Ezekiel 6 King James Version (KJV)
6 And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying,
2 Son of man, set thy face toward the mountains of Israel, and prophesy against them,
3 And say, Ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord God; Thus saith the Lord God to the mountains, and to the hills, to the rivers, and to the valleys; Behold, I, even I, will bring a sword upon you, and I will destroy your high places.
4 And your altars shall be desolate, and your images shall be broken: and I will cast down your slain men before your idols.
5 And I will lay the dead carcases of the children of Israel before their idols; and I will scatter your bones round about your altars.
6 In all your dwellingplaces the cities shall be laid waste, and the high places shall be desolate; that your altars may be laid waste and made desolate, and your idols may be broken and cease, and your images may be cut down, and your works may be abolished.
7 And the slain shall fall in the midst of you, and ye shall know that I am the Lord.
8 Yet will I leave a remnant, that ye may have some that shall escape the sword among the nations, when ye shall be scattered through the countries.
9 And they that escape of you shall remember me among the nations whither they shall be carried captives, because I am broken with their whorish heart, which hath departed from me, and with their eyes, which go a whoring after their idols: and they shall lothe themselves for the evils which they have committed in all their abominations.
10 And they shall know that I am the Lord, and that I have not said in vain that I would do this evil unto them.
11 Thus saith the Lord God; Smite with thine hand, and stamp with thy foot, and say, Alas for all the evil abominations of the house of Israel! for they shall fall by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence.
12 He that is far off shall die of the pestilence; and he that is near shall fall by the sword; and he that remaineth and is besieged shall die by the famine: thus will I accomplish my fury upon them.
13 Then shall ye know that I am the Lord, when their slain men shall be among their idols round about their altars, upon every high hill, in all the tops of the mountains, and under every green tree, and under every thick oak, the place where they did offer sweet savour to all their idols.
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.
Commentary
The idolatry of Israel (6:1-14)
From the time of the judges (the period that followed Israel’s settlement of Canaan) the people of Israel had copied Canaanite religious practices. Canaanite gods, collectively known as Baalim (plural of Baal) were gods of nature, and Israelites used the Canaanite shrines throughout the countryside as places to offer worship to Yahweh. These shrines were called ‘high places’ because they were usually built on the tops of hills and mountains. Israel’s false worship at these high places was largely the reason for the nation’s unfaithfulness to God and its consequent punishment. Ezekiel, in keeping with the preaching of earlier prophets, announced God’s judgment on the idolatrous shrines (6:1-4). The idol-worshipping Israelites would be slaughtered in the coming judgment, and their corpses would lie scattered over these pagan hilltop sites along with the remains of the demolished altars and broken idols (5-7).
Of those taken captive to foreign countries, some would realize that God had been just in punishing them for their idolatry. In shame at their former waywardness they would turn again to God (8-10). God’s triumph over all the wicked would be celebrated by the clapping of hands and the stamping of feet.
Throughout Israel, from south to north, the rebels would be punished and God’s honour restored. Then all would know that Yahweh was the one true God (11-14).