a son (as a builder of the family name) · noun, common masculine singular construct
man
אָדָם֙'a.Dam
H120
ruddy i.e. a human being (an individual or the species · noun, common masculine singular absolute
take
קַחkach-
H3947
to take (in the widest variety of applications) · verb, qal imperative, 2nd person masculine singular
tile
לְבֵנָ֔הle.ve.Nah
H3843
a brick (from the whiteness of the clay) · noun, common feminine singular absolute
lay
וְנָתַתָּ֥הve.na.ta.Tah
H5414
to give · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
before
לְפָנֶ֑יךָle.fa.Nei.kha
H6440
the face (as the part that turns) · preposition + noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person masculine singular
pourtray
וְחַקּוֹתָ֥ve.cha.ko.Ta
H2710
properly · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
city
עִ֖יר'ir
H5892
a city (a place guarded by waking or a watch) in the wi… · noun, common feminine singular absolute
Jerusalem
יְרוּשָׁלִָֽםye.ru.sha.Lim
H3389
Jerushalaim or Jerushalem · proper noun, a place name
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Hosea 1:2-9 The beginning of the word of the LORD by Hosea. And the LORD said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms…
1 Samuel 15:27-28 And as Samuel turned about to go away, he laid hold upon the skirt of his mantle, and it rent.
1 Kings 11:30-31 And Ahijah caught the new garment that was on him, and rent it in twelve pieces:
Isaiah 20:2-4 At the same time spake the LORD by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, Go and loose the sackcloth from off thy loins, and put off thy shoe from…
Jeremiah 6:6 For thus hath the LORD of hosts said, Hew ye down trees, and cast a mount against Jerusalem: this is the city to be visited; she is wholly o…
Jeremiah 13:1-14 Thus saith the LORD unto me, Go and get thee a linen girdle, and put it upon thy loins, and put it not in water.
Jeremiah 18:2-12 Arise, and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will cause thee to hear my words.
Jeremiah 19:1-15 Thus saith the LORD, Go and get a potter’s earthen bottle, and take of the ancients of the people, and of the ancients of the priests;
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Ezekiel 4:1-8
The prophet is here ordered to represent to himself and others by signs which would be proper and powerful to strike the fancy and to affect the mind, the siege of Jerusalem; and this amounted to a prediction.
I. He was ordered to engrave a draught of Jerusalem upon a tile, Eze 4:1. It was Jerusalem's honour that while she kept her integrity God had graven her upon the palms of his hands (Isa 49:16), and the names of the tribes were engraven in precious stones on the breast-plate of the high priest; but, now that the faithful city has become a harlot, a worthless brittle tile or brick is thought good enough to portray it upon. This the prophet must lay before him, that the eye may affect the…
Take thee a tile - A tile, such as we use in covering houses, will give us but a very inadequate notion of those used anciently; and also appear very insufficient for the figures which the prophet was commanded to pourtray on it. A brick is most undoubtedly meant; yet, even the larger dimensions here, as to thickness, will not help us through the difficulty, unless we have recourse to the ancients, who have spoken of the dimensions of the bricks commonly used in building. Palladius, De Re Rustica, lib. 6 c. 12, is very particular on this subject: - Sint vero lateres longitudine pedum duorum, latitudine unius, altitudine quatuor unciarum. "Let the bricks be two feet long, one foot broad, and…
Thou also, son of man, take thee a tile,.... Or "brick" (z). The Targum renders it, a "stone"; but a tile or brick, especially one that is not dried and burned, but green, is more fit to cut in it the figure of a city. Some think that this was ordered because cities are built of brick; or to show the weakness of the city of Jerusalem, how easily it might be demolished; and Jerom thinks there was some design to lead the Jews to reflect upon their making bricks in Egypt, and their hard service there; though perhaps the truer reason may be, because the Babylonians had been used to write upon tiles. Epigenes (a) says they had celestial observations of a long course of years, written on tiles; he…
The Church Fathers
Some things, however, ought to be reproved strongly, so that when a fault is not recognized by the one who has committed it, he may be made aware of its gravity by verbal reproof, or when anyone glosses over an evil that he has perpetrated, he may be led by the harshness of his censure to entertain grave fears of its effects on him. For indeed it is the duty of a ruler to show by the voice of preaching the glory of our heavenly country, to disclose what great temptations of the old enemy are lurking in this life's journey, and to correct with zealous harshness such evils among those who are under his sway that should not be gently borne with, lest, in being too little incensed against such faults, he himself be held guilty of all faults.
