Ezekiel 28:9 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Wilt thou yet say Or, Wilt thou then say, before him that slayeth thee, I am God Nothing can be more finely expressed than this: the prince of Tyrus thought himself, as a god, as invincible, as secure from all harm; God therefore, by his prophet, asks him here if he would have these proud thoughts, if he would think of himself as a god, when he found himself in his enemy's power, just going to be slain. The question is most sharp and cutting: it sets the folly of his insolent pride in the strongest light; for surely he could not boast of being a god, when he was to fall by the sword of a man; and whatever proud thoughts he now entertained of himself, they certainly would be changed when he saw the sword of his enemy lifted up to slay him. So Plutarch tells us of Alexander, that “he vainly affected to be thought Jupiter's son, and next in honour to Bacchus and Hercules: yet when he saw the blood run out of a wound he had received, which at the same time gave him much pain, he confessed that was not such blood as Homer said issued from the immortal gods.” Lib. 2, De Alexandri fortuna. This whole chapter, as well as the foregoing one, is exceedingly fine, both as to the style and composition.