2 Esdras 13: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

After seven days Ezra dreams of a man who comes up out of the sea, flies with the clouds, carves out a great mountain, and burns up with fire from his mouth an innumerable crowd gathered to fight him; the man then calls to himself another crowd, a peaceful one. Ezra asks what the dream means, and he is told that the man is the one the Most High has kept for a long time, his Son, who will be revealed after wars and signs, will stand on Mount Zion, and will destroy the gathered nations by the law. The peaceful crowd is the ten tribes, taken away in the time of Osea and now returning across the river. Ezra is told he was shown this because he set himself to seek the law, and he goes out into the field to give thanks and sits there three days.

Claim by Claim

1. 13:1
   • Seven days passed.
   • The speaker dreamed a dream by night.
2. 13:2
   • A wind arose from the sea.
   • The wind moved all the waves of the sea.
3. 13:3
   • The speaker looked.
   • That man waxed strong with the thousands of heaven (the King James reads 'thousands' where the Latin reads 'clouds').
   • When the man turned his face to look, everything that was seen beneath him trembled.
4. 13:4
   • Whenever the voice went out of the man's mouth, all who heard his voice burned.
   • They burned as the earth fails when it feels the fire (the King James reads 'earth' where the Latin reads 'wax melts').
5. 13:5
   • The speaker looked again.
   • A multitude of men beyond number was gathered together.
   • They were gathered from the four winds of heaven.
   • They gathered to subdue the man who came out of the sea.
6. 13:6
   • The man had carved out for himself a great mountain.
   • The man flew up onto the mountain.
7. 13:7
   • The speaker tried to see the region or place from which the mountain was carved.
   • The speaker could not see it.
8. 13:8
   • All those who were gathered together to subdue the man were very afraid.
   • They nevertheless dared to fight.
9. 13:9
   • The man saw the violent assault of the multitude that came.
   • The man did not lift up his hand.
   • The man did not hold a spear.
   • The man did not hold any instrument of war.
10. 13:10
    • The speaker saw only that the man sent out of his mouth something like a blast of fire.
    • The man sent out of his lips a flaming breath.
    • The man cast out of his tongue sparks and tempests.
11. 13:11
    • The blast of fire, the flaming breath, and the great tempest were all mixed together.
    • They fell with violence upon the multitude that was prepared to fight.
    • They burned up every one of the multitude.
    • Suddenly nothing could be perceived of the innumerable multitude except dust and the smell of smoke.
    • When the speaker saw this he was afraid.
12. 13:12
    • Afterward the speaker saw the same man come down from the mountain.
    • The man called to himself another multitude, a peaceable one.
13. 13:13
    • Much people came to the man.
    • Some of them were glad.
    • Some of them were sorry.
    • Some of them were bound.
    • Some of them were bringing others who were presented as offerings.
    • The speaker became sick through great fear.
    • The speaker awoke.
    • The speaker spoke, praying to the Most High.
14. 13:14
    • The speaker says God showed his servant these wonders from the beginning.
    • The speaker says God counted him worthy to receive his prayer.
15. 13:15
    • The speaker asks God to show him also the interpretation of this dream.
16. 13:16
    • The speaker conceives this in his understanding.
    • Woe belongs to those who shall be left in those days.
    • Much more woe belongs to those who are not left behind.
17. 13:17
    • Those who were not left were in heaviness.
18. 13:18
    • There are things laid up in the latter days.
    • The speaker now understands those things.
    • Those things shall happen to them and to those who are left behind.
19. 13:19
    • Therefore they have come into great perils.
    • They have come into many necessities.
    • These dreams declare such things.
20. 13:20
    • It is easier for one in danger to come into these things than to pass away as a cloud out of the world and not see the things that happen in the last days.
    • He answered the speaker.
    • He spoke.
21. 13:21
    • He will show the speaker the interpretation of the vision.
    • He will open to the speaker the thing the speaker asked for.
22. 13:22
    • The speaker has spoken of those who are left behind.
    • What follows is the interpretation of that.
23. 13:23
    • He who endures the peril at that time has kept himself.
    • Those who have fallen into danger are those who have works.
    • Those who have fallen into danger are those who have faith toward the Almighty.
24. 13:24
    • Those who are left behind are more blessed than those who are dead.
25. 13:25
    • This is the meaning of the vision.
    • The speaker saw a man coming up from the midst of the sea.
26. 13:26
    • That man is the one whom God the Highest has kept for a great season.
    • That man will by his own self deliver his creature.
    • That man will order those who are left behind.
