Symbolic Actions of the Prophets Table

4:1 take for yourself a brick It is probably engraved with a city plan to symbolize a city under siege.

son of man See note on 2:1.

a city, Jerusalem Ezekiel’s drama illustrates the siege predicted against Jerusalem.

4:2 you must build against it siege works Literally fulfilled in 2 Kgs 25:1. Compare Yahweh’s declaration that He will place siege works around Jerusalem in Isa 29:3. Ezekiel’s role in this drama is to represent Yahweh, the ultimate orchestrator.

you must heap against it a siege ramp The Hebrew wording specifically indicates a siege ramp. An attacking army would construct a large earthen ramp to bridge the dry moat surrounding fortified cities. The structure would provide access to the city wall for the battering rams. The Assyrians and Babylonians left behind well-documented accounts of siege methods involving towers, ramps, and battering rams.

4:3 a plate of iron This type of dish had a specific priestly use for preparing grain offerings (Lev 2:5). This is the only reference to the item outside the priestly regulations in Leviticus.

a wall of iron Represents the barrier Israel’s sin has raised between them and Yahweh.

you must set your face against it Ezekiel is acting out Yahweh’s promise from Lev 26:17 to set His face against (to act against) Israel if they disobey His laws (see note on Ezek 4:2).

a sign The prophet’s symbolic actions provide a tangible reminder for Israel of his prophetic prediction (compare 12:6; Isa 8:18; 20:3–6).

4:4 You will carry their guilt Used with the Hebrew verb nasa, meaning “bear,” the noun awon usually carries the sense of “sin” or “iniquity” (e.g., Lev 10:17). The image of the prophet bearing the punishment deserved by the people prefigures the nt representation of Christ bearing the sin of all people (see 1 Pet 2:24; compare Isa 53:12).

4:5 the years of their guilt Ezekiel spends 390 days bound and lying on his left side. This second phase of the sign-act represents the prophet bearing the punishment of Israel.

4:6 a second time Ezekiel will repeat the action but on his other side to symbolize the punishment of Judah.

forty days An allusion to Num 14:34, where, after spying out the land of Canaan for 40 days, Israel is punished with 40 years of wandering in the wilderness to atone for their unbelief. A year for each day is reversed to a day for each year in Ezekiel’s sign-act.

4:7 the siege of Jerusalem See note on Ezek 4:1.

and your bared arm To symbolize Yahweh’s preparation to act in judgment (see Isa 52:10).

4:8 I will put on you cords Ezekiel was bound for an earlier sign-act in Ezek 3:25.

from one side to your other side Ezekiel now represents the besieged people. In a city under siege, people lose all freedom of movement.

4:9 wheat and barley These ingredients are typically used for bread, but most of the other ingredients mentioned are unusual. The combination of ingredients suggests that Ezekiel’s bread represents a siege bread created from whatever remained from a dwindling food supply.

three hundred and ninety days you shall eat it The crude bread is Ezekiel’s ration while he lives under symbolic siege-like conditions.

4:10 according to weight; twenty shekels for each day The small quantity of food allotted to Ezekiel also mimics siege conditions. His rations of about eight ounces were barely enough to avoid starvation.

4:11 an amount of water you shall drink, a sixth of a hin As with food, strict water rationing was necessary during a siege.

4:12 human excrement Animal dung was a common fuel for cooking fires in the ancient Near East, as wood was too valuable to use for these purposes. Human dung, however, was considered unclean, and using it would make a person ritually impure (see Deut 23:12–14; see note on Lev 11:1–47).

4:13 shall the Israelites eat their unclean food Ritual uncleanness was precisely the point of the command to bake bread over human dung.

4:14 Look! I have not been defiling myself As a priest, Ezekiel is acutely aware of issues of ritual purity, and he reacts strongly to Yahweh’s command to use human dung to bake the bread (see note on Ezek 5:11).

4:15 cattle manure in the place of the feces of a human Honoring Ezekiel’s scruples, Yahweh creates a compromise (see note on Ezek 4:14).

4:16 am going to break the supply of bread The Hebrew phrase used here likely reflects Ezekiel’s priestly background since one of the only uses of this phrase outside of Ezekiel is in Lev 26:26, also in the context of siege as punishment for disobedience.