The Bible

 

Ezekiel 32

Study

   

1 And it came to pass in the twelfth year, in the twelfth month, in the first [day] of the month, that the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying,

2 Son of man, take up a lamentation over Pharaoh king of Egypt, and say unto him, Thou wast likened unto a young lion of the nations: yet art thou as a monster in the seas; and thou didst break forth with thy rivers, and troubledst the waters with thy feet, and fouledst their rivers.

3 Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: I will spread out my net upon thee with a company of many peoples; and they shall bring thee up in my net.

4 And I will leave thee upon the land, I will cast thee forth upon the open field, and will cause all the birds of the heavens to settle upon thee, and I will satisfy the beasts of the whole earth with thee.

5 And I will lay thy flesh upon the mountains, and fill the valleys with thy height.

6 I will also water with thy blood the land wherein thou swimmest, even to the mountains; and the watercourses shall be full of thee.

7 And when I shall extinguish thee, I will cover the heavens, and make the stars thereof dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give its light.

8 All the bright lights of heaven will I make dark over thee, and set darkness upon thy land, saith the Lord Jehovah.

9 I will also vex the hearts of many peoples, when I shall bring thy destruction among the nations, into the countries which thou hast not known.

10 Yea, I will make many peoples amazed at thee, and their kings shall be horribly afraid for thee, when I shall brandish my sword before them; and they shall tremble at every moment, every man for his own life, in the day of thy fall.

11 For thus saith the Lord Jehovah: The sword of the king of Babylon shall come upon thee.

12 By the swords of the mighty will I cause thy multitude to fall; the terrible of the nations are they all: and they shall bring to nought the pride of Egypt, and all the multitude thereof shall be destroyed.

13 I will destroy also all the beasts thereof from beside many waters; neither shall the foot of man trouble them any more, nor the hoofs of beasts trouble them.

14 Then will I make their waters clear, and cause their rivers to run like oil, saith the Lord Jehovah.

15 When I shall make the land of Egypt desolate and waste, a land destitute of that whereof it was full, when I shall smite all them that dwell therein, then shall they know that I am Jehovah.

16 This is the lamentation wherewith they shall lament; the daughters of the nations shall lament therewith; over Egypt, and over all her multitude, shall they lament therewith, saith the Lord Jehovah.

17 It came to pass also in the twelfth year, in the fifteenth [day] of the month, that the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying,

18 Son of man, wail for the multitude of Egypt, and cast them down, even her, and the daughters of the famous nations, unto the nether parts of the earth, with them that go down into the pit.

19 Whom dost thou pass in beauty? go down, and be thou laid with the uncircumcised.

20 They shall fall in the midst of them that are slain by the sword: she is delivered to the sword; draw her away and all her multitudes.

21 The strong among the mighty shall speak to him out of the midst of Sheol with them that help him: they are gone down, they lie still, even the uncircumcised, slain by the sword.

22 Asshur is there and all her company; her graves are round about her; all of them slain, fallen by the sword;

23 whose graves are set in the uttermost parts of the pit, and her company is round about her grave; all of them slain, fallen by the sword, who caused terror in the land of the living.

24 There is Elam and all her multitude round about her grave; all of them slain, fallen by the sword, who are gone down uncircumcised into the nether parts of the earth, who caused their terror in the land of the living, and have borne their shame with them that go down to the pit.

25 They have set her a bed in the midst of the slain with all her multitude; her graves are round about her; all of them uncircumcised, slain by the sword; for their terror was caused in the land of the living, and they have borne their shame with them that go down to the pit: he is put in the midst of them that are slain.

26 There is Meshech, Tubal, and all their multitude; their graves are round about them; all of them uncircumcised, slain by the sword; for they caused their terror in the land of the living.

27 And they shall not lie with the mighty that are fallen of the uncircumcised, that are gone down to Sheol with their weapons of war, and have laid their swords under their heads, and their iniquities are upon their bones; for [they were] the terror of the mighty in the land of the living.

28 But thou shalt be broken in the midst of the uncircumcised, and shalt lie with them that are slain by the sword.

29 There is Edom, her kings and all her princes, who in their might are laid with them that are slain by the sword: they shall lie with the uncircumcised, and with them that go down to the pit.

30 There are the princes of the north, all of them, and all the Sidonians, who are gone down with the slain; in the terror which they caused by their might they are put to shame; and they lie uncircumcised with them that are slain by the sword, and bear their shame with them that go down to the pit.

31 Pharaoh shall see them, and shall be comforted over all his multitude, even Pharaoh and all his army, slain by the sword, saith the Lord Jehovah.

