“For thus says the Lord GOD, ’Behold, I will bring upon Tyre from the north Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, king of kings, with horses, chariots, cavalry and a great army…. So I will silence the sound of your songs, and the sound of your harps will be heard no more…. I will bring terrors on you and you will be no more; though you will be sought, you will never be found again,” declares the Lord GOD” (Ezek 26:7, 13, 21).
In our relativistic atmosphere of religious and moral pluralism, where everyone’s truth is mutually exclusive yet somehow considered equally valid, passages about God’s judgment on Israel’s enemies cause many believers embarrassment. For the original readers of Ezekiel, however, the oracles against the nations filled God’s people with incredible hope. These promises of judgment against the nations that had harmed God’s people and blasphemed the holy name of God provided a deep sense of relief and comfort that one day justice would finally be served. For these ancient readers of Scripture, a world filled with antisemitism and rebellion against God was not merely intolerable, it was a living hell on earth.
For the original readers of Ezekiel, however, the oracles against the nations filled God’s people with incredible hope.
While we should constantly pray for the salvation of our enemies, we should also read the oracles against the nations as promises that no stone will be left unturned when God finally brings justice upon those who have caused great harm to his very good creation. And if anyone opposes this way of reading and applying Ezekiel’s oracles against the nations, my best defense is Scripture itself. For this is precisely how the Apostle John read and interpreted these same oracles too.
“Then a strong angel took up a stone like a great millstone and threw it into the sea, saying, ‘So will Babylon, the great city, be thrown down with violence, and will not be found any longer. And the sound of harpists and musicians and flute players and trumpeters will not be heard in you any longer; and no craftsman of any craft will be found in you any longer; and the sound of a mill will not be heard in you any longer…. And in her was found the blood of prophets and of saints and of all who have been slain on the earth’” (Rev 18:21-22, 24).