27. 13:27
    • The speaker saw that out of the man's mouth there came something like a blast of wind, and fire, and storm.
28. 13:28
    • The man held no sword.
    • The man held no instrument of war.
    • The rushing in of the man destroyed the whole multitude that came to subdue him.
    • What follows is the interpretation of this.
29. 13:29
    • Days are coming.
    • In those days the Most High will begin to deliver those who are upon the earth.
30. 13:30
    • Astonishment of mind will come upon those who dwell on the earth.
31. 13:31
    • One will undertake to fight against another.
    • City will fight against city.
    • Place will fight against place.
    • People will fight against people.
    • Realm will fight against realm.
32. 13:32
    • The time will come when these things happen.
    • The signs that he showed the speaker before will happen.
    • Then his Son will be declared.
    • The speaker saw that Son as a man ascending.
33. 13:33
    • All the people will hear the Son's voice.
    • Every man will leave, in his own land, the battle they have one against another.
34. 13:34
    • An innumerable multitude will be gathered together.
    • The speaker saw them so gathered.
    • They will be willing to come and to overcome him by fighting.
35. 13:35
    • He will stand upon the top of Mount Zion.
36. 13:36
    • Zion will come.
    • Zion will be shown to all men.
    • Zion will be prepared and built.
    • The speaker saw the mountain carved without hands.
37. 13:37
    • His Son will rebuke the wicked inventions of those nations.
    • Those nations have fallen into the tempest because of their wicked life.
38. 13:38
    • He will lay before them their evil thoughts.
    • He will lay before them the torments with which they will begin to be tormented.
    • Those torments are like a flame.
    • He will destroy them without labour by the law.
    • The law is like unto the speaker (the King James reads 'like unto me' where the Latin reads 'likened to fire').
39. 13:39
    • The speaker saw that the man gathered another peaceable multitude to himself.
40. 13:40
    • That multitude is the ten tribes (the King James reads 'ten' where the Latin reads 'nine').
    • The ten tribes were carried away prisoners out of their own land.
    • This happened in the time of Osea the king (the King James reads 'Osea' where the Latin reads 'Josiah').
    • Salmanasar king of Assyria led them away captive.
    • He carried them over the waters.
    • They came into another land.
41. 13:41
    • They took this counsel among themselves.
    • They would leave the multitude of the heathen.
    • They would go forth into a further country.
    • Mankind had never dwelt in that country.
42. 13:42
    • They went there so that they might keep their statutes.
    • They had never kept those statutes in their own land.
43. 13:43
    • They entered into the Euphrates by the narrow places of the river.
44. 13:44
    • The Most High then showed signs for them.
    • He held still the flood until they had passed over.
45. 13:45
    • Through that country there was a great way to go.
    • The journey was of a year and a half.
    • That region is called Arsareth.
46. 13:46
    • They dwelt there until the latter time.
    • They will begin to come back.
47. 13:47
    • The Highest will stay the springs of the stream again.
    • He will do so that they may go through.
    • For this reason the speaker saw the multitude with peace.
48. 13:48
    • Those of your people who are left behind are those who are found within my borders.
49. 13:49
    • He will destroy the multitude of the nations that are gathered together.
    • At that time he will defend his people who remain.
50. 13:50
    • Then he will show them great wonders.
51. 13:51
    • The speaker said this.
    • He addressed the Lord who bears rule.
    • He asked to be shown why he had seen the man coming up from the midst of the sea.
52. 13:52
    • He answered the speaker.
    • No one can seek out or know the things that are in the deep of the sea.
    • In the same way no man upon earth can see my Son, or those who are with him, except in the time of his day.
53. 13:53
    • This is the interpretation of the dream the speaker saw.
    • The speaker alone has been enlightened concerning these things.
54. 13:54
    • The speaker has forsaken his own way.
    • The speaker has applied his diligence to God's law.
    • The speaker has sought out that law.
55. 13:55
    • The speaker has ordered his life in wisdom.
    • The speaker has called understanding his mother.
56. 13:56
    • For this reason God has shown the speaker the treasures of the Highest.
    • After another three days God will speak other things to the speaker.
    • God will declare mighty and wondrous things to the speaker.
57. 13:57
    • The speaker went forth into the field.
    • The speaker gave great praise and thanks to the Most High.
    • He did so because of the wonders God did in time.
58. 13:58
    • God governs the times.
    • God governs the things that fall in their seasons.
    • The speaker sat there three days.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

