Ezekiel 31

In the eleventh year, in the third month, on the first day of the month, the word of the LORD came to me. He said:

1And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month, in the first day of the month, that the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,

NoteEzekiel dates his oracles from the deportation of King Jehoiachin of Judah to Babylon in 597 BC, the exile Ezekiel himself was part of. The eleventh year, third month, first day falls around June 587 BC, a few weeks before Babylon breached the walls of Jerusalem.

2Son of man, speak to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to his crowds of people. Say: Who can be compared to you in your greatness?

2Son of man, speak unto Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to his multitude; Whom art thou like in thy greatness?

Note"Son of man" is a Hebrew phrase meaning simply "human being" or "mortal"; it is how God addresses Ezekiel throughout the book, over ninety times. "Crowds of people" translates a Hebrew word (hamon) covering a nation's massed population, its army, and the noisy pomp that goes with them, Pharaoh's teeming greatness, not just his subjects.

3Look at Assyria. It was a cedar tree in Lebanon, with beautiful branches that spread shade over the forest. It stood very tall, and its top reached up among the clouds.

3Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a shadowing shroud, and of an high stature; and his top was among the thick boughs.

NoteAssyria was the empire that had dominated the whole region, including Israel and Judah, for two centuries; its capital Nineveh fell in 612 BC and the last of it was gone by 609 BC (roughly a generation before this speech. Egypt is being shown a corpse and asked whether it looks familiar. The cedars of Lebanon were the tallest and most valuable timber known in the ancient Near East, shipped to build palaces and temples; a cedar is the obvious image for an empire. (The Hebrew word read here as "Assyria" is spelled the same as a word for a kind of tree, and some read the line as "a cypress, a cedar in Lebanon") the text is genuinely uncertain.) The phrase rendered "among the clouds" can equally mean "among the thick branches"; both senses run through the chapter.

4The waters made it grow big. The deep springs made it tall, sending their streams all around the ground where it was planted, and sending smaller channels out to every other tree of the field.

4The waters made him great, the deep set him up on high with her rivers running round about his plants, and sent out her little rivers unto all the trees of the field.

Note"The deep" is the mass of fresh water the ancient world pictured lying beneath the earth, feeding springs, wells and rivers from below. The tree is not merely rained on; it is fed from the primordial source, an image with an edge to it for Egypt, whose whole life came from the Nile.

5So it stood taller than all the trees of the field. Its boughs grew many and its branches grew long as it spread them out, because there was so much water.

5Therefore his height was exalted above all the trees of the field, and his boughs were multiplied, and his branches became long because of the multitude of waters, when he shot forth.

6All the birds of the sky built their nests in its boughs. All the wild animals gave birth to their young under its branches. All the great nations lived in its shade.

6All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations.

7So it was beautiful in its greatness, with its long branches, because its roots reached down to plenty of water.

7Thus was he fair in his greatness, in the length of his branches: for his root was by great waters.

8The cedars in God's garden were no match for it. The cypress trees did not equal its boughs, and the plane trees did not equal its branches. No tree in God's garden was as beautiful as it was.

8The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him: the fir trees were not like his boughs, and the chestnut trees were not like his branches; nor any tree in the garden of God was like unto him in his beauty.

Note"God's garden" is Eden, pictured here not as a vegetable plot but as a divine park planted with the finest trees in existence. The comparison is to the best that has ever grown anywhere.

9I made it beautiful, with its many branches, so that all the trees of Eden, the ones in God's garden, envied it.

9I have made him fair by the multitude of his branches: so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied him.

10So this is what the Lord GOD says: You lifted yourself up high, and that tree pushed its top up among the clouds, and its heart grew proud of its height.

10Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Because thou hast lifted up thyself in height, and he hath shot up his top among the thick boughs, and his heart is lifted up in his height;

NoteThe Hebrew slides between addressing the tree as "you" and describing it as "it" within a single sentence, because the tree, Assyria, and Pharaoh listening are all the same target. The rendering keeps the shift rather than smoothing it out.

