the face (as the part that turns) · noun, common masculine plural absolute
baldness
קָרְחָֽהka.re.Chah
H7144
baldness · noun, common feminine singular absolute
heads
רָאשֵׁיהֶ֖םra.shei.Hem
H7218
the head (as most easily shaken) · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd 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
Isaiah 15:2-3 He is gone up to Bajith, and to Dibon, the high places, to weep: Moab shall howl over Nebo, and over Medeba: on all their heads shall be bal…
Amos 8:10 And I will turn your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation; and I will bring up sackcloth upon all loins, and baldness u…
Job 21:6 Even when I remember I am afraid, and trembling taketh hold on my flesh.
Isaiah 3:24 And it shall come to pass, that instead of sweet smell there shall be stink; and instead of a girdle a rent; and instead of well set hair ba…
Ezekiel 27:31 And they shall make themselves utterly bald for thee, and gird them with sackcloth, and they shall weep for thee with bitterness of heart an…
Genesis 15:12 And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and, lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him.
Psalms 35:26 Let them be ashamed and brought to confusion together that rejoice at mine hurt: let them be clothed with shame and dishonour that magnify t…
Psalms 55:4-5 My heart is sore pained within me: and the terrors of death are fallen upon me.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Ezekiel 7:16-22
We have attended the fate of those that are cut off, and are now to attend the flight of those that have an opportunity of escaping the danger; some of them shall escape (Eze 7:16), but what the better? As good die once as, in a miserable life, die a thousand deaths, and escape only like Cain to be fugitives and vagabonds, and afraid of being slain by every one they meet; so shall these be.
I. They shall have no comfort or satisfaction in their own minds, but be in continual anguish and terror; for, wherever they go, they carry about with them guilty consciences, which make them a burden to themselves. 1. They shall be always solitary and under prevailing melancholy; they shall not be in the…
cover them--as a garment.
baldness--a sign of mourning (Isa 3:24; Jer 48:37; Mic 1:16).
Adam Clarke on Ezekiel 7:17
All knees shall be weak as water - Calmet understands this curiously: La frayeur dont on sera saisi, fera qu'on ne pourra retenir son urine. D'autres l'expliquent d'une autre souillure plus honteuse. I believe him to be nearly about right. St. Jerome is exactly the same: Pavoris magnitudine, urina polluet genua, nec valebit profluentes aquas vesica prohibere. This and other malretentions are often the natural effect of extreme fear or terror.
John Gill on Ezekiel 7:18
They shall also gird themselves with sackcloth,.... As a token of mourning, Genesis 37:34;
and horror shall cover them: either the horror of a guilty conscience, or the perpetual dread and terror of the enemy:
and shame shall be upon all faces; because of their sins and transgressions, which they shall now be convinced of; or because of their desolate condition, their sins had brought them into:
and baldness upon all their heads; through the plucking off of the hair of their heads in their distress; for to make baldness as a token of mourning for the dead was forbidden the Jews, Deuteronomy 14:1.
The Church Fathers
(Verse 18.) In every face there is confusion, and in every head there is baldness. The reddening of the face is a sign of shame, and the conscience of sins shines forth on the face. The hope of salvation is when shame follows sin. Therefore it was said to her who gloried in her sins with a hard heart: Your face has become like that of a prostitute, you do not know how to blush (Jer. 3:3). Baldness of the head is also a sign of sorrow, when we lose the beauty of our hair and the comeliness of our youth. And it is said about Jerusalem: For the adornment of your head, you will have baldness, because of your works (Isaiah 3:17). And another prophet says: All heads, he says, will be shaved in every place, and every beard will be cut off (Jeremiah 48:37). Also, Micah to the same Jerusalem: Shave, he says, and shear over the sons of your delights, spread your baldness like an eagle (Micah 1:16). And it is commanded to make baldness over the dead. But the holy ones, that is, the Nazarites, and those who deserved to obtain priesthood of the Lord, do not shave their heads (Num. VI). For they do not perform deeds of death, nor are they unclean, because they are Nazarites, that is, holy ones of the Lord. But if someone dies near them, all the previous days will not be considered as their sanctification. Samuel, the holy one of God, possessed the eternal ornament of the head: and he heard this from the Song of Songs: Your hair is black like a raven (Cant. V, 11). Furthermore, Samson, because he lost his hair, lost his strength (Judg. XVI): and as his hair gradually grew back, his former strength returned, so that he killed many more in his death than in his life. However, although Elisha had a bald head, because he was a servant of the Lord, he enjoyed the locks of his head. Hence, little children, because they were little and had not yet reached manhood, mocked his baldness and said, 'Go up, baldhead! Go up, baldhead!' (2 Kings II, 23), and they were torn by the bites of wild beasts, whose leaps and woods are their dwelling place.
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
Baldness — From natural causes was uncommon (2 Kings 2:23; Isa. 3:24). It was included apparently under “scab” and “scurf,” which disqualified for the priesthood (Lev. 21:20). The Egyptians were rarely subject…
Baldness · A — A
Remorse · General scriptures concerning — General scriptures concerning
Sackcloth · A symbol of mourning — A symbol of mourning
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 7:18
Ezekiel 7:18
18. They shall also gird themselves with sackcloth, and horror shall cover them; and shame shall be upon all faces, and baldness upon all their heads.
18. Et accingent se saccis, et operiet ipsos formido, et super omnes facies, [161] probrum, [162] et in omnibus capitibus calvitium.
He continues the same sentiment. He says, such was the slaughter of the people that they should all gird themselves with sackcloth. But it seems little in accordance with this, that those who should be astonished should gird themselves with sackcloth, so as not to bewail the dead. But the prophets so vary their discourse because they cannot otherwise affect obstinate minds. Although therefore thes…
Third strophe
Thus will they fall into irresistible destruction; even their silver and gold they will not rescue, but will cast it away as useless, and leave it for the enemy. - Eze 7:15. The sword without, and pestilence and famine within: he who is in the field will die by the sword; and famine and pestilence will devour him that is in the city. Eze 7:16. And if their escaped ones escape, they will be upon the mountains like the doves of the valleys, all moaning, every one for his iniquity. Eze 7:17. All hands will become feeble, and all knees flow with water. Eze 7:18. They will gird themselves with sackcloth, and terrors will cover them; on all faces there will be shame, and baldness on…
When Israel sounded the trumpet in holy war, the troops would not rally and the enemy would not be terrified, as in the past (see Num 10:9; Josh 6:4-20; Judg 6:34; 7:16-22; Neh 4:18-20).
