28 myths
Myths, legends, and mystical writings about Ezekiel from across Jewish tradition.
28 myths on JewishMythology.com retell how Jewish tradition imagines ezekiel, drawn from the Hebrew Bible, Midrash, Talmud, Kabbalah, and later Jewish literature. Each story below synthesizes primary sources into a single narrative; follow any myth to read it, and from there into the source passages behind it.
By the Chebar River, Ezekiel watched fire, wings, and eye-covered wheels rise into a chariot that thundered, fell silent, and carried mercy.
When the Temple burned the Presence wept at the last wall and walked out with Israel, as she had walked into Egypt, Babylon, Eilam, and Edom.
Two cherubim and a turning sword of fire stand east of Eden. They are not bolting the gate. They are guarding the way to the tree of life.
The rabbis nearly voted to suppress the Book of Ezekiel. One sage locked himself away with 300 jugs of oil and refused to stop until the book was safe.
In Babylonian exile, Ezekiel watches the sky tear open. Fire, wheels full of eyes, and four impossible creatures arrive bearing the throne of God.
Ezekiel gave an uncertain answer about rescue. The three men declared they were ready to die regardless. That declaration was when the rescue became certain.
Ezekiel was a priest by a canal in Babylon with no altar to serve. The sky opened over the ditch, and four creatures came out of the fire.
Two hundred thousand Ephraimites left Egypt thirty years early, fought the Philistines, and died. Their bones became Ezekiel's valley.
Vayikra Rabbah says a prophet sees God the way a candle is seen through a window. Abraham got nine clouded panes. Moses got one clear one.
Moses sang about divine arrows drunk with blood on the edge of Canaan. Six centuries later, Ezekiel announced that the day Moses described had finally arrived.
Moses saw God most clearly of all the prophets. Ezekiel saw through nine clouded panes. So why is Ezekiel's vision so much stranger and more detailed?
Ezekiel was a priest of a temple that no longer stood, sitting by a canal in the wrong country. The sky came open over Babylon anyway.
Hiram of Tyre supplied the cedar for Solomon's Temple, then spent centuries building seven false heavens to claim the throne that was not his.
Jehoiachin surrendered to save Jerusalem. Zedekiah was blinded by his own tears. Ginzberg gathered the legends behind the fall of Judah.
Targum Jonathan counts sixty-four faces and 256 wings on the throne. Ezekiel watches the glory move out through the east gate and waits for it to return.
The four living creatures strain forever under the Throne, crying blessed be the glory, and not one of them knows where that glory is.
In exile beside a Babylonian canal, Ezekiel is shown a Temple no hand will build, and a river from its threshold that wakes the dead salt sea.
Ezekiel opens with a stutter, hayoh hayah, the word of the Lord was, was. The first marks prophecy in Israel, the second in Babylonia among the exiles.
God orders Ezekiel to lie on his left side, then his right, until the prophet's body becomes a bed for the guilt of Israel and Judah.
An angel told Daniel that the angel of Persia had blocked his way, and that the angel of Greece was coming next. Empires have officers in heaven.
Out of the north the storm came with cloud, fire, and wind. Ezekiel named what he could. Behind the vision, four shells tried to choke the light.
Nimrod stood like a green high tree over the nations until God dried him and raised the low, while Israel was told to keep no strange god inside the camp.
Moses spoke four hard judgments over Israel. Centuries later Amos, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Isaiah rose and mercy-read each decree until heaven agreed.
By the river Chebar Ezekiel sees wheels and living beings, then the shapes of letters themselves begin to teach what he saw.
A drunk priest at a banquet said his people were kinder than the Jews. Rabbi Judah answered with a riddle about a master who stores dishes in many houses.
The Assyrian king drinks the water of strangers and counts his hosts, then an angel answers with a body count of one hundred eighty-five thousand.
On his last day Moses orders Israel to put heart, eye, and ear into the words. Torah hangs like mountains on a hair, and a slip drops the range.
David sang that God's humility crowned him. The rabbis found the same stooping God waiting on naked Adam and beating Ezekiel to the plain.