13:1

The seven days tie this vision to the one before it. Through the middle of the book Ezra keeps a fixed pattern: a stretch of fasting or waiting, then a vision at night, then its explanation. This is the sixth of seven such episodes.

13:3

Two things are happening in the King James here. First, it is shorter than the Latin manuscripts, which begin the verse by describing the wind bringing up out of the sea something in the shape of a man; without that sentence, "that man" arrives with nothing to refer back to. Second, "waxed strong with the thousands of heaven" means "grew strong," and comes from a different reading of the Latin than "flew with the clouds of heaven," which most manuscripts have and which the rendering follows. The picture echoes Daniel 7, where beasts come up out of the sea and "one like the Son of man" comes "with the clouds of heaven."

13:4

"Like as the earth faileth when it feeleth the fire" comes from a damaged reading of the Latin; the manuscripts compare the hearers to wax melting when fire touches it. "Faileth" in 1611 English meant gave way or lost strength.

13:5

"The four winds of the heaven" is a standard Hebrew way of naming the four directions, so it means from everywhere on earth.

13:6

"Graved" is the old past tense of "grave," to carve or cut. A mountain carved out rather than built recalls Daniel 2, where a stone is cut out of a mountain "without hands" and grows until it fills the earth.

13:8

"Sore" means greatly or severely, and "durst" is the old past tense of "dare." The sense is that they were terrified and attacked anyway.

13:9

"Instrument of war" means a weapon of any kind. Where the King James has "sword," most Latin manuscripts read "spear."

13:13

"Bound" means tied up as prisoners. "Brought of them that were offered" is obscure in the Latin itself, and translators split over it: either people bringing others forward as an offering, or people bringing offerings along with them. The rendering keeps the ambiguity rather than deciding it.

13:14

Calling yourself someone's servant was a polite way to speak to a king, or to God. Ezra is showing respect, not describing a job.

13:16

"Woe unto" is not a curse laid on anyone. It is a cry of grief, the way a mourner says "how terrible for them."

13:18

Verses 17 and 18 are tangled in the King James, which makes Ezra himself the one who now understands. In the Latin manuscripts the understanding belongs to the dead: those not left alive grieve because they know what is stored up for the last days and will not live to reach it. Modern translations diverge from the King James here for that reason.

13:19

"Necessities" in 1611 English meant hardships or distresses, states of being hard pressed, not things a person needs.

13:20

"To pass away as a cloud out of the world" means simply to die, and so to be gone before any of this happens.

13:21

"Required" here means asked for, with no sense of demanding.

13:23

The King James "hath kept himself" and the reading found in modern versions, "will protect those who fall into danger," come from two ways of construing the same Latin sentence. The grammar allows both, and who is being kept safe changes depending on which is taken.

