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5. Three hundred and ninety days. Many interpretations of this time period have been set forth. There are those who prefer the reading of the LXX, which assigns 150 days for bearing the iniquities of Israel and 40 days for those of Judah, and totals the two to make 190 days. This view is not without difficulty, for the 150 days do not represent the years of the captivity of the ten tribes, who were led captive in 723/722 b.c.

If we accept the figure of the Hebrew Bible, we must consider the 390 years to represent the period of Israel’s defection. The period began with the secession of Jeroboam and the ten tribes from Judah. This secession marked the beginning of Israel’s sin. Having withdrawn from the divinely appointed monarchy, the northern kingdom suffered under a long line of evil rulers; not one of their kings was a God-fearing man. But here again we are confronted with difficulty. According to the chronology of the kings adopted for this commentary (see Vol. II, pp. 140-144), the secession of the ten tribes occurred in 931 b.c. (see Vol. II, p. 77). From here to Ezekiel’s vision in 593/592 was only about 339 years, to the fall of Jerusalem only 345 years, and to the return from captivity, 395 years. By the now obsolete method of reconciling the Judah-Israel synchronisms by assuming interregnums, 390 years to Ezekiel were formerly calculated from an earlier date for the secession of the ten tribes.

However, the specifications of the symbolic period are not precisely enough stated to use this synchronism as a basis for chronology.