What is the context?
The Spirit brings Ezekiel to the east gate, where twenty-five men have gathered. Two leaders are named: Jaazaniah son of Azzur and Pelatiah son of Benaiah. The Lord identifies the group as men who plot evil and give wicked counsel.
In the BSB, their words ask whether the time is near to build houses, then compare the city to a cooking pot and themselves to the meat inside. The picture expresses confidence that they belong safely within the city.
The Lord turns their saying against them. The slain whose deaths they have multiplied are the meat that remains within the city; these leaders will be brought out. The sword they fear will reach them, and judgment will extend to Israel’s borders.
The reason is stated plainly: they have followed the practices of surrounding nations instead of the Lord’s statutes. The protection they imagine cannot cancel their responsibility for what they have done.
How is this passage commonly understood?
Henry reads the pot as the leaders’ claim that the city walls will protect them. Wesley likewise understands their counsel as defiance of the announced danger, even though fear is present beneath their confidence.
The wording about building houses is understood differently in translations. The Cambridge commentary on verse 3 discusses both a statement that the time to build is not near and the question reflected in the BSB. Across those readings, the Lord’s answer overturns the claim of safety within the city: the leaders will be brought out to face judgment.
What is our position?
We don't have a position on this passage yet. When our study reaches a conclusion the text supports, it will appear here.