an altar · noun, common feminine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person masculine plural
desolate
וְנָשַׁ֙מּוּ֙ve.na.Sha.mu
H8074
to stun (or intransitively · conjunction + verb, niphal sequential perfect, 3rd person common plural
images
חַמָּֽנֵיכֶ֑םcha.ma.nei.Khem
H2553
a sun-pillar · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person masculine plural
broken
וְנִשְׁבְּר֖וּve.nish.be.Ru
H7665
to burst (literally or figuratively) · conjunction + verb, niphal sequential perfect, 3rd person common plural
down
וְהִפַּלְתִּי֙ve.hi.pal.Ti
H5307
to fall · conjunction + verb, hiphil sequential perfect, 1st person common singular
slain
חַלְלֵיכֶ֔םcha.lei.Khem
H2491
pierced (especially to death) · adjective, masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person masculine plural
before
לִפְנֵ֖יlif.Nei
H6440
the face (as the part that turns) · preposition + noun, common masculine plural construct
idols
גִּלּוּלֵיכֶֽםgi.lu.lei.Khem
H1544
properly · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person masculine plural
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
2 Chronicles 14:5 Also he took away out of all the cities of Judah the high places and the images: and the kingdom was quiet before him.
Leviticus 26:30 And I will destroy your high places, and cut down your images, and cast your carcases upon the carcases of your idols, and my soul shall abh…
1 Kings 13:2 And he cried against the altar in the word of the LORD, and said, O altar, altar, thus saith the LORD; Behold, a child shall be born unto th…
2 Kings 23:14 And he brake in pieces the images, and cut down the groves, and filled their places with the bones of men.
2 Kings 23:16-20 And as Josiah turned himself, he spied the sepulchres that were there in the mount, and sent, and took the bones out of the sepulchres, and…
2 Chronicles 34:4-5 And they brake down the altars of Baalim in his presence; and the images, that were on high above them, he cut down; and the groves, and the…
Jeremiah 8:1-2 At that time, saith the LORD, they shall bring out the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of his princes, and the bones of the pries…
Jeremiah 43:13 He shall break also the images of Beth-shemesh, that is in the land of Egypt; and the houses of the gods of the Egyptians shall he burn with…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Ezekiel 6:1-7
Here, I. The prophecy is directed to the mountains of Israel (Eze 6:1, Eze 6:2); the prophet must set his face towards them. If he could see so far off as the land of Israel, the mountains of that land would be first and furthest seen; towards them therefore he must look, and look boldly and stedfastly, as the judge looks at the prisoner, and directs his speech to him, when he passes sentence upon him. Though the mountains of Israel be ever so high and ever so strong, he must set his face against them, as having judgments to denounce that should shake their foundation. The mountains of Israel had been holy mountains, but now that they had polluted them with their high places God set his face…
images--called so from a Hebrew root, "to wax hot," implying the mad ardor of Israel after idolatry [CALVIN]. Others translate it, "sun images"; and so in Eze 6:6 (see Kg2 23:11; Ch2 34:4; Isa 17:8, Margin).
cast your slain men before your idols--The foolish objects of their trust in the day of evil should witness their ruin.
Adam Clarke on Ezekiel 6:4
Your images shall be broken - Literally, your sun images; representations of the sun, which they worshipped. See the margin.
John Gill on Ezekiel 6:4
And your altars shall be desolate,.... Being pulled down; or because the priests and worshippers would now be slain, and there would be none to attend them:
and your images shall be broken; the "images of the sun" (b). The word for images has its derivation from heat; and were so called, either from the heat of the sun, to whose worship they were devoted, or from the heat of the love and affections of their worshippers:
and I will cast down your slain men before your idols; before your dung, or your "dunghill gods" (c); for the word used has the signification of dung, Ezekiel 4:12. The Targum renders it,
"before the carcass of your idols;''
where they committed idolatry, there they shoul…
(Vers. 4, 5.) Behold, I will bring a sword upon you, and I will destroy your high places. And I will overthrow your altars, and break your images, and cast down your slain before your idols. And I will give the dead bodies of the children of Israel before the face of their idols; and I will scatter your bones round about your altars in all your dwellingplaces. It is said of the mountains of Israel that God will destroy their high places, where people worshiped false gods, and will break their altars and images, and cause their worshipers to be killed in front of their temples; so that the bodies of the dead may lie where the offerings used to lie; and the bones of those who were on the mountains, not the mountains themselves, will be scattered around the altars and in all the cities and villages of Israel. This literally. Otherwise, against those who are uplifted in pride, and of whom the Apostle speaks: Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up (I Cor. VIII, 1), the sword is brought forth, so that all their images, which they have fashioned in their own minds, may be crushed and lie dead, and they may feel themselves to be dead, realizing that their images and creations are of no benefit to them. And he says that the bones of the mountains shall be scattered around the altars, indicating that the strongest among them should be separated from one another. For it is beneficial for evil to be separated from evil by perverse knowledge. And as those who were building the tower with the worst consent were dispersed for their own utility, and their tongues were divided (Gen. XI), so will the bones of the mountains be scattered, that they may understand the vanity of their endeavors. This that we have set forth: 'And I will give the bodies of the children of Israel before the face of your idols,' is not found in the Septuagint.
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
Sun · Worshiped — Worshiped
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).
John Calvin on Ezekiel 6:4
Ezekiel 6:4
4. And your altars shall be desolate, and your images shall be broken: and I will cast down your slain men before your idols.
4. Et desolabuntur altaria vestra, et conterentur idola vestra, et cadere faciam [127] occisos coram idolis vestris.
Hence it appears how greatly obedience pleases God, and how true it is that it is better than sacrifices. (1 Samuel 15:22; I Kings 12.) For it is certain that the Israelites extolled their own fictions exorbitantly, as if they were worshipping God correctly In the beginning, indeed, Jeroboam cunningly devised those new rites, that he might alienate the ten tribes from the family of David, and at length the error spread, so that they thoug…
The corpses and bones of the dead worshipers scattered around an altar would defile the altar and make it unfit for use. • idols: The Hebrew term for idols (literally round things) probably alludes to dung; when used in this way, it is a term of strong derision.
Rashi on Ezekiel 6:4
your sun gods חַמָּנֵיכֶם, a class of pagan idols made on the roofs [dedicated] to the sun.
