Commentary on Ezekiel Chapters 1-20 John Calvin (continued)
EZEKIEL
by too much heat, if we have escaped the frost and the hail, the storm, and the rain., and the drought, it will have already gone well with us.'' Thus the impious harden themselves in their security. And why? because they restrict God's arrows to a fixed and certain number. This is the reason why he says, I will multiply famine upon them; that is, when they think their yearly produce safe, because they have escaped drought, and rain, and mildew, and storm, and hail, I will find, says he, other modes unknown to them, by which I will bring famine upon them. And he expresses one manner of doing so --- I will break the staff of bread, concerning which form of speaking we have spoken previously. I do not subscribe to their opinion who say, that the staff of bread is broken when God sends a deficiency of corn; for in the greatest plenty the staff of bread is broken, as we saw in Moses, when God takes away the nourishing quality of bread, and makes it vanish, (Deuteronomy 8:3,) because man lives not by bread alone, but by that secret inspiration which God has implanted in the bread. Hence we may eat more than fourfold the usual quantity, and yet not be satisfied, as this form of speech often occurs with the Prophets, which they take from Moses. Thou shalt eat, and not be satisfied, say they. (Leviticus 26:26; Isaiah
9:20; Ezekiel 7; Hosea 4:10; Micah 6:14.) So also here the Prophet repeats what we saw in the last chapter --- that God breaks the staff of bread, that is, takes away its nourishing quality, so that he who feeds upon it does not feel that he has recovered new rigor. It follows ---
Ezekiel 5:17
17. So will I send upon you famine and evil beasts, and they shall bereave thee; and pestilence and blood shall pass through thee; and I will bring the sword upon thee. I the LORD have spoken it.
17. Et mittam in vos famem, et bestiam malam, 123 et orbabunt to; 124 get pestis, et sanguis transibunt in to, et gladium venire faciam super to: ego Iehovah locutus sum.
Here God speaks generally concerning certain adversities --- I will send evil upon them, he says, but immediately afterwards he adds the kind of evil, of which he had not yet spoken. Hence, under the name of evil he embraces all adversities, as if he had said that he intended to exact the penalty from the wicked, not in one or two ways only, but by those numberless troubles which surround us, and to which we are subject; so that there would be no bounds to his wrath, unless men should cease to provoke his anger. This is the reason, then, why he now speaks generally concerning evil; but as I have said he adds the kind of evil --- An evil beast shall come upon thee, and so I will bereave thee Although only one form of evil is expressed, yet it is by no means doubtful that for the sake of example God mentions this, that they might understand that all injuries are in his hand. And these are numberless. If we look upwards, how many deaths hang over us from that direction? If we look at the earth, how many poisons? how many wild and fierce beasts, how many serpents, swords, pitfalls, stumbling-blocks, precipices, falls of houses, throwings of stones and darts?
In short, we cannot stir a step without ten deaths meeting us. So God here speaks
123Or, "wild beast" — Calvin. 124"He used before the plural number" — Calvin.