EZECHIA

EZECHIAH. — 1. King of Judah (Heb. Hiszajjáh [ú], Gr. 'Ezekias, Akkadian Haszajjáh) from 718 to 689 B.C. Upon ascending the throne at the age of fifty, succeeding his father Ahaz, he initially adhered to the policy of subjection to Assyria followed by his predecessor, while secretly supporting the prophetic circles, of which Isaiah was the leading figure, who championed both nationalist and monotheistic ideals. As soon as he was able, he implemented a religious reform to restore the people to pure Yahwism, for which he is praised in biblical history as the most upright of the Davidic monarchs (2 Kings 18:3, 5).

He abolished idolatrous cults, even those established within the Temple itself, and with some success sought to reclaim the remaining Samaritans for nationalism and Yahwism. He also oversaw the collection of Israel’s spiritual and literary heritage through a special commission (Prov. 25:1). Meanwhile, he strove to improve the state’s finances (2 Kings 20:13), made some military preparations (armaments and fortifications), and renewed the water supply systems of Jerusalem, including the construction of a tunnel to bring water into the city (a work commemorated in an inscription found in the tunnel in 1880; V. SILOAM). Meanwhile, developments abroad fully matured the relationship with Assyria. He did not participate in the anti-Assyrian revolt of 711, quickly suppressed by Sargon; however, on that occasion, he demonstrated his loyalty by paying a heavier tribute. In 704, the Babylonian agitator Merodach-baladan, under the pretext of congratulating Hezekiah on his recovery from a severe illness—considered miraculous (Isa. 38:5)—sent a delegation to Jerusalem to conclude a military alliance. Hezekiah also negotiated with Ethiopia (Isa. 18:1) and Egypt (ibid., 30:1 ff.). In 703, the revolt took place, which the new Assyrian king Sennacherib easily crushed.

Judah was attacked last: the Assyrian invaded the kingdom, deported many inhabitants, and laid siege to Jerusalem, as recorded in Assyrian documents themselves (H. Gressmann, *Altorientalische Texte*, 2nd ed., Berlin-Leipzig 1926, p. 353). What these documents do not recount, but is recorded in the Bible (confirmed by Herodotus, II, 141), is the end of the invasion: while Sennacherib, after failing to negotiate with the besieged Hezekiah, prepared to return to Assyria, where a revolt had broken out, one night the angel of the Lord—perhaps through an epiphany—killed 185,000 of his soldiers in the camp (2 Kings 19:9-37).

After the invasion, for about a decade he continued to govern victoriously, devoting himself to the reconstruction of the kingdom, which became one of the most flourishing in Western Asia.

2. Name of various Jews who lived after the exile (1 Chron. 3:23; Neh. 7:2; 10:18; in the Heb. form Yebizjáh: 1 Chron. 28:12; Ezra 2:16. Giovanni Rinaldi)

EZEKIEL (Heb. Yebezgél, “God strengthens” or “God fortifies”). — The third great writing prophet, called among the exiles in Babylon during the turbulent period when the new Israel was being prepared.

Outline:

