145
146
instructions and sin offering instructions precede this command, nothing is stated regarding qualifications for participation. Given the description of Passover as a
pilgrimage “festival” (HCSB) and that “all the people of the land” should participate in the feast that follows Passover (v. 22), the Passover is surely a national celebration.
163The national celebration continues the pattern set by Hezekiah and Josiah.
164The most intriguing aspect of these two passages is the way in which the Lord requires circumcision of flesh and heart for entrance to the sanctuary and that the sanctuary is the most contextually appropriate location for the Passover to occur.
Therefore, although the text does not state the matter so explicitly as Exodus 12:43-49, the exilic prophet appears to place a heightened, though similar requirement on any who would join in the Passover—they must be circumcised not only in flesh but also in heart.
The argument for this principle follows.
Ezekiel writes while in exile in Babylon (1:1-3). Early in his prophecy, he promises to make an “everlasting covenant” with his people (16:60). Later, the Lord promises to make “a covenant of peace” (34:25).
165This covenant includes the fact that both David and the Lord act as the safe-keeping shepherd (vv. 11-24) and “they shall know that I am the Lord” when they return to his land of blessing (v. 27, 30). The covenant of peace and the everlasting covenant are one and the same, because the Lord promises, “I will make a covenant of peace with them. It shall be an everlasting
land for the priests (45:1-5), for the “holy district” (v. 6), and the prince (vv. 7-10). Then, after commanding the princes to uphold a righteous standard of weights and measures (vv. 11-12) and
instructing them on which sacrifices to give and provide for the people (vv. 13-17), the Lord turns to more general sacrificial instructions with the priest in view (vv. 18-25).
163 Exod 34:25 utilizes the same word for Passover—as a pilgrimage festival—as is used in Ezek 45:21. Block, Ezekiel, 2:664.
164 Block, Ezekiel, 2:665n26.
165 On the connection between the covenant of peace (shalom) and the eschatological new covenant, see Block, Ezekiel, 2:301–9.
147
covenant” (37:26).
166The Lord adds that his sanctuary will be among them
“forevermore.” Given that the everlasting covenant of peace is promised for the time after the Lord rescues them from exile (34:27),
167the Lord’s promise to cleanse them, give them a new heart/spirit, and place his Spirit in them after gathering them from the
nations, appear to be of a piece (36:24-29; cf. 11:17-21).
168The circumcised heart that the Lord requires for worshiping in his sanctuary in 44:7-9 is the same heart the Lord
promises to give his people when he establishes the everlasting covenant of peace, when he delivers them from exile. As Daniel Block argues, the language prohibiting foreigners here is similar to Jeremiah 9:25-26, in which the Lord indicts Israel for being circumcised merely in the flesh while retaining uncircumcised hearts, like the nations. Alternatively, Ezekiel 44:7 and 9 indicate that the door into covenant and worship participation, corresponding to one’s priestly status in Israel, is open to any foreigner who submits to circumcision (Gen 17:27; cf. Exod 12:43).
169The context of 45:21 provides the clearest indication that the location at which the Passover is to be celebrated is the temple. Each of the three preceding verses contains some instruction of cleansing or preparation of the temple/sanctuary.
170The development of Ezekiel’s own logic is important. Given Ezekiel’s development of the concept of circumcision of the heart (without the precise verbiage),
171the requirement
166 For a defense of the covenant of peace being the new covenant, see Gentry and Wellum, Kingdom through Covenant, 480–81.
167 Hamilton Jr., God’s Indwelling Presence, 51.
168 For a comparison of these passages, see Block, Ezekiel, 2:355.
169 For a similar take, grounded in Jeremiah, see DeRouchie, “Counting Stars with Abraham and the Prophets,” 463–64. Block describes several possibilities of the origin of these foreigners and the duties they were allowed to perform. He suggests they may have been members of the royal guard, who were allowed to enter the sanctuary. He marshals the appointment of the Levites to perform the guarding function in 44:10 in support of his hypothesis. Block, Ezekiel, 2:622–23.
170 Verse 18 speaks of purifying the sanctuary. Verse 19 regards the sin offering, the blood of which the priests were to put on the temple doorposts. Verse 20 gives instructions for “atonement for the temple.”
171 Hamilton describes the promises of a new heart, new spirit, and God’s Spirit at work in and
148
that “foreigners” should be “circumcised in heart and flesh” bespeaks the same reality Ezekiel develops throughout the book. Because circumcision of the heart and flesh are required for entering the sanctuary for worship, and the sanctuary appears to be the location of the Passover celebration in 45:21, Ezekiel appears to be restating the requirement found in Exodus 12:48-49. Yet, Ezekiel raises the standard by adding that fleshly circumcision is insufficient. Because this circumcision of the heart is redemptive- historically connected to the everlasting covenant of peace after exile, the new covenant is in view. This observation helps explain the significance of the heart/flesh prerequisite on foreigners rather than Israel. The Lord does not say that Israelites must be circumcised in heart and flesh to enter the sanctuary; the foreigners are in view. However, the Lord has already promised that Israel would receive just such a circumcision of the heart, in language of heart cleansing and transplant (11:17-21; 36:25-27). These realities are predicated of the people of God in terms of a new creation, through Ezekiel’s valley of dry bones vision and the explanation that follows (37:23-28).
172Therefore, the
prohibition of uncircumcised foreigners entering the sanctuary indicates, ironically, that with the coming of the new covenant and Davidic king, foreigners would also be recipients of the flesh/heart circumcision. Thus, the Lord would provide the means by which foreigners could, together with Israel, celebrate the Passover in the same, renewed spiritual condition as Israel—made alive by the Holy Spirit, Spirit indwelt, heart
circumcised, new creations (cf. Isa 52:1).
173indwelling God’s people as a “conceptual parallel” to circumcision of the heart. Hamilton Jr., God’s Indwelling Presence, 53.
172 W. J. Dumbrell, The End of the Beginning: Revelation 21-22 and the Old Testament (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2001), 96; Hamilton Jr., God’s Indwelling Presence, 48–50.
173 Deenick reaches strikingly similar conclusions about Isa 52:1. Deenick, Righteous by Promise, 82–84.