Commentary - Ezekiel 6:1-7

Bird's-eye view

Here in Ezekiel, God brings a covenant lawsuit against His people. This is not some petty squabble; it is a formal indictment for high treason against the King of Heaven. The sin at the center of it all is idolatry, which the Bible treats as spiritual adultery. Israel had gone whoring after other gods, and had done so publicly and shamelessly. This passage is God's declaration of war against the entire infrastructure of their false worship. He is not just coming for the idolaters; He is coming for their idols, their altars, their high places, and the very land they have polluted. The judgment is a terrifying work of divine deconstruction, but its ultimate purpose is restorative. God tears down in order to reveal Himself. The goal is that through this fiery judgment, they will once again know who their God is: "and you will know that I am Yahweh."

This is a hard word, but it is a necessary one. A god who does not hate idolatry is not a god worth worshiping. A god who is indifferent to sin is an idol himself. The God of the Bible is a jealous God, which is another way of saying He is a faithful husband. His wrath against Israel's high places is the righteous anger of a spurned lover who will not let His bride be defiled without consequence. This is not just an ancient story; it is a perpetual warning against the idols of any age, including our own.

Outline

Context In Ezekiel

Ezekiel is a prophet of the exile. He is with the captives by the Chebar canal in Babylon, but his prophecies are largely directed back toward Jerusalem and the land of Judah. The people in exile were tempted to think one of two things: either that God had been defeated by the gods of Babylon, or that they would be returning home shortly, as though this whole exile business were a minor misunderstanding. Ezekiel's task is to demolish both of those false hopes. God has not been defeated; He is the one actively orchestrating this judgment because of Israel's covenant unfaithfulness. And they are not going home any time soon, because the sin that sent them into exile has not yet been dealt with. This prophecy against the mountains of Israel is a direct assault on the spiritual cancer that led to their national ruin.

Clause-by-Clause Commentary

Verse 1: And the word of Yahweh came to me saying,

The prophecy begins, as it must, with a divine initiative. Ezekiel is not sharing his personal analysis of the geopolitical situation. He is not offering his hot take on Israel's moral decline. The word of Yahweh came to him. This is foundational. The prophetic office is not a career path you choose; it is a burden you receive. The prophet is a mouthpiece. What follows is not Ezekiel's opinion, but a direct, unmediated message from the sovereign God. This is what gives the message its terrifying weight and authority.

Verse 2: "Son of man, set your face toward the mountains of Israel, and prophesy against them

The title "Son of man" emphasizes Ezekiel's humanity. He is a man, a son of Adam, speaking to other men. But he is a man under divine orders. The command to "set your face toward" something indicates a resolute, determined, and confrontational posture. There is no wavering here. God is setting His prophet in direct opposition to the object of His wrath. And what is that object? "The mountains of Israel." This is striking. He is not told to prophesy against the people, but against the geography. Why? Because the people had so thoroughly corrupted the land with their idolatry that the very creation itself stood as a witness against them. The high places, the groves, the pagan altars, these were all built on the mountains and hills. The land itself was stained with their sin, and so the land itself must hear the verdict.

Verse 3: and say, 'Mountains of Israel, hear the word of Lord Yahweh! Thus says Lord Yahweh to the mountains, the hills, the ravines, and the valleys: "Behold, I Myself am going to bring a sword on you, and I will destroy your high places.

The address is expanded to the entire topography. No part of the land is exempt. The repetition of "Lord Yahweh" underscores His absolute sovereignty. He is the Lord, Adonai, the Master, and He is Yahweh, the covenant-keeping God. He is acting in both capacities here. The message is blunt: "I Myself am going to bring a sword on you." God takes personal responsibility for this judgment. This is not a random tragedy or a mere political event. This is a direct act of God. The Babylonians are the sword, but God is the one wielding it. And the primary target is specified: "I will destroy your high places." The high places were centers of syncretistic worship, where the worship of Yahweh was mingled with Canaanite paganism. This was an abomination to God, a direct violation of the first and second commandments. God will not tolerate rivals, and He is coming to tear down every last vestige of their spiritual adultery.

