Then those who dwell in the cities of Israel will go forth: After the destruction of Gog’s army, the people living in the towns of Israel will go out of the towns into the countryside. God does not mention where the people were during the fighting, but it is clear that they emerged from the war safe and unharmed. New International Reader’s Version renders this clause as “At that time those who live in the towns of Israel will go out.”

And make fires of the weapons and burn them, shields and bucklers, bows and arrows, handpikes and spears: Make fires and burn render two Hebrew verbs, which when used together mean “kindle a fire and burn [something].” Many languages will need to insert an intermediate step between the people going out and making the fires. They will need to make explicit that the people will go out to “collect” (Good News Translation, Contemporary English Version), or “pick up” (New Living Translation), the weapons before they burn them. The Hebrew word rendered weapons is a general term for the implements used for fighting, for example, swords, spears, shields, as well the protective clothes that soldiers wore. Here they must be wooden or leather implements since they could be burned. Translators whose language does not have a general term for these things may say “things they used for fighting in war,” or they may omit it and simply name the individual weapons listed. For shields and bucklers, see the comments on 23.24. These weapons were probably made of leather, since they could burn. For bows and arrows, see Ezek 39.3. The Hebrew expression for handpikes (literally “stick of the hand”) probably refers to simple wooden “[war] clubs” (Good News Translation, Contemporary English Version, New International Version, New International Reader’s Version, New Century Version, English Standard Version, Jerusalem Bible, New American Bible, Christian Community Bible, New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh) that are held in the hand, but some scholars have suggested that it may refer to longer spears that are thrown at an enemy (compare Revised English Bible “throwing-sticks” and New King James Version “javelins”). The Hebrew word rendered spears refers to long implements that were not thrown but were held and thrust out in an attempt to stick into enemies. Translators may say “pointed wooden weapons.” In English these weapons are known as lances or pikes.

And they will make fires of them for seven years: There will be so many weapons lying on the ground that it will take seven years to burn them all.

A model for this verse is:

• Then the people who live in the cities of Israel will go out into the countryside, gather up all the weapons of the dead soldiers, make fires and burn them. They will burn the large and small shields, the bows and arrows, the wooden clubs and the pointed wooden weapons. It will take seven years to burn them all.

Quoted with permission from Gross, Carl & Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on Ezekiel. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2016. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .