Ezekiel Chapter 45 verse 1 Holy Bible

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerses 1-8. - The portions of land that should be allotted to the sanctuary, the city, and the prince. Verse 1. - Moreover, When ye shall divide by lot the land (literally, and in your causing the land to fall) for inheritance. As the territory of Canaan had been originally divided by lot among the twelve tribes after the conquest (comp. Numbers 26:55; Numbers 33:54; Joshua 13:6, etc.), this same method of allocating the soil amongst the new community should be followed on a second time taking possession of it after the exile. Currey believes the phrase, "divide by lot," "does not imply anything like casting lots, but is equivalent to our notion of allotment, the several portions being assigned by rule." There is, however, little doubt "lots" were cast to determine, if not the actual size, at least the precise situation, of each tribe's territory (see REFERENCE_WORK:Keil & DelitzschNumbers 26:54 Keil and 'Pulpit Commentary' on Numbers 26:54). That no such methodical distribution of Canaan ever took place, or for that matter could hays taken place amongst the returned exiles, should be proof sufficient that the prophet here moves in the region of the ideal and symbolical rather than of the real and literal. Ye shall offer an oblation -literally, lift up a heave offering (comp. Ezekiel 44:80; Exodus 25:2, 3; Exodus 29:28; Exodus 30:13, 14; Leviticus 7:14, 32; Leviticus 22:12; Numbers 15:19; Numbers 18:24) - unto the Lord, an holy portion of the land; literally, a holy (portion) from the land. Very significantly, in the new partition of Palestine the Lord's portion should be the first to be marked off and solemnly dedicated to Jehovah for the purposes to be forthwith specified. Those who, like Wellhansen and Smend, perceive in this allotment of land to Jehovah, and therefore to the priests, a contradiction to Ezekiel 44:28, omit to notice first that Jehovah required some place on which his sanctuary might be erected, and the priests some ground on which to build houses for themselves; and secondly, that, so far as the priests were concerned, the laud was given by the people, not to them, but to Jehovah, and by him to them (comp. on Ezekiel 44:28). The exact site of this terumah, or "holy portion," is afterwards indicated (Ezekiel 48:8); meanwhile its dimensions are recorded. The length shall be the length of five and twenty thousand reeds, and the breadth shall be ten thousand. Whether "reeds" or "cubits" should be supplied after "thousand" has divided expositors. Bottcher, Hitzig, Ewald, Hengstenberg, and Smend decide for "cubits," principally on the grounds that "cubits" are mentioned in ver. 2; that "cubits" have been the usual measure hitherto, even (as they contend) in Ezekiel 42:16; and that otherwise the dimensions of this sacred territory must have been colossal, in fact, out of all proportion to the Holy Land, viz. about 720 square miles (25,000 reeds, or 42.5 miles, × 10,000 reeds, or 17 miles, = 722.5 square miles). Havernick, Keil, Kliefoth, Currey, and Plumptre favor "reeds," chiefly for the reasons that in ver. 2 "cubits" are specified, and are therefore to be regarded as exceptional; that the customary measuring instrument throughout has been a reed (see Ezekiel 40:5; Ezekiel 42:16); and that the dimensions, which Ezekiel designed should be colossal (comp. Ezekiel 40:2), correspond exactly with the measurements afterwards given in Ezekiel 48, if these he in reeds, but not if they be in cubits. As to the breadth of this terumah from east to west, Hitzig, Keil, Smend, Schroder, and Plumptre follow the LXX. (εἴκοσι χιλιάδας) in substituting 20,000 for 10,000, considering that the space referred to in ver. 3 appears as if meant to be taken from an already measured larger area, which could only be that of ver. 1 - the portion in ver. 1 being the whole territory assigned to the priests and Levites, and that in ver. 3 the allotment for the priests. Kliefoth, however, contends that no necessity exists for tampering with the text, and certainly if vers. 1-4 be regarded as descriptive of the priests' portion only, and מִן in the phrase, "of this measure" (וּמִן־חַמִּדָּה הַזּלֺאת), in ver. 8 be rendered "according to" - a sense it may have (see Gesenius, sub voce), the supposed difficulty disappears. In this case the demonstrative this in the last clause will refer to the priests' portion exclusively; in the former ease, to the whole portion of the priests and Levites. That Ezekiel 48:14 declares the Levites' portion to be "holy unto the land" does not prove it must have been included in the holy terumah of ver. 1 Nor does this concession follow, as will appear, from ver. 7.

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English ReadersXLV.This and the first part of the following chapter form a remarkable portion of the book. They first describe the setting apart of a large part of the whole land for the sanctuary, the priests, the prince, and the city, in a way and in a geographical position entirely unknown either in the past or the subsequent history of the people (Ezekiel 45:1-8). The portion assigned to the prince is to prevent violence and exaction on his part; in this connection all unjust measurements are to cease, and standard weights and measures are prescribed (Ezekiel 45:9-12). Then follow directions for the tax or "oblation" to be paid by the people to the prince, that he may be able to furnish the required sacrifices (Ezekiel 45:13-17). The chapter closes with directions concerning the daily sacrifices and the feasts, these feasts being in part unknown to the law; while some feasts that were prominent in the law are entirely omitted, and the ritual of nearly all is greatly changed. The whole is so different from the arrangements of the Mosaic economy, and so foreign to the restoration of that economy on the return from the exile, that it can only be explained of an ideal picture which both prophet and people understood was not to receive a literal realisation.(1) When ye shall divide by lot.--The same expression is used in Ezekiel 47:22; Ezekiel 48:29, as it had long before been used in Joshua 13:6; but that it does not imply anything of chance is plain from the fact that in Ezekiel 48 a definite portion of the land is assigned to each of the tribes by name. The idea seems to be the same as is conveyed by our word allotment. . . .