They shall put bands upon thee, etc. Did the warning mean that the prophet's hearers would treat him as the men of Jerusalem treated Jeremiah (Jeremiah 32:3; Jeremiah 33:1; Jeremiah 38:6)? Of this, at all events, we have no record, and so far we are led to the other alternative of taking the words (as in Ezekiel 4:8) in a figurative sense.
The prophet would feel, as he stood in the presence of the rebellious house, as tongue tied, bound hand and foot by their hardness of heart, teaching by strange and startling signs only, and, it may be, writing his prophecies.
In Ezekiel 24:27, four years later, and again in Ezekiel 29:21, we have a distinct reference to a long period of such protracted silence. We may compare, as in some sense parallel, the silence of Zacharias (Luke 1:22).
That silence unbroken for nine months was a sign to those who "were looking for redemption in Jerusalem," more eloquent than speech.