Bible Dictionary
Imagery
Imagery refers to carved or pictured representations. In Ezekiel 8:12 it describes images in hidden chambers that were associated with idolatrous worship.
Definition
Imagery refers to carved figures, pictures, or representations. In Ezekiel, it describes chambers whose walls were covered with representations associated with idolatrous worship.
Biblical Usage
The expression “chambers of imagery” describes hidden rooms where elders of Israel worshiped representations of reptiles, vermin, and other figures.
Historical Background
The Hebrew term can elsewhere mean a figured stone, pictured representation, network, or a mental image. The supplied material records proposals that the chamber cult was Egyptian, Babylonian, or a survival of older superstitions.
Scripture References
Related Figures
Historical Bible Dictionaries
Easton's Bible Dictionary
Only in the phrase “chambers of his imagery” (Ezek. 8:12). (See CHAMBER.)
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (ISBE)
<p>im'-aj-ri (maskith, "carved figure"): Only in Eze 8:12, "every man in his chambers of imagery," i.e. dark chambers on whose walls were pictures in relief representing all kinds of reptiles and vermin, worshipped by elders of Israel. Some maintain that the cult was of foreign origin, either Egyptian (Bertholet, Commentary on Ezekiel), or Babylonian (Redpath, Westminster Commentary on Ezekiel); others that it was the revival of ancient superstitions of a totemistic kind which had survived in obscure circles in Israel (W.R. Smith, Lectures on the Religion of the Semites, revised edition, 357). The word here rendered "imagery" is elsewhere in the King James Version translated "image" (of stone) (Le 26:1, the Revised Version (British and American) "figured stone"), "pictures" (Nu 33:52, the Revised Version (British and American) "figured stones"; Pr 25:11, the Revised Version (British and American) "network"); twice it means imagination, conceit, i.e. a mental picture (Ps 73:20; Pr 18:11). "Imagery" occurs once in Apocrypha (Sirach 38:27 the King James Version, eis homoiosai zographian, the Revised Version (British and American) "to preserve likeness in his portraiture").</p><p>D. Miall Edwards</p>