I. Time and Setting

II. Prophetic Activity and Doctrine

III. The Book

IV. Archaeology

V. Iconography

I. Time and Setting

They were settled, for the most part, along the great canal (Nar-Kabari), which, leaving the Euphrates near Babylon, ran southeast, passing through Nippur before rejoining the river. They were employed in agricultural work (cf. the names Tel ‘Abib, “mound of the ears of grain,” in Ezek. 3:15; Tel-Havṣa’, “mound of the plow,” in Ezra 2:59, etc.), but enjoyed considerable autonomy. They formed colonies in which the elders retained some authority (Ezek. 8:1; 14:1; 20:1). Jeremiah’s counsel to build houses and plant gardens (Jer. 29) and the prosperity of the exiles at the time of the return demonstrate that they were permitted to improve their conditions and become property owners and wealthy. Ezekiel himself had his own house (Ezek. 3:24-25; 8:1). Yet the tranquility of their surroundings contrasted with the profound turmoil of their hearts. The deportees hoped for Jerusalem’s revenge against Babylon and an immediate return. The exaggerated confidence in Egypt played a part in this dream, but above all, their animistic ideal of God and worship was at stake. Yahweh could not allow Jerusalem to suffer the fate of Samaria (721 B.C.) and Nineveh (612 B.C.), for with it would fall His worship and even His name. Hence the superstitious trust in the Temple: Yahweh might permit temporary punishment, but He could never allow His dominion to be conquered by Marduk. For His prestige’s sake, He had to punish the Chaldeans who had laid sacrilegious hands on the sanctuary’s furnishings; yet the destruction of Jerusalem would have broken the Sinai covenant—all the promises God had sworn to Abraham, the patriarchs, and David would have been rendered void. Moreover, by the law of solidarity, the merits of the righteous should have saved the nation from punishment; divine justice could not destroy it when, from Abraham onward and down to their generation (Ezek. 9:4), all and so many Jews had loved the Lord and revered Him as no other people could. False prophets and chauvinistic priests fostered these erroneous ideas (Jer. 29:31-32; Ezek. 13). Thus, the deportees gave no thought to reforming their depraved customs; indeed, they believed they had already atoned enough by enduring the exile and expected Yahweh to reward them with an immediate, triumphant return. They expected salvation from Judea.

When, in 587 B.C., after a siege of about eighteen months during which Pharaoh, moved to aid Jerusalem, was defeated (Ezek. 30:21-22), the city was taken, plundered, and burned, harsh reality shattered their fond illusions, shaking their religious ideas and threatening to drive them to adopt the worship of Marduk-Bel, who appeared more powerful than their God. This temptation was already strong far from Judea and the Temple, near the great Chaldean cities, where they witnessed the ziggurats and the varied and confused cults. God’s merciful plan to purify Israel from idolatry and other grave sins through the sufferings and humiliations of exile (Lev. 26; Deut. 28) would thus have failed. To avert this danger, to prepare the exiles for the great disaster of 587, to prevent them—unlike the deportees of the kingdom of Samaria (721)—from being absorbed into the sea of nations and disappearing forever, and to prepare them for conversion and make of them the new Israel, the promised land, the Lord chose from among the exiles themselves, as His spokesman, Ezekiel. In a sublime vision reminiscent of Isa. 6, this priest, son of Buzi (Ezek. 1:3), in 593 B.C. along the banks of the great canal, received from God the mission of “watchman for the house of Israel” (Ezek. 3:17). He exercised his long ministry (about twenty-two years) at Tel-Abib. The last dated prophecy (Ezek. 29:17) brings us to April 571 B.C. It is unlikely that he lived until 561, the year of Jehoiachin’s release, of whom he makes no mention. Unlike Jeremiah, Ezekiel had a wife, whom he lost in the ninth year of the exile (Ezek. 24:1, 16-18). According to an ancient tradition, Ezekiel was killed by a leader of the people whom he had reproved for idolatry (PG 25, 160; 43, 40; PL 83, 143).

II. PROPHETIC ACTIVITY AND DOCTRINE

He will completely destroy Israel; Jahweh replies that the remnant He will bless, and which will form the Israel of tomorrow, are precisely the exiles of 597. Judah and Jerusalem are doomed to ruin; salvation will come only from the exiles who will convert. Jahweh therefore abandons Jerusalem; Ezekiel recounts all this to the bystanders (chs. 8–11). But the restoration promised for the future does not please the rebels, who dream of a material, immediate revenge; thus they mock the announcements of misfortune that fade with time, and the promises made for distant epochs (12:21–26). Ezekiel insists on the imminence of punishment and the certain fulfillment of God’s word. He vividly announces the fate that will befall Zedekiah, his flight, capture, blinding, and deportation to Babylon (12:1–16), as he will later describe the advance of Nebuchadnezzar and the attack on Jerusalem (chs. 21). To the false prophets and pseudo-prophetesses, who according to Ezekiel venally foster the illusions of the exiles, he announces death and exclusion from the new theocracy (chs. 13). Nor can the merits of the just be invoked; it would be convenient to use them as a smoke-screen to persist tranquilly in impiety. There is indeed solidarity in reward, but the same principle applies also to punishment. Now the iniquity in Jerusalem is at its height; for the sake of His justice, Jahweh can no longer delay punishment. His own holiness is at stake in the eyes of the nations. The just, this time, can save only themselves (chs. 14).

