The ancient Hebrews were unique among the nations in their belief that God existed outside of time and space. Their God revealed His will to them by disclosing His character and providing guidelines for how they should live, fostering a healthy relationship with Him and with each other.
The stability and order of their society depended on how they treated one another in accordance with His revealed will, as outlined in the Ten Commandments.
They agreed to the covenant that God gave them, as well as to the blessings for obeying it and the curses for breaking it. Leviticus 26 outlines the blessings and curses.
The blessings are found in the first 13 verses. Curses for disobedience are found in verses 14-19. Then, there is a promise of restoration in verses 40-45.
For approximately 430 years, Israel repeatedly attempted to blend the worship of the One True God with the idols of the surrounding nations. During this time, many prophets were sent to call them away from their sinful practices and back into a relationship with God.
However, they failed to heed these warnings, and now the time has come for the curses of their covenant to take effect.
The curses for persistent disobedience mentioned in Leviticus are as follows.
As for those of you who survive, I will send faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies; the sound of a driven leaf shall put them to flight, and they shall flee as one flees from the sword, and they shall fall though no one pursues.
They shall stumble over one another, as if to escape a sword, though no one pursues; and you shall have no power to stand against your enemies.
You shall perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies shall devour you.
And those of you who survive shall rot away in your enemies’ lands because of their iniquities; also they shall rot away because of the iniquities of their ancestors (Leviticus 26:36-39).
The Curses Applied by Ezekiel
As a sign prophet, Ezekiel publicly acted out the Levitical curses before the community elders in the public square.
And you, O mortal, take a sharp sword; use it as a barber’s razor and pass it over your head and your beard; then take balances for weighing and divide the hair.
One-third of the hair you shall burn in the fire inside the city when the days of the siege are completed; one-third you shall take and strike with the sword all around the city; and one-third you shall scatter to the wind, and I will unsheathe the sword after them.
Then take from these a small number and bind them in the skirts of your robe.
From these, again, you shall take some, throw them into the fire, and burn them up; from there a fire will come out against all the house of Israel (Ezekiel 5.1-4).
The judgment that God brings on the nation is not haphazard, but deliberate and carefully measured.
The first portion is to be set on fire, symbolizing destruction. The second portion is to be distributed around the brick and chopped off, representing the violent death of those who managed to escape the destruction inside the city.
When Ezekiel is commanded to scatter the third portion of the hair to the wind, it symbolizes the dispersion and disappearance of the remainder of the population.
The final portion of the hair shows the protective care that God has over the exiles. If any survive the scattering, it will be only because of God’s intervention on their behalf.
The New Covenant
In the years leading up to Ezekiel’s prophecy and God’s judgment on Jerusalem, Israel remained religious. They continued to offer sacrifices and observe festivals as part of their relationship with God.
However, they wrongly assumed that these rituals would allow them to both worship other deities and treat one another in ways that violated the Ten Commandments.
They were God’s chosen people, given the privilege of living in a relationship with Him because He graciously selected them to be His followers. They mistakenly took God’s grace for granted and ultimately faced the promised consequences of disobedience.
We are living in the era of the New Covenant, as described in the New Testament. As friends of God, we live in a relationship with Him by grace.
However, Dietrich Bonhoeffer warns that grace can become “cheap” when we take God’s grace for granted and continue in disobedience. By doing so, we risk facing the same consequences as the ancient Hebrews.
Israel was chosen by God to reflect His character—His justice, righteousness, love, and other attributes—to a world that needed to understand what God is like.
With the Messiah coming from Israel and the gift of the Holy Spirit in our lives, we too are called to do the same.
If we view this as merely a privilege without recognizing the responsibilities that come with it, we risk failing just as they did.
It is crucial for us to examine our lives deeply and consider where we need to change.
YouTube Discussion
Rudy Ross and I discussed this passage on YouTube today. It is on the Bob Spradling channel.
Real Voices 