Ezekiel 47: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

A man leads Ezekiel back to the temple entrance, where water flows out from under the threshold toward the east. As the man measures off distances, the stream deepens from ankle-deep to a river too deep to cross, lined with trees; it flows down to the sea and makes the water there fresh, so fish and living creatures thrive. The Lord GOD then lays out the boundaries of the land on the north, east, south, and west, and orders it divided as an inheritance among the twelve tribes, with Joseph getting two portions and foreigners living among the people receiving an inheritance in the tribe where they live.

Claim by Claim

1. 47:1
   • The guide brought the prophet back to the door of the house.
   • Water was issuing out from under the threshold of the house toward the east.
   • The front of the house faced east.
   • The water came down from under the right side of the house.
   • The water came down south of the altar.
2. 47:2
   • The guide brought the prophet out by way of the north gate.
   • The guide led him around the outside to the outer gate that faces east.
   • Water was trickling out on the right side.
3. 47:3
   • The man went out eastward with a measuring line in his hand.
   • He measured a thousand cubits.
   • He led the prophet through the water.
   • The water reached the ankles.
4. 47:4
   • He measured another thousand.
   • He led the prophet through the water.
   • The water reached the knees.
   • He measured another thousand.
   • He led the prophet through.
   • The water reached the loins.
5. 47:5
   • He measured another thousand.
   • It was now a river the prophet could not cross.
   • The water had risen.
   • The water was deep enough to swim in.
   • It was a river that could not be crossed.
6. 47:6
   • The guide asked the prophet, called son of man, whether he had seen this.
   • The guide led the prophet back to the bank of the river.
7. 47:7
   • On returning, the prophet saw very many trees at the bank of the river.
   • The trees were on both sides of the river.
8. 47:8
   • The guide said these waters flow out toward the eastern region.
   • The waters go down into the Arabah.
   • The waters go into the sea.
   • When the waters are brought into the sea, the water of the sea will be made wholesome.
9. 47:9
   • Every living creature that swarms will live wherever the river comes.
   • There will be a very great multitude of fish.
   • The fish will be there because these waters come there.
   • The waters will be made wholesome.
   • Everything will live wherever the river comes.
10. 47:10
    • Fishermen will stand beside it.
    • They will stand from En-gedi to En-eglaim.
    • The place will be a spreading place for nets.
    • The fish there will be of many kinds.
    • The fish will be like the fish of the great sea.
    • The fish will be exceedingly many.
11. 47:11
    • Its miry places and marshes will not be made wholesome.
    • They will be given over to salt.
12. 47:12
    • Every kind of tree for food will grow by the river on both banks.
    • Their leaves will not wither.
    • Their fruit will not fail.
    • They will bear fresh fruit every month.
    • This is because their water issues out of the sanctuary.
    • Their fruit will be for food.
    • Their leaves will be for medicine.
13. 47:13
    • The Lord GOD speaks the following.
    • This is the border by which the land is to be inherited among the twelve tribes of Israel.
    • Joseph shall have two portions.
14. 47:14
    • The land is to be inherited by each one equally with his brother.
    • God swore with uplifted hand to give this land to their fathers.
    • This land will fall to them as an inheritance.
15. 47:15
    • This is the border of the land on the north side.
    • The north border runs from the great sea by the way of Hethlon toward the entrance of Zedad.
16. 47:16
    • The border includes Hamath, Berothah, and Sibraim.
    • Sibraim lies between the border of Damascus and the border of Hamath.
    • The border includes Hazar-hatticon, the middle village.
    • Hazar-hatticon lies by the border of Hauran.
17. 47:17
    • The border from the sea shall be Hazar-enan.
    • The border includes the border of Damascus.
    • The border includes the north northward and the border of Hamath.
    • This is the north side.
18. 47:18
    • The east side is to be measured from between Hauran and Damascus.
    • The east side runs between Gilead and the land of Israel, along the Jordan.
    • The measuring goes from the border to the eastern sea.
    • This is the east side.
19. 47:19
    • The south side runs southward from Tamar to the waters of strife at Kadesh.
    • From there it runs by the brook to the great sea.
    • This is the south side southward.
20. 47:20
    • The west side is the great sea from the border.
    • It runs until opposite the entrance of Hamath.
    • This is the west side.
21. 47:21
    • The land is to be divided among them according to the tribes of Israel.
22. 47:22
    • The land is to be allotted as an inheritance to them.
    • The land is also to be allotted to the strangers who sojourn among them.
    • These are strangers who have begotten children among them.
    • The strangers are to be treated as native-born among the children of Israel.
    • The strangers shall receive inheritance along with them among the tribes of Israel.
23. 47:23
    • In whatever tribe a stranger sojourns, there his inheritance is to be given.
    • The Lord GOD declares this.

