Ezekiel 32:17-32·~1 min

Egypt Cast into the Pit

Later in the twelfth year Ezekiel receives another word instructing him to wail for Egypt and send her down to the pit. Pharaoh and his multitudes are told they will lie among the sword-slain with other fearsome nations already there: Assyria, Elam, Meshech, Tubal, Edom, the northern princes, and the Sidonians. Each group once spread terror in the land of the living but now lies disgraced in death. Pharaoh will behold them and find bleak consolation in sharing their fate, because God has delivered Egypt and all her multitude to the sword.

I¹⁷n the twelfth year, on the fifteenth day of the month, the word of the LORD came to me, saying, ¹⁸“Son of man, wail for the multitudes of Egypt, and consign her and the daughters of the mighty nations to the depths of the earth with those who descend to the Pit: ¹⁹Whom do you surpass in beauty? ²⁰They will fall among those slain by the sword. ²¹Mighty chiefs will speak from the midst of Sheol ²²Assyria is there with her whole company; ²³Her graves are set in the depths of the Pit, ²⁴Elam is there ²⁵Among the slain they prepare ²⁶Meshech and Tubal are there ²⁷They do not lie down ²⁸But you too will be shattered ²⁹Edom is there, ³⁰All the leaders of the north ³¹Pharaoh will see them ³²For I will spread My terror

Section summaryIn a second oracle Ezekiel is told to wail for Egypt and send her down to the pit with the daughters of mighty nations. There Pharaoh joins other fallen empires already in Sheol: Assyria, Elam, Meshech, Tubal, Edom, the princes of the north, and the Sidonians. All once inspired terror in the land of the living, yet now lie among the slain and uncircumcised. Pharaoh will see this company and be consoled only in the grim sense that he is not alone in judgment, for Egypt too has been handed over to the sword.

Role in the chapterThis section completes Egypt's humiliation by placing Pharaoh among the dead empires, turning his imagined uniqueness into shared disgrace.