Ezekiel 25:14

And I will lay my vengeance upon Edom by the hand of my people Israel: and they shall do in Edom according to mine anger and according to my fury; and they shall know my vengeance, saith the Lord GOD.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(14) By the hand of my people Israel.—This points distinctly to the fact that the Divine vengeance on Edom should be accomplished by the hand of the Israelites, a prophecy which was fulfilled when they were conquered by John Hyrcanus, and compelled to submit to circumcision as a mark of absorption into the Jewish people. Subsequently Herod (who was himself of Idumean origin), as king of the Jews, reigned over them, and their name disappeared from history.

Many commentators would see in this prophecy a further intimation of their ultimate conversion and incorporation into the Church; but this seems quite foreign, not only to the scope of this series of prophecies, but especially to the connection, “I will lay my vengeance upon Edom,” and “they shall know my vengeance.”

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

25:8-17 Though one event seem to the righteous and wicked, it is vastly different. Those who glory in any other defence and protection than the Divine power, providence, and promise, will, sooner or later, be ashamed of their glorying. Those who will not leave it to God to take vengeance for them, may expect that he will take vengeance on them. The equity of the Lord's judgments is to be observed, when he not only avenges injuries upon those that did them, but by those against whom they were done. Those who treasure up old hatred, and watch for the opportunity of manifesting it, are treasuring up for themselves wrath against the day of wrath.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

From Teman ... - Or "from Teman" even unto "Dedan," "shall they fall." Teman and Dedan were districts (not cities), the former in the south (Ezekiel 20:46 note), the latter in the north ("over the whole country").

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

14. by … my people Israel—namely, by Judas Maccabeus. The Idumeans were finally, by compulsory circumcision, incorporated with the Jewish state by John Hyrcanus (see Isa 34:5; 63:1, &c.; 1 Maccabees 5:3). So complete was the amalgamation in Christ's time, that the Herods of Idumean origin, as Jews, ruled over the two races as one people. Thus the ancient prophecy was fulfilled (Ge 25:23), "The elder shall serve the younger."

Matthew Poole's Commentary

I will lay my vengeance upon Edom; which as it is great, so just, sure, and opportune, their foot slideth in due time, Deu 32:35.

By the hand of my people Israel; no history mentions the fulfilling of this, as it sounds in the letter of it, unless /APC 1Ma 5:3,2Ma 10:16,17; some therefore interpret, by the hand, by the same hand, that I used in punishing my people Israel; others refer it to a spiritual meaning, as Isaiah 11:14 Jeremiah 49:2 Ob 21.

They; the instruments God used, whether Maccabees in after-times, or the Chaldeans in that present age.

Shall do in Edom according to my anger; my just displeasure, as it set them on work, shall give them their strength and measures; they shall do as much as I intended against Edom.

And according to my fury; redoubled to affect the more, and confirm the prediction.

They shall know my vengeance; both Edom, my people, and those I employ, shall see this was my quarrel, which I threatened to revenge, and now have done it, and Edom shall know I am not like their gods, though they said so, Ezekiel 25:8.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And I will lay my vengeance upon Edom by fie hand of my people Israel,.... This was fulfilled in the times of the Maccabees, when Judas Maccabins overthrew and conquered them,

"Then Judas fought against the children of Esau in Idumea at Arabattine, because they besieged Gael: and he gave them a great overthrow, and abated their courage, and took their spoils.'' (1 Maccabees 5:3)

and when Hyrcanus took their cities, and subdued them, and they became Jews, as Josephus (x) relates; though Kimchi thinks this refers to future time, and is yet to be accomplished; and it is, by the ancient Jews (y), understood of the times of the Messiah: some choose to understand the phrase,

by the hand of my people Israel, the same hand by which judgment was inflicted upon Israel; suggesting that by the same hand vengeance would be inflicted on the Edomites, namely, by the Babylonians:

and they shall do in Edom according to mine anger and according to my fury; that is, shall execute all the anger and fury, or all that punishment in anger and fury, which the Lord in righteous judgment has appointed them to, and has determined shall be performed upon them, by the children of Israel or the Babylonians, as his instruments:

and they shall know my vengeance, saith the Lord God; the meaning is, they shall feel it, and be sensible of it, and know that it comes from the Lord himself; full of resentment against them, and highly displeased at their behaviour towards his people Israel.

(x) Antiqu. l. 13. c. 9. sect. 1.((y) In Bemidbar Rabba, sect. 2. fol. 179. 3.

