Ezekiel 6:14 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Ezekiel 6:14
So will I stretch out my hand upon them, and make the land desolate, yea, more desolate than the wilderness toward Diblath, in all their habitations: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
to stretch or spread out · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 1st person common singular
hand
יָדִי֙ya.Di
H3027
a hand (the open one (indicating power · noun, common both genders singular construct + pronominal suffix
make
וְנָתַתִּ֨יve.na.ta.Ti
H5414
to give · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 1st person common singular
land
הָאָ֜רֶץha.'A.retz
H776
the earth (at large · definite article + noun, common feminine singular absolute
desolate
שְׁמָמָ֤הshe.ma.Mah
H8077
devastation · noun, common feminine singular absolute
desolate
וּמְשַׁמָּה֙u.me.sha.Mah
H4923
a waste or amazement · conjunction + noun, common feminine singular absolute
wilderness
מִמִּדְבַּ֣רmi.mid.Bar
H4057
a pasture (i.e. open field · preposition + noun, common masculine singular construct
Diblath
דִּבְלָ֔תָהdiv.La.tah
H1689
Diblah · proper noun, a place name + directional suffix
habitations
מוֹשְׁבֽוֹתֵיהֶ֑םmo.she.vo.tei.Hem
H4186
a seat · noun, common feminine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
know
וְיָדְע֖וּve.ya.de.'U
H3045
to know (properly · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 3rd person common plural
LORD
יְהוָֽהYah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
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
Isaiah 5:25 Therefore is the anger of the LORD kindled against his people, and he hath stretched forth his hand against them, and hath smitten them: and…
Isaiah 9:12 The Syrians before, and the Philistines behind; and they shall devour Israel with open mouth. For all this his anger is not turned away, but…
Ezekiel 20:33-34 As I live, saith the Lord GOD, surely with a mighty hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out, will I rule over you:
Numbers 33:46 And they removed from Dibon-gad, and encamped in Almon-diblathaim.
Isaiah 9:17 Therefore the Lord shall have no joy in their young men, neither shall have mercy on their fatherless and widows: for every one is an hypocr…
Isaiah 9:21 Manasseh, Ephraim; and Ephraim, Manasseh: and they together shall be against Judah. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand…
Isaiah 10:4 Without me they shall bow down under the prisoners, and they shall fall under the slain. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his…
Isaiah 26:11 LORD, when thy hand is lifted up, they will not see: but they shall see, and be ashamed for their envy at the people; yea, the fire of thine…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Ezekiel 6:11–end
The same threatenings which we had before in the foregoing chapter, and in the former part of this, are here repeated, with a direction to the prophet to lament them, that those he prophesied to might be the more affected with the foresight of them.
I. He must by his gestures in preaching express the dep sense he had both of the iniquities and of the calamities of the house of Israel (Eze 6:11): Smite with thy hand and stamp with thy foot. Thus he must make it to appear that he was in earnest in what he said to them, that he firmly believed it and laid it to heart. Thus he must signify the just displeasure he had conceived at their sins, and the just dread he was under of the judgments comin…
Diblath--another form of Diblathaim, a city in Moab (Num 33:46; Jer 48:22), near which, east and south of the Dead Sea, was the wilderness of Arabia-Deserta.
