fell. It is a striking reminder of the blessed Lord's words at a later date: "How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not" (Luke 13:34).
When God finds such a man, the work turns out to be prayer. But prayer has a closing time:
Poor Jeremiah could appeal to God, telling Him how he had stood in the gap to turn away the anger from them. That lasted until the Lord said to him, "Do not pray for this people," and the anger took its course. For intercession is always the place for the one who has the mind of God, to make a way for God's love, until the place for intercession is closed.
The wall had to stand for one particular day. That day is not hidden:
Now it is especially important to get a clear view of the day of Jehovah. The main truth involved in that day is that it means the open judgment of the world by God. The choice of the word "day" involves this. It is not a question of secret judgments or providential dealings. Those might happen during the night, unseen.
- Breach — The prophets' sin was absence. A prophet's first duty is to go into the gaps, not to look away from them or from what caused them.
- Burden — The priest carried the people's names on his heart. The man in the gap carries the same load: God's interests and the people's.
- Cowardice — They stayed out of the gap, like later men who changed their message to escape persecution for the cross.
- Crowd — As ruin came closer, God raised up more true witnesses. False prophets multiplied alongside them.
- Closing door — God searched for one man to stand in the breach and found none. Prayer holds a place open for God's love until He says to stop. Then judgment runs its course in the open day of the LORD.
They have seen vanity and lying divination, that say, Jehovah saith! and Jehovah hath not sent them; and they make [them] to hope that the word will be fulfilled.
God tells Ezekiel to speak against the prophets of Israel — men who claimed to carry His own word to His people. Their fault was not a wrong detail: they saw nothing, and still signed God's name to what they said.
These men made a huge claim, and they had to. Everyone in Israel knew what a prophet was meant to be. One writer explains why a man who saw nothing still had to speak like a man sent from God:
The word the prophet spoke was not simply something drawn out of a man's "inner consciousness," as people describe it today. It was not divination — a spiritual mind guessing the future from what he saw in front of him. On the contrary, what they claimed to bring was not human judgment at all, but the judgment of God Himself. So it was not their own saying, but the Lord's saying. Everyone in Israel knew this so well that the false prophets themselves had to go that far in their pretending. If they saw nothing, they had to pretend that they saw.
Putting "Declares the LORD" on your own idea is not a small thing. One writer links the judgment these men face to what their words do to God's majesty and truth:
To be a prophet out of your own heart is to make God's judgment certain. However gracious and merciful He is, He must be jealous of His majesty and truth when they are misrepresented and profaned like this. What could the end be, for themselves and for those who followed them, but destruction?
The verse gives the plain test of a messenger: was he sent? These prophets fail it, and a commentator presses the same test on preaching in any age:
Every man who prophesies out of his own heart speaks his own mind. His preaching and teaching does not match the word of God. He is a false prophet, a blind leader of the blind. False teachers in the Christian world do what the false prophets did in Israel. They are the cause of the spiritual state of those who profess to be God's people. What the Lord said through Ezekiel is true of them all: "They have seen false visions and lying divinations. They say, 'Declares the LORD,' when the LORD has not sent them." They are self-called and self-sent. Behind them stands the father of lies.
The last part of the verse turns from the speakers to the people listening. Older translations read it as the prophets making others hope that the word would come true.
Such people did not fear the Lord and were not in His confidence. They had only falsehood and divination. They said "Declares the LORD" when He had not sent them, and yet they made people hope that the word would come true.
God sent prophets when things had gone badly wrong. That is exactly where the enemy finds his opening:
God in His goodness raised up the prophet as His messenger. He sent him with His word to the people when things were, or should have been, completely out of the ordinary. Sadly, the enemy of God and man could find his opportunity in this very thing. He imitates what is of God. He puts forward prophets of his own making, who speak lies as though the words came from God, and so lead their followers completely astray.
If anyone can claim to speak for God, the claim itself proves nothing. Something outside the speaker must settle it:
We must remember that everything claiming to be spiritual always has a spirit behind it. "Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world." Testing the spirits, then, means testing the teachings of men by the pure Word of God. The Spirit of God can teach nothing contrary to the Word of God.
