Bible Strands
Ezekiel 19:6
He prowled among the lions, and became a young lion. After learning to tear his prey, he devoured men.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Ezekiel addresses the exiled community, continuing a poetic lament over the fallen kings of Judah. The oracle extends the metaphor of a royal line represented by lion cubs raised by a grieving mother.
The words — The verbs וַיִּתְהַלֵּךְ (va/yi.ttehallekh, "he went about") and וַיִּלְמַד (va/yi.lammad, "he learned") mark the cub’s shift from passive wandering to active predation. The noun כְּפִיר (kephir, "young lion") and the phrase לִטְרָף (li/tref, "to tear prey") concretize the violence that follows.
The thread — The text immediately expands this image in Ezekiel 19:7, where the lion breaks strongholds, devastates cities, and terrifies the land with his roar. This prophetic lion motif parallels other biblical warnings against rulers who substitute military terror for covenant justice.
Why it lands — The passage demands recognition of how royal ambition corrupts into predatory violence that destroys communities. Readers must confront the plain reality that inherited power, when untethered from justice, inevitably consumes the very people it should protect.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And he went up and down among the lions, he became a young lion, and learned to catch the prey, and devoured men.
Cross-references
- 2 Kings 24:1 During Jehoiakim’s reign, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon invaded. So Jehoiakim became his vassal for three years, until he turned and rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar.
- 2 Kings 24:9 And he did evil in the sight of the LORD, just as his father had done.
- 2 Chronicles 36:5 Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem eleven years. And he did evil in the sight of the LORD his God.
- 2 Chronicles 36:9 Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem three months and ten days. And he did evil in the sight of the LORD.
- Jeremiah 22:13 “Woe to him who builds his palace by unrighteousness, and his upper rooms without justice, who makes his countrymen serve without pay, and fails to pay their wages,
- Jeremiah 26:1 At the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, this word came from the LORD:
- Jeremiah 36:1 In the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, this word came to Jeremiah from the LORD: