Day 247 Ezekiel 27-28

Why our text lavishes so much attention on the now long-vanished Phoenician city-state of Tyre is not immediately apparent to the modern reader. Tyre was, of course, the Venice of its day, the greatest maritime empire of the age. It was the emporium of the ancient world. In commercial and cultural importance it could only be compared to New York in our own time. Its trading ships not only brought goods to the furthest coasts, they also carried the Phoenician alphabet, the foundation of all western European scripts. Tyre's rulers and merchants were not only fabulously rich, they were militarily strong; its wealth commanded an exotic mercenary army recruited from the furthest corners of the then-known world (27:10). The best testament to it power is the fact that the island city held mighty Nebuchadnezzar and his war machine at bay for seventeen long years. (He never did indeed take the city, contrary to the prophet's predictions.)
The beauty of Tyre is extolled in many sources (27:3-4). Every luxury was available in its souks and markets. And in our text we are given an inventory of the most coveted goods of ancient times and where they came from. Purple dye (27:7)—Tyrrhenian purple--was a monopoly of the Phoenician port. Produced from sea snails, it was synonymous with high status, the color of kings. Ezekiel is moved to gorgeous poetry in cataloguing of Tyre's wealth and beauty, a city is "made perfect" and serene by its military power and economic might.
In describing Tyre's commercial empire the prophet gives us a veritable geography lesson on the world of his time. "Tarshish" (27:12) is modern Spain, the source of tin necessary to make bronze. Trading ships from Tyre reached Britain, the west coast of Africa, and India, where they traded for iron, ivory, spices and precious stones.
Nevertheless, the city, like one of its ships, "filled and heavily laden" (27:25), is doomed to founder in deep waters—the prophet writes: "The east wind has wrecked you in the heart of the seas" (27:26), and that "east wind' is certainly Babylon. The entire crew will be lost, together with the merchandise. "The mariners and all the pilots of the sea stand on the shore and wail aloud over [the ruin of mighty Tyre], and cry bitterly" (27:30) . And the merchants of many nations, who had goods in its hold, will "hiss at you" in their anger (27:36). Tyre, so serene is wealth and power, will come "to a dreadful end and shall be no more forever" (27:36).
But why does it fall? The great city and its king provide the prophet with historical lesson on the dangers of wealth and power. The King of Tyre in his pride over-reaches himself. "I am a god;" he says, "I sit in the seat of the gods, in the heart of the seas" (28:2). Such over-weaning pride and presumption cannot go unpunished. He is a mere moral, in spite of his great wisdom—"wiser than Daniel" (28:3), the text says-- and yet he foolishly makes himself an idol. And God will destroy all idols—he cannot abide them. The prophet addresses the king with a dire prediction—the LORD "bring strangers against you, the most terrible of nations; they shall draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom and defile your splendor" (28:7). At their hands "you will die the death of the uncircumcised" (28:10). (Male circumcision is the sign of being in covenant with the God of Israel. This covenant made the person who enters it truly
human. "The death of the uncircumcised" would be little better than the death of an animal.) The LORD jeers at the king's pretension and asks whether, in the presence of those who kill him, he will still say, "I am a god" (28:9).
Yet Ezekiel gives his fall is given mythic proportions. Uniquely placed in the world form birth—"in Eden, the garden of God" (28:13)—the king of Tyre is little short of angelic. He is "the signet of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty" (28:12). And he was blameless as well-that is until "iniquity was found in [him]" (28:15). The exact nature of this iniquity is not disclosed, only that "in the abundance of [his] trade [he was] filled with violence, and [he] sinned" (28:16). Pride is at the base of it, and like Lucifer elsewhere in scripture, he is cast down from the mountain of God. His "heart was proud because of his beauty"; and in his conceit and desire to be a god he "corrupted [his] wisdom for the sake of [his] splendor" (28:17). Therefore God punished him, and now what was luminous and angelic has "come to a dreadful end" (28:19).
The city of Sidon, another Phoenician city-state located north of Tyre, punishment will also come to a dreadful end, though no concrete reason is given for it. No particular vice or crime is mentioned. The LORD is simple "against" Sidon (28:21) because it is powerful and wealthy—and therefore its very existence presents a danger to God's chosen people. The peoples living roundabout have been "a pricking brier' and "a piercing thorn" to Israel (28:24), a deadly nuisance, but they shall be no longer, God assures the prophet. He promises to gather that "house of Israel from among the peoples where they are scattered" (28:25). And they "shall settle on their own soil' and "live in safety when [the LORD executes] judgments upon all their neighbors who have treated them with contempt" (28:26). When all these surrounding nations have been humbled or destroyed by the hand of the LORD and their evil influences removed, then Israel
will be established in its own land in sovereign freedom and righteousness.