- Nothing seen. These men had no vision, so the pretence had to be loud; a prophet who sees nothing must act as though he saw.
- Nothing sent. The test is not how sure a message sounds, but who sent it. These men were self-called and self-sent, with the father of lies behind them.
- Nothing but presumption. Saying "Declares the LORD" when He has not spoken profanes His majesty and truth. It makes God's judgment certain.
- Nothing to stand on. They made people hope for the fulfilment of a word God never gave — hope resting on a lie.
- Nothing safe but the Word. Satan imitates the true messenger. So test every teaching by the pure Word of God, which the Spirit never contradicts.
Have ye not seen a vain vision, and spoken a lying divination, when ye say, Jehovah saith; and I have not spoken?
God turns and puts a question to the prophets of Israel. They had signed their messages with His name. He had said nothing. The verse opens a gap between the claim and the truth. It raises a question anyone who listens to religious talk must face. How do you tell a word from God from a word God never spoke?
The charge running through the chapter is that these men spoke what came from inside them. Kelly ties the offence to who God is:
To be a prophet out of one's own heart is to ensure judgment from God. He is gracious and merciful, yet He must be jealous of His majesty and truth when they are so completely misrepresented and profaned. What could be the end, for themselves and for those who followed them, but destruction?
The verse names two things: a false vision and a lying divination. One commentator explains what a prophet's word really was, and why the counterfeits had to pretend to see:
The word the prophet spoke was not simply something worked up out of a man's own "inner consciousness," as people describe it today — a kind of divination, a spiritual mind predicting the future from what he saw in front of him. On the contrary, it was no human judgment that they claimed to bring, but the judgment of God Himself. So it was not their own saying, but the Lord's saying. Israel understood this so well that the false prophets themselves had to go this far in their pretence. If they saw nothing, they had to pretend that they saw.
The verse says the Lord had not spoken; the chapter also says He had not sent them. Gaebelein widens this into a test, and names who stands behind such men:
Every man who prophesies out of his own heart, who speaks his own mind, whose preaching and teaching does not follow the word of God, is a false prophet, a blind leader of the blind. What the Lord said through Ezekiel is true of all such men: "They have seen vanity and lying divination, saying, The Lord says, and the Lord has not sent them." They are self-called and self-sent. Behind them stands the father of lies.
Why were there so many false prophets in the first place? A commentator traces it to the prophet's place in Israel:
Priest and king belonged to the established order of things, so their office passed from father to son in the ordinary way. With the prophet it was different. There was no provision for the prophet to continue. God in His goodness raised him up specially, as His messenger, to bring His word to the people. The state of things then was, or should have been, completely exceptional. Sadly, the adversary of God and man could find his opportunity in this very way. He imitates what is of God. He brings forward prophets of his own invention to speak falsehood as if it came from God, and so leads their followers completely astray.
False prophecy also has an appeal. Another writer, comparing the narrow and the broad way, points to what marked these prophets out:
The false prophets in Ezekiel 13 made it very easy for people to go along. They prophesied out of their own heart. The serious thing was that they followed their own spirit and paid no attention to the words of God.
Kelly, tracing how a people reaches this point, locates the source of the rot:
It is painful but profitable to trace the progress of religious corruption. It arises not from outside, but from within. It seems no outward temptation could have brought the people of Judah to rebel so boldly. Corrupt prophets and a corrupt priesthood did.
- Source. The fault begins inside. These men prophesied out of their own hearts and followed their own spirit, ignoring God's words. Any teaching that does not follow God's word is false teaching, whatever name it carries.
- Pretence. Having seen nothing, they had to pretend they had seen. Only a message carrying the Lord's name would get a hearing.
- Sender. They were self-called and self-sent, with the father of lies standing behind them.
- Appeal. Their message made it easy for people to go along. Kelly adds that such corruption grows from within a people, not from outside pressure.
- Sentence. Speaking from your own heart in God's name brings judgment. God is jealous of His truth, and destruction reaches the followers too, not just the speakers.