Words Worth Explaining

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

47:1

"The man" is the guide who has been leading Ezekiel since chapter 40, a figure with the appearance of bronze, carrying a measuring cord and rod. Chapters 40–48 are one continuous vision in which this guide walks Ezekiel through a temple and measures it. The altar stood in the open courtyard in front of the temple building; the threshold is the raised stone sill of the doorway.

47:2

He has to go the long way round because in this vision the outer east gate had been shut permanently (44:1–2), so it could not be used as a way out. The temple complex is a set of walled courts, each with gates on the north, east and south.

47:3

A cubit was the length of a forearm, roughly eighteen inches; the temple vision uses a longer cubit of about twenty-one inches (40:5). A thousand cubits is therefore something over a quarter of a mile, and the four measurements together cover roughly a mile.

47:6

"Son of man" translates a Hebrew phrase meaning simply "human being" or "mortal." It is how the voice addresses Ezekiel throughout the book, a form of address, not a title.

47:8

The "eastern region" and "desert valley" are the Arabah, the deep rift valley running south from the Sea of Galilee down past the Dead Sea. "The sea" is the Dead Sea, which lies below sea level with no outlet; its water is so salt-heavy that no fish live in it. The King James "the waters shall be healed" means made fresh, drinkable rather than briny.

47:10

Engedi is a freshwater spring and oasis on the western shore of the Dead Sea, about halfway down. Eneglaim's location is uncertain, but it is assumed to be elsewhere on the same shore, so the two names mark the stretch of coast between them. The "Great Sea" is the Mediterranean, which does teem with fish, the point of the comparison.

47:11

The Dead Sea's shallow margins were worked as evaporation pans for salt, a valuable commodity used for preserving food and required with grain offerings. Saying the marshes are "left for salt" means that trade continues there.

47:12

Fruit trees in that climate bear once a year, in a short season. Fruit every month, on trees whose leaves never dry out, is the detail that marks this as a vision rather than a description of ordinary farmland.

47:13

"Inheritance" here means a permanent allotted holding of land, passed down within a family, not property received when someone dies. Joseph gets two portions because he had no tribe under his own name: his two sons Ephraim and Manasseh each headed a tribe. The total still comes to twelve because Levi, the priestly tribe, receives no share of land.

47:14

"I swore with a raised hand" is literal: lifting the hand was the physical gesture that accompanied an oath, the way a raised right hand does in a courtroom today.

47:15

These northern places lie in what is now Lebanon and Syria, well beyond the territory Israel normally held. Hethlon and Zedad cannot now be located with confidence; most of the names in verses 15–17 are known only from boundary lists like this one.

47:16

"Hamath" here probably renders Lebo-hamath, the pass or approach to Hamath, a city-kingdom on the Orontes river in Syria; it served as a standard label for the far northern limit. Damascus is the Syrian city; Hauran is the fertile plateau east of the Sea of Galilee.

47:18

The "eastern sea" is the Dead Sea. Gilead is the highland region east of the Jordan river. The Hebrew of this verse is difficult, and translations differ over exactly where the line runs and whether Tamar belongs at its southern end.

47:19

"The waters of strife at Kadesh" is Meribath-kadesh; Meribah means "quarrelling," and the name comes from a dispute over water at that desert oasis south of Judah (Numbers 20). "The brook" is the Brook of Egypt, the seasonal watercourse now called Wadi el-Arish, the traditional south-western limit of the land.

47:22

Dividing land "by lot" means assigning shares by a drawing of lots, comparable to drawing straws, rather than by negotiation. The "foreigners" are resident aliens, long-term settlers living permanently among Israelites, not visitors. Under earlier practice such settlers had legal protections but no tribal landholding, since land was allotted by descent.