2tn Or “power.”

sn Hand in the OT can refer metaphorically to power, authority, or influence. In Ezekiel God’s hand being on the prophet is regularly associated with communication or a vision from God (3:14, 22; 8:1; 37:1; 40:1).

3tn Heb “fell upon me there,” that is, God’s influence came over him.

4tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something and has been translated here as a verb (so also throughout the chapter).

5tc The MT reads “fire” rather than “man,” the reading of the LXX. The nouns are very similar in Hebrew.

6tc The MT reads “what appeared to be his waist and downwards was fire.” The LXX omits “what appeared to be,” reading “from his waist to below was fire.” Suggesting that “like what appeared to be” belongs before “fire,” D. I. Block (Ezekiel [NICOT], 1:277) points out the resulting poetic symmetry of form with the next line as followed in the translation here.

7tc The LXX omits “like a brightness.”

8tn See Ezek 1:4.

9tn The Hebrew term is normally used as an architectural term in describing the pattern of the tabernacle or temple or a representation of it (see Exod 25:8; 1 Chr 28:11).

10tn Or “spirit.” See note on “wind” in 2:2.

11map For the location of Jerusalem see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

12tn Or “image.”

13tn Heb “lift your eyes (to) the way of.”

14tn Heb “house.”

15tn Or “pattern.”

16tn Heb “detestable.” The word is often used to describe the figures of foreign gods.

17sn These engravings were prohibited in the Mosaic law (Deut 4:16-18).

18sn Note the contrast between these seventy men who represented Israel and the seventy elders who ate the covenant meal before God, inaugurating the covenant relationship (Exod 24:1, 9).

19tn The Hebrew word occurs only here in the OT.

20tn Heb “the room of his images.” The adjective “idolatrous” has been supplied in the translation for clarity.

sn This type of image is explicitly prohibited in the Mosaic law (Lev 26:1).

21tn Given the context this could be understood as a shock, e.g., idiomatically “Good grief! I saw….”

22sn The worship of Tammuz included the observation of the annual death and descent into the netherworld of the god Dumuzi. The practice was observed by women in the ancient Near East over a period of centuries.

23tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something.

24sn The priests prayed to God between the porch and the altar on fast days (Joel 2:17). This is the location where Zechariah was murdered (Matt 23:35).

25tc The LXX reads “twenty” instead of twenty-five, perhaps because of the association of the number twenty with the Mesopotamian sun god Shamash.

tn Or “exactly twenty-five.”

26sn The temple faced east.

27tn Or “the sun god.”

sn The worship of astral entities may have begun during the reign of Manasseh (2 Kgs 21:5).

28tn It is not clear what the practice of “holding a branch to the nose” indicates. A possible parallel is the Syrian relief of a king holding a flower to his nose as he worships the stars (ANEP 281). See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 1:145-46. The LXX glosses the expression as “Behold, they are like mockers.”

29tn The meaning of the Hebrew term is primarily emotional: “to pity,” which in context implies an action, as in being moved by pity in order to spare them from the horror of their punishment.