Devotions

20221113

Eden’s trees in hell

Ezekiel 31:15-17 (JDV)

Ezekiel 31:15 ” ‘This is what the Lord Yahveh says: I caused grieving on the day the cedar went down to Sheol. I shut off the underground deep because of it: I held back the rivers of the deep, and its abundant water was restrained. I made Lebanon mourn on account of it, and all the trees of the field fainted because of it.
Ezekiel 31:16 I made the nations quake at the sound of its downfall when I threw it down to Sheol to be with those who descend to the Pit. Then all the trees of Eden, the choicest and best of Lebanon, all the well-watered trees, found consolation below the ground.
Ezekiel 31:17 They too descended with it to Sheol, to those murdered ones by the sword. As its allies, they had lived in its shade among the nations.

Eden’s trees in hell

Why would the trees of Eden go to hell? That is what the KJV says, but Shrewsbury points out that the Hebrew here is Sheol “the ‘grave,’ as the word chiefly signifies in the Old Testament.”1 He’s saying that the prideful pagan king (described as a great cedar) will join all the other fallen trees in death. Everyone goes to Sheol and awaits resurrection and judgment to determine their permanent fate: either permanent life through Christ or permanent destruction in the real hell: Gehenna.

1 Shrewsbury, W. J., and J. V. B. Shrewsbury. Notes on Ezekiel, Critical and Explanatory: [With the English Text]. 1863. p. 127.

20221112

no pride there

Ezekiel 31:10-14 (JDV)

Ezekiel 31:10 ” ‘Therefore, this is what the Lord Yahveh says: Since it towered high in stature and set its top among the clouds, and it grew proud on account of its height,
Ezekiel 31:11 I determined to hand it over to a ruler of nations; he would surely deal with it. I banished it because of its guilt.
Ezekiel 31:12 Foreigners, ruthless men from the nations, cut it down and left it lying. Its limbs fell on the mountains and in every valley; its boughs lay broken in all the land’s ravines. All the peoples of the land left its shade and abandoned it.
Ezekiel 31:13 All the birds of the sky nested on its fallen trunk, and all the animals of the field were among its boughs.
Ezekiel 31:14 This happened so that no trees planted beside water would become great in height and set their tops among the clouds, and so that no other well-watered trees would reach them in height. You see, they have all been consigned to death, to below the ground, among the people who descend to the Pit.

Redpath describes the fate of the once-proud trees like this: “Haughtiness comes before a fall, and in this fall they must learn humility; for they go down into the kingdom of the dead, where they are nothing else than ordinary sons of men: comp. Job iii . 19, “Small and great are there.” Except that there is no kingdom. It is just a hole in the ground. Sheol — where everyone goes at death. There is no pride there. There is no conscious life there. There we all wait for resurrection and judgment.”1

LORD give us the wisdom to live for you on this side. There is no living and no pride in the grave.

1 Redpath, Henry A. The Book of the Prophet Ezekiel: With Introd. and Notes. London: Methuen, 1907. p. 177.