Geneva Study Bible

And I will lay my vengeance upon Edom by the hand of my people Israel: and they shall do in Edom according to mine anger and according to my fury; and they shall know my vengeance, saith the Lord GOD.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

14. the hand of my people] Cf. Obadiah 1:18, “the house of Jacob shall be a fire … and the house of Esau for stubble, and they shall burn among them and devour them.” Isaiah 11:14, Zephaniah 2:9.

know my vengeance] that it is I who take vengeance upon them (Ezekiel 25:4); Isaiah 34:8.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 14. - By the hand of my people Israel: The words received a fulfillment in the conquest of Edom by John Hyrcanus, who compelled its people to receive circumcision (Josephus, 'Ant.,' 13:09. 1). In Amos 9:12 its subjugation is connected with the Messianic prophecy that the fallen tabernacle of David should be raised up. There is an obvious emphasis in the repetition of the word vengeance. The law of a Divine retribution will work out its appointed purpose-vengeance to those who sought vengeance. They (the Edomites) shall reap as they have sown, and shall know that the vengeance of Jehovah is more terrible than their own. Ezekiel 25:14

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Against the Edomites

Ezekiel 25:12. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Because Edom acteth revengefully towards the house of Judah, and hath been very guilty in avenging itself upon them, Ezekiel 25:13. Therefore, thus saith the Lord Jehovah, I will stretch out my hand over Edom, and cut off man and beast from it, and make it a desert from Teman, and unto Dedan they shall fall by the sword. Ezekiel 25:14. And I will inflict my vengeance upon Edom by the hand of my people Israel, that they may do to Edom according to my anger and my wrath; and they shall experience my vengeance, is the saying of the Lord Jehovah. - Whilst the Ammonites and the Moabites are charged with nothing more than malicious pleasure at the fall of Israel, and disregard of its divine calling, the Edomites are reproached with revengeful acts of hostility towards the house of Judah, and threatened with extermination in consequence. The עשׂות, doing or acting of Edom, is more precisely defined as 'בּנקום וגו, i.e., as consisting in the taking of vengeance, and designated as very guilty, ישׁמוּ אשׁום. עשׂה, followed by בּ with an infinitive, as in Ezekiel 17:17. Edom had sought every opportunity of acting thus revengefully towards Israel (vid., Obadiah 1:11; Amos 1:11), so that in Ezekiel 35:5 Ezekiel speaks of the "eternal enmity" of Edom against Israel. For this reason we must not restrict the reproach in Ezekiel 25:12 to particular outbreaks of this revenge at the time of the devastation and destruction of Judah by the Chaldeans, of which the Psalmist complains in Psalm 137:1-9, and for which he invokes the vengeance of God upon Edom. Man and beast are to be cut off from Edom in consequence, and the land to become a desert from Teman to Dedan. These names denote not cities, but districts. Teman is the southern portion of Idumaea (see the comm. on Amos 1:12); and Dedan is therefore the northern district. Dedan is probably not the Cushite tribe mentioned in Genesis 10:7, but the tribe of the same name which sprang from the sons of Abraham by Keturah (Genesis 25:3), and which is also mentioned in Jeremiah 49:8 in connection with Edom. דּדנה has ה local with Seghol instead of Kametz, probably on account of the preceding a (vid., Ewald, 216c). There is no necessity to connect מתּימן with the following clause, as Hitzig and Kliefoth have done, in opposition to the accents. The two geographical names, which are used as a periphrasis for Idumaea as a whole, are distributed equally through the parallelismus membrorum between the two clauses of the sentence, so that they belong to both clauses, so far as the sense is concerned. Edom is to become a desert from Teman to Dedan, and its inhabitants from Teman to Dedan are to fall by the sword. This judgment of vengeance will be executed by God through His people Israel. The fulfilment of this threat, no doubt, commenced with the subjugation of the Edomites by the Maccabees; but it is not to be limited to that event, as Rosenmller, Kliefoth, and others suppose, although the foundation was thereby laid for the disappearance of the national existence of Edom. For it is impossible with this limitation to do justice to the emphatic expression, "my people Israel." On the ground, therefore, of the prophecies in Amos 9:12 and Obadiah 1:17, that the people of God are to take possession of Edom, when the fallen tabernacle of David is raised up again, i.e., in the Messianic times, which prophecies point back to that of Balaam in Numbers 24:18, and have their roots, as this also has, in the promise of God concerning the twin sons of Isaac, "the elder shall serve the younger" (Genesis 25:23), we must seek for the complete fulfilment in the victories of the people of God over all their foes, among whom Edom from time immemorial had taken the leading place, at the time when the kingdom of God is perfected. For even here Edom is not introduced merely as a single nation that was peculiarly hostile to Judah, but also as a type of the implacable enmity of the heathen world towards the people and kingdom of God, as in Ezekiel 35:1-15, Isaiah 34:63, etc. The vengeance, answering to the anger and wrath of Jehovah, which Israel, as the people of God, is to execute upon Edom, consists not merely in the annihilation of the national existence of Edom, which John Hyrcanus carried into effect by compelling the subjugated Edomites to adopt circumcision (see the comm. on Numbers 24:18), but chiefly in the wrathful judgment which Israel will execute in the person of Christ upon the arch-enemy of the kingdom of God by its complete extinction.