Ezekiel 31
This chapter gives God’s answer to the ambition of the king of Egypt who would have his country exalted to the supreme place among the nations, left vacant for a time by the fall of Assyria. We have already seen (Jeremiah 27, etc.) that God had chosen Nebuchadnezzar and the kingdom of Babylonia to take Assyria’s place, and indeed to be the world’s first empire, but if the Egyptian Pharaoh had learned of His purpose, he did not regard it.
Egypt was the first great nation, as far as the Scriptures, and human records too, reveal. It was a substantial country when Abraham lived, and he was born only 352 years after the flood.
Assyria’s beginning was later, and not much has been learned concerning that people before the period in which the children of Israel entered Canaan. They began to assume some importance as a nation about fifty years before Saul became Israel’s first king.
Tiglathpileser, who is regarded as the founder of the second empire of Assyria is named in 2 Kings 15:2929In the days of Pekah king of Israel came Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria, and took Ijon, and Abel-beth-maachah, and Janoah, and Kedesh, and Hazor, and Gilead, and Galilee, all the land of Naphtali, and carried them captive to Assyria. (2 Kings 15:29). From about B. C. 745 to B. C. 606 when Nineveh was destroyed by the Medes and Babylonians, Assyria was the most powerful of the nations. It overcame Egypt at one time (about B. C. 671) under Esar-had-don who is named in Isaiah 37:3838And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons smote him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Armenia: and Esar-haddon his son reigned in his stead. (Isaiah 37:38).
Egypt had, before Israel’s possession of the land of Canaan, held the country, and after Solomon’s death, God moved that nation, with Ethiopia, to attack Judah (2 Chronicles 12:1-121And it came to pass, when Rehoboam had established the kingdom, and had strengthened himself, he forsook the law of the Lord, and all Israel with him. 2And it came to pass, that in the fifth year of king Rehoboam Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem, because they had transgressed against the Lord, 3With twelve hundred chariots, and threescore thousand horsemen: and the people were without number that came with him out of Egypt; the Lubims, the Sukkiims, and the Ethiopians. 4And he took the fenced cities which pertained to Judah, and came to Jerusalem. 5Then came Shemaiah the prophet to Rehoboam, and to the princes of Judah, that were gathered together to Jerusalem because of Shishak, and said unto them, Thus saith the Lord, Ye have forsaken me, and therefore have I also left you in the hand of Shishak. 6Whereupon the princes of Israel and the king humbled themselves; and they said, The Lord is righteous. 7And when the Lord saw that they humbled themselves, the word of the Lord came to Shemaiah, saying, They have humbled themselves; therefore I will not destroy them, but I will grant them some deliverance; and my wrath shall not be poured out upon Jerusalem by the hand of Shishak. 8Nevertheless they shall be his servants; that they may know my service, and the service of the kingdoms of the countries. 9So Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem, and took away the treasures of the house of the Lord, and the treasures of the king's house; he took all: he carried away also the shields of gold which Solomon had made. 10Instead of which king Rehoboam made shields of brass, and committed them to the hands of the chief of the guard, that kept the entrance of the king's house. 11And when the king entered into the house of the Lord, the guard came and fetched them, and brought them again into the guard chamber. 12And when he humbled himself, the wrath of the Lord turned from him, that he would not destroy him altogether: and also in Judah things went well. (2 Chronicles 12:1‑12)). A second invasion under an Ethiopian general took place in Asa’s reign (2 Chronicles 14:9-139And there came out against them Zerah the Ethiopian with an host of a thousand thousand, and three hundred chariots; and came unto Mareshah. 10Then Asa went out against him, and they set the battle in array in the valley of Zephathah at Mareshah. 11And Asa cried unto the Lord his God, and said, Lord, it is nothing with thee to help, whether with many, or with them that have no power: help us, O Lord our God; for we rest on thee, and in thy name we go against this multitude. O Lord, thou art our God; let not man prevail against thee. 12So the Lord smote the Ethiopians before Asa, and before Judah; and the Ethiopians fled. 13And Asa and the people that were with him pursued them unto Gerar: and the Ethiopians were overthrown, that they could not recover themselves; for they were destroyed before the Lord, and before his host; and they carried away very much spoil. (2 Chronicles 14:9‑13)), and a military expedition was sent (B. C. 610) by Pharaoh-Necho to the head of navigation on the Euphrates, while Josiah was king of Judah (2 Chronicles 35:2020After all this, when Josiah had prepared the temple, Necho king of Egypt came up to fight against Carchemish by Euphrates: and Josiah went out against him. (2 Chronicles 35:20) to 36:5). A few years later, about the time of the destruction of Nineveh, Nebuchaezzar and Necho, met in battle, and the latter was defeated (2 Kings 24:77And the king of Egypt came not again any more out of his land: for the king of Babylon had taken from the river of Egypt unto the river Euphrates all that pertained to the king of Egypt. (2 Kings 24:7); Jeremiah 46:22Against Egypt, against the army of Pharaoh-necho king of Egypt, which was by the river Euphrates in Carchemish, which Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon smote in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah. (Jeremiah 46:2)).
Zedekiah, the last king of Judah, had bound himself by an oath of allegiance to Nebuchadnezzar, but broke his promise, forming an alliance with Pharaoh-Hophra (Jeremiah 44:3030Thus saith the Lord; Behold, I will give Pharaoh-hophra king of Egypt into the hand of his enemies, and into the hand of them that seek his life; as I gave Zedekiah king of Judah into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, his enemy, and that sought his life. (Jeremiah 44:30)), the second ruler of Egypt after Necho. Of this act of rebellion, the Babylonian king learned, and sent an army to besiege Jerusalem and destroy the city, ending the kingdom of Judah. He also defeated Hophra in battle during the siege of Jerusalem.
In the message to Hophra contained in chapter 31, he is reminded of Assyria’s greatness, God using the figure of a cedar in Lebanon to describe Assyria after the unfaithfulness to Himself of Solomon and his successors, the kings of Judah;
“No tree in the garden of God was like unto him in his beauty. I had made him fair by the multitude of his branches, and all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, (i.e., the neighboring nations) envied him” (verses 8 and 9).
God had lifted up Assyria, but its king exalted himself in the greatest degree of pride and boastfulness; therefore “I have given him into the hand of the mighty one of the nations” (Nebuchadnezzar), So reads verse 11, and in verse 14 it is declared that no other nation should exalt itself after Assyria; in the government of God, death awaited them all.
Verses 15 to 18 refer to Assyria’s fall; that event had produced a very profound effect in the world. The Hebrew word translated “the grave” in verse 15 and “hell” in verses 16 and 17, is Sheol; it does not refer to the lake of fire, but to the unseen world, like the Greek word Hades. The application of the history of Assyria to Egypt’s proud monarch and his people is made in the last verse of the chapter. Did he think to arise to Assyria’s, former height? He would be brought down to the lowest place, according to the word of the Lord Jehovah.
ML 01/05/1936