Ezekiel 34

Chapter 34 of Ezekiel comes after chapter 33, which reports the arrival of news that Jerusalem had fallen, and it begins the series of restoration prophecies that follows. The chapter likens Israel's leaders to shepherds and the people to sheep.

Outline

• Verses 1–6 The LORD commands the son of man to prophesy against the shepherds of Israel. The shepherds took only the fat and the wool of the sheep. They neglected the weak, the sick, and the lost, and ruled with force and cruelty. As a result, the sheep were scattered and became meat for the beasts of the field.
• Verses 7–10 The LORD swears that he is against the shepherds and will deliver his flock from their mouth.
• Verses 11–16 The LORD himself becomes the shepherd and gathers his sheep scattered among the nations. He promises to feed them in good pasture upon the mountains of Israel, to seek the lost, and to bind up the broken (Ezekiel 34:11–16).
• Verses 17–22 The LORD rebukes the fat sheep that trampled the good pasture, fouled the water, and thrust the weak aside with their horns. He declares that he will judge between the fat cattle and the lean cattle.
• Verses 23–24 He sets up one shepherd, "my servant David," to feed the flock, and David becomes a prince among them.
• Verses 25–31 The LORD makes a covenant of peace, causes the evil beasts to cease, and sends rain in its season. Israel will no more be a prey, and the people will know that the LORD is their God.

Key Verses

• Ezekiel 34:2 "Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves!" This verse makes clear that a leader's duty is to feed the flock.
• Ezekiel 34:16 "I will seek that which was lost." This verse reverses verse 4: what the shepherds failed to do, God himself will do.
• Ezekiel 34:23 "Even my servant David." As a promise concerning a ruler from David's line, this verse is read in connection with messianic prophecy.

Characters and Places

• Ezekiel: The prophet, addressed as "son of man," who receives and delivers the word.
• The shepherds of Israel: Understood as the kings and leaders who ruled the people.
• David: King of Israel. In this chapter the name is commonly understood to refer to a future shepherd from David's line.
• The mountains of Israel: The homeland to which the scattered sheep will return to graze.

Interpretive Considerations

• In the ancient Near East, kings were called shepherds, so the passage is understood to refer primarily to Israel's rulers. In the church, it is also applied to church leaders such as pastors.
• Jewish tradition reads the David of verse 23 as a future Davidic Messiah, while Christianity identifies him with Jesus Christ. The verse is read alongside John 10:11–15, where Jesus presents himself as the Good Shepherd, and the Parable of the Lost Sheep (Luke 15:4–7).
• Interpretations of verse 13, "gather them from the countries, and will bring them to their own land," differ. Some see it as the return from the Babylonian exile. Dispensationalism reads it as a future restoration of the nation of Israel. Covenant theology tends to read it as fulfilled within the church.
• The "covenant of peace" in verse 25 also appears in Ezekiel 37:26. The judgment between the rams and the he goats in verse 17 is sometimes compared with the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats (Matthew 25:31–46).

In Korean Churches

• The chapter is commonly used as a text for sermons on the conduct of pastors and for ordination and installation services.
• The "showers of blessing" in verse 26 are known as the basis of the English hymn "Showers of Blessing." The hymn appears in the Korean hymnal as "Bin deure mareun pulgachi" ("Like Dry Grass in an Empty Field").