And the people said to me, “Will you not tell us what these things mean for us, that you are acting thus?”
Ezekiel buried his wife and shed no tear. The people watching asked him what it meant for them, and his answer named what God was about to take.
A silence that demanded an answer
Public grief in Israel was loud and organised. A man who buried his wife in silence was doing something no one could ignore.
Numerical Bible NotesLoud mourning was the custom in such cases — they even hired mourners. Against that, this silent conduct calls for explanation.
God had used Ezekiel's actions this way before. The strangeness itself was meant to make people ask.
Numerical Bible NotesAll this, of course, was not a vision but real. It was meant to raise questions in those who saw these puzzling actions and would ask what they meant.
The answer: the sanctuary profaned
Ezekiel's answer was not about his wife at all. It told the people what God Himself was about to do to them.
William KellyThe prophet's fresh act is explained. God would teach the people about a trouble like no other. It would leave no room for tears or ordinary mourning. The destruction now beginning was so sweeping that nothing would remain for them but wasting away in their sins and groaning to one another. The Lord Himself was profaning the sanctuary by judgment, as they had profaned it by their sins. What a picture of despair, when sorrow lies too deep for tears, and an overwhelming sense of guilt forces people to give up hope!
Why this loss was greater than all others
God did not forbid Ezekiel to grieve. He forbade him to show it. What was coming on Jerusalem would silence mourning altogether.
Numerical Bible NotesJerusalem is gone in judgment — the city gone, and the sanctuary with it. The nation as a whole needed that sanctuary, for it was the only place where the blood of sacrifice could be offered to God. So the destruction of the sanctuary was the end of all relationship. What could remain between a holy God and a people for whose sins no atonement could be made? For the people, this disaster was so overwhelming that every other loss might well seem small. The voice of lamentation itself was hushed in this silence of despair… It is not that grief is forbidden, but the expression of it.
What the people could not yet feel
The people asked what the sign meant for them. Even the answer did not bring out its full meaning.
Numerical Bible NotesYet, after all, they cannot feel these things as God accounts them. The disaster might overwhelm them, but they were to waste away in sins still unrepented of. This is why, it seems, the full meaning of what Ezekiel is called to do does not come out. The loss of their sons and daughters, hard as it is, cannot match the breaking of the marriage bond that Ezekiel suffers under. For that, we have to think of the sanctuary itself gone. The sanctuary was the pledge and seal of that bond. It spoke of the Lord's presence with them and gave the people access to Himself. When that bond breaks, that loss might well swallow up all the rest.
The prophet himself is the sign
This sign was not the first. God had asked Ezekiel for costly, public obedience again and again.
Arno Clemens GaebeleinGod commanded this great prophet to do certain things in front of the people. They were living in deception after listening to the false prophets… he had to shave his head and beard (5:1); to carry a captive's baggage (12:3-7); when his wife died, he was not to mourn (24:15-20); and again he lost his speech (24:27). Chapter 24:24 is the key to all this.
The cost to the man
Behind the sign stands a husband who loved his wife and felt her loss.
W. T. P. WolstonHe had all the human sympathies and affections. The beautiful touch of tenderness that opens the account makes that clear. But he puts himself entirely under the will of the Lord, and sinks the interests of his own life in the work of his prophetic office.
Summary
- Question. Ezekiel's tearless silence broke every custom of public mourning. It was meant to make people ask what it meant for them.
- Answer. God was about to profane His own sanctuary and take their sons and daughters. The blow would leave no room for tears or ordinary mourning.
- Loss. The sanctuary gone meant the place of sacrifice gone. With it went the whole relationship between a holy God and a people whose sins no atonement could cover.
- Depth. Losing children was severe. The broken marriage bond points deeper still: to the bond with God that the sanctuary sealed.
- Sign. Ezekiel's whole life of strange obedience finds its key here. The man himself became the message, feeling the loss yet holding his sorrow under God's will.