And wherever the river goes, every living creature that swarms will live, and there will be very many fish. For this water goes there, that the waters of the sea may become fresh; so everything will live where the river goes.
This part of Ezekiel's vision must so necessarily have a mystical and spiritual meaning that thence we conclude the other parts of his vision have a mystical and spiritual meaning also; for it cannot be applied to the waters brought by pipes into the temple for the washing of the sacrifices, the keeping of the temple clean, and the carrying off of those waters, for...
Commenting on Ezekiel 47:1-12
And it shall come to pass that everything that liveth, which moveth,.... That is, every living man; everyone that lives naturally or corporeally, that lives, moves, and has his being in God, as all men have, Act 17:28, whithersoever the rivers shall come, shall live; or, "the two rivers" (i); the waters divided as before, east and west; not the two Testaments, Old and New...
rivers--in Hebrew, "two rivers." Hence Hebrew expositors think that the waters from the temple were divided into two branches, the one emptying itself into the eastern or Dead Sea, the other into the western or Mediterranean. So Zac 14:8. However, though this probably is covertly implied in the Hebrew dual, the flowing of the waters into the Dead Sea only is expressed. Compare Eze 47:8, "waters . . .