(Chapter 4, Verses 1-2.) And you, son of man, take a brick for yourself and set it before you, and portray on it the city of Jerusalem. Build siege works against it, build a siege mound against it, raise a ramp against it, set up camps against it, and place battering rams against it all around. As we have said before, go inside and enclose it in the midst of your house; and behold, ropes will be put on you, and you will be bound, and you shall not go out. This is a symbolic representation of the prophet's future siege of the city of Jerusalem. Now he is commanded to use geometric art to depict it on a brick, and to place that brick in front of the prophet. After he has portrayed Jerusalem with dust, he is to depict the entire siege against it, representing the fortifications, the raised mound, the encircling army, and the battering rams, all of which are typical in capturing cities. Fortifications are called the things by which a city is enclosed, so that none of the besieged can escape: mounds are brought together by which ramparts and ditches are filled; camps are the guards of soldiers in a circuit; battering rams are those by which the foundations of walls are shaken, and the joining of stones is dissolved. However, this is said in order to signify the neighboring captivity of the city of Jerusalem under Zedekiah: in the eleventh year of which both the king and the city were captured. On the side, which is called in Greek the feminine gender ἡ πλίνθος, Symmachus has more clearly interpreted it as πλίνθιον, which we can call a brick and a tile. In whose dust geometers are accustomed to draw lines, that is, lines and rays. From which some wish, not unreasonably, also to have knowledge of this doctrine (replicating those examples, that Joshua son of Nun sent explorers, who described the land (Joshua 2), which is properly called Geometry: and the Angel in Zechariah had a Geometric cord to measure Jerusalem (Zechariah 2). And what the Prophet now commands to describe in the dust (which is properly called scenography) we can take as a brick and as a stroke of the Israelites, which served Pharaoh in mud and clay (Exodus 1). Or suppose that the city, which they thought was strong and impregnable, is compared to a very fragile wall, which immediately dissolves upon contact with water, as was previously stated: is the hardest rock or a deserted mountain turned…
Dictionary and topics
Brick — (Genesis 11:3) The brick in use among the Jews were much larger than with us, being usually from 12 to 13 inches square and 3 1/2 inches thick; they thus possess more of the character of tiles.…
Graving — (1.) Heb. hatsabh. Job 19:24, rendered “graven,” but generally means hewn stone or wood, in quarry or forest. (2.) Heb. harush. Jer. 17:1, rendered “graven,” and indicates generally artistic work in…
Drawing · Of pictures on tile — Of pictures on tile
Instruction · Il — Il
Pantomime · By Ezekiel — By Ezekiel
Prophets · Frequently in their actions, &c were made signs to the people — Frequently in their actions, &c were made signs to the people
Tile · Brick — Brick
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Ezekiel 4:1-3
1. Thou also, son of man, take thee a tile, and lay it before thee, and pourtray upon it the city, even Jerusalem:
1. Et tu, Fili hominis, sume tibi laterem, et pone ipsum coram facie tua, et pinge super ipsum urbem, nempe Hierosolymam:
2. And lay siege against it, and build a fort against it, and cast a mount against it; set the camp also against it, and set battering rams against it round about.
2. Et pone contra eam obsidionem, et extrue contra eam turrim, et funde adversus eam aggerem, et pone adversus eam castra, et statue contra eam arietes in circuitu.
3. Moreover take thou unto thee an iron pan, and set it for a wall of iron between thee and the city: and set thy…
In words and in mimed actions, the prophet Ezekiel declared the certainty of impending judgment on Jerusalem. God’s people, having broken the terms of the Lord’s covenant with them at Mount Sinai, now faced the curses of death and destruction that were attached to that covenant. Only after these curses had taken effect could there be any hope for the future.
4:1–7:27 These chapters focus on words and actions that proclaimed doom to the city of Jerusalem (chs 4–5) and to the surrounding land of Judah (chs 6–7).
4:1-2 The first of Ezekiel’s sign acts (see “Prophetic Sign Acts” Theme Note) was to create a detailed tableau depicting Jerusalem . . . under siege.
Rashi on Ezekiel 4:1
a brick Heb. לְבֵנָה, tivle in Old French [tuile in modern French]. Some of them are large.
"And you, son of man, take a brick for yourself, and place it before you, and draw upon it the city of Jerusalem." In these words, indeed, what else is designated according to history but the siege and destruction of the city of Jerusalem, and what else is expressed but the affliction of a sinful people? It is called a provoking house. From this we are instructed that when we know one thing is fulfilled according to history, and we recognize another thing according to history to be empty of reason, we should hold to both in the sacred word, so that we may believe the siege of Jerusalem, which was later accomplished according to the letter, to be prefigured in the words and deeds of the prophet, and yet through that same siege another siege, that is, an interior one, may be designated. But first we must inquire why the prophet Ezekiel, whenever he beholds sublime things or whenever he is commanded to perform something mystical, is first called "son of man." For often he is lifted up to heavenly things, and his mind is fed on hidden and invisible realities. It is therefore necessary that among the hidden things which he penetrates, he be called "son of man," so that he may always recognize what he is and never be exalted because of those things to which he is led. For what does it mean to always say "son of man" to a prophet lifted up to spiritual things, except to make him mindful of his own weakness? So that, conscious of his frail condition, he ought not to be elevated in thought because of the greatness of his contemplation. Because this same prophet, as we have already said above, holds the type of preachers or teachers, it is rightly said to him now: "Take for yourself a brick, and you shall place it before you." For every teacher, when he receives some earthly hearer for instruction in the heavenly word, takes up a brick. When he begins to speak to him about what the reward of the heavenly homeland is, what the vision of supernal peace is, he describes the city of Jerusalem on the brick. He places it before himself, because with attentive mind he considers the quality of the hearer, that is, he observes his progress or deficiency, and according to that person's understanding he moderates the words of his preaching, so that the city of Jerusalem, that is, the vision of peace, may be described in the hearer's mind. Let it therefore be said: "Take for…
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
