Ezekiel 28:6

Eze 28:6 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Because thou hast set thine heart as the heart of God;

Ver. 6. Because thou hast set thine heart as the heart of God.] Thou thinkest thy wisdom to be divine, and thyself the only one. The Tyrians were famous for their great wisdom, {Zec 9:2} and they are said to be the inventors of many arts; yet should they not have overly weaned themselves in this sort; which because they did, let them hear their doom.

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.

Eze 28:6. Therefore, thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because thou hast set thine heart as the heart of God,

Eze 28:7. Therefore, behold, I bring upon thee strangers, the terrible of the nations; and they shall draw their swords against the beauty of thy wisdom, and pierce through thy splendour:

Eze 28:8. To the pit shall they bring thee down, and thou shalt die the deaths (Why deaths here, and in Eze 28:10, and not rather death? Because, say some, various kinds of death are referred to; or, because the abstract idea (as made up of the several particulars) is thus denoted when raised to its highest form. No, says Häv., “the plural is only used of death when several persons are spoken of.” This is not so clear. Isa 53:9 is not quite easily explained on that principle. And certainly the apostle Paul, whose style of thought was quite Hebraistic, used the plural in reference to different kinds, when he says, “in deaths oft.” ) of the pierced-through in the midst of the seas.

Eze 28:9. Wilt thou indeed say, I am God, in the presence of him that slays thee? and thou art man (that is, thou art assuredly man), and not God, in the land of him that pierces thee through. 10. The deaths of the uncircumcised thou shalt die by the hand of strangers: for I have spoken, saith the Lord Jehovah.

The judgment to be executed on the king of Tyre was thus to be exactly adapted to his guilt; it was to be such as would force on him the conviction that he had not the might and wisdom of God at his command, but, like other frail and erring mortals, was liable to be overcome and brought to destruction. This judgment, it is simply declared, was going to be executed by the hand of strangers, the terrible ones of the nations—an epithet elsewhere given to the Chaldeans (Eze 30:11, Eze 31:12); though there is no necessity here for absolutely confining it to them. Here it only intimates that terrible instruments of vengeance should be provided, fit for executing the Divine purpose of retribution; so that destruction would surely come in its appointed time—the death, as of persons given up to the slaughter, or as of the uncircumcised, who had no interest in the covenant of Heaven, and were doomed to perish.

The delineation we have considered, first of the high presumption and peerless glory of the king of Tyre, and then of his Divine chastisement and utter ruin, is followed by another in which precisely the same topics are again handled, and in the same order. The representation, however, at the beginning, of the king’s greatness and glory, while it is drawn in the same ironical vein as in the former case, is cast in an entirely different mould, and is intended to exhibit this proud monarch as a kind of normal or primeval man, the type of humanity in its best and most divine-like form; but only for the purpose of showing how incapable he was of bearing the glory, and how necessary it was that he should be visited with Divine chastisement, and brought to final ruin. The passage is not without its difficulties; but these have often been greatly aggravated by not perceiving the exact point of view from which the delineation is drawn; and hence, from the LXX. downwards, all manner of liberties have been taken with the original.

Patrick Fairbairn — An Exposition of Ezekiel (1851), Jonah (1849), and The Pastoral Epistles (1874) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

28:6-7 The prince of Tyre’s pride was the precursor to his fall (Prov 16:18). His claim to wisdom and power would be empty when the Lord brought the Babylonian army against him; they would draw their swords and cut him down to size.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Because, &c.--resumptive of Eze 28:2.

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

(6) Set thine heart as the heart of God.—The same expression as in Eze_28:2. (Comp. Oba_1:3, “The pride of thine heart hath deceived thee.”) The meaning is plain: thou hast entertained thoughts and purposes fitting only to the Supreme.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Therefore thus saith the Lord God,.... Now follows the punishment threatened, because of all this pride, haughtiness, and blasphemy:

because thou hast set thine heart as the heart of God; seeking thine own glory; setting up thyself above all others; assuming that to thyself which belongs to God; and making thyself equal to him, or showing thyself as if thou wast God; See Gill on Eze 28:2.

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

Hast set thine heart: see Eze 28:2.

As the heart of God, who doth, as justly he may, design himself, his own glory, in all he designeth and worketh, and take the glory to himself; thou hast done so too, designed thy own greatness, and gloried in it.

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

Connecting Statement:

Yahweh continues giving Ezekiel his message to the ruler of Tyre.

General Information:

The words "you" and "your" in these verses refer to the ruler of Tyre.

you have made your heart like the heart of a god

Here "heart" represents the mind or thinking. A god thinks of himself as better than people. See how you translated the similar phrase in Ezekiel 28:2. (See: Metonymy and Simile)

the beauty of your wisdom

The abstract nouns "beauty" and "wisdom" can be translated using the adjective "beautiful" and the adverb "wisely." AT: "the beautiful things that you have so wisely made" (See: Abstract Nouns)

profane your splendor

The abstract noun "splendor" can be translated using the adjective "splendid." AT: "profane how splendid you are" or "defile how majestic you are" (See: Abstract Nouns)

translationWords

heart

alien

nation

sword

wise

profane

splendor

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.