Ezekiel 1:26,27 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Above the firmament was the likeness of a throne Namely, the throne of God. God having given his prophet emblems of his attendants and ministers, while he was coming forth in the chariot of his power and justice, to execute judgment, and of the mysterious dispensations of his providence toward his church and the world, he now proceeds to discover to him some glimpses of his divine glory. The prophet does not say that he saw a real throne, but only the likeness of a throne, emblematical, doubtless, of God's sovereign power and dominion over all creatures, whether in heaven or on earth. God is described in Scripture as dwelling in light, and clothing himself with it. So the throne of God is here described as made up of light resembling the colours and brightness of a sapphire-stone. And upon the likeness of the throne, as the appearance of a man “When Moses and the elders saw the God of Israel, Exodus 24:8, or the glory of God, as the Targum explains it, they saw no determinate figure, but an inconceivably resplendent brightness, that they might not think God could be represented by any image. But in this vision the form and shape of a man are directly represented to Ezekiel, as a prelude or figure of the incarnation.” This, indeed, was doubtless the ever- blessed and only-begotten Son of God, who was in due time to assume human nature, and in that nature to be the visible image and representative of his invisible Father, whom no man hath seen, or can see, 1 Timothy 6:16; John 1:18. He had appeared to Isaiah in glory, to constitute him a prophet, and he now appears to Ezekiel for the same purpose: see note on Isaiah 6:1, and compare John 12:37-41. He appears also as the Lawgiver and King of Israel, to vindicate his own honour, punish his rebellious subjects, and give warning by his prophet, ere he executed his just but severe indignation. And I saw as the colour of amber See note on Ezekiel 1:4. As the appearance of fire Said to be a fire infolding itself, Ezekiel 1:4. Round about within it Namely, within the amber, to signify that Christ's executing of judgment outwardly proceeded from his zeal for the glory of God and his indignation against sin. From the appearance of his loins even upward Denoting, as some interpret it, his divine nature: and from the appearance of his loins even downward Signifying his human nature. I saw, as it were, the appearance of fire The general sense seems to be, that Christ, considered in his whole person, as God and man, is full of indignation against sin, and sinners continuing in sin, and is glorious in both his natures, and in all his proceedings: see 2 Thessalonians 1:8. And it had brightness round about Majesty, justice, and unstained holiness shine round about him. In this colour does Christ appear to the Jews; he that would have visited them, clothed with the garments of salvation, now put on the garments of vengeance, expressed by such metaphors.