Charles Ellicott Commentary Ezekiel 1

The thirtieth year. —On this date see Introduction, § 4. It may be added here that the concurrence of the fifth day of the month in connection with this epoch, and with that of Jehoiachin’s captivity in Ezekiel 1:2, shows that the years of the two epochs began at the same time.

Among the captives. —That is, in the midst of the region where they were settled. The vision which follows was seen by Ezekiel only, and was probably vouchsafed to him in solitude. The captives, or rather, the captivity, as it is in the original, is the same word as is used of Jehoiachin in the next verse, and yet must be somewhat differently understood in the two cases. Jehoiachin was actually in prison for many years; his people, within certain limits, were free. They were more than exiles, but less than prisoners. (On the heavens were opened, compare Matthew 3:16; Acts 7:56.)

Visions of God. —Not merely great visions, as the Divine name is often added in Scripture to express greatness or intensity (Psalms 36:6 (see margin); Psalms 80:10 (see margin); Jonah 3:3 (see margin); Acts 7:20 (see margin)), but Divine visions, visions sent from God, as in Ezekiel 8:3; Ezekiel 40:2.

Came expressly.—Or, came certainly, with the fullest proof of reality. In the original, there is simply the ordinary form of repeating the verb for emphasis. The prophet mentions his own name only here and in Ezekiel 24:24.

The hand of the Lord was there upon him.—This is a form of expression indicating the special power and influence that the Spirit exercised over the prophets when they were called to be the means of Divine communications. (Compare to 1 Kings 18:46, and Ezekiel 3:22; Ezekiel 37:1; Daniel 10:10; Revelation 1:17).

It is noticeable that Ezekiel here speaks of himself in the third person, while in Ezekiel 1:1, and always after this, he uses the first person. It has been suggested that this, together with the mention of his own name, may indicate the insertion of these two verses during a revision of his work by the prophet.

In entering upon the vision of the glory of the Lord, which fills the rest of this chapter, it is to be remembered that Ezekiel is struggling to portray what necessarily exceeds the power of human language. It is therefore not surprising that there is some repetition and obscurity in the detail.

All similar descriptions of Divine manifestations are marked more or less strongly by the same characteristics (Isaiah 6:1–4; Daniel 7:9–10; Revelation 1:12–20; Revelation 4:2–6, etc.).

It should also be kept in mind that what the prophet saw was not the eternal Father in His own absolute essence, who dwells in unapproachable light, and whom no man hath seen, nor can see (1 Timothy 6:16). And if it had been possible for Ezekiel to have been so transported out of the body as to behold this, it would then have been impossible for him to describe it.

But what he saw in vision was such a manifestation as humans could bear, in which God hides His face and allows only His uttermost parts to be seen (Exodus 33:22–23).

In the description that follows, a mingling of the symbols of the Divine manifestation at Sinai with the "patterns of heavenly things" in the Most Holy Place of the Temple may be recognized. The whole is modified to suit the present occasion and possibly somewhat colored by the now-familiar symbolic art of Babylonia.

A whirlwind came out of the north. —The north is seen as the direction from which the vision proceeded, not because the Babylonians conceived that the seat of Divine power was there (Isaiah 14:13–14), but because it was common for the prophets to represent the Divine judgments upon Judea as coming from the north (Jeremiah 4:6; Jeremiah 6:1). It was from that direction that the Assyrian and the Chaldean conquerors were accustomed to descend upon the Holy Land. The vision is actually seen in Chaldea, but it refers to Jerusalem and is described as if viewed from that standpoint.

A great cloud. —As in the Divine manifestation on Sinai (Exodus 19:9–16). The cloud serves both as the foundation for all the other details of the manifestation—a place where, and by means of which, everything is situated—and also as a hiding-place of the Divine majesty. This ensures that all that the human eye can bear may be seen, while what it cannot bear may still be known to be there, shrouded in the cloud. The transposition of a single letter from the end of one word in the Hebrew to the beginning of the next will change the reading to “a whirlwind out of the north brought on a great cloud.”

A fire infolding itself. —More literally translated in the margin, catching itself. The idea conveyed is that of flames round and round the cloud, the flashes following one another so rapidly that each seemed to catch the one before it; there were tongues of flame, each one reaching to another. The same word occurs in Exodus 9:24, in connection with “fire,” and is there translated mingled. The vision so far seems modeled on the natural appearance of a terrific thunderstorm seen at a distance, in which the great black cloud appears illuminated by the unceasing and coalescing flashes of lightning. So, with all its impressive darkness, there was a brightness about it.

