A Mark on their Forehead – the Surprise of Ezekiel 9: 4-6
André H. Roosma 6 February 2012 (EN + NL)
In Ezekiel 9: 4-6, we read about a time that God has had enough of all
sin and abominations happening in Jerusalem.
He set out to destroy all the people who were engaged in such horrific
activities. He sends out a couple of men (angels?) to carry this out.
But before those destructive messengers He sends a messenger who gets
quite a different assignment.
He has to care that all the people are rescued who also suffered under
the evil that happened.
Remarkable is how this man had to care for that, when we read the passage
with an eye on the old script of those days.1
For his task, he is fitted with a writer’s ink-horn.
4 And YaHUaH said to him [the one with the
ink horn], “Go through the city, through Jerusalem, and put a
(tav / cross mark) upon the
foreheads of the men who sigh and groan over all the abominations that are
committed in it.”
5 And to the others He said in my hearing, “Pass
through the city after him, and smite; your eye shall not spare, and you
shall show no pity;
6 slay old men outright, young men and maidens, little
children and women, but touch no one upon whom is the (tav / cross mark). And begin at my sanctuary.”
So they began with the elders who were before the temple.
The name of the Hebrew letter tav (ת earlier: ) as a word
is build up of two signs (תו);
originally: – the tav sign itself and the wav – basically: the pin or stick with a sharp
point used to draw or engrave such signs in clay or in a rock (Yirme-Yahu (Jeremiah) 17: 1 shows that one of the utensils
used was an iron pin with a sharp stone (diamond?) tip).
So, this word stands for cross mark.
In addition, the word tav stands literally also for ‘(cross)
mark of attachment, belonging and security’ (the
- wav as tent pin stood symbolically for attachment,
belonging, security and safety).
This tav (written in full as תו or ) as a sign of God is Biblically very
significant. The well known dictionary by Brown, Driver & Briggs
gives for tav: ‘mark (as a sign of
exemption from judgment)’!
We encounter it in Job 31: 35 (a text which is also
a lot richer in the (Old) Hebrew original then in any translation);
and in the above mentioned passage.
Thus we see that the old Biblical script and this history in Ezekiel
contains already a clear reference to God’s redemptive work at
Calvary!
Hallelu YaH !
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