The reason: long hatred turned violent

These lines sit inside an oracle aimed at “Mount Seir,” a way of addressing the land and people associated with Edom (Ezekiel 35 as a whole). The passage is built as reason followed by outcome: first the charge (enduring hatred expressed in violent action during Israel’s collapse), then the announced response (blood pursuing them, and the land becoming uninhabitable). The language is intense and repetitive, pressing the point that what Mount Seir chose to do during another nation’s crisis becomes the basis for what will now happen to it.

Ezekiel speaks as Judah is being dismantled by Babylon and many Judeans are already living in exile. In that setting, neighboring groups could exploit the chaos—attacking, looting, blocking escape routes, or cooperating with the victors as Jerusalem fell and survivors fled. Edom’s territory lay south and east of Judah, and traditions of rivalry between the groups were remembered as long-standing. This oracle treats Mount Seir as having taken advantage of Judah’s catastrophe, turning older hostility into concrete violence at the moment of Judah’s “calamity.”

Shared ground

Ezekiel 35:5–7 explains why Mount Seir is targeted: it held on to a long-standing hatred and acted on it when Israel was already collapsing. The text’s explicit claims are that Mount Seir “gave over” Israelites to the sword during their calamity, and that this violent choice becomes the reason for what follows.

The response is framed as the Lord Yahweh’s sworn declaration (“as I live”), emphasizing certainty. The consequence is described with repeated “blood” language: because Mount Seir did not recoil from bloodshed, blood will pursue it. The judgment is also geographic and social: the land becomes a stunned ruin where normal travel (“the one who passes through and the one who returns”) is cut off.

Where interpretation differs

Two questions draw different readings.

First, how long is “perpetual enmity”? Some read it as centuries of hostility between related peoples, stressing deep historical rivalry. Others read it more narrowly as an entrenched posture over a sustained period (a settled policy of hostility), without requiring a claim about many centuries.

Second, what does “I will prepare you to blood” mean? Many take it as a vivid way of saying Mount Seir is being set up for bloody judgment—violence will meet them. Others think it means something like “I will make you blood,” picturing the land soaked in bloodshed, a more concrete image of devastation.

Why the disagreement exists The passage uses compressed poetic language and repetition. Phrases like “time of the iniquity of the end” and the unusual wording about being “for blood” are evocative but not fully explained. Readers decide whether to read them as broad historical summaries, narrow references to the collapse of Judah, or strong imagery that is not meant to map one-to-one onto a single event.

What this passage clearly contributes This text links judgment to a specific moral charge: exploiting another people’s catastrophe with lethal hostility. It portrays divine justice in “measure-for-measure” terms—bloodshed embraced becomes bloodshed experienced—without needing to detail the mechanics. It also shows judgment affecting more than individuals: it reaches land stability, safety, and the possibility of ordinary movement through a region (compare the emphasis on “blood” in blood).