As the colour of amber. —Color is, literally, eye. The word translated “amber” (chasmal) occurs only in this book (here, and Ezekiel 1:27 and Ezekiel 8:2), and is now generally recognized as meaning some form of bright metal, either glowing in its molten state, or as the fine brass of Ezekiel 1:7 and Revelation 1:15, burnished and glowing in the light of the “infolding flame.” Therefore, there is now added to the first appearance of the natural phenomenon, a glowing eye or center to the cloud, shining out even from the middle of the fire.

The likeness of four living creatures next appeared from this centre of the fiery cloud. The word “likeness” is not without significance. The prophet would make it plain that this was a vision, that these were symbolic, not actually existing creatures. Their prominent characteristic is that they were “living.” This word is used over and over again in connection with them (see Ezekiel 1:13-15, Ezekiel 1:19, Ezekiel 1:21, and following); and in fact, in Ezekiel and Revelation (Revelation 4:6 and following, where it is mistranslated beasts) it occurs nearly thirty times.

The same characteristic is further emphasized in Ezekiel 1:14 by the speed, as of a flash of lightning, with which they ran and returned, by the multiplicity of eyes in the wheels connected with them (Ezekiel 1:18), and by their going instantly wherever the spirit was to go (Ezekiel 1:20); while in Revelation 4:8 it is said that they rest not day and night. Their life is represented as most closely connected with the source of all life, the living God, whose throne is seen in the vision (Ezekiel 1:26) as above the heads of these “living creatures.”

Ezekiel does not here say what these living creatures were, but in a subsequent vision, when he saw them again in connection with the Temple, he recognised them as the cherubim (Ezekiel 10:15, Ezekiel 10:20). Cherubim, whether here, or in the Temple overshadowing the mercy-seat, or in the garden of Eden keeping the way of the tree of life, always indicate the immediate presence of the God of holiness. The prophet again mentions these composite symbolic figures in connection with the vision of the Temple in Ezekiel 41:18-20. The origin of such ideal figures has been variously ascribed to the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Phoenicians, and the Arabs; but this symbolism was, in fact, almost universal throughout the East. Dr. Currey (Speaker’s Commentary, note on Ezekiel 1:0) points out the striking difference between this symbolism and that of the Greeks.

They tried to delineate the Divine attributes with the utmost beauty of form and harmony of detail under some human figure in which those attributes were conspicuous. In consequence, the mind of the worshipper lost sight of the ideal, and became absorbed in the sensuous imagery by which it was represented; while here, by the very strangeness, and sometimes grotesqueness, of the imagery, its purely symbolic character was kept constantly in view. Cherubim are associated in the Old Testament with that tree of life of which humanity might not partake except through Him who is the life, and with that typical holy of holies which humanity might not enter until the true Holy of Holies was entered once for all by Christ through His own blood (Hebrews 9:8, Hebrews 9:12).

They had the likeness of a man. —With all the strange variety of details to be described immediately, they still had a general human form, and are to be understood as like a human in whatever is not specified.

Four faces. —The cherubim, being merely symbolical figures, are variously represented. Those placed in the Tabernacle and in the Temple of Solomon appear to have had only a single face; those described in Ezekiel’s vision of the Temple (Ezekiel 41:18–19) had two; the four living creatures of Revelation 4:7 were each different from the other: one like a man, one like a lion, one like an ox, and one like an eagle, and these four are combined here in each one of the cherubim (Ezekiel 1:10). Man is the head of the whole animal creation, the lion of wild beasts, the ox of the domestic animals, and the eagle of the birds.

Four wings. —In Revelation 4:8, six wings are mentioned, as also with the seraphim of Isaiah 6:2. The cherubim in Solomon’s Temple had two (1 Kings 6:27). In Ezekiel 10:21, as here, they have four. The number is plainly not important, though doubtless assigned to them with reference to the number of creatures, their faces, and the wheels. But it is appropriate here that they have more than the normal number of two wings, partly to align with the other indications of the fullness of their life and activity, and partly because (Ezekiel 1:11) two of them were used to express their reverence, as were four of those of the seraphim in Isaiah.