Two Elegies on the Fall of Judah (Ezekiel 19) * W. H

TWO ELEGIES ON THE FALL OF JUDAH (EZEKIEL 19) * BY W. H. BROWNLEE Claremont The nineteenth chapter of Ezekiel contains two of the most beautiful allegories to be found in all literature. Gustav Holscher was sufficiently impressed by the chapter that he came to the conclusion that its composer was not the same as the author of the tedious and repetitious prose of the book as a whole. Here was a prime illustration of his view that the original prophet was a poet.1 Rudyard Kittel recognized great poetry here; but in opposition to Holscher he developed a theory of split personality for the prophet in order to account for the wide variations of interest and literary quality within the book.2 W. A. Ir win followed up the lead of Holscher in the quest of poetic substrata within the Book of Ezekiel; but he denied Chapter 19 to Ezekiel on the basis that the historical allusions in its first allegory related to the Maccabean age and that the second allegory also contained late features pointing to a date after 500 B.C.3 For our examination of the chapter, it will be advantageous to present first of all my translation, reserving the discussion of problems of text and interpretation for the appropriate places in the subsequent discussion. Materials believed to be secondary are bracketed. Prose material (as in 12d) begins furtherest to the left. The three-beat stichs are indented to the right of this, and the two-beat stichs are indented still further to the right. I have endeavored to give a rhythmic trans- * This study was first presented at the Pacific Coast Section of the Society of Biblical Literature, Feb. 13, 1965. 1 Hesekiel- der Dichter und das Buch, Giessen, 1924 (ZAW, Beiheft XXXIX), pp.102.108. 2 Geschichte des Volkes Israel, Stuttgart, 1927, Vol. III, pp. 148·159. Also see W. E. O. Oesterley and Theodore H. Robinson, An Introduction to the Books oJ the Old Testa ment, New York, 1934, p. 322. 3 The Problem oJ Ezekiel, Chicago, 1943, pp. 119·125. 94 W. H. BROWNLEE lation which is faithful to the Hebrew scansion, emphasizing the syllables which in English naturally receive the stress. 1 As for thee, [take up a dirge for the rulers of Israel and say:] what was thy mother 1 A lioness amid lions! 4 She couched in the midst of young lions; she raised her whelps. 3 She brought up one of her whelps; a young lion he became; But he learned to capture prey; man he devoured. 4 So nations were summoned against him: in their pit was he caught; [And they brought him in fetters to the land of Egypt]. 7a Then they crushed his fortresses, laid waste his cities. 5 When she saw that she had waited, (and) her hope had failed, She took another of her whelps, made him a young lion. 6 He prowled among the lions; a young lion he became. But he learned to capture prey; man he devoured. 7 b The land and its inhabitants were alarmed at the sound of his roaring. 8 Then nations placed against him snares round about. They spread over him their net; in their pit was he captured. 9 With fetters they put him in a cage 4 The punctuation follows the honorable tradition of the King James Version, American Standard Version, and The Jerusalem Bible. The rendering, "What a lioneBB was your mother!" (Revised Standard Version) is not favored by the syntax. The New American Bible follows this with "a lion of lions"; but this last is a correct paraphrase of "a lioness amid lions", and it is not permissible to use the word "lioneBB" twice in construing the sense. In the organization of the chapter there is also a second answer to the question, viz., "Thy mother was like a vine of thy vineyard". .

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