Ezekiel 8:12 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Ezekiel 8:12
Then said he unto me, Son of man, hast thou seen what the ancients of the house of Israel do in the dark, every man in the chambers of his imagery? for they say, the LORD seeth us not; the LORD hath forsaken the earth.
to say (used with great latitude) · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
Son
בֶןven-
H1121
a son (as a builder of the family name) · noun, common masculine singular construct
man
אָדָם֒'a.Dam
H120
ruddy i.e. a human being (an individual or the species · noun, common masculine singular absolute
seen
הֲרָאִ֣יתָha.ra.'I.ta
H7200
to see · interrogative particle + verb, qal perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
ancients
זִקְנֵ֤יzik.Nei
H2205
old · adjective, masculine plural construct
house
בֵֽיתveit-
H1004
a house (in the greatest variation of applications · noun, common masculine singular construct
Israel
יִשְׂרָאֵל֙Yis.ra.'El
H3478
Jisrael · proper noun, a place name
do
עֹשִׂ֣ים'o.Sim
H6213
to do or make · verb, qal active participle, masculine plural absolute
dark
בַּחֹ֔שֶׁךְba.Cho.shekh
H2822
the dark · preposition with the article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
man
אִ֖ישׁ'ish
H376
a man as an individual or a male person · noun, common masculine singular absolute
chambers
בְּחַדְרֵ֣יbe.chad.Rei
H2315
an apartment (usually literal) · preposition + noun, common masculine plural construct
imagery
מַשְׂכִּית֑וֹmas.ki.To
H4906
a figure (carved on stone · noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
say
אֹמְרִ֗ים'o.me.Rim
H559
to say (used with great latitude) · verb, qal active participle, masculine plural absolute
LORD
יְהוָה֙Yah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
seeth
רֹאֶ֣הro.'Eh
H7200
to see · verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
LORD
יְהוָ֖הYah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
forsaken
עָזַ֥ב'a.Zav
H5800
to loosen · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
earth
הָאָֽרֶץha.'A.retz
H776
the earth (at large · definite article + noun, common feminine singular absolute
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 29:15 Woe unto them that seek deep to hide their counsel from the LORD, and their works are in the dark, and they say, Who seeth us? and who knowe…
Ezekiel 9:9 Then said he unto me, The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceeding great, and the land is full of blood, and the city full of…
Ezekiel 8:15 Then said he unto me, Hast thou seen this, O son of man? turn thee yet again, and thou shalt see greater abominations than these.
Psalms 10:11 He hath said in his heart, God hath forgotten: he hideth his face; he will never see it.
John 3:19-20 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
Ephesians 5:12 For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret.
Job 22:12-13 Is not God in the height of heaven? and behold the height of the stars, how high they are!
Job 24:13-17 They are of those that rebel against the light; they know not the ways thereof, nor abide in the paths thereof.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Ezekiel 8:7-12
We have here a further discovery of the abominations that were committed at Jerusalem, and within the confines of the temple, too. Now observe,
I. How this discovery is made. God, in vision, brought Ezekiel to the door of the court, the outer court, along the sides of which the priests' lodgings were. God could have introduced him at first into the chambers of imagery, but he brings him to them by degrees, partly to employ his own industry in searching out these mysteries of iniquity, and partly to make him sensible with what care and caution those idolaters concealed their idolatries. Before the priests' apartments they had run up a wall, to make them the more private, that they might not l…
every man in . . . chambers of . . . imagery--The elders ("ancients") are here the representatives of the people, rather than to be regarded literally. Mostly, the leaders of heathen superstitions laughed at them secretly, while publicly professing them in order to keep the people in subjection. Here what is meant is that the people generally addicted themselves to secret idolatry, led on by their elders; there is no doubt, also, allusion to the mysteries, as in the worship of Isis in Egypt, the Eleusinian in Greece, &c., to which the initiated alone were admitted. "The chambers of imagery" are their own perverse imaginations, answering to the priests' chambers in the vision, whereon the pic…
Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan - Shaphan was a scribe, or what some call comptroller of the temple, in the days of Josiah; and Jaazaniah his son probably succeeded him in this office. He was at the head of this band of idolaters.
