261 In the eleventh year, on the first day of the month, God's Message came to me: 2 "Son of man, Tyre cheered when they got the news of Jerusalem, exclaiming, "'Good! The gateway city is smashed! Now all her business comes my way. She's in ruins and I'm in clover.' 3 "Therefore, God, the Master, has this to say: "'I'm against you, Tyre, and I'll bring many nations surging against you, as the waves of the sea surging against the shore. 4 They'll smash the city walls of Tyre and break down her towers. I'll wash away the soil and leave nothing but bare rock. 5 She'll be an island of bare rock in the ocean, good for nothing but drying fishnets. Yes, I've said so.' Decree of God, the Master. 'She'll be loot, free pickings for the nations! 6 Her surrounding villages will be butchered. Then they'll realize that I am God.' 7 "God, the Master, says: Look! Out of the north I'm bringing Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, a king's king, down on Tyre. He'll come with chariots and horses and riders - a huge army. 8 He'll massacre your surrounding villages and lay siege to you. He'll build siege ramps against your walls. A forest of shields will advance against you! 9 He'll pummel your walls with his battering rams and shatter your towers with his iron weapons. 10 You'll be covered with dust from his horde of horses - a thundering herd of war horses pouring through the breaches, pulling chariots. Oh, it will be an earthquake of an army and a city in shock! 11 Horses will stampede through the streets. Your people will be slaughtered and your huge pillars strewn like matchsticks. 12 The invaders will steal and loot - all that wealth, all that stuff! They'll knock down your fine houses and dump the stone and timber rubble into the sea. 13 And your parties, your famous good-time parties, will be no more. No more songs, no more lutes. 14 I'll reduce you to an island of bare rock, good for nothing but drying fishnets. You'll never be rebuilt. I, God, have said so. Decree of God, the Master. Introduced to the Terrors of Death
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Ezekiel 26:1-14
Commentary on Ezekiel 26:1-14
(Read Ezekiel 26:1-14)
To be secretly pleased with the death or decay of others, when we are likely to get by it; or with their fall, when we may thrive upon it, is a sin that easily besets us, yet is not thought so bad as really it is. But it comes from a selfish, covetous principle, and from that love of the world as our happiness, which the love of God expressly forbids. He often blasts the projects of those who would raise themselves on the ruin of others. The maxims most current in the trading world, are directly opposed to the law of God. But he will show himself against the money-loving, selfish traders, whose hearts, like those of Tyre, are hardened by the love of riches. Men have little cause to glory in things which stir up the envy and rapacity of others, and which are continually shifting from one to another; and in getting, keeping, and spending which, men provoke that God whose wrath turns joyous cities into ruinous heaps.