A dominant concept in Ezekiel is the crisis of the Sinai covenant (chs. 15, 16, 20, 22, 23). The moral alliance was a free choice on God’s part of the people of Israel as His peculiar portion, based on divine mercy on the one hand and observance of moral precepts on the other. Consequently, Jahweh defends Israel, bestows every good upon it, provided Israel remains faithful to Him, shuns idolatry, and practices justice. Since Israel has instead always acted against the covenant, God, in His dignity as an offended and betrayed spouse and in His very holiness, must punish II. Since Israel is more guilty than Samaria and Sodom, Jahweh must punish it at least as severely as He punished those two cities (chs. 23). Israel was chosen to keep alive the idea of the true God among the nations; by failing in its mission, it no longer has any right to exist (chs. 15). The breaking, at least externally, of the covenant will, however, be only temporary. God punishes Israel so that it may repent (16:35–63; 20:1–38). Ezekiel thus illustrates better than any other prophet the central idea of the economy of the Old Testament: collective solidarity. Even the house of David will be punished; it will be exiled (chs. 17, 19). Yet, notwithstanding His threats, Jahweh will raise up from it the Messiah. Nor should it be said (chs. 18) that, since collective punishment is inevitable, conversion is useless. “What’s the point,” the exiles ask, “of doing penance when we must remain in exile anyway, helplessly witnessing the definitive triumph of the Chaldeans? Having already expired, with the deportation nearly six years ago, we see that God makes us pay, in addition, for the sins of our fathers.” And they cry out against injustice. It is not the principle of solidarity that they reject, but its partial application. Ezekiel’s response condemns such blasphemy against the justice of God. The collective penalty does not concern them; therefore, whether they convert or not, it will take place just the same. But this does not mean they can continue impunely in impiety and sin. Besides collective justice, with reward and punishment for the entire nation, there is an individual justice, which they conveniently forget. There is a strictly personal responsibility that places each one face to face with God, who strikes each wicked person with an equally terrible punishment: temporal and eternal death; just as He rewards each just person. Nothing escapes the Lord, who has absolute dominion over every mortal. Wrongly, then, do the exiles play with the principle of solidarity, while overlooking the state of their own consciences. Ezekiel, whether they like it or not, calls them back to the straight and narrow moral path; they must settle their accounts directly with God, each one separately and personally. And it is not these accounts that do not add up: they are the wicked, as is also demonstrated by their opposition to his voice. Jahweh already shows such great mercy in waiting for them to convert. They believe they have already atoned enough, while they remain in rebellion and vice; but whoever does not convert will be struck by divine justice and annihilated. Conversion is the only means offered them to escape death and share in the future restoration.