11So I handed it over to the ruler of the nations, and he will certainly deal with it. I drove it out because of its wickedness.

11I have therefore delivered him into the hand of the mighty one of the heathen; he shall surely deal with him: I have driven him out for his wickedness.

Note"The ruler of the nations" is left unnamed. In Assyria's case the destroyer was Babylon; the same Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, was the standing threat to Egypt as Ezekiel spoke.

12Foreigners, the most ruthless of the nations, cut it down and left it lying there. Its branches fell on the mountains and in every valley. Its boughs lay broken in all the streambeds of the land. All the peoples of the earth walked away from its shade and left it.

12And strangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off, and have left him: upon the mountains and in all the valleys his branches are fallen, and his boughs are broken by all the rivers of the land; and all the people of the earth are gone down from his shadow, and have left him.

13Now all the birds of the sky settle on its fallen trunk, and all the wild animals live among its broken branches.

13Upon his ruin shall all the fowls of the heaven remain, and all the beasts of the field shall be upon his branches:

14This happened so that no other tree growing by the water would lift itself up so high, or push its top up among the clouds, or stand tall and proud of its height, no matter how well watered it is. For they are all handed over to death, to the world below, along with human beings who go down into the pit.

14To the end that none of all the trees by the waters exalt themselves for their height, neither shoot up their top among the thick boughs, neither their trees stand up in their height, all that drink water: for they are all delivered unto death, to the nether parts of the earth, in the midst of the children of men, with them that go down to the pit.

Note"The pit" and "the world below" both refer to Sheol, the underworld where the Hebrew Bible pictures all the dead going, powerful and powerless alike. It is a place of shadowy existence, not a place of punishment; the point being made is leveling, not torment.

15This is what the Lord GOD says: On the day that tree went down to the place of the dead, I made mourning. I covered over the deep springs for it. I held back its rivers, and the great waters stopped flowing. I made Lebanon mourn for it, and all the trees of the field wilted because of it.

15Thus saith the Lord GOD; In the day when he went down to the grave I caused a mourning: I covered the deep for him, and I restrained the floods thereof, and the great waters were stayed: and I caused Lebanon to mourn for him, and all the trees of the field fainted for him.

NoteCovering the deep and stopping the rivers is mourning imagery: the underground waters that fed the tree are pictured shrouded and stilled, as a household would darken itself and stop its ordinary business at a death.

16I made the nations shake at the sound of its fall, when I threw it down to the place of the dead with those who go down into the pit. Then all the trees of Eden, the choicest and best of Lebanon, all the well-watered trees, were comforted down in the world below.

16I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to hell with them that descend into the pit: and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, shall be comforted in the nether parts of the earth.

Note"Comforted" here has the older sense of being consoled by company in misfortune, the trees already fallen take some satisfaction in seeing the greatest of them all brought down to their own level.

17They too went down to the place of the dead with it, to those killed by the sword. They had been its strength, and they had lived in its shade among the nations.

17They also went down into hell with him unto them that be slain with the sword; and they that were his arm, that dwelt under his shadow in the midst of the heathen.

Note"They had been its strength" renders a Hebrew idiom, "they were its arm", its military backing and allies, the powers that propped the empire up.

18So which of the trees of Eden is like you in glory and greatness? Yet you will be brought down with the trees of Eden to the world below. You will lie among the uncircumcised, with those killed by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his crowds of people, says the Lord GOD.

18To whom art thou thus like in glory and in greatness among the trees of Eden? yet shalt thou be brought down with the trees of Eden unto the nether parts of the earth: thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised with them that be slain by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, saith the Lord GOD.

NoteTo lie among the uncircumcised was, to an ancient Israelite audience, burial in the most dishonourable company imaginable, and the insult bites harder because the Egyptians themselves practiced circumcision and looked down on peoples who did not. "Those killed by the sword" means men cut down in battle and often left unburied, a shameful death, not a soldier's honor.