NOTES for Eze 24:1-27

Exactly one year before Jerusalem’s destruction by Nebuchadnezzar, in late December 589–early January 588 BC, the prophet Ezekiel records the last prophecy, which for the first time is given with calendar precision. The day on which everything the prophet had foretold will come to pass has been appointed, and the prophet’s announcement of it becomes a kind of seal that seals all the preceding prophecies. Its fulfilment at the appointed time will, in turn, confirm both the authenticity of the rebukes spoken by the prophet Ezekiel and the incredible hope he has revealed.

Calling on the prophet to perform yet another prophetic action, to offer Israel another visible parable, the Lord speaks precisely of the irrevocability of the fate prepared for Israel. No blows of fate, not even the Babylonian conquest, have been able to purge the chosen people of the abominations of violence and idolatry. It now becomes conclusively clear that the people have made their moral choice and will not change it, will not turn to God. Thus the coming calamities cease to be merely potential and become real, as inevitable as the movement of the planets.

After this prophecy, Ezekiel’s wife dies, and God commands him to make a new sign, forbidding him to observe the mourning customs. Everything listed in verses 16–18 was as much an expression of mourning in Israel as black clothes, covered mirrors in the house and a glass covered with a piece of bread at a memorial meal are among us. Instead of all this, God commands the prophet to remain silent, to bear his grief in silence. This will be a sign to the Jews that they will be driven out of Jerusalem, away from the desecrated Temple, with no one to share this grief with them—for that is precisely the purpose of mourning rites. Once again, in the book of the prophet Ezekiel, we see a view of history in which there are no participants other than the human being and God.

But the prophet’s silence is a much deeper symbol. The fact is that people are becoming witnesses to a mystery—the fulfilment of the Almighty’s saving purpose. What can people bring to purifying suffering other than silence? Thus the prophet’s silence becomes a foreshadowing of the speechlessness that overcame the witnesses to the Saviour’s Sacrifice on the Cross. This silence will end, the Lord says, when the prophet receives word from Jerusalem that everything foretold has come to pass.