Ezra 5:12

But after that our fathers had provoked the God of heaven unto wrath, he gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, the Chaldean, who destroyed this house, and carried the people away into Babylon.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(12) Gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, the Chaldean.—These words not only show that the people regarded themselves as punished by the sole hand of God, but also remind the overthrowers of the Chaldean power that they also themselves are no more than instruments of the same Divine will.

Benson Commentary

Ezra 5:12-14. After that our fathers had provoked the God of heaven — It was to punish us for our sins, that we were, for a time, put out of the possession of this house, and not because the gods of the nations had prevailed against our God. But in the first year of Cyrus, &c. — We have the royal decree of Cyrus to justify us, and bear us out in what we do. And he not only permitted, but charged and commanded us, to build this house, and to build it in its place, (Ezra 5:15,) the same place where it had stood before. And the vessels also, &c. — These also he delivered to one whom he intrusted with the care of them, and commanded him to restore them to their ancient place and use. And these we have to show in confirmation of what we allege.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

5:3-17 While employed in God's work, we are under his special protection; his eye is upon us for good. This should keep us to our duty, and encourage us therein, when difficulties are ever so discouraging. The elders of the Jews gave the Samaritans an account of their proceedings. Let us learn hence, with meekness and fear, to give a reason of the hope that is in us; let us rightly understand, and then readily declare, what we do in God's service, and why we do it. And while in this world, we always shall have to confess, that our sins have provoked the wrath of God. All our sufferings spring from thence, and all our comforts from his unmerited mercy. However the work may seem to be hindered, yet the Lord Jesus Christ is carrying it on, his people are growing unto a holy temple in the Lord, for a habitation of God through the Spirit.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Great stones - literally, as in the margin; i. e., stones so large that they were rolled along, not carried. Others translate "polished stones."

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

8. the house of the great God, which is builded with great stones—literally, "stones of rolling"; that is, stones of such extraordinary size that they could not be carried—they had to be rolled or dragged along the ground.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

But after that our fathers had provoked the God of heaven unto wrath,.... By their idolatries; which accounts for it how it was that they who were the servants of the great God of heaven and earth, and this temple built for the honour of his name, were not preserved by him; but they were carried captive, and this house left desolate: it was for their sins for which

he (God) gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon the Chaldean, who destroyed this house, and carried the people away into Babylon; see 2 Chronicles 36:19.

Geneva Study Bible

But after that our fathers had provoked the God of heaven unto wrath, he gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, the Chaldean, who destroyed this house, and carried the people away into Babylon.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

12. after that] So R.V., R.V. marg. ‘because that’. The purpose of the passage is to account for the destruction of the Temple and the captivity of God’s people. The conjunction is not temporal, but causal: ‘for this reason, namely, that &c.’ The rendering of the R.V. margin is preferable.

provoked … unto wrath] The word used here for ‘provoke’ is found in the Hebrew books with this meaning only in Job 12:6. Elsewhere to ‘shake’, ‘disquiet’, 1 Samuel 28:15; Isaiah 13:13; Isaiah 23:11; Jeremiah 50:34.

the God of heaven] See on Ezra 1:2. A general description of Israel’s provocation of their God is given in 2 Chronicles 36:14-21.

Nebuchadnezzar] Cf. on Ezra 1:7 : the Chaldean, i.e. the Babylonian.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 12. - Our fathers provoked the God of heaven unto wrath. Mainly by their long series of idolatries, with the moral abominations that those idolatries involved - the sacrifice of children by their own parents, the licentious rites belonging to the worship of Baal, and the unmentionable horrors practised by the devotees of the Dea Syra. For centuries, with only short and rare intervals, "the chief of the priests, and the people, had transgressed very much after all the abominations of the heathen," and had even "polluted the house of the Lord which he had hallowed in Jerusalem" (2 Chronicles 36:14). Therefore, he gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon. He punished, as he always does, national apostasy with national destruction. Making an idolatrous people, but a less guilty one, his sword, he cut off Judah, as he had previously cut off Israel, causing the national life to cease, and even removing the bulk of the people into a distant country. Not by his own power or might did Nebuchadnezzar prevail. God could have delivered the Jews from him as easily as he had delivered them in former days from Jabin (Judges 4:2-24), and from Zerah (2 Chronicles 14:11-15), and from Sennacherib (2 Kings 19:20-36). But he was otherwise minded; he "gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar" (comp. 2 Chronicles 36:17). He divided their counsels, paralysed their resistance, caused Pharaoh Hophra to desert their cause (2 Kings 24:7), and left them helpless and unprotected. Nebuchadnczzar was his instrument to chastise his guilty people, and in pursuing his own ends merely worked out the purposes of the Almighty. Ezra 5:12

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

For this reason (להן), because (מן־דּי equals מאשׁר, e.g., Isaiah 43:4) our fathers provoked the God of heaven, He gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, the Chaldean, and he (Nebuch.) destroyed this house, and carried the people away into Babylon. For כּסדּיא the Keri requires כּסדּאה, the ordinary form of the absolute state of the noun in ai. סתר, Pael, in the sense of destroy, appears only here in biblical Chaldee, but more frequently in the Targums. עמּה, its people, would refer to the town of Jerusalem; but Norzi and J. H. Mich. have עמּהּ, and the Masora expressly says that the word is to be written without Mappik, and is therefore the stat. emphat. for עמּא.