2tn The phrase “mountains of Israel” occurs only in the book of Ezekiel (6:2, 3; 19:9; 33:28; 34:13, 14; 35:12; 36:1, 4, 8; 37:22; 38:8; 39:2, 4, 17). The expression refers to the whole land of Israel.

sn The mountainous terrain of Israel would contrast with the exiles’ habitat in the river valley of Babylonia.

3tn The introductory formula “Hear the word of the sovereign Lord” parallels a pronouncement delivered by the herald of a king (2 Kgs 18:28).

4tn Heb “Look I, I am bringing.” The repetition of the pronoun draws attention to the speaker. The construction also indicates that the action is soon to come; the Lord is “about to bring a sword against” them.

5tn The Hebrew term refers to elevated platforms where pagan sacrifices were performed.

6tn Thirty-nine of the forty-eight biblical occurrences of this Hebrew word are found in the book of Ezekiel.

sn This verse is probably based on Lev 26:30 in which God forecasts that he will destroy their high places, cut off their incense altars, and set their corpses by the corpses of their idols.

7tc This first sentence, which explains the meaning of the last sentence of the previous verse, does not appear in the LXX and may be an instance of a marginal explanatory note making its way into the text.

8tn The Hebrew verb translated “wiped out” is used to describe the judgment of the Flood (Gen 6:7; 7:4, 23).

9sn The phrase you will know that I am the Lord concludes over sixty oracles in the book of Ezekiel and indicates the ultimate goal of God’s action. The phrase is often used in the book of Exodus as well (Exod 7:5; 14:4, 18). By Ezekiel’s day the people had forgotten that the Lord (Yahweh) was their covenant God and had turned to other gods. They had to be reminded that Yahweh alone deserved to be worshiped because only he possessed the power to meet their needs. Through judgment and eventually deliverance, Israel would be reminded that Yahweh alone held their destiny in his hands.

10tn Heb “when you have fugitives from the sword among the nations, when you are scattered among the lands.”

11tn The words “they will realize” are not in the Hebrew text; they are added here for stylistic reasons since this clause assumes the previous verb “to remember” or “to take into account.”

12tn Heb “how I was broken by their adulterous heart.” The image of God being “broken” is startling, but perfectly natural within the metaphorical framework of God as offended husband. The idiom must refer to the intense grief that Israel’s unfaithfulness caused God. For a discussion of the syntax and semantics of the Hebrew text, see M. Greenberg, Ezekiel (AB), 1:134.

13tn Heb adds “in their faces.”

14tn Heb “not in vain did I speak to do to them this catastrophe.” The wording of the last half of v. 10 parallels God’s declaration after the sin of the golden calf (Exod 32:14).

15sn By the sword and by famine and by pestilence. A similar trilogy of punishments is mentioned in Lev 26:25-26. See also Jer 14:12; 21:9; 27:8, 13; 29:18).

16tn Heb “the one who is left, the one who is spared.”

17sn By referring to every high hill…all the mountaintops…under every green tree and every leafy oak Ezekiel may be expanding on the phraseology of Deut 12:2 (see 1 Kgs 14:23; 2 Kgs 16:4; 17:10; Jer 2:20; 3:6, 13; 2 Chr 28:4).

18sn I will stretch out my hand against them is a common expression in the book of Ezekiel (14:9, 13; 16:27; 25:7; 35:3).

19tc The Vulgate reads the name as “Riblah,” a city north of Damascus. The MT reads Diblah, a city otherwise unknown. The letters resh (ר) and dalet (ד) may have been confused in the Hebrew text. The town of Riblah was in the land of Hamath (2 Kgs 23:33) which represented the northern border of Israel (Ezek 47:14).