THE WORD OF THE LORD came to me: 13“Son of man, if a country sins against me by being unfaithful and I stretch out my hand against it to cut off its food supply and send famine upon it and kill its men and their animals, 14even if these three men—Noah, Daniel and Job—were in it, they could save only themselves by their righteousness, declares the Sovereign LORD.
15“Or if I send wild beasts through that country and they leave it childless and it becomes desolate so that no one can pass through it because of the beasts, 16as surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, even if these three men were in it, they could not save their own sons or daughters. They alone would be saved, but the land would be desolate.
17“Or if I bring a sword against that country and say, ‘Let the sword pass throughout the land,’ and I kill its men and their animals, 18as surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, even if these three men were in it, they could not save their own sons or daughters. They alone would be saved.
19“Or if I send a plague into that land and pour out my wrath upon it through bloodshed, killing its men and their animals, 20as surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, even if Noah, Daniel and Job were in it, they could save neither son nor daughter. They would save only themselves by their righteousness.
21“For this is what the Sovereign LORD says: How much worse will it be when I send against Jerusalem my four dreadful judgments—sword and famine and wild beasts and plague—to kill its men and their animals! 22Yet there will be some survivors—sons and daughters who will be brought out of it. They will come to you, and when you see their conduct and their actions, you will be consoled regarding the disaster I have brought upon Jerusalem—every disaster I have brought upon it. 23You will be consoled when you see their conduct and their actions, for you will know that I have done nothing in it without cause, declares the Sovereign LORD.”
Original Meaning
THIS SECTION OF Ezekiel’s prophecy focuses on the inevitability and justice of God’s decision to destroy Jerusalem. The oracle begins by introducing a hypothetical country that is unfaithful to the Lord. The implied universality of the principle is an important element supporting the justice of God’s actions: The rules are the same for any nation and have not been applied unfairly to Israel. However, behind the implied universality, the actual reference is clearly to Israel, for the phrase “by being unfaithful” (Ezek. 14:13) refers elsewhere to a breach of a covenant relationship. This may be through marital infidelity (Num. 5:12, 27), misappropriation of an object belonging by rights to the Lord, as in the case of Achan (Josh. 7:1), or other action that violates the covenant between God and his people (e.g., Lev. 26:40; Ezek. 17:20). Such a breach of the covenant inevitably brings on the offending nation (i.e., Israel) the curses attached to the covenant in Leviticus 26.
These covenant curses are itemized individually in the form of four test cases (Ezek. 14:13–14, 15–16, 17–18, 19–20). In each case, a different covenant curse is envisaged: famine, through cutting off the bread supply (Lev. 26:26); wild beasts (26:22); a sword (26:25); and finally plague (26:25). The prophet has already brought together this fearsome foursome in Ezekiel 5, underlining the nature of judgment as nothing arbitrary but simply the just application of the sanctions of a covenant to which Israel subscribed—and then repeatedly broke. Now, therefore, the curses of Leviticus 26 will descend.
What is common to all four cases is the hypothetical presence in the land of three righteous men: Noah, Daniel, and Job. Each of these men was noted for righteous behavior in the midst of a corrupt generation. Noah is described as “a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time” (Gen. 6:9), while Job was held up by God to Satan as a model of righteousness (Job 1:8). The identity of “Daniel” has provoked considerable discussion, with the majority of scholars arguing that he is not the biblical character of that name, which has a different spelling, but rather a heroic figure of antiquity, Danel. This king is known from Ugaritic sources as a just ruler who “judges the cause of the widow and adjudicates the case of the fatherless.”1 He would fit with Noah and Job as ancient figures of international reputation.
Others have argued, however, that this ruler’s unquestioned pagan origins would likely have been problematic for a radically theocentric prophet such as Ezekiel, and that the arguments advanced against the traditional identification with the biblical figure Daniel are not as strong as they may at first sight appear. He too fits the description of a righteous man in a difficult time, and he would probably have been known, at least by reputation, to Ezekiel’s hearers.2 However, Ezekiel’s oracles against the nations (Ezek. 25–32) demonstrate that he is quite capable of utilizing mythical ideas known to his hearers to make his theological points, and in the oracle against the King of Tyre he once again alludes to “Danel” (28:3).3 The bottom line is that both passages are open to either identification. Fortunately, in neither case does the interpretation of the passage rest on the identification adopted. Whether mythical Danel or biblical Daniel was originally intended, in the passage he functions merely as a cipher for a readily recognized wise and righteous man.4
The point in each case is that even three such outstanding citizens would be unable to rescue their closest relatives (sons and daughters) out of the divinely decreed disaster for covenant violation (14:14, 16, 18, 20); their righteousness would suffice merely to save themselves. Here, there is reference to the principle of covenant or corporate solidarity, whereby a family unit often stands or falls together.5 It may well be that again the apparently universal language serves to deal with a specific situation, for many of those in exile would have left their children behind them and would naturally be concerned for their fate.6 The source of their hope would be that, as Abraham noted, God would not surely destroy the righteous along with the wicked (Gen. 18:23).
