And this shall be the border of the land toward the north side, from the great sea, the way of Hethlon, as one goeth to Zedad,
God has just told Ezekiel to divide the land among the tribes. Now He draws the map, starting at the top: the line runs from the Mediterranean inland past Hethlon and Hamath to Zedad. The question this raises is simple: is this a real survey line for a real country, and if so, when has Israel ever held it?
Here the prophet begins handing out territory, and commentators read it as real ground.
The rest of the chapter deals with how Israel will be arranged in their future place in the land. Here Henderson has to come back to "the literal Canaan and the literal tribes," as the only view that satisfies a reader without bias. The counsels of God stand.
One reference work notes the first landmark after the coast:
A place spoken of as "the way of Hethlon." It appears only as the northern border of the land Israel will possess in the future. It is in the area of Hamath. It is thought to be the same as "the entrance of Hamath." Ezekiel 47:15; Ezekiel 48:1.
The same source places the last name in the verse far inland and far north:
Zedad: the northern border of the promised land. Numbers 34:8; Ezekiel 47:15. Probably Sudud, about fifty miles east-north-east of Baalbek.
Hamath sets how far north this frontier reaches. The ESV calls it "Lebo-hamath"; older translations read "the entrance of Hamath".
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A district and a well-known city in the north of Syria… The district lay north of the Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon mountains. It may have stretched southward too, since Israel's northern border is called "the entering in of Hamath" (1 Kings 8:65)… It was more than a hundred miles further north than Dan.
This is not a new survey. An earlier list gave the same borders, with two differences worth noting.
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This final section begins by giving the boundaries of the land. They are basically the same as the ones in Numbers 34:1-15. The difference is that Numbers gives the southern boundary first, while here we begin with the north. In both cases the Jordan forms the eastern line. The two and a half tribes settled east of the river, and that was a departure from the original plan. The final arrangement gives it no place: all the tribes receive their inheritance west of the Jordan.
The two and a half tribes east of the Jordan chose ground outside that frame:
These tribes made a mistake at the start in settling too soon outside the Holy Land. Their error will be put right when the millennial kingdom is established.
Measured against history, these borders remain an unpaid promise.
Let us remember: Israel has never yet received this — the land according to the promise to Abraham… They never possessed the land of the Sidonians, though it was promised to them, nor Mount Lebanon, which was part of it. Edom, Moab, Ammon and Philistia are all to belong to them, and never did. David's empire reached the Euphrates at one point, but only over kings who paid him tribute. That land was never Israel's. (Compare Genesis 15:18-21; Exodus 23:31; Joshua 1:2-4; Ezekiel 47:13 — 48.)
Does a land with fixed borders have space for a whole nation brought home? One writer answers:
Does anyone fear that the territory will not be enough for Israel once they are gathered in from every land? They need not. In that day the earth will yield its increase, the abundance of the sea will be turned to Zion, and the riches of the nations will come without measure.
This border encloses twelve inheritances arranged around a centre.
The close of the book of Ezekiel describes a fresh division of the land among the twelve tribes of Israel (Ezekiel 47:13 — 48:35). In the millennial kingdom the tribal inheritances will form parallel strips of territory running eastward from the Mediterranean Sea to the river Jordan. Near Jerusalem these strips are divided by Jehovah's portion, called the holy oblation or heave-offering. It will be for the prince, the priests and the Levites, with the sanctuary in the middle.
- Promise. The northern line repeats the boundaries in Numbers 34. The map is old even though the vision is new.
- Places. Hethlon, Hamath and Zedad are real northern landmarks. Hamath lay over a hundred miles north of Dan.
- Pending. Israel has never yet held this territory. Sidon, Mount Lebanon, Edom, Moab, Ammon and Philistia all lay inside the promise and outside their grasp.
- Put right. The Jordan forms the eastern line, so the tribes who settled beyond it come back inside the original plan. The coming kingdom corrects their old mistake.
- Purpose. The border encloses twelve inheritances in parallel strips, with Jehovah's portion and the sanctuary at the centre.