Ezekiel will continue to speak of the principle of collective solidarity, as in ch. 16 and in chs. 20, 22, 23, 36, 37. On the very day that Nebuchadnezzar begins the siege of Jerusalem (588), Ezekiel announces it to the exiles; then he falls silent: for him, events will speak (chs. 24). Here ends the first part of his mission. In it, he combats the errors and illusions of his fellow exiles. He goes against the current; he meets with contempt and hostility. His preaching is often limited to those who come to visit him at home (3:24–25; 8:1; 14:1); yet it reaches and spreads among all the others. It is necessary, in fact, that all—whether hesitant or openly hostile—hate the words of Jahweh, so that when they are fulfilled they may come to their senses and finally recognize that they were true, and thus make amends and begin a new life (2:5; 12:2): cf. the formula often used: “Then they shall know that I am the Lord” (6:7, 13; etc.). The miracle of prophecy must awaken these hardened hearts. Only those who forget this purpose of Ezekiel’s prophecies will be surprised that he, until 587, so often inveighed against the sins of the Jews who remained in the homeland and against the destruction of Jerusalem (Tondelli), or worse, will dream of a Palestinian minister of our prophet (Bertholet). Five months after the destruction of Jerusalem, a survivor brings the news to Ezekiel (33:21), who begins the second part of his mission. He now preaches openly (33:21 ff.), consoles, preventing the people from despairing, and works deeply for their conversion. The dispositions of minds, in general, have changed. The prophecies, fulfilled down to the last detail, cause the exiles to recognize their illusions and their wrongs. Ezekiel now appears to them as a true prophet. The details of his long activity (587–571) are unknown, because the book offers only a selection of the most significant oracles of this second period. Having reiterated the necessity of conversion (chs. 33), Ezekiel announces the new theocracy, which will later be absorbed into the Messianic Kingdom (chs. 34). The restoration is certain because Jahweh will accomplish it for His glory, to demonstrate to the nations His power; He will sanctify the exiles, to show the world His holiness (36:16–38). The symbolic vision of the bones, which at God’s command are clothed with flesh and return to life (chs. 37), vividly confirms this certainty. The theocracy is now predicted to live in peace on the hills of Palestine: powerful enemies will arise, who in a supreme effort will seek to destroy II. But Jahweh will annihilate them (chs. 38–39). The organization of reconstituted Israel is described, in an ideal and symbolic way, in chs. 40–43. In these chapters, stress is laid on the spirit that will animate the new theocracy: full and filial observance of the essence of the Sinai covenant; veneration of the one God, which must permeate worship and all manifestations of social and individual life. Those who have wished to find in these chapters not the prophet but the architect and legislator have encountered insurmountable difficulties. Perhaps in Baruch (1–3:8), one can already see the fruits of Ezekiel’s prophetic work.

Ezekiel’s characteristics, as regards form, are the visions described in minute detail and the frequent symbolic actions, sometimes complex and strange. The visions are presented as real and objective, and there is no reason to interpret them otherwise; they correspond to the data of the Babylonian environment, while at the same time repeating and developing the traditional elements of the sacred books. They occur in the prophet’s internal senses and are joined to intellectual revelations. The symbolic actions were actually performed, as is generally admitted today. Jeremiah approaches Ezekiel in terms of visions (1:11ff.; 13–16; etc.) and symbolic actions (13:1–11; 18:1–12; etc.). Some symbolic actions—voluntary seclusion (3:25), muteness (3:26f.), immobility (4:4–8), and certain expressions (e.g., “I fell on my face” 1:2; etc.)—have led Klostermann to advance the thesis of Ezekiel’s epilepsy, embraced by several critics (Kraetzschmar, Bertholet, etc.). The incongruity of the arguments adopted renders any refutation unnecessary.

III. The Book

The book, almost always, unlike those of Jeremiah, follows the unfolding of Ezekiel’s activity and is entirely his work. The only exception to the chronological order is the oracles against the nations. To this unity of structure and composition must be added that of style: the same stereotyped inflections and expressions recur throughout the book. Yet it would be an exaggeration to hold, with Cornill or Lajčikà, that everything is in order, in the whole as in the details, “from the first to the last syllable.”