That basic theological statement is not contested in the hypothetical situation of Ezekiel 14; the righteous would themselves escape the judgment. What is contested, however, is the presumption that the presence of men of sufficient righteousness would save a land under the just judgment of God. If even such men could only save themselves and not their closest relatives, then what hope was there for the families of ordinary people? A similar declaration of the hopelessness of Jerusalem’s situation is found in Jeremiah 15. There the Lord declares that he would not heed the intercession of even such famous prophets as Moses and Samuel. The people’s fate is decided. It is too late for any change of heart to occur, and it would be useless for Jeremiah to attempt to avert it.
The repetition of the four cases in which the sentence and the outcome are the same, while only the form of the judgment is different, underlines the inevitability of Jerusalem’s destruction (14:21). Her situation is worse on two counts than that of the hypothetical land of 14:12–20. Not only does she lack such righteous men as Noah, Daniel, and Job, but in addition she is faced with not one kind of judgment but all four at once. The statement “How much worse will it be . . .” is obvious; the inevitable outcome to be expected is that none can survive.7
Yet the next verse introduces a surprising twist. Indeed, unexpectedly, some will survive the catastrophe. There will be sons and daughters brought out of the ruins (14:22). Their survival, however, is not due to their own righteousness or to the righteousness of relatives imputed to them. Indeed, they are not “saved” (nāṣal) from the city but “brought out” (Hophal of yāṣāʾ ) from it, a term that focuses on them as prisoners of war rather than trophies of grace.8 The purpose of saving this remnant is not for their sake but to “console” those already in exile by allowing them to see the extent of Jerusalem’s depravity. When the exiles see the impious behavior of this “unspiritual remnant,” then they will know that the Lord has not acted without cause (14:23). Justice will not only be done; it will be seen to have been done. Every mouth will be stopped by a recognition of just how bad Jerusalem had become, and therefore how clearly God had no other choice but to act.
Bridging Contexts
CORPORATE RESPONSIBILITY. The idea of corporate or familial responsibility is not a familiar one in contemporary culture. We are thoroughly indoctrinated into the idea of individual responsibility, whereby a person who does wrong is the only one who should receive punishment. Thus, when we read the story of Achan’s sin in Joshua 7, we find it hard to understand why Achan’s whole family should suffer for his sin. In our culture, we would simply have punished Achan, and though that punishment may have had consequences also for his family (in the loss of a husband and father), those consequences would be an unintentional by-product of justice, not its goal.
In contrast, the Old Testament is full of examples of corporate responsibility. Representatives of a person’s family suffer on account of the sins of the head of that family (e.g., Saul’s descendants in 2 Sam. 21:1–9) or are saved on account of the righteous behavior of a family member (e.g., Lot saved out of Sodom because of Abraham’s intercession in Gen. 19:29; Rahab’s family in Josh. 2:12–13; 6:17).
Nor is this simply an expression of ancient cultural beliefs picked up from the surrounding cultural context, which we can dismiss as irrelevant for us. In the incident of Saul’s descendants, God’s judgment fell on the people because of Saul’s unatoned sin (2 Sam. 21:1), while in the book of Chronicles, Judah’s prosperity is inextricably and immediately bound up with the faithfulness of their king. Not only do the people act on the basis of corporate solidarity, so too does God. Indeed, this principle of corporate solidarity is expressed in the very heart of Israel’s creed, the Ten Commandments. There the Lord describes himself as “a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand [generations] of those who love me and keep my commandments” (Ex. 20:5–6).
The covenant community. This corporate solidarity is closely connected to the idea of the covenant. When Abraham enters into a covenant with God, he is not the only one to be included in the blessings; they are for his descendants as well (Gen. 17:7). But if his descendants share in the blessings of the covenant as they faithfully follow in Abraham’s footsteps, so also they face the consequences that flow from disobedience to the covenant. In the case of the Abrahamic covenant, the curse is simple exclusion from the covenant community (17:14). With the Sinai covenant, however, arrive not only more detailed blessings for obedience (Lev. 26:3–13) but also more extensive sanctions for disobedience (26:14–45). Because of God’s covenant with David and his house, the king is assigned a unique place in the economy of Israel, as a channel of God’s blessing or curse on his people. The consequences for those who disobey these covenants include not merely themselves but the whole covenant community.