Hamath, Berothah, Sibraim, which is between the border of Damascus and the border of Hamath; Hazer-hatticon, which is by the border of Hauran.
God shows Ezekiel the map of a restored Israel. Verse 16 traces part of the northern line — Berothah, Sibraim, Hazer-hatticon — with Damascus and Hamath as markers on either side. The question every reader meets here is simple: are these real places on a real map, and when has Israel ever held a border drawn this far north?
The name that anchors the whole line is Hamath. People knew it as a landmark long before Ezekiel, and Israel named its northern edge by the approach to it:
A district and a well-known city in northern Syria. We read of the Hamathite as early as Genesis 10:18. The district lay north of Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon. It may have reached farther south as well, since Scripture calls Israel's northern border "the entrance of Hamath" (1 Kings 8:65). Toi, king of Hamath, sent congratulations to David on his victory over Hadadezer. It lay more than a hundred miles farther north than Dan. Yet it paid tribute to Solomon, and he built storage cities there.
That distance matters. Dan marked the familiar northern limit of the settled nation, and this line runs far north of it. Hamath was a known name as far back as Genesis 10:18, and both David and Solomon dealt with it. Here it marks the edge of the land itself.
Today we cannot locate every place the verse names. Sibraim is one example. The verse fixes it only by the two territories it sits between:
A northern landmark of Palestine, lying between Damascus and Hamath (Ezekiel 47:16). Not identified.
Hauran, at the end of the verse, is the opposite case. The district still carries that name, and half of one tribe once lived there:
A province east of the Jordan forming part of the ancient kingdom of Bashan, lying south of Damascus. The half tribe of Manasseh occupied it. It is now called the Hauran. It is a rich and fertile plain, but with little natural water supply. One day Israel will hold all of Palestine. Then their territory will reach on the north-east to the "border of Hauran" (Ezekiel 47:16, 18).
These boundary lists are not a record of past history. The tribes in Ezekiel's vision take up allotments the nation has never occupied:
There is no ground for assuming that any single feature of these visions came true in any single fact of the returned captives' past history. Less than fifty thousand men, women, and children came up from Babylon. They were a little remnant of a remnant. They were in no sense those twelve tribes whom the prophet sees taking up their allotted portions in the land — seven in the north, five in the south, reaching beyond the ancient bounds of Palestine, with Jerusalem between.
Why has Israel never held the whole of it? One writer points to who sits on the throne:
The population will grow fast, since nothing cuts it short — no death by violence, none by old age. There will be plenty of room to spread eastwards to the Euphrates. That stretches their limits to the full bounds of the land promised to Abraham (see Genesis 15:18) and to Moses (see Deuteronomy 11:24). Israel will never fully occupy those bounds till Christ sits on His own throne. Everything finds its fullest development under Him.
Some readers take these chapters as a picture of the church, not a description of real territory. One writer answers that by pointing to the boundaries themselves:
Once again Ezekiel gives the limits of the land and how it is divided among the tribes. This is not the small portion the Israelites of old took for themselves. It matches far more closely the large promise given to Abraham. The tribes are spread over this wider area in a completely different way from the division Joshua and his fellow surveyors made. What does all this mean if you apply it to the Church? Take it literally, as every spiritual Israelite must have taken it, and it raises no difficulty at all. It simply gives interesting details of that blessed time when Israel will be delivered from her enemies and restored to the LORD's favour. Then, under the Messiah's rule, she will enjoy the promises made to Abraham and David that are still unfulfilled.
- Promise — this map matches the large promise given to Abraham. It is far wider than the strip Israel took under Joshua.
- Places — the names are real geography: Hamath in northern Syria, Sibraim between Damascus and Hamath, Hauran east of the Jordan.
- Breadth — the line runs past the old bounds of Palestine. Hamath sits over a hundred miles north of Dan, and there is room eastward to the Euphrates.