32 For I have put his terror in the land of the living; and he shall be laid in the midst of the uncircumcised, with them that are slain by the sword, even Pharaoh and all his multitude, saith the Lord Jehovah.

   

Commentary

 

Field

  
The Sower, by Vincent van Gogh

A "field" in the Bible usually represents the Lord's church, and more specifically the desire for good within the church. It's where good things start, take root, and grow. When you have a desire to be a good person and to do good things, the natural first questions are "What does that mean?", "What should I do?", "What can I do?". You look for ideas, concepts, direction. Once you figure out something you want to do or a change you want to make in yourself, you seek specific knowledge. If you want to volunteer at a food pantry, say, you'd need to know whom to call, when they need help, where to go, what to bring. Armed with that knowhow, you're ready to get to work. That process could be compared to food production. You start with a field -- which is that desire to be good. Then you plant seeds -- those ideas and concepts. Those seeds sprout into plants -- the specific facts and knowledge needed for the task (easily seen in the food pantry example, but also true with deeper tasks like "being more tolerant of my co-workers" or "taking more time for prayer," or "consciously being a more loving spouse"). Finally, those plants produce food -- the actual good thing that you go and do. The Writings also say that in a number of cases a "field" represents the doctrine, or teachings, of the church. This sounds markedly different. The desire for good is emotional, a drive, a wanting; doctrine is a set of ideas. But for a church to be true, its doctrine must be centered on a desire for good, and must lead people toward doing what is good. So sound doctrine is actually closely bound up with the desire for good.

The Bible

 

Exodus 23

Study

   

1 "You shall not spread a false report. Don't join your hand with the wicked to be a malicious witness.

2 "You shall not follow a crowd to do evil; neither shall you testify in court to side with a multitude to pervert justice;

3 neither shall you favor a poor man in his cause.

4 "If you meet your enemy's ox or his donkey going astray, you shall surely bring it back to him again.

5 If you see the donkey of him who hates you fallen down under his burden, don't leave him, you shall surely help him with it.

6 "You shall not deny justice to your poor people in their lawsuits.

7 "Keep far from a false charge, and don't kill the innocent and righteous: for I will not justify the wicked.

8 "You shall take no bribe, for a bribe blinds those who have sight and perverts the words of the righteous.

9 "You shall not oppress an alien, for you know the heart of an alien, since you were aliens in the land of Egypt.

10 "For six years you shall sow your land, and shall gather in its increase,

11 but the seventh year you shall let it rest and lie fallow, that the poor of your people may eat; and what they leave the animal of the field shall eat. In the same way, you shall deal with your vineyard and with your olive grove.

12 "Six days you shall do your work, and on the seventh day you shall rest, that your ox and your donkey may have rest, and the son of your handmaid, and the alien may be refreshed.

13 "Be careful to do all things that I have said to you; and don't invoke the name of other gods, neither let them be heard out of your mouth.

14 "You shall observe a feast to me three times a year.

15 You shall observe the feast of unleavened bread. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, at the time appointed in the month Abib (for in it you came out from Egypt), and no one shall appear before me empty.

16 And the feast of harvest, the first fruits of your labors, which you sow in the field: and the feast of harvest, at the end of the year, when you gather in your labors out of the field.

17 Three times in the year all your males shall appear before the Lord Yahweh.

18 "You shall not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leavened bread, neither shall the fat of my feast remain all night until the morning.

19 The first of the first fruits of your ground you shall bring into the house of Yahweh your God. "You shall not boil a young goat in its mother's milk.

20 "Behold, I send an angel before you, to keep you by the way, and to bring you into the place which I have prepared.

21 Pay attention to him, and listen to his voice. Don't provoke him, for he will not pardon your disobedience, for my name is in him.

22 But if you indeed listen to his voice, and do all that I speak, then I will be an enemy to your enemies, and an adversary to your adversaries.

23 For my angel shall go before you, and bring you in to the Amorite, the Hittite, the Perizzite, the Canaanite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite; and I will cut them off.

24 You shall not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor follow their practices, but you shall utterly overthrow them and demolish their pillars.

25 You shall serve Yahweh your God, and he will bless your bread and your water, and I will take sickness away from your midst.

26 No one will miscarry or be barren in your land. I will fulfill the number of your days.

27 I will send my terror before you, and will confuse all the people to whom you come, and I will make all your enemies turn their backs to you.

28 I will send the hornet before you, which will drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before you.

29 I will not drive them out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate, and the animals of the field multiply against you.

30 Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased and inherit the land.

31 I will set your border from the Red Sea even to the sea of the Philistines, and from the wilderness to the River; for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you shall drive them out before you.

32 You shall make no covenant with them, nor with their gods.

33 They shall not dwell in your land, lest they make you sin against me, for if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you."