Thus saith the Lord Jehovah Smite with thy hand, and stamp with thy foot, and say, Alas for all the abominations of the iniquities of the house of Israel! for they shall fall by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence.
God tells Ezekiel to preach with his body: clap, stamp, and cry out over what Israel has done. Two questions follow. What had Israel done? And what was God doing in sending sword, famine and pestilence?
One writer sees the action itself as marking a judgment already certain:
Once again Ezekiel must mark, by a striking action, God's certain judgment on Israel's abominations. Their own land would become more waste and desolate than the desert, everywhere they lived.
Other prophets acted in the same physical way. One writer links it to how God was dealing with people then:
The Old Testament prophets were, as far as we can discover, men of natural fervency and eloquence. reason: very hard sentences, passives, jargon, redundant tail
The cry is over specific sins, not sin in general. Earlier in the chapter God addresses the mountains, and a commentator explains what had been set up there and whom it insulted:
But what had Israel done? They had turned these very mountains into nothing but heathen altars. With them they insulted their gracious Protector, the Source of all their blessing. On the tops of those mountains stood the idolatrous altars, plain for everyone to see. They were now the sad witnesses that Israel had departed from Jehovah, their covenant God. That very name declared what He was to them, and it was the name they insulted. Judgment must therefore bring them to recognise Him as the Jehovah that He was. So they would learn by experience — as bitter as God would have made it sweet to them — that He was Jehovah indeed.
The verse names three ways of dying. The same writer sees no escape left for the mass of the people:
But for the mass of the people, no judgment could do any good. Nothing less than emptying the land of the living could now meet the case. It would be left a mere burial ground of their countless dead, foul with unburied corpses, and made desolate — "more desolate than the wilderness towards Diblath." That last word is disputed, but it probably means "fertility." Fertility is what Jehovah's land should have been in every way. Now it was to be a complete desolation.
The prophet is not told to gloat. Writing on Jeremiah, one commentator finds the same mix — zeal against the evil, affection for the people:
He relates their hopeless evil, and the unfeigned grief of the prophet at their stubbornness. Compare Luke 19:41. This zeal for Jehovah's glory against the evil and against the people who dishonoured Him, together with touching affection for them as Jehovah's people, is everywhere a striking mark of the working of the Spirit of Christ.
Another writer turns that same tone into a test of how we warn people today:
As faithful witnesses for God, it is our duty to warn an evil world of the judgement appointed (woe to us if we neglect to sound the warning!) — but how do we do it? Is it in the stern spirit of denunciation, or is it with trembling lips and compassionate hearts? Are we forgetting that but for the infinite grace of God and the costly sacrifice of the Lord Jesus, we should ourselves be in the lake of fire?
Judgment is not God's last word for the nation. One commentator explains why God left a remnant alive:
Yet a remnant is to be left, to be His witness. On the one hand they witness to the grace in which He would at last, for His own sake, fulfil His promises — "a remnant," as the apostle says, "according to the election of grace." On the other hand they are a remnant who must witness, in sorrow and brokenness of spirit, the judgment that had come because of the abominations practised. From that judgment grace alone could spare anyone.
- Sin. Israel turned the very mountains into heathen altars, insulting the God who protected them and gave them everything.
- Sign. Clapping and stamping were prophecy in action. They marked God's judgment on those abominations as certain.
- Sentence. Sword, famine and pestilence left no escape for the mass. Judgment would empty the land and leave it more desolate than the wilderness.
- Sorrow. "Alas" holds grief and zeal together. Warning given with trembling lips, not with denunciation, is the mark of the Spirit of Christ.
- Survivors. Grace still reserved a remnant — kept to witness both the judgment and the promises God would fulfil for His own sake.
He that is far off shall die of the pestilence; and he that is near shall fall by the sword; and he that is left, and is besieged, shall die by the famine and I will accomplish my fury upon them.
The three deaths named here are not options a person could pick between. They cover the map, so fleeing the city only trades one instrument for another. Even the one who is left alive still dies, by famine; being spared the sword is no escape. One writer sets the verse in the wider chapter, where mercy is still at work:
Ezekiel 6 shows that this judgment would fall not only on Jerusalem. It would also fall on all the high places of the mountains of Israel, notorious for their idols, and on the valleys and rivers. They would know that the LORD had not "said in vain that I would do this evil to them." Those far off would die of pestilence, and those nearby would fall by the sword. Yet mercy would spare a remnant.
Why could no place save them? The answer lies in what they had trusted for cover:
Chapter 6 shows that God takes account of every scene of their idolatrous evil throughout the land, though we have seen that Jerusalem was the worst of all… So the LORD would wake up the sword to destroy Israel throughout the land. They had abandoned Him for foreign gods. Those gods could not shield them from destruction; they only exposed them to it.
The verse ends with God carrying His fury through to the finish. Nothing partial would meet the case now:
But for the mass, no judgment could help… Nothing but a complete emptying of the land of the living could now be enough. The land would become a mere tomb of their many dead. They were scattered among the nations, and wherever they lived they were at last to know, beyond all doubt, that their God was the LORD.
"I am the LORD" is the line Ezekiel returns to again and again, and it is the note this passage is driving toward. One writer reads the whole refrain as being about God's rule over the earth being made visible — and he insists that holiness is not its only content:
The same chapter that closes every exit also promises survivors. They do not survive by merit, and their survival is not comfortable:
Yet a remnant is to be left, to be His witness. On one side it witnesses to the grace in which He would, for His own sake, at last fulfil His promises — "a remnant," as the apostle says, "according to the election of grace." On the other side, this remnant must see in sorrow and brokenness of spirit the judgment which had come in because of the abominations practised. From that judgment, grace alone could exempt anyone.
- Cause — idols. God took account of idolatrous evil across the whole land, not Jerusalem only. The false gods could not shield anyone; they only exposed them.
- Sentence — threefold. Pestilence for the far off, the sword for the near, famine for the one who is left. The three cover every position a person could hold.
- Reach — total. For the mass, no lesser dealing could help; only a complete emptying of the land would now be enough.
- Purpose — "I am the LORD." This refrain runs through Ezekiel. It shows God's government on earth, displaying His true character in grace as well as in holiness.
- Result — a remnant. Survivors remain, kept by grace alone. They bear witness in brokenness both to the judgment and to the promises God will yet fulfil for His own sake.