NOTES for Eze 27:1-36

Certain features of Tyre’s way of life make it especially close and comprehensible to our own time. If we subtract slavery and the extreme forms of paganism, the principal feature of the Tyrians’ way of life is the ultimate commercialization of every aspect of it, a phenomenon we observe everywhere today. Commercial and economic success brought Tyre abundant wealth, but that wealth did not save it from destruction.

Tyre’s fate foretold in the prophecy helps us recall the Gospel parable of the foolish rich man, who was not rich toward God but likewise relied on earthly prosperity, which he lost in a single night. The specter of material success is one of the most attractive and persistent of all; even when we understand its illusory nature, we fall under its spell far too easily. The prophetic warning about the futility of accumulating riches that cannot avert disaster therefore applies not only to the Tyrians.