Israel ad consulendum Jehovam: et sederunt coram facie mea.
Ezekiel 20
CHAPTER 20
Ezekiel 20:1
1. And it came to pass in the seventh year, in the fifth month, the tenth day of the month, that certain of the elders of Israel came to inquire of the LORD, and sat before me.
1. Et fuit anno septimo, quinto mense, decimo mensis venerunt viri e senioribus
Israel ad consulendum Jehovam: et sederunt coram facie mea. 527
Here he does not narrate a vision but an event which really happened. It is a simple historical narrative, that some of the elders of Israel were chosen to interrogate him. We know this to be customary, and when God separates His people from the profane nations, he opposes his prophets to the soothsayers and magi, augurs and astrologers. For he says that the Gentiles inquire what concerns them in various ways, and so interrogate their deities; but that he prescribes to the chosen people but one method: I will raise for them a prophet from the midst of their brethren, says
Moses, (Deuteronomy 18:18;) that is, they need not wander about, like the wretched gentiles, destitute of counsel, first to their soothsayers, then to magi, and then to astrologers: there is no end to them' but I will meet them, says he, by my prophets, who shall always exist among the people. In this sense Ezekiel says that the elders of Israel came to consult God. The verb, {,}דרשderesh, properly signifies ``to seek'' but it is here received for ``to consult'' or ``inquire into,'' as in many other places.
Now it is not surprising that the elders came by public consent to the Prophet: for the Israelites were already worn out by long weariness, and thought that they had almost perished through their long exile. But there was another reason, since false prophets, as we saw, tickled the ears of the simple by offering them daily some new hope. Since therefore they were agitated between hope and fear, and the devil
527Or, "before me." — Calvin.