The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him: the fir trees were not like his boughs, and the chestnut trees were not like his branches; nor any tree in the garden of God was like unto him in his beauty.
Parallel translations
- WEB The cedars in the garden of God could not hide it; the cypress trees were not like its boughs, and the pine trees were not as its branches; nor was any tree in the garden of God like it in its beauty.
- BSB The cedars in the garden of God could not rival it; the cypresses could not compare with its branches, nor the plane trees match its boughs. No tree in the garden of God could compare with its beauty.
- NKJV The cedars in the garden of God could not hide it; The fir trees were not like its boughs, And the chestnut trees were not like its branches; No tree in the garden of God was like it in beauty.
- NASB ‘The cedars in God’s garden could not match it; The junipers could not compare with its branches, And the plane trees could not match its branches. No tree in God’s garden could compare with it in its beauty.
- NLT No other cedar in the garden of God could rival it. No cypress had branches to equal it; no plane tree had boughs to compare. No tree in the garden of God came close to it in beauty.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
No tree even in 'the garden of God' could match this cedar's beauty—it surpassed every rival. Egypt's glory is described as unrivaled among the nations.
Overview
By invoking Eden, 'the garden of God,' Ezekiel sets Egypt's grandeur against the highest imaginable standard and declares it supreme. The Eden imagery, though, also recalls humanity's first fall, hinting that exalted glory paired with pride ends in expulsion and ruin. What looks incomparable to human eyes is still subject to the Creator who planted every tree.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 11
- Ezek 28:13Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created.
- Isa 51:3For the LORD shall comfort Zion: he will comfort all her waste places; and he will make her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the LORD; joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving, and the voice of melody.
- Ps 80:10The hills were covered with the shadow of it, and the boughs thereof were like the goodly cedars.
- Gen 13:10And Lot lifted up his eyes, and beheld all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered every where, before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, even as the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt, as thou comest unto Zoar.
- Ezek 31:16I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to hell with them that descend into the pit: and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, shall be comforted in the nether parts of the earth.
- Ezek 31:18To whom art thou thus like in glory and in greatness among the trees of Eden? yet shalt thou be brought down with the trees of Eden unto the nether parts of the earth: thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised with them that be slain by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, saith the Lord GOD.
- Gen 2:8–9And the LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed.
- Isa 10:7–14Howbeit he meaneth not so, neither doth his heart think so; but it is in his heart to destroy and cut off nations not a few.
- Isa 36:4–18And Rabshakeh said unto them, Say ye now to Hezekiah, Thus saith the great king, the king of Assyria, What confidence is this wherein thou trustest?
- Isa 37:11–13Behold, thou hast heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands by destroying them utterly; and shalt thou be delivered?
- Ps 37:35I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree.
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Christ at the center
The promise of one Shepherd-King David, a new heart and new Spirit, and the river of life flowing from the temple all stream toward Christ, the good Shepherd who gives the Spirit.
How Ezekiel 31:8 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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