John Gill on Ezekiel 8:12
Then said he unto me, son of man, hast thou seen,.... Here should be a stop, as the accent "segolta" shows; hast thou taken notice of, hast thou considered, what thou hast seen, the amazing shocking abominations committed by these men? it follows, and the question is to be repeated, "hast thou seen"
what the ancients of the house of Israel do in the dark? their deeds being evil, such as will not bear the light, of which they had reason to be ashamed before men; and which they imagined would not be seen by the Lord, though the darkness and the light are both alike to him:
every man in the chambers of his imagery? the Septuagint, Syriac, and Arabic versions, render it, "in his hidden" or "se…
The Church Fathers
(Verse 12) And he said to me: Surely you see, son of man, what the elders of the house of Israel do in darkness, each one in the secrecy of his room. For they say: The Lord does not see us; the Lord has forsaken the land. From this, he says, it is shown what each one does in his own room when they gather together in the temple. But according to the anagogy, it can be better understood that some leaders of the Churches do in darkness things that are even shameful to speak of. This is a hidden person of the heart, of whom it is said: Enter into your inner chamber (Mich. VI, 4). And again: He who sees in secret will repay you. Let each one examine his own conscience, and let him remember the works of darkness in the darkness, and let him know the scripture: Everyone who does evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest he be accused by the light (John III, 20; I Thess. V). And in themselves they will understand it to be fulfilled: He who is drunk, is drunk at night (Prov. II, 25). For what cannot stand according to the letter. For how many are intoxicated with feasts and banquets of days? But because the drunkenness of the heart offends God, it belongs to darkness, and not to light, therefore whoever is intoxicated, is intoxicated at night. But when the elders of the house of Israel have done evil in the darkness and in the hiddenness of their chambers, and have thought that they can hide from God, then consequently they will say: The Lord does not see us, the Lord has forsaken the earth. There are many sinners who walk according to their own thoughts, who do not believe that God cares about mortal things or that our vices concern Him. Certainly, if we were to think that God sees and is present when we sin, we would never do what displeases Him. Furthermore, it follows that the Lord has abandoned the earth, as is the opinion of some philosophers who, from the movement and constancy of the stars, suspect that there is providence in the heavens and that earthly things are despised, since nothing good or in accordance with order takes place on earth.
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
Ezekiel, Book of — Consists mainly of three groups of prophecies. After an account of his call to the prophetical office (1-3:21), Ezekiel (1) utters words of denunciation against the Jews (3:22-24), warning them of…
Idol — (1.) Heb. aven, “nothingness;” “vanity” (Isa. 66:3; 41:29; Deut. 32:21; 1 Kings 16:13; Ps. 31:6; Jer. 8:19, etc.). (2.) ‘Elil, “a thing of naught” (Ps. 97:7; Isa. 19:3); a word of contempt, used of…
Imagery — Only in the phrase “chambers of his imagery” (Ezek. 8:12). (See CHAMBER.)
Blasphemy · General scriptures concerning — General scriptures concerning
Confidence · FALSE — FALSE
Infidelity · General scriptures concerning — General scriptures concerning
Scoffing · 21:14,15;34:7; — 21:14,15;34:7;
Sin · .Secret sins — .Secret sins
Visions · Mentioned in scripture: To Ezekiel (See chapters 10, 40-48 of Ezekiel) — Mentioned in scripture: To Ezekiel (See chapters 10, 40-48 of Ezekiel)
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 8:12
12. Then said he unto me, Son of man, hast thou seen what the ancients of the house of Israel do in the dark, every man in the chambers of his imagery? for they say, The LORD seeth us not; the LORD hath forsaken the earth.
12. Et dixit mihi, An vidisti, fili hominis, quae seniores domus Israel faciunt in tenebris, [182] quisque in absconditis [183] imaginationis suae? qui dicunt, non rider nos Iehovah, deseruit Iehovah terram.
Again God questions his servant: we have explained the reason -- that he may pass sentence as a judge on his own people, whence it may be more clearly evident that those who had provoked God were unworthy of any pardon. Thou seest, says he, what the eld…
Second Abomination: Worship of Beasts
Eze 8:7. And He brought me to the entrance of the court, and I saw, and behold there was a hole in the wall. Eze 8:8. And He said to me, Son of man, break through the wall: and I broke through the wall, and behold there was a door. Eze 8:9. And He said to me, Come and see the wicked abominations which they are doing here. Eze 8:10. And I came and saw, and behold there were all kinds of figures of reptiles, and beasts, abominations, and all kinds of idols of the house of Israel, drawn on the wall round about. Eze 8:11. And seventy men of the leaders of the house of Israel, with Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan standing among them, stood in front, every man wi…
The Lord could see what the leaders of Israel were doing, and he revealed these things to his prophet (cp. Luke 12:3).
Rashi on Ezekiel 8:12
in his paved chambers Heb. מַשְּׂכִּיתוֹ. Covered with a floor of marble. An expression related to (Exod. 32:22): “and I will cover (וְשֲּׂכֹּתִי) you with My hand.”
