Ezekiel 13:14

Eze 13:14 So will I break down the wall that ye have daubed with untempered [morter], and bring it down to the ground, so that the foundation thereof shall be discovered, and it shall fall, and ye shall be consumed in the midst thereof: and ye shall know that I [am] the LORD.

Ver. 14. So that the foundation thereof shall be discovered.] So that all men shall see your falsehoods. See 2Ti 3:9 Rev 17:16. The old whore is first made naked and then desolate. Mr Philpot, martyr, dealt plainly by the Popish prelates in open convocation when he said to them, Before God ye are all bare arsed. God hath detected you, &c. {a}

And ye shall be consumed.] See on Eze 13:12.

{a} Acts and Mon.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The repetition of the same threat (see on Eze 13:11) is to awaken the people out of their dream of safety by the certainty of the event.

foundation--As the "wall" represents the security of the nation, so the "foundation" is Jerusalem, on the fortifications of which they rested their confidence. GROTIUS makes the "foundation" refer to the false principles on which they rested; Eze 13:16 supports the former view.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

This verse ought to be united with the other: God says, I will throw down the wall. For the false prophets had acquired so much favor, that their boasting was as much esteemed as an oracle. Hence the people were persuaded that what even these impostors dreamt was uttered by God. Since, therefore, they had so bound men’s minds to themselves, the Prophet was obliged to inveigh vehemently against those impostures, since he would not have succeeded by simple language. This language, indeed, may seem superfluous; but if any one considers how greatly these miserable exiles were deluded by the false prophets, he will easily acknowledge that God does not repeat the same thing so often in vain: as in this place he brings forward nothing new; but he so inculcates what we have already seen as to confirm it. I will pull down, therefore, the wall which you have daubed with untempered mortar, and I will lay it low on the ground, and its foundation shall be uncovered, or discovered. Here the Prophet signifies that God would so lay bare the fallacies of those who had deceived the people with vain hopes, that no disguise should remain for them, but their disgrace should be plain to every one. Now, such was the shamelessness of these impostors, that if they were convicted on one point, yet they did not desist on that account, but took credit to themselves if anything turned out more fortunately than they could expect, as if they had not prophesied in vain, while a single thing came true. Since, therefore, the impious so turned their backs when God detected their folly, the Prophet adds, that the false prophets would have nothing left, because God will not only overthrow whatever they seemed to build, but he will uncover even the foundations, so that the people may understand that there was not a scruple or the least particle of truth in them.

And it shall fall, and you shall be consumed in the midst of it. He had just said that it should be ruinously consumed: hailstones, he said, should fall to consume it; by which word he understood that the final slaughter should be so severe that no hope should be left. For as long as Jerusalem stood, the Israelites always look forward to a return. But when they saw the kingdom not only weakened, but utterly destroyed, the temple overthrown, and the city ruined, whenever they heard of their dreadful dispersion, not the slightest remnant of hope survived. Now this consumption is transferred to the false prophets. As that consumption was final, and without a gleam of hope, ye shall be consumed, says he, in the midst of it, and ye shall know that I am Jehovah. He does not inculcate this particular so often in vain; but he inveighs with indignation against the wicked audacity of the false prophets, who dared so petulantly to oppose themselves to the true servants of God, and to assume his name, and to trifle with him like children. Such is the prodigious madness of mortals who dare to set themselves against God: for this reason, he says, they shall at length perceive with whom they have to do. It follows —

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

14. shall be discovered] i.e. uncovered, laid bare. The prophets shall be destroyed in the ruins of the wall (Amo_9:1). The figure tends in these words to be replaced by the reality, namely, Jerusalem and its downfall.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

To wit, the prophets of Israel, which prophesy concerning Jerusalem,.... This explains who are meant by those that daubed with untempered mortar:

and which see visions of peace for her; not in reality, but in pretence; they boasted that they had visions and revelations from the Lord, and assured the people they should enjoy great peace and prosperity; but these, as they are before called, were vain visions and lying divinations: there seems to be in this an allusion to the name of Jerusalem, which, according to some, signifies,

"they shall see peace:''

and there is no peace, saith the Lord God; not to the wicked; nor to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, who listened to the false prophets; nor to the false prophets themselves.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

You. Literally, "it." But Hebrew and Septuagint have, "ye." (Haydock) --- The wall and the inhabitants shall perish. (Calmet)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

This verse with very little variation repeats the same dreadful procedure of God against this people, and these false prophets, and their false, ill-grounded confidences. And this repeating these things is to give us to know the certainty of the thing, the terror wherewith God will do it, and the stupidity of the Jews bewitched by the flatteries of their false prophets.

I will break down the wall; pull it down stone by stone; level it with the ground. The unsoundness of the foundation, whatever it may seem to be,

shall be discovered to every one that will look on it, and this to the utter shame of the builders.

And ye, who deceive and are deceived by it, shall perish in the midst thereof. So all that hearkened to these false prophets, rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar, fortified the city, and obstinately stood it out, fell with the ruins of the city, and perished, and then felt the stroke of God’s hand, and truth of his prophet.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

14. So will I break down the wall — Although it was the Chaldeans who swept like a flood or a windstorm over Judea, and whose blows fell like hailstones, yet these were but the agents of Jehovah. It was not because the walls of the city were fragile, but because the God of the city did not protect it, that it fell before its enemies.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Ye shall know - Those that deceived others, will in the end be found to have deceived themselves. And no doom will be more fearful, than that of unfaithful ministers.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

the wall That is Jerusalem.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.