- Unfulfilled — the small company that came back from Babylon matched nothing in this vision. It waits on the twelve tribes: seven portions north, five south, Jerusalem between.
- Christ — Israel will not fill those bounds until He sits on His own throne. Everything finds its fullest development under Him.
And the border from the sea shall be Hazar-enan, the border of Damascus, and the north northward, and the border of Hamath this is the north side.
This verse closes the northern border of the land. God's own hand draws the line, not Israel's armies — and the place-names raise a question. Is this real soil, and has Israel ever held ground this far north?
Hazar-enan is not a new name. The same corner appears in the boundary list Moses received centuries earlier. A Bible dictionary traces where it turns up and where it probably stands today:
The north-eastern boundary of the promised land, both in the past and in the future. Num. 34:9-10; Ezek. 47:17; Ezek. 48:1. Mr. Porter has identified it with Kuryetein, about sixty miles east-north-east of Damascus, where there are plentiful springs — which is what the name 'Enan' seems to imply.
Hamath sits at the top of that line. The city is still there today, and it keeps its place in the prophecy:
It is now called Hamah. The river Orontes runs through the city. The district appears in the future division of the land. Ezek. 47:16-17, 20; Ezek. 48:1; Amos 6:14; Zech. 9:2.
Set this border beside Israel's history and a gap opens up. The line takes in regions the nation never held:
Let us remember: this is what Israel has never yet received — the land according to the promise to Abraham... Their possessions were narrow, and through unbelief they limited themselves to that narrow strip. They never did hold the land of the Sidonians, which was promised to them, nor Mount Lebanon, which was part of it. Edom, Moab, Ammon and Philistia are all to belong to them, and never did. Though David's empire reached the Euphrates at one point, it was only over kings who paid tribute, and that land never was Israel's possession.
One commentator, writing on the earlier boundary list in Numbers, draws out both the failure and the promise that follows it:
The same hand that had guided their wanderings now fixes the borders of their home. Sadly, they never took the land the way God gave it. He gave them the whole land, and He gave it for ever. They took only a part, and only for a time. But thank God, the moment is coming when Abraham's descendants will enter the full and everlasting possession of that beautiful inheritance. For now they are shut out of it. The Lord will certainly accomplish all His promises. He will lead His people into all the blessings secured to them in the everlasting covenant — the covenant sealed by the blood of the Lamb.
The tribes had no claim of their own to this land. Joseph's sons have a dark history, and Reuben lost his birthright — yet each portion still stands:
God's counsels stand. Joseph must have his portion, whatever the dark history of his sons in the meantime. The claim of natural descent failed: Reuben forfeited his birthright. But the original gift of grace did not fail.
Some read these chapters as a picture of the church rather than a survey of land. The exact boundaries and the reshuffled tribal order argue against that:
Again Ezekiel gives the boundaries of the land they occupy, and its division among the various tribes. The land is not the small portion the Israelites of old took. It matches far more closely the large promise given to Abraham. The tribes are spread over this wider area in a way completely different from the division Joshua and his fellow surveyors made. What does all this mean if you apply it to the Church? Take it literally, as every spiritual Israelite must have taken it, and there is no difficulty at all. It simply fills in details of that blessed time when Israel, delivered from her enemies and restored to the Lord's favour, will enjoy under the Messiah's rule the promises made to Abraham and David that are still unfulfilled.
The order of the prophecy itself settles the timing:
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In Ezekiel the instructions for the temple follow the restoration of the twelve tribes and the destruction of the enemies who oppose them. Nothing like that happened when the exiles returned under Zerubbabel. Here too it is linked with dividing the whole land among the twelve tribes, so it must certainly be still future.
- Promised — Hazar-enan marks the north-eastern corner in Moses' day and in Ezekiel's. God names the same landmark twice, centuries apart.
- Measured — God's own hand draws the boundary, the hand that guided their wandering. He, not Israel, decides how far the inheritance reaches.
- Unclaimed — Israel never held all the ground inside this line. Sidon, Lebanon, Edom, Moab, Ammon and Philistia stayed outside her grasp.
