I will let people walk on you, even my people Israel. And they shall possess you, and you shall be their inheritance, and you shall no longer bereave them of children.
God tells Ezekiel to speak to a ruined countryside as if it could hear, and He promises that the land will carry His people again. Two questions follow: when does a promise like this come true, and how can ground stop robbing a nation of its children?
The Land Addressed
God speaks to the hills before He speaks to the people. One writer notes the turn the prophecy takes, right after a judgement on Israel's old enemy Edom:
William KellyAfter the judgement on Mount Seir, Jehovah now speaks to the mountains of Israel as though they were persons. He declares the comfort stored up for them, whatever the proud spite of the Edomite may have said against them.
The Promise Of Return
Verse 12 sits inside a block of promises about the land filling up again. One writer maps the chapter and names the force behind it:
Arno Clemens GaebeleinThe promised return to the land comes in verses 8-15. The mountains of Israel, barren so long, shall be inhabited again... The characteristic words in verses 23-28 are the words "I will do." It is the word of sovereign grace. Eighteen times Jehovah says what He will do. They are the "I wills" of Israel's hope and coming glory.
Possession And Inheritance
Israel receives the land as an inheritance, yet the land never stops being God's own property. One writer holds both together:
C. H. MackintoshJehovah has said concerning Palestine, "The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine" (Lev. 25:23). So no one will ever finally own that land but Jehovah Himself. He will inherit it through the seed of Abraham. One plain passage of Scripture is quite enough to settle the mind about this or any other subject. The land of Canaan is for the seed of Abraham, and the seed of Abraham for the land of Canaan. No power of earth or hell can ever reverse this divine order.
Even in a future restoration, Scripture keeps the same title for the land:
Morrish Bible DictionaryThe land of promise is constantly spoken of as the inheritance of Israel: the land flowing with milk and honey was given to them by God... So when Israel returns to take possession of the land in a future day, it is still called their inheritance.
A Reproach Removed
The verse's last promise answers an old slander. Moses once sent twelve men to scout Canaan, and ten came back saying the country killed those who lived in it. One writer links that report to this promise:
W. T. P. WolstonYou remember that when the spies went up to the land (Num. 13:31-33), all of them except Joshua and Caleb said it was "a land that devours its inhabitants" — so barren that people could not live on it. You see that is exactly what Palestine is now. Many cannot live there, because the early and the later rain have not yet come. Until they do, the land cannot feed the people. But the Scripture says, "I will give the rain for your land in its season, the early rain and the later rain" (Deut. 11:14). It will yet bring forth abundantly, for the curse will be removed, and Jesus will be there.
Not Yet Fulfilled
Many people say the small group who came home from exile in Babylon fulfilled all this. One writer tests that claim against the chapter itself:
William KellyIt is useless to apply such glowing words to the return from Babylon. That return was only a foretaste of what is coming for the whole people. Can anyone who respects Scripture and knows the facts pretend that the Lord multiplied men on the mountains of Israel, "all the house of Israel, even all of it"? (v. 10) Such words seem written on purpose to guard souls from such thin and misleading views... Did the land, did the mountains, become Israel's inheritance and bereave them no more? (v. 12) Do we not know that under the fourth empire a still worse destruction came and a longer dispersion?
A People Made New
The chapter does not stop at soil and harvests. One writer points to the inward change promised later in the chapter, the change Jesus spoke of to the teacher Nicodemus:
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W. T. P. WolstonEzekiel 36:24-29 describe their spiritual regeneration, referred to by the Lord when speaking to Nicodemus. The Jew must be born anew to enter God's kingdom on its earthly side, just as today the Christian is born again to share its joys on the heavenly side.
Summary
- Ground — God speaks to the mountains as persons. He comforts a countryside that has taken the enemy's scorn.
- Gift — Israel receives the land by grace, not by achievement. The chapter's repeated "I will" carries the whole promise.
- Grant — The land stays God's own. He inherits it through Abraham's descendants, and no power can undo that order.
- Gone — The old slander that the land devours its people ends. Rain returns, the curse lifts, and the ground feeds those who live on it.
- Glory — The return from Babylon did not fulfil this. God will first make the people new inside, and the full blessing is still ahead.