So will I stretch out my hand upon them, and make the land desolate, yea, more desolate than the wilderness toward Diblath, in all their habitations: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
Diblath - another form of Diblathaim, a city in Moab (Numbers 33:46, "Almon-diblathaim;" Jeremiah 48:22, "Beth-diblathaim"), near which, at the east and south of the Dead sea, was the wilderness of Arabia Deserta.
Remarks:
(1) God marks the retributive justice of His judgments by making the mountains and "the high places," which had been the scene of Israel's sin, to become the scene of her punishment (Ezekiel 6:2-3). God justly makes that a desolation (Ezekiel 6:4) which we make an idol.
(2) The images in which Israel trusted for deliverance could not even deliver themselves, much less deliver others. Israel's slain men were to be cast before her idols, whereby the close connection between her sin and its punishment is plainly marked. The idols wherein she trusted for safety brought upon her destruction from the God who is a jealous God, and who will not let the glory which is His due be given to another with impunity (Ezekiel 6:5-7). Let us watchfully guard against trusting in any earthly confidences or works (Ezekiel 6:6), and solely look to the Lord as our stay and defense.
(3) A promise of grace to a remnant breaks in like a gleam of sunshine upon the otherwise dark face of the prophetic sky. The loving purpose of God's chastizements shall at last be accomplished in the case of the elect Jews, who shall survive the long series of calamities which have so crushed the nation. At length the people that escape shall remember the Lord, and observe the justice of His dealings in the lands of their exile. They shall call to mind with what amazing long-suffering God bore with their fathers, until at last, wearied out by their obstinacy, and above all by their crowning guilt in crucifying the Son of God, He was compelled to punish them (Ezekiel 6:9). Then shall they loathe themselves for the evils and abominations which they and their nation have committed. That this spirit of repentance may be poured out upon the Jews nationally should be the prayer of every true Christian. Meanwhile let us seek earnestly the conversion of individual Jews, as we know that there is, "Even at this present time, a remnant according to the election of grace" (Romans 11:5).
(4) It is awful when men cannot Be taught to "know the Lord" as the God of grace and love, and require to be taught, by His pouring His righteous fury upon them (Ezekiel 6:12), smiting them with His hand and treading them under His feet (Ezekiel 6:11), to know that He is the Almighty Yahweh, who will by no means clear the guilty (Ezekiel 6:14). But such cases are recorded for our warning, that we may flee the sin of the Jewish nation, and so escape their punishment. Let us judge ourselves, that we be not judged of the Lord. Remembering our obligations to Him, and how sadly we fall short of them, let us loathe ourselves because of our sinfulness, and rejoice at the same time in the true salvation provided for us in the Lord Jesus Christ.
(5) Then let our feeling toward those still on the broad way be like the compassionate feeling of Ezekiel, sighing for his nation's sin and consequent doom. "Alas for all the evil abominations of the house of Israel! for they shall fall by the sword, the famine, and the pestilence" (Ezekiel 6:11). Let us warn all to flee from sin and condemnation to the only Saviour, since we know that "he which convert eth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins" (James 5:20).