- Guaranteed — the gift rests on grace, not on merit. Joseph still has his portion, and Reuben's forfeited birthright cannot cancel God's counsels.
- Future — the division follows the restoration of all twelve tribes and the ruin of their enemies. No past history matches that. Abraham's descendants will yet enter full and everlasting possession.
-- And on the east side ye shall measure between Hauran and Damascus, and Gilead and the land of Israel [by] the Jordan, from the border unto the east sea this is the east side.
Ezekiel is marking out the borders of Israel's future land, and here he traces the eastern edge. Two questions sit inside the verse: which sea is meant, and whether these borders describe real ground or a picture of something else.
One commentator answers the question of the sea by looking straight at the words of the verse.
To tell the honest truth, I do not know much about Ezekiel myself; the best thing is to look at it. In Ezekiel 47:18, it is just named: "And from the land of Israel by the Jordan, from the border to the east sea." The east sea is the Dead Sea.
He was also asked whether the land north of that sea belonged to Israel. His reply was short.
No. The east sea is the Dead Sea. What was north of the east sea was not Israel proper at all, except, perhaps, in the general sense of prophecy, that the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose, and so on.
Hauran is the first place named in the verse, and it marks the north-eastern corner of Israel's future land.
A province east of the Jordan. It was part of the ancient kingdom of Bashan and lay south of Damascus. The half tribe of Manasseh occupied it… It is a rich, fertile plain, but with little natural water supply… When Israel in a future day fully possess Palestine, their territory will reach on the north-east to the 'coast of Hauran.'
The rest of the chapter settles where each tribe will live. One commentator holds that only literal tribes in a literal land fit the words.
The rest of the chapter arranges Israel according to their future place in the land. Here Henderson has to come back to "the literal Canaan and the literal tribes" as the only reading that satisfies an unbiased interpreter. The counsels of God stand. Joseph must have his portion, whatever the dark history of his sons in the meantime. The title of natural descent failed, and Reuben forfeited his birthright; but the original gift of grace did not fail.
These borders do not match the map Joshua drew. They reach further out, and the tribes sit in new places.
Again Ezekiel gives the limits of the land and its division among the various tribes. The land is not the narrow portion the Israelites of old took. It matches far more closely the large promise given to Abraham. The tribes are spread over this enlarged area in a completely different way from the division Joshua and his fellow surveyors made. What meaning has all this when applied to the Church? Understand it literally, as every spiritual Israelite must have understood it, and it presents no difficulty at all. It simply gives details of that blessed time when Israel, delivered from her enemies and restored to Jehovah's favour, will enjoy under the Messiah's rule the promises made to Abraham and David that are still unfulfilled.
Here commentators differ. The verse names Gilead, east of the Jordan, yet one writer sees the future division stopping at the river.
In the millennial kingdom, the tribes will hold parallel strips of land running east from the Mediterranean Sea to the River Jordan… Jehovah does not include the land of Gilead and Bashan east of the Jordan, first held by the Reubenites, the Gadites, and half the tribe of Manasseh (Joshua 22). These tribes made a mistake at the start by settling outside the Holy Land too soon. That mistake will be put right when the millennial kingdom is set up.
Their choice cost them, but it is not the end of their story.
Three clear facts sum up their tribal history: they refused God's land; they went after other gods; Assyria carried them away. The first led straight to the second, and then came judgment… Sovereign grace will bring them back at the end. Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh will stand in their lot with the other tribes, and in equal numbers (Rev. 7), at least symbolically.
- Named — The eastern sea in this verse is the Dead Sea, not some distant gulf; land north of it was never Israel proper.
- Measured — The line starts at Hauran, a fertile plain east of the Jordan and south of Damascus. It marks how far north-east Israel's land will reach.
- Literal — Real borders and real tribes. Reading them as a picture of the Church empties the chapter of its plain sense.
- Enlarged — These limits run far wider than anything Israel held. They match the promise given to Abraham, not Joshua's map.
