Ezekiel 36:8, commentary and pictures

The mountains of Israel are the promised land, which is to become fruitful again to provide for God's people of Israel as they return, for they are near, at hand to come. The promise is conditional, requiring Israel to return to God wholeheartedly in faith and obedience and to turn from wickedness and be ashamed of sins. Because Israel came back half-heartedly and did not meet the conditions, the promised restoration could be fulfilled only feebly and partially, and never literally or exactly as written in its original detailed form. What God promised concerning the restoration of His people will yet be fulfilled in glorious measure to true Israel, understood in the spiritual, new-covenant sense as the people of faith, in redemption and a more glorious inheritance in the earth made new. That gathering and restoration is God's own work of salvation, by which Israel saved by the Lord is transplanted as a flourishing tree bearing immortal fruit in the new world to come.

Words and Historical Setting

The mountains of Israel are the promised land itself, addressed as mountains, which are to shoot forth branches and yield fruit by becoming fruitful again to supply God's people of Israel as they return, for they are near, at hand to come. At hand means approaching, to come, with the returning people near to coming back to their land. The land's renewed fruitfulness belongs to the promises to living Israel, to be fulfilled at the beginning of the day of the Lord, before the resurrection of the just. It is part of what God would have done for Israel after the return from Babylon, when the mountains would again be fruitful for His people as they came back to the land.

That promise belonged to Israel in its historical setting and was conditional on returning to God wholeheartedly, turning from wickedness and being ashamed of sins, and it does not identify Joseph with the American continent. Had the people obeyed, the restoration would have been fulfilled in fuller measure, but through failure only about forty thousand returned and the promises were not realized in their fullness as described. The verse was given during the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem after the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 B.C., concerning return and restoration. Its setting is the return from seventy years of captivity in Babylon, with Jerusalem fully restored under the decree of Artaxerxes in 457 B.C.

God would have fulfilled those promises then if Israel had yielded to Him, but through their failure what was promised concerning true Israel would be fulfilled later, not in every detail as originally described, with future glory and immortal inheritance nevertheless coming to the faithful. The verse stands in Ezekiel 36 onward, with chapters 38 and 39 on to the close of the book, in chapters 36 to 48. Those chapters are the prophecies of restoration and consolation, in which God directly promises great blessings which He Himself will bestow in the salvation of Israel His people and in the glory He will put upon the land, the city and the sanctuary, whose fulfillment whether past or future is the work of God's hand. As a conditional prophecy its promise that the land would shoot forth branches and yield fruit for returning Israel rested on conditions, with fulfillment depending on obedience by the rule of Jeremiah 18:7-10 that when God speaks of building and planting a nation to benefit it He will withhold the promised good if it does evil and does not obey His voice.

Conditional Promise and Fulfillment

The promise of fruitful mountains for a returning people was conditional, calling Israel to return to God wholeheartedly in faith, obedience and faithfulness. It required turning from wickedness and being ashamed of sins. By the rule of Jeremiah 18:7-10, when God speaks of building and planting a nation to benefit it, He will withhold the promised good if it does evil and does not obey, even where no condition is stated beside each promise.

Had Israel fully complied and yielded to His call to return, He would have given prosperity and power far beyond their dreams, forgiven sins, given new hearts, built all the waste cities, made them a holy flock like the flock of Jerusalem in her solemn feasts, and caused them to know He is Jehovah. He would have called the wandering honest-hearted back from the nations to make the captive nation alive again, figured as sleeping Israel restored by dry bones clothed with flesh and given life as the whole house of Israel. He would have joined Israel and Judah in one nation under the seed of David, divided the land on a new plan, destroyed the Scythian nations of the north called Gog and Magog before them in the detail of Ezekiel 38 and 39, built the wonderful sanctuary of Ezekiel 40-48, dwelt among His people, rested His glory on the city named Jehovah-shammah meaning Jehovah is there, and made the land flourish for them as they returned.

Because Israel came back half-heartedly, mingling with other nations and doing their deeds, and was not ashamed of sins and did not meet the conditions, the promised restoration and fruitfulness could not be fulfilled in fullness as described. Fulfillment was only feeble, partial, and a faint shadow. Fewer than fifty thousand, about forty thousand, gathered back, with a temple far inferior to Solomon's, persecution by northern foes preeminently under Antiochus IV instead of their destruction, and final subjection to the Romans until the nation was destroyed.

The prophecy was therefore never literally or exactly fulfilled as written in its original detailed form. What God promised concerning the restoration of His people will yet be fulfilled in glorious measure to true Israel and the faithful, in redemption and a more glorious inheritance in the earth made new with future glory and immortal inheritance, as shown in Revelation 20 and 21. That greater fulfillment comes in the glory of Christ's second coming and related events, though not in every detail as originally described nor through the original local conditions.

Israel's Identity and Hope

Israel in the promise is not limited to the natural descendants of Jacob but must be understood in the same spiritual, new-covenant sense as the people of faith, the spiritual seed. This follows because the prophecy belongs with blessings promised to Israel including fruitfulness for the people who are to come, and it cannot be assigned to literal Israel under the first covenant while its companion prophecy applies David to Christ.

In its historical setting the promise belonged to literal Israel under the old covenant and to the first dispensation after the captivity, when the mountains of Israel would again be fruitful and provide for God's people when they returned to the land. Its fulfillment depended on Israel turning from iniquities and obeying God and on returning to God wholeheartedly, and it was conditional even when conditions were not stated alongside each promise. It was not an unconditional promise of a future age and does not establish an unconditional future restoration of the Jewish nation, nor does it identify Joseph with the American continent. If God's people had been faithful the mountains would have become fruitful and yielded their produce at their return, but the promise was not fulfilled because they failed to meet its conditions.

The land's renewed fruitfulness is part of the promises to living Israel, fulfilled at the beginning of the day of the Lord, before the resurrection of the just. The gathering and restoration to the land is God's own work of salvation in which God himself directly and explicitly promises great blessings which he will bestow in the salvation of Israel his people and in the glory he will put upon the land, the city and the sanctuary, whether in the past or in the future. It is not something Israel accomplishes by gathering itself and rebuilding Jerusalem, but God gathering scattered Israel and restoring them to their land. The mountains becoming fruitful picture the promised land into which Israel, saved by the Lord, is transplanted as a flourishing olive tree spreading its branches and bearing immortal fruit in the new world to come.

At hand means approaching, to come. John the Baptist and Jesus saying the kingdom of heaven is at hand is true only in that sense, because they lived in the time of the fourth universal empire and the kingdom of heaven is to be the fifth. The kingdom of God is still at hand and will not be set up until the last generation when the signs of the second advent come to pass.