Now as I beheld the living creatures, behold one wheel upon the earth by the living creatures, with his four faces.
Behold one wheel. The "dreadful height" of the wheel (Ezekiel 1:18) indicates the gigantic, terrible energy of the complicated revolutions of God's providence, bringing about His purposes with unerring certainty. One wheel appeared transversely within another, so that the movement might be without turning, wheresoever the living creatures might advance (Ezekiel 1:17). Thus each wheel was composed of two circles, cutting one another at right angles, "one" only of which appeared to touch the ground ("upon the earth"), according to the direction the cherubim desired to move in.
With his, four faces - rather, 'according to its four faces' or sides; as there was a side or direction to each of the four creatures, so there was a wheel for each of the sides (Fairbairn). The four sides or semicircles of each composite wheel pointed, as the four faces of each of the living creatures, to the four quarters of heaven. Havernick refers "his" or "its" to the wheels' four faces. The cherubim and their wings and wheels stood in contrast to the symbolical figures, somewhat similar, then existing in Chaldea, and found in the remains of Assyria. The latter, though derived from the original revelation by tradition, came by corruption to symbolize the astronomical zodiac, or the sun and celestial sphere, by a circle with wings or irradiations. But Ezekiel's cherubim rise above natural objects, the gods of the pagan, to the representation of the one true God, who made and continually upholds them.