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Prophecy

Tyre taken and razed by Nebuchadnezzar, “you will be built no more”: the oracle that Ezekiel 29 corrects (Ezekiel 26:7-14; 29:17-20)

Al-Mina archaeological site in Tyre (Lebanon), with mostly Roman remains: the island city continued to be inhabited and rebuilt after Nebuchadnezzar.
Archaeological object Al-Mina archaeological site in Tyre (Lebanon), with mostly Roman remains: the island city continued to be inhabited and rebuilt after Nebuchadnezzar. — Vyacheslav Argenberg, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY 4.0

⊘ Not fulfilled as written

Written 587–586 BC according to tradition; 586–571 BC according to historians. Event: c. 573–571 BC.

See the full entry: sources, objections, answers

In short

The announcement. The prophet Ezekiel, in the book of Ezekiel, around 587–586 BC, announces that Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, will take Tyre, the great merchant city on an island, will raze it, and that it will never be rebuilt.

What happened. Nebuchadnezzar besieges Tyre for years without taking it. In 571 BC, Ezekiel himself writes that he got “no wages” from it and that God gives him Egypt instead. Tyre remains inhabited, falls to Alexander in 332 BC, is rebuilt, and the city of Sour still exists.

What is still debated. Jewish and Christian commentators say that the city was taken but emptied of its riches, or that the announcement has in view old Tyre or other attackers, while skeptics see in it a prophecy that its own author had to correct.

What is surprising

It is one of the rare cases where a prophetic book keeps side by side the announcement and its dated correction, by the same author, without trying to reconcile them. Nebuchadnezzar did not destroy Tyre, and the city still exists today.

Main objection (in French for now)

Ez 26:7-11 attribue nommément à Nabuchodonosor la prise de Tyr, le massacre de son peuple et la chute de ses monuments. Il ne l’a pas prise, et Ez 29:18 le reconnaît : c’est une prophétie corrigée par son propre auteur.

The text (World English Bible)

“For the Lord GOD says: ‘Behold, I will bring on Tyre Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, king of kings, from the north, with horses, with chariots, with horsemen, and an army with many people. He will kill your daughters in the field with the sword. He will make forts against you, cast up a mound against you, and raise up the buckler against you. He will set his battering engines against your walls, and with his axes he will break down your towers. By reason of the abundance of his horses, their dust will cover you. Your walls will shake at the noise of the horsemen, of the wagons, and of the chariots, when he enters into your gates, as men enter into a city which is broken open. He will tre…

Ezek 26:7-11

I will make you a bare rock. You will be a place for the spreading of nets. You will be built no more; for I the LORD have spoken it,’ says the Lord GOD.

Ezek 26:14

It came to pass in the twenty-seventh year, in the first month, in the first day of the month, the LORD’s word came to me, saying, “Son of man, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon caused his army to serve a great service against Tyre. Every head was made bald, and every shoulder was worn; yet he had no wages, nor did his army, from Tyre, for the service that he had served against it. Therefore the Lord GOD says: ‘Behold, I will give the land of Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon. He will carry off her multitude, take her plunder, and take her prey. That will be the wages for his army. I have given him the land of Egypt as his payment for which he served, because they worked for me,’ says …

Ezek 29:17-20

Sources