13:24

Blessed means having God's care and kindness. It is a happy thing to be.

13:26

"Creature" in 1611 English meant anything created, so "his creature" is his creation, what he has made, not an animal. "A great season" means a long stretch of time.

13:30

The King James "come to the astonishment of them that dwell on the earth" is old word order for "astonishment will come upon those who live on the earth." It does not mean "to their surprise," which is what the phrase suggests in modern English.

13:31

A kingdom is a land ruled by a king. A nation is a group of people with their own land.

13:32

The Latin reads "my Son." Behind it lies a lost Greek text, and the Greek word usually reconstructed here, pais, means both "son" and "servant," so the title is less fixed in the original than the English looks. "Declared" means revealed, made publicly known.

13:33

The King James and the Latin part company slightly. The Latin can be read as "every man will leave his own land and the battle they have against one another," that is, they abandon both the fight and their homes; the King James reads it as each man leaving the fight while staying where he is.

13:35

Sion is the older English spelling of Zion, the hill in Jerusalem on which the temple stood, and by extension the city itself.

13:36

The city is pictured as already made and kept ready, to be revealed rather than constructed on the spot. "Builded" is the old past participle of "build," and "graven without hands" points again to Daniel 2:34, the stone "cut out without hands."

13:37

"Inventions" in 1611 English meant devices, plans or schemes, not new machines.

13:38

"The law which is like unto me" is almost certainly a slip in the King James: the Latin compares the law to fire, not to the speaker. "Without labour" means without effort or struggle.

13:40

The ten tribes are the northern kingdom of Israel, which split from Judah after Solomon and was destroyed by Assyria. Osea is Hoshea, its last king, and Salmanasar is Shalmaneser V, the Assyrian king whose armies besieged the capital, Samaria; the city fell and the population was deported eastward around 722 BC. What became of them afterward was unknown, and legends grew up to fill the gap. This passage is one of them. "The waters" they were carried over is the Euphrates.

13:41

"The heathen" is the King James word for the nations other than Israel, the gentiles. It is a term of identity, not of insult; it simply means people who are not Jewish.

13:42

"Statutes" are the laws given through Moses, the body of commandments Israel was held to as a people.

13:43

The Euphrates is the great river of Mesopotamia, running from the mountains of modern Turkey through Syria and Iraq. "The narrow places" are its upper reaches, where the channel is tight and shallow enough to be crossed.

13:44

Water held back so people can walk across repeats two older crossings: the Red Sea in Exodus and the Jordan in Joshua. The wording is meant to be recognized.

13:45

Arsareth appears in no other text. It is usually explained as a Hebrew phrase carried over untranslated, erets achereth, "another land," which is the wording of Deuteronomy 29:28 about exiles being cast "into another land."

13:47

"Stay" means hold back or stop. "The stream" is the Euphrates again.

13:48

"Within my borders" means inside the land of Israel. Some manuscripts read "my holy border."

13:52

"But in the day time" is misleading in modern English. The Latin says "in the time of his day," meaning the appointed day on which he is revealed, not daylight hours as opposed to night.

13:53

"Lightened" means enlightened, given light on the matter. It has nothing to do with weight.

13:55

Calling understanding your mother is a proverbial way of claiming close kinship with wisdom. Compare Proverbs 7:4, "Say unto wisdom, Thou art my sister; and call understanding thy kinswoman."

13:56

"Treasures" here means storehouses, the things held in reserve, rather than jewels or money. Most Latin manuscripts read instead that a reward is laid up with the Most High, which is why modern versions differ from the King James at this point.

13:57

Ezra had been told to go out into an open field to pray and fast. Every one of these visions comes to him there.

13:58

"Such things as fall in their seasons" means the things that happen at their appointed times. The three days of sitting open the interval before the next vision, matching the seven days at the start of this one.