Ezekiel 32

And here are a few other short passages from the prophets.

Ezekiel 32, 7.

When I blot you out, I will cover the heavens and make their stars dark.

I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give its light.

Well, they're not dead.

They may be like dead because they're totally cut off from the world, one presumes by that extreme sort of understanding, although Ezekiel 32 might say otherwise.

Um, but that's a different rabbit hole.

Um, so we know that they are sent to the pit prison.

Um, and so I leave cracks open for other possibilities there.

But what we also know, though, is there's something also kin to the post-diluvian giants, because they have this demonic spirit of the disembodied spirits that roam the earth after from these ones as well.

And some of the ones like, as Ezekiel 32 talks about, some of these terrible post-diluvian after the flood giants, they're what they call the terrible ones, the aretim, who are sent to the pit prison for doing all these horrible things to humankind, right? After they died.

And some of them didn't go to the, the, the pit prison, but are still classified as terrible ones.

So I'm just gonna make mention of this real quick, and I'll read it here in a second.

Ecclesiastes 1:7, Ezekiel 32:26, and Daniel 2:31-34.

That's a lot of Bible verses for a 1990s song.

I'm telling you.

Hi there, and welcome to this Reader Take Note episode, which I'm entitling How to Understand the Prophetic Books of the Bible.

This seems to me to be a good time to talk with you about how to understand the prophetic books of the Bible as we now are starting to read the Babylonian exile prophet Ezekiel.

And starting in a week and extending to the end of the year, our poetry readings will be from the prophet Isaiah, who lived around two hundred years before Ezekiel.

Near the end of the year, we'll read the minor prophets in quick succession.

All the books in the prophetic genre are hands down the most difficult books to understand in the Bible.

So I hope I can give basic pointers in this episode that will be helpful to you from now on to the end of the year.

I will start with quoting a paragraph from How to Read the Bible for All It's Worth by Gordon Fee and Douglas Stuart.

This quote gives one reason why people have difficulty with the sixteen prophetic books of the Old Testament.

What were these depths? They refer to Sheol, which is a poetic picture, which is poetically pictured in several ways throughout the Bible.

A vast grave in Ezekiel 32, a stronghold in Psalm 9, 107, and Matthew 16, a wasteland in Job, and an insatiable beast of prey in Isaiah 5.

Sheol, traditionally translated hell, generally means just a place of the dead without implying either reward or punishment.

David was saying that God's sovereignty extends even to the grave and beyond.

For behold, the darkness shall cover the earth and deep darkness the people, but the Lord shall arise over you and his glory will be seen upon you.

Ezekiel 32 verse seven, but I will put out your light.

I will cover the heavens and make it stars dark.

I will cover the sun with a cloud and the moon shall not give its light.

Um, Nophelim actually does pop up in the Bible, but not where you'd think.

It shows up in Ezekiel 32:27, and it's talking about slain warriors going down to Sheol.

Uh, so if you wanted a passive participle, those who have fallen, you would get nephulim, not Nephilim, but nephulim, a word that, by the way, doesn't show up in the Bible at all.

So it, it doesn't-

Mm.

We don't get those who fall.

That's a different word that shows up in Ezekiel 32.

We don't get nephulim, because that word doesn't show up in the scriptures.

You know, this thing about being like a green olive tree in the house of God, trusting in the steadfast love of God.

We were just reading today about nations, Syria in Ezekiel 32, I think, being counted among the trees of

God.

Very interesting.