Ultimately, the Bible tells us, the whole world is divided into two communities, under two covenant heads. One community is made up of those who are “in Adam,” unregenerate humanity. The other community is made up of those who are “in Christ,” God’s covenant people. The fate of these two peoples is already determined by the obedience or disobedience of their respective covenant heads: All those in Adam are under sentence of death, while those who are in Christ will reign in life (Rom. 5:12–20).
The point of Ezekiel 14, however, is that this “big picture” of righteousness or sin imputed on the basis of membership of a community must not blind us to the individual demands made on covenant members. Jesus answers the claim of the Jews of his day that they were Abraham’s children by saying, “If you were Abraham’s children . . . you would do the things Abraham did” (John 8:39). The members of Adam’s community prove themselves to be natural children of their father by sinning on their own account; equally, those who claim to be members of the Lord’s covenant community must demonstrate a righteousness of their own, reflecting the perfect righteousness they have been given. As the apostle John puts it:
The man who says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But if anyone obeys his word, God’s love is truly made complete in him. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did. (1 John 2:4–6)
We cannot trade on the borrowed righteousness of others while ourselves lacking the marks of regeneration. For we too face a judgment to come on the last day in which God’s justice will be poured out in full measure. Only those truly trusting in Jesus Christ as their covenant head will escape, and there can be no assurance apart from obedience. Obedience—genuine, idol-smashing obedience—is the mark of a true work of grace in the heart.
Contemporary Significance
THE MYSTERIOUS SIDE of providence. As human beings, one of our persistent traits is the marginalization of evil. We find it hard to believe in the existence of evil inside ourselves and the ones we love; instead, we reserve that sobriquet for the perpetrators of genocide and mass murder. We are ready to recognize that Hitler may have been evil, and perhaps Charles Manson and others of his ilk, but we are reluctant to admit that all of us are tainted with the same brush. We start from the premise that we are all basically good. And if we are basically good, how can a good God permit “bad things” to happen to us?
The Bible has a radically different perspective. All of us are basically bad, as Paul makes clear in Romans 3:23: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Until we grasp the accuracy of this statement as a description not merely of the worst of people but the very best, we will never understand the nature of the world in which we live. Our hearts will be filled with resentment at the impossible demands that God makes on us and his inexplicable anger at our inevitable failures.
But when we (all too rarely) experience genuine guilt over our actions, then our eyes are finally opened to the truth about our standing in God’s sight. We realize that a God who is not moved to anger by what we have done cannot be a good being.9 If that is so, and we are in fact much worse than we ever thought, then the astonishing aspect of the world is not the bad things that happen to good people but the good things that happen to bad people. Why should God send his rain on good and evil alike? God’s patience with sinners is the really mysterious side of providence.
For that reason, the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians is not a bad thing happening to good people but a genuinely bad thing (a “dreadful,” or more lit., an “evil” judgment; see Ezek. 14:21), which is deservedly happening to bad people. When the exiles learn the truth of Jerusalem’s depravity by observing the survivors of the holocaust, then they will come to recognize that God has indeed not acted without cause (14:23). A city and nation can reach a stage where the presence of a few righteous people, be they the most righteous people who ever lived, cannot save it from God’s wrath (14:13–20). As it was in the days of Noah and in the time of Sodom, so now judgment without mercy will descend upon the wicked of Jerusalem.
A God of grace and patience. Yet was Jerusalem really worse in its idolatry and social sins than New York or San Francisco or any of our modern cities? Are our small towns and villages really more God-fearing than the ancient Israelites were? The astonishing fact is not that God judged Jerusalem, but that God allows our contemporary society, with all its sins, flagrant and secret, to continue to exist. We should not regard that patience as inability to act, however. God’s “slowness” is patience in order to allow time for all of his chosen people to repent. But once that harvest is complete, the Day of Judgment will come with speed and finality (2 Peter 3:9–10). The sheep will be separated out from the goats, the children of the kingdom from the children of wrath, and there will be no room for quibbling at the justice of God.
All will then see that God has indeed done nothing without cause. When the true extent of the evil in our hearts is revealed, there will be no more marveling over how a good God could send anyone to eternal punishment. Instead, there will only be wonder and adoration at the astonishing grace of God that chose to rescue us from the fate we deserved all too well. We will be truly astonished that he chose from before the foundation of the world to save for himself a people of every tribe and nation and language group, through the death of his only Son on the cross. On that day, our refrain will indeed be, in Charles Wesley’s words:
Died He for me, who caused His pain?
For me, who Him to death pursued?
Amazing love! How can it be?
That Thou, my God, shouldst die for me?