Though so homogeneous, the book of Ezekiel occasionally reveals some corrections and additions, extending only to particular and brief excursuses (Rothstein, Heinisch, Herrmann = Cooke). Thus we may disregard the thesis of Hölscher, based on a subjective aesthetic criterion, which assigns to Ezekiel only the passages of high poetry (about 170 verses in all), as Duhm does for Jeremiah; and that of Torrey (1930), who attributes everything to a redaction of 230 B.C., on the testimony of the Talmud: “The men of the Great Synagogue will increase the book of Ezekiel” (Báthá’ Báthrá’). But this assertion, which conflates Ezekiel with all the Minor Prophets, must be rejected and corrected, understanding it as referring simply to transcription. More widely accepted was the hypothesis of two recensions, advanced by Kraetzschmar and given particular emphasis by Bertholet (1936), based on the so-called doublets: often in Ezekiel similar thoughts are repeated with slightly different wording; it was deduced that these were parallel texts from different forms, combined by a third hand. But this deduction is arbitrary: the repetitions, acknowledged by all critics from Cornill to Cooke, are to be attributed to the prophet’s characteristic style, or sometimes to textual correction. Ezekiel lingers over the exposition of an idea, returning to it and illustrating it from various aspects; not allowing any detail to escape him, he states an idea in general terms, then analyzes its aspects one by one, defining it ever more precisely, and finally synthesizes what he has analyzed. This manner of composition is evident where recourse has not been made to the hypothesis of recensions (cf. 1:4–2:1; 4–5; etc.). Repetitions were therefore inevitable, especially since the book lacks the work of refinement, as St. Jerome well observed: “The style of the book of Ezekiel is neither sufficiently elegant nor altogether rustic, but tempered from both modes.” Yet, given the progression of ideas, they cannot even be called repetitions. If we admit that Ezekiel himself finally edited his book toward the end of his life (c. 570), using his own writings or earlier collections reflecting the activity of many years, we can fully explain these frequent returns to the same ideas.

The book of Ezekiel, written almost exclusively in prose, has a predominantly didactic character: it aims to instruct. The insistence with which the same subject is treated produces a certain monotony. Yet there are pages of sublime poetry with splendid imagery (chs. 15, 17, 19, 21, 26–28): the allegory of the ship (ch. 27) may be compared to the finest pages of Isaiah. Unfortunately, it is difficult to fix the rhythm because of the corruption and uncertainty of the text.

The language is strongly influenced by Aramaic; the academic vocabulary is also notable. The Masoretic Hebrew text is particularly correct, and for its critical reconstruction recourse is had to the Septuagint. Yet from Cornill onward the Masoretic text was too much devalued, with preference given to the Greek version, as in the Biblia Hebraica of R. Kittel (24th ed.) by Rothstein. Bewer was the first to oppose this devaluation; and in the same Biblia Hebraica (35th ed.) he restores the Masoretic text to the place it deserves. The Septuagint version appears indeed mediocre, omitting passages it does not understand, or paraphrasing them in a way discordant with the context. The papyri of the Scheide Collection, published by Johnson, have confirmed the position of more recent criticism; from them it also emerges that the Greek translator was unique.

Francesco Spadafora

IV. Archeologia

scuta quale simbolo della resurrezione dei corpi: nostram filum restituem clare demonstri. La scena non è mai stata riprodotta nella pittura cimiteriale e neanche nei musici basilicali. Nel sec. IV si incontra soltanto su un numero limitatissimo di sarcofagi e su un vetro dorato. Sui sarcofagi gli artisti hanno rappresentato il momento in cui il profeta con la verga tatuatura richiama in vita i defunti: accanto ad un corpo disteso in terra se ne vede in genere un altro già in piedi, mentre un terzo, grazie allo spirito vivificatore, sta per alzarsi; di altri cadaveri si scorge solo la testa che sembra emergere dalla terra. Tale scena si vede, p. es., in un sarcofago della cattedrale di Gerona e su quattro ora conservati nel Museo del Laterano. Più realistica è la scena figurata, insieme con molte altre tratte dal Vecchio dal Nuovo Testamento, sopra un vetro dorato riavvenuto nel 1866 a Colonia: E. è presso un albero con bachetta diretta verso un luogo dove trovarsi sparsa due mani, due gambe, due piedi e una testa: le ossa arida che stanno per riamarsi.

Ad uno spirito pure realistico si informa una miniatura del manoscritto greco n. 510 della Biblioteca Nazionale di Parigi della fine del sec. IX. Vi si vede il profeta che, condotto dall'angelo Gabriele in un campo coperto di ossa, parla con Dio raffigurato in alto per mezzo d'una mano luminosa sporgente dalle nubi sotto cui sono scritte le parole: "Eis diegoua" e "Eis gogoua".

Il von Dobschutz ha riconosciuto la rappresentazione della visione di E. anche in una tavoletta eburnea bizantina del sec. IX, ora conservata nel Museo britannico.