Next: Ezekiel Chapter 7
Adam Clarke on Ezekiel 6:14
And make the land - more desolate than the wilderness toward Diblath - Diblath or Diblathayim is situated in the land of Moab. It is mentioned Num 33:46, Almon-Diblathaim; and in Jer 48:22, Beth-Diblathaim. It was a part of that horrible wilderness mentioned by Moses, Deu 8:15, "wherein were fiery serpents, and scorpions, and drought." The precise reason why it is mentioned here is not very evident. Some think it is the same as Riblah, where Nebuchadnezzar slew the princes of Israel, and put out Zedekiah's eyes; the principal difference lying between the ד daleth and the ר resh, which in MSS. is often scarcely discernible; and hence vast multitudes of various readings. Five, probably six, of…
So will I stretch out mine hand upon them,.... Not unto them, in a way of mercy; but upon, or against them, in a way of judgment. The Targum paraphrases it,
"and I will lift up the stroke of my power upon them;''
his mighty hand of vengeance:
and make the land desolate; by destroying the inhabitants of it:
yea, more desolate than the wilderness towards Diblath, in all their habitations; so the Syriac version renders it, "and I will make this land more desolate than the land of Diblath"; but other versions, "I will make the land desolate from the wilderness of Diblath"; to which the Targum agrees; or, "from the wilderness to Diblath": Kimchi and Ben Melech think this is the same with Ribl…
The Church Fathers
(Verse 14.) And I will stretch out my hand upon them and make the land desolate and forsaken, from the wilderness of Deblath to all their dwellings. And they shall know that I am the Lord. O mountains of Israel, when your slain ones have fallen among your idols and on every high hill and on all the mountaintops, when I have filled your forests with the corpses of the dead, those whom you once burned incense to, then I will stretch out my hand against you in vengeance, which has been restrained until now, and I will make the whole land of Israel a desolation, from the wilderness of Deblath in the land of Hamath, which is called Epiphania of Syria, to all their dwellings. So that all may know that there is nothing between the wilderness and the Great Sea that the sword of the enemy has not consumed. Many people think that the same place is meant, about which it is written in Jeremiah: 'And they took Zedekiah in the desert that is near Jericho, and all his company fled from him.' And when they had captured the king, they brought him to the king of Babylon in Riblah, which is in the land of Hamath (Jer. 39:5). It may also be called Deblatha or Reblatha due to the close similarity of the Hebrew letters Daleth and Res, which are distinguished by a small dot. But according to mystical understanding, the Lord extends His hand over all those who have been deceived by heretical error, in order to make their land, which is interpreted as the Church, desolate from the desert of Deblatha, which in our language means 'mass of figs', and of compacted thistles, so that after they have discovered bitterness in the simulated sweetness, which was not of cultivated land but of solitude, then they may know that He Himself is the Lord. Honey drips from the lips of a prostitute, who temporarily satiates the mouths of those who eat, but afterwards is found bitter as gall (Prov. 5:3,4). This also signifies the two baskets of figs that were placed in front of the Temple in Jeremiah (Jer. 24): one basket of good figs and one of rotten figs. One of these refers to the Church of Christ, the other to the congregation of the wicked.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Beth-diblathaim — House of two cakes of figs, a city of Moab, upon which Jeremiah (48:22) denounced destruction. It is called also Almon-diblathaim (Num. 33:46) and Diblath (Ezek. 6:14). (R.V., “Diblah.”)
Diblath — (accurately DIBLAH), a place named only in (Ezekiel 6:14) Probably only another form of Riblah.
Almon-Diblathaim · And with Diblath — And with Diblath
Deserts · Described as: Desolate — Described as: Desolate
Diblath · An unknown place — An unknown place
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 6:14
14. So will I stretch out my hand upon them, and make the land desolate, yea, more desolate than the wilderness toward Diblath, in all their habitations: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
14. Et extendam manum meam super eos, et ponam terram vastitatem, et derelictionem [147] prae deserto Diblathah in omnibus habitationibus eorum: et cognoscent quod ego Iehovah.
Ezekiel pursues the same sentiment, but it is necessary to persist with more words in confirmation of his prophecy, because it was somewhat difficult of belief, especially among men so secure, and who had been hardened against God by long habit. This is the reason, then, why he uses so many words about a thing…
The general divine instructions. - Eze 3:25. And thou, son of man, lo, they will lay cords upon thee, and bind thee therewith, so that thou canst not go out into their midst. Eze 3:26. And I shall make thy tongue cleave to thy palate, that thou mayest be dumb, and mayest not serve them as a reprover: for they are a stiff-necked generation. Eze 3:27. But when I speak to thee, I will open thy mouth, that thou mayest say to them, Thus sayeth the Lord Jehovah, Let him who wishes to hear, hear, and let him who neglects, neglect (to hear): for they are a stiff necked generation. - The meaning of this general injunction depends upon the determination of the subject in נתנוּ, Eze 3:25. Most exposito…
Riblah was located on the northern border of Israel and is well known from other biblical books. At Riblah, Nebuchadnezzar set up his tribunal and executed the sons of Zedekiah and many other leading citizens of Judah (2 Kgs 25:6, 21).
Rashi on Ezekiel 6:14
a desolation Heb. שְּׁמָמָה, without an inhabitant.
and an astonishment Heb. ומשמה, a wonder, i.e., that all who see it will wonder about it.
