Ezekiel 43 is the forty-third chapter of the

Book of Ezekiel The Book of Ezekiel is the third of the Latter Prophets in the Tanakh and one of the major prophetic books, following Isaiah and Jeremiah. According to the book itself, it records six visions of the prophet Ezekiel, exiled in Babylon, during ...

in the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
'' Old Testament of the Christian

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts ...

.Halley, Henry H. ''Halley's Bible Handbook'': an Abbreviated Bible Commentary. 23rd edition. Zondervan Publishing House. 1962.''Holman Illustrated Bible Handbook''. Holman Bible Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee. 2012. This book contains the prophecies attributed to the

prophet In religion, a prophet or prophetess is an individual who is regarded as being in contact with a divine being and is said to speak on behalf of that being, serving as an intermediary with humanity by delivering messages or teachings from the s ...

priest A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in partic ...

Ezekiel, and is one of the

Books of the Prophets Nevi'im (; he, נְבִיאִים ''Nəvīʾīm'', Tiberian: ''Năḇīʾīm,'' "Prophets", literally "spokespersons") is the second major division of the Hebrew Bible (the ''Tanakh''), lying between the Torah (instruction) and Ketuvim (wri ...

.J. D. Davis. 1960. ''A Dictionary of the Bible''. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House.Theodore Hiebert, et al. 1996. ''The New Interpreter's Bible: Volume VI''. Nashville: Abingdon. Chapters 40- 48 give the ideal picture of a new temple. This chapter contains Ezekiel's vision of the glory of God returning into the temple, Ezekiel 43:1-6; God promises to dwell there, if the people will put away their sins, Ezekiel 43:7-9; to incite them to repentance, the prophet shows them the model and law of the house, Ezekiel 43:10-12; the measures of the altar, Ezekiel 43:13-17; the ordinances thereof, Ezekiel 43:18-27.Robert Jamieson, Andrew Robert Fausset; David Brown. '' Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown's Commentary On the Whole Bible''. 1871.

Text

The original text was written in the

Hebrew language Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

. This chapter is divided into 27 verses.

Textual witnesses

Some early manuscripts containing the text of this chapter in

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

are of the

Masoretic Text The Masoretic Text (MT or 𝕸; he, נֻסָּח הַמָּסוֹרָה, Nūssāḥ Hammāsōrā, lit. 'Text of the Tradition') is the authoritative Hebrew and Aramaic text of the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) in Rabbinic Judaism. ...

tradition, which includes the Codex Cairensis (895), the Petersburg Codex of the Prophets (916), Aleppo Codex (10th century),

Codex Leningradensis The Leningrad Codex ( la, Codex Leningradensis [Leningrad Book]; he, כתב יד לנינגרד) is the oldest complete manuscript of the Hebrew Bible in Hebrew, using the Masoretic Text and Tiberian vocalization. According to its colopho ...

(1008). There is also a translation into

Koine Greek Koine Greek (; Koine el, ἡ κοινὴ διάλεκτος, hē koinè diálektos, the common dialect; ), also known as Hellenistic Greek, common Attic, the Alexandrian dialect, Biblical Greek or New Testament Greek, was the common supra-reg ...

known as the

Septuagint The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint (, ; from the la, septuaginta, lit=seventy; often abbreviated ''70''; in Roman numerals, LXX), is the earliest extant Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. It includes several books beyond ...

, made in the last few centuries BC. Extant ancient manuscripts of the

version include

Codex Vaticanus The Codex Vaticanus ( The Vatican, Bibl. Vat., Vat. gr. 1209), designated by siglum B or 03 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering), δ 1 ( von Soden), is a fourth-century Christian manuscript of a Greek Bible, containing the majority of the Greek Old ...

(B;

\mathfrak

^B; 4th century),

Codex Alexandrinus The Codex Alexandrinus (London, British Library, Royal MS 1. D. V-VIII), designated by the siglum A or 02 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering of New Testament manuscripts), δ 4 (in the von Soden numbering of New Testament manuscripts), is a manu ...

(A;

\mathfrak

^A; 5th century) and

Codex Marchalianus Codex Marchalianus designated by siglum Q is a 6th-century Greek manuscript copy of the Greek version of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh or Old Testament) known as the Septuagint. The text was written on vellum in uncial letters. Palaeographically it ...

(Q;

\mathfrak

^Q; 6th century).

The glory of God returns (43:1–12)

The section records the vision of God's glory returning to the temple, in comparison to its departure in chapters 10 and 11, as Ezekiel witnesses the glory moves through the east gate into the temple, while previously it passed through to move out and stand east of the city (). Ezekiel was given the final command to convey the things he saw to the people of Israel (verses 10–12), which summarizes the purpose of his visions and the existence of his book, so that the future generation would know the original authority of the temple rebuilding from his writing (verse 11). The command to "write it down" indicates that most of the messages in this book highly likely were personally written by Ezekiel, giving a rare indication of the literacy and the writing skills among the priests.

Verse 1

:''Afterward he brought me to the gate, the gate that faces toward the east.'' This was the gate first surveyed, in .

Verse 3

: ''And it was according to the appearance of the vision which I saw,'' : ''even according to the vision that I saw when I came to destroy the city:'' : ''and the visions were like the vision that I saw by the river Chebar;'' : ''and I fell upon my face.'' The "River Chebar" is generally identified as the "Kebar Canal", near Nippur in what is now Iraq. It was part of a complex network of irrigation and transport canals which also included the Shatt el-Nil, a silted up canal toward the east of Babylon. The earlier vision referred to was recounted in Ezekiel 1:1.

Verse 7

: ''And He said to me, "Son of man, this is the place of My throne and the place of the soles of My feet, where I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel forever. No more shall the house of Israel defile My holy name, they nor their kings, by their harlotry or with the carcasses of their kings on their high places.'' * The vision was given on the 25th anniversary of Ezekiel's exile, "April 28, 573 BCE"; 14 years after the fall of Jerusalem and 12 years after the last messages of hope in chapter 39. * "Son of man" (Hebrew: בן־אדם ''-''): this phrase is used 93 times to address Ezekiel, distinguishing the creator God from God's creatures, and to put Ezekiel as a "representative member of the human race."

The altar of burnt offering (43:13–17)

This part is an addition to the short description of the altar in the inner court in . The design gives an appearance like a Babylonian temple-tower, unlike the altar of unhewn stones actually used in the post-exilic temple.

Verse 13

: ''These are the measurements of the altar in cubits (the cubit is one cubit and a handbreadth): the base one cubit high and one cubit wide, with a rim all around its edge of one span. This is the height of the altar:'' NKJV * "Cubit": here is a "long cubit", about , a sum of "short cubit" and "a handbreadth" as defined in Ezekiel 40:5.

The consecration of the altar (43:18–27)

This section is apparently a later addition, referring to the Priestly material in f. After the altar was consecrated by special offerings of seven days, it can be used for regular sacrifices. The regulations were likely incorporated to fill in details for the original report as well as to avoid disorder, and – along the visions in the book – were preserved in the post-exilic period by the descendants of the influential priest group that was exiled together with Ezekiel.

Notes

References

Sources

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External links

Jewish

Ezekiel 43 Hebrew with Parallel EnglishEzekiel 43 Hebrew with Rashi's Commentary

Christian

Ezekiel 43 English Translation with Parallel Latin Vulgate
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