- Restored — Commentators differ on whether Gilead falls inside the final line. They agree on the end: grace brings back the tribes who settled short of God's land, and they receive their lot with the rest.
-- And the south side southward, from Tamar to the waters of Meribah-Kadesh, by the torrent, unto the great sea this is the south side southward.
Ezekiel's vision of the restored temple ends with God mapping the land His people will inherit. Verse 19 draws the southern line past the waters of strife — so why does God mark a future blessing with the memory of Israel's failure?
The chapter turns from the healing river to the surveyor's line. Commentators read the land and the tribes here as literal.
The rest of the chapter arranges Israel according to their future place in the land. Here Henderson has to come back to "the literal Canaan and the literal tribes." That is the only reading an unbiased interpreter can accept. The counsels of God stand.
The four sides Ezekiel lists are not new. They match the survey in Numbers, with two differences.
This final section starts with the boundaries of the land. They are much the same as those in Num. 34:1-15. The difference is that Numbers gives the southern boundary first, while here we begin with the north. In both cases the Jordan forms the eastern line. The two and a half tribes settling east of the river was a departure from the original plan. The final arrangement gives it no place: every tribe receives its inheritance west of the Jordan.
"Meribah" means strife. The southern border runs past the place where that name was earned.
It was one of the stopping places of the Israelites. They stayed there a long time, and from there the twelve spies were sent into the land. At the end of the thirty-eight years of wandering they came back to Kadesh, where Miriam died and was buried. It was here too that Moses struck the rock when the people complained about the lack of water. The water that came from the rock is called both the "water of MERIBAH," or "strife," and the "waters of strife in Kadesh." … Kadesh is known to lie in the far south of the land.
The line begins at Tamar. A name in Solomon's building list may point to the same town.
In 1 Kings 9:18 the Authorized Version calls a city Tadmor, but the Hebrew text reads TAMAR… Solomon also built this city in the wilderness, yet the text adds "in the land," while Tadmor lay outside it. The other towns named in that passage belong to the south of the land. So it is doubtless a different place, and may be the same as the Tamar of Ezek. 47:19; Ezek. 48:28.
The line ends at a watercourse. One Hebrew word rules out the Nile.
Num. 34:5-8 gives directions about the boundaries of the land the tribes were to hold then. In that passage a different word stands for "river" (nachal) in "river of Egypt." This word means "brook in a valley," and cannot refer to the Nile.
Others treat the identification as a detail that does not affect the point. One writer sets the two options side by side and moves on:
Finally, the stream of Egypt becomes the boundary to the sea, and on this we have no great interest in deciding whether the Wady el Arish is meant, as is commonly believed, or rather, as Poole argues, the Pelusiac branch of the Nile.
Israel never held all the land these lines enclose. The reason lies in the terms on which they entered it.
Even here, where God gives them the bounds of their inheritance, we find nothing like the full extent of the land promised them… At this time their bounds touched neither the Red Sea nor the Euphrates. The reason is plain. They were going into the land under a legal covenant, not brought in according to the fullness of divine grace, as they yet will be… Men taunt Israel now with how small the land is, barely the size of Wales. That smallness does not show what grace has assigned them as their portion. It shows only their inability to make good their title to it.
The borders are not the end of the survey. It also settles who will hold land inside them.
The evidence is complete on every side. What we read here is not the past and finished, but God's bright future for Israel in their land. Then the stranger will meet a welcome that is truly divine, and receive an inheritance in any tribe at all.
- Counsel — The land, the borders and the tribes are literal. God's purpose about them stands.
- Strife — The southern border runs through Kadesh, where Israel quarrelled and Moses struck the rock.
- Grace — Israel entered under a legal covenant and never held the full promise. Grace, not their failure, fixes their portion.
- Correction — God draws the survey of Numbers 34 again, and now every tribe sits west of the Jordan.
- Welcome — Inside these same borders the stranger receives an inheritance in whatever tribe he lives.