Verse 4: So your altars will become desolate, and your incense altars will be broken; and I will make your slain fall in front of your idols.

The deconstruction continues. The altars will be made desolate, the incense altars smashed. Every piece of religious hardware associated with their false worship will be destroyed. But then the judgment becomes intensely personal and deeply ironic. "I will make your slain fall in front of your idols." The very people who bowed down to these idols for protection, for fertility, for blessing, will be cut down and left to rot at their feet. This is a graphic demonstration of the impotence of false gods. They cannot save. They cannot even twitch a stony eyebrow as their worshipers are slaughtered before them. God is rubbing their noses in the utter foolishness of their sin.

Verse 5: I will also put the dead bodies of the sons of Israel in front of their idols; and I will scatter your bones all around your altars.

The desecration is intensified. Not only will they die before their idols, but God will place their corpses there as a sign of His contempt. Furthermore, He will scatter their bones around their altars. In the ancient world, to have one's bones scattered and left unburied was the ultimate curse, a sign of complete and total defeat and shame. Their places of worship, which they considered sacred, will be turned into a defiled boneyard. God is performing a ritual cleansing of the land, but He is using the bones of the idolaters themselves as the instrument of desecration. This is a holy and terrible irony.

Verse 6: In all your places of habitation, cities will become waste, and the high places will be desolate, that your altars may become waste and desolate, your idols may be broken and cease, your incense altars may be cut in pieces, and your works may be blotted out.

The scope of the judgment is universal within the land. "In all your places of habitation." No one can retreat to a safe distance. The cities will be ruined, the high places made desolate. And notice the explicit purpose clause: "that..." This is not mindless destruction. It is purposeful, targeted, and theological. The goal is the complete and utter eradication of their idolatrous system. Altars, idols, incense altars, all of it must go. The final phrase is telling: "and your works may be blotted out." Idolatry is a human work. It is man's attempt to create a god in his own image, a god he can manage and control. God declares that all such works, all such human religious projects, will be erased.

Verse 7: The slain will fall among you, and you will know that I am Yahweh.

Here we come to the heart of the matter. This is the refrain that echoes throughout the book of Ezekiel. The terrible judgment, the falling of the slain, is not the ultimate point. The point is the revelation that follows. "And you will know that I am Yahweh." The knowledge spoken of here is not a mere intellectual assent. It is a deep, experiential, and shattering recognition of who God truly is. They had forgotten Him. They had tried to domesticate Him and put Him on a shelf next to Baal and Ashtoreth. Through this fiery judgment, God will reintroduce Himself. He will strip away all their false notions and their comfortable syncretism, and they will be left with the stark reality of the one true God in all His holiness, justice, and power. This is a severe mercy. It is through the experience of the covenant curses that they will come to know the covenant Lord.

Application

It is easy for modern Christians to read a passage like this and thank God that we are not like those ancient Israelites, building Asherah poles on every high hill. But idolatry is a much more subtle and insidious thing than that. As John Calvin said, the human heart is a perpetual idol factory. We may not bow down to statues of wood and stone, but we have our own high places. We have altars to security, to comfort, to political power, to personal autonomy, to sexual expression, to the approval of men. Anything that we look to for what only God can provide has become an idol.

The message of Ezekiel 6 is that God is a jealous God, and He will not tolerate rivals in the hearts of His people. He will bring a sword against our high places. He will allow our lives to be shaken, our securities to be smashed, and our comfortable arrangements to be overturned, all for the purpose of exposing the idols we trust in. He will make our slain hopes fall in front of the very things we trusted in, to show us their impotence.

The purpose of this is not ultimately to crush us, but to bring us to that place where we can say, "Now I know that you are Yahweh." God's judgments in the life of a believer are always restorative. He deconstructs our false worship so that true worship might be built in its place. The good news of the gospel is that in Jesus Christ, the ultimate judgment against idolatry has already fallen. At the cross, the sword of God's wrath fell upon His own Son, who became a curse for us. He took the desecration we deserved. And in His resurrection, He is building a new temple, the church, from which the knowledge of God will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. Our response, then, is to continually, by the Spirit, tear down the high places in our own hearts and flee to the one true altar, Jesus Christ Himself.