-- And the west side shall be the great sea from the border, as far as over against the entering into Hamath this is the west side.
Ezekiel's closing chapters map the land God will give Israel in a coming day, and this verse marks its western edge. That short border line raises two questions: which sea is meant, and has Israel ever held a land this size?
Commentators identify the Great Sea as the Mediterranean, and they name the water that closes the land on the other side:
As already mentioned, the west side is the Great Sea, the Mediterranean (47:20); and the Jordan and the East, or Dead, Sea form the east side.
Elsewhere Scripture calls the same coast by another name. Older translations of Deuteronomy 11:24 read "the uttermost sea," which the ESV renders "the western sea":
Deuteronomy 11:24 proves that "the uttermost sea" (the hinder sea) is the Mediterranean, the well-known western boundary of the land.
These two waters set the ends of every tribal portion in the map that follows. That map also decides who receives a portion and which land is left outside:
The close of the Book of Ezekiel describes a fresh division of the land among the twelve tribes of Israel (Ezek. 47:13 — 48:35). In the millennial kingdom, the tribal inheritances will lie in parallel strips of land. These strips run eastward from the Mediterranean Sea to the River Jordan. The whole land from north to south will consist of twelve belt-like portions. Near Jerusalem these portions are divided by Jehovah's portion, called the holy oblation or heave-offering. That portion will be for the prince, the priests and the Levites, with the sanctuary in the middle (Ezek. 48:8-22). In dividing the land among the tribes, Jehovah said, "Joseph shall have two portions" (Ezek. 47:13) — one for Manasseh and one for Ephraim. Levi is not counted with the twelve, but has his share in the sacred heave-offering, land devoted to Jehovah's service. The land of Gilead and Bashan east of the Jordan, first occupied by the Reubenites, the Gadites and half the tribe of Manasseh, is not included by Jehovah. These tribes made a mistake at the start by seeking a settlement outside the Holy Land too early. Their error will be put right when the millennial kingdom is established.
These borders match nothing in Israel's past. God promised this land long before Ezekiel, and Israel never took all of it:
Edom, Moab, Ammon, Philistia are all to belong to them, and never did. David's empire did reach the Euphrates at one point, but only over tributary kings. That land never became Israel's own.
The borders and the tribal layout here differ from anything Joshua measured out. So they do not fit the church, and read plainly they describe Israel's future:
Ezekiel gives the limits of the land occupied, and its division among the various tribes. The land is not the small portion that the Israelites of old took. It matches far more closely the large promise given to Abraham. The tribes are spread over this larger area in a way completely unlike the division made by Joshua and the men who measured the land with him. What meaning has all this when applied to the Church? Understand it literally… and it presents no difficulty at all. It simply gives details of that blessed time when Israel, rescued from her enemies and restored to Jehovah's favour, will enjoy under the Messiah's rule the promises to Abraham and David that are still unfulfilled.
A warning comes with that reading, because the other approach hands Israel's promises to the church:
Guard carefully against the fatal system wrongly called spiritualising. It works mainly by taking all the special blessings of the house of Israel and applying them to the professing church. To Israel it leaves only the curses of a broken law. We can be sure that God will not approve any such system. Israel is beloved for the fathers' sakes; and "the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable." Romans 11.
- Sea. On the west the Great Sea is the Mediterranean, also called the uttermost or hinder sea. The Jordan and the Dead Sea close the land on the east.
- Shape. From that coast the tribal portions run east as parallel belts. Near Jerusalem sits the holy portion for the prince, priests and Levites, with the sanctuary at its centre.
- Shortfall. Israel has never held land to these limits. God promised Sidon, Lebanon, Edom, Moab, Ammon and Philistia, and Israel never took them. David's reach to the Euphrates was tribute, not ownership.
- Straightforward. These measurements give a land larger than Joshua's, with a tribal layout unlike his. Read them as written, not as a picture of the church.
- Sure. God's promise to Abraham still stands, because He does not take back His gifts and His calling.