“ ‘ “It has happened after all your wickedness. Woe, woe to you!” says the Lord Yahweh, “that you have built for yourselves a vaulted place, and have made yourselves a lofty place in every street. You have built your lofty place at the head of every way, and have made your beauty an abomination, and have opened your feet to everyone who passed by, and multiplied your prostitution. You have also committed sexual immorality with the Egyptians, your neighbors, great of flesh; and have multiplied your prostitution, to provoke me to anger. See therefore, I have stretched out my hand over you, and have diminished your portion, and delivered you to the will of those who hate you, the daughters of the Philistines, who are ashamed of your lewd way. You have played the prostitute also with the Assyrians, because you were insatiable; yes, you have played the prostitute with them, and yet you weren’t satisfied. You have moreover multiplied your prostitution to the land of merchants, to Chaldea; and yet you weren’t satisfied with this.
“ ‘ “How weak is your heart,” says the Lord Yahweh, “since you do all these things, the work of an impudent prostitute; in that you build your vaulted place at the head of every way, and make your lofty place in every street, and have not been as a prostitute, in that you scorn pay.
“ ‘ “A wife who commits adultery! Who takes strangers instead of her husband! People give gifts to all prostitutes; but you give your gifts to all your lovers, and bribe them, that they may come to you on every side for your prostitution. You are different from other women in your prostitution, in that no one follows you to play the prostitute; and whereas you give hire, and no hire is given to you, therefore you are different.” ’
“Therefore, prostitute, hear Yahweh’s word:
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv23, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35 The first verse is variously explained. Some read the…
The first verse is variously explained. Some read the clause separately, ויהי אחרי כל רעתך, vihi achri kel regnethek — it was after all thy wickedness: and they think that God threatens the Jews here as he did in Hosea, (Hosea 2:9,10.) For after God had there complained that his wool and his flax had been taken away, and offered as gifts to idols, he afterwards adds, I will demand all things back again, and then all thy beauty shall be taken from thee, and thy nakedness shall be laid bare, so that you shall be deservedly ashamed. Thus then they explain these words, that the condition of the Jews should be as it formerly was; as if he had said in one word, I will so avenge myself, that whether you will or not, you shall be compelled to feel the disgrace of your nakedness, since I will manifest it again. But this sense seems forced; therefore I unite it with the remainder of the verse which follows it. Thus then the language of the Prophet flows on: and it was after all thy wickedness that you built a high place for thyself — you made for thyself a lofty place in every street: there are two different words, but the sense is the same: you did set up thy high places in all the principal ways, and so, says he, thy beauty became abominable. But this is inserted by way of parenthesis, Alas! alas for thee! This exclamation is abruptly interposed. But, at the same time, I have no doubt that these things all adhere together, since the Jews added sin to sin, and never made an end of sinning. He says, therefore, after they had been perfidious and ungrateful to God, after they had basely devoted all they had to perverse worship, then this new crime was added, that they had erected high places in every street and in every path.
If any one objects that this was not a greater crime than others, the answer is easy, that God does not speak of one high place only, or of one altar, but he comprehends all the signs of idolatry by which they had infected the land; for it was the height of impudence to erect everywhere the standard of their superstitions. For every high place and every altar was a testimony of their backsliding; just as if they had openly boasted that they would not magnify the worship of the law, and intended purposely to overthrow whatever God had prescribed. God therefore, not without cause, burns with wrath because the Jews had erected high places and altars everywhere. Now, then, we understand the Holy Spirit’s meaning as far as these words are concerned. It is added, after all thy wickedness, says he; that is, in addition to all thy crimes, this sin and impudence is added, that you have built not only one, but innumerable high places in every street, nay, in every pathway of importance, that is, in the most celebrated places. For the heads of the pathways are the most conspicuous places, and whatever is done there is more exposed to the eyes of all.
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We must now notice the exclamation which is interposed. Alas! alas! for thee, says the Lord Jehovah. Since the Jews, through their sloth, were not at all attentive to the reproofs of the prophets, that God might waken them up, he here pronounces his curse twice. It is clear that they were not moved by it: but this vehemence tended to their severer condemnation, since, though they were drowned and sunk in deep sleep, yet they might be raised by this formidable voice. There is no doubt that they applauded themselves for their own superstitions; but it is on that account profitable to estimate the weight of these words of God. For we gather from hence, that when idolaters indulge in their own fictions, and think themselves entirely free from blame, the word of God is sufficient, by which he thunders against them, saying, alas! alas! for thee. Hence men cease to judge according to their own notions, and are rather attentive to the sentence of God, and acknowledge his curse passing on them when they think that they are rightly discharging the duty of piety in worshipping idols.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv25, 26, 27, 30, 31 Or, head.
Or, head.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv23–35 Eze 16:23 And it came to pass after all…
Eze 16:23 And it came to pass after all thy wickedness, (woe, woe unto thee! saith the Lord GOD;)
Ver. 23. Woe, woe unto thee, saith the Lord God.] A double woe will fall very heavy here and hereafter; woe and alas for evermore.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv23–35 It came to pass; it shall come to pass;…
It came to pass; it shall come to pass; so the Hebrew may be read, and then this verse will be a dreadful threat of misery to come upon the Jews for all their wickednesses; when they have filled up the measure of their sins, God will fill them with his judgments, and bring one woe after another upon them, as they proceeded from one wickedness to another. But as we read the words, they are an introduction to a further declaring of this people’s multiplied wickedness, with a dreadful menace introduced somewhat abruptly to express God’s great displeasure against them: the threat is doubled, because it is certainly coming, and will be great when come.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v35 Adultery was by the law of Moses made a…
Adultery was by the law of Moses made a capital crime. This notorious adulteress, the criminal at the bar, being in the foregoing verses found guilty, here has sentence passed upon her. It is ushered in with solemnity, Eze 16:35. The prophet, as the judge, in God's name calls to her, O harlot! hear the word of the Lord. Our Saviour preached to harlots, for their conversion, to bring them into the kingdom of God, not as the prophet here, to expel them out of it. Note, An apostate church is a harlot. Jerusalem is so if she become idolatrous. How has the faithful city become a harlot! Rome is so represented in the Revelation, when it is marked for ruin, as Jerusalem here. Rev 17:1, Come, and I will show thee the judgments of the great whore. Those who will not hear the commanding word of the Lord and obey it shall be made to hear the condemning word of the Lord and shall tremble at it. Let us attend while judgment is given.
I. The crime is stated and the articles of the charge are summed up (Eze 16:36) and (as is usual) with the attendant aggravations (Eze 16:43); for when God speaks in wrath he will be justified, and clear when he judges, clear when he is judged; and sinners, when they are condemned, shall have their sins so set in order before them that their mouth shall be stopped and they shall not have a word to object against the equity of the sentence. The crimes which this harlot stands convicted of, and is now to be condemned for, are, 1. The violation of the first two commandments of the first table by idolatry, which is here called her whoredoms with her lovers (so she called them, Hos 2:12, because she loved them as if they had been indeed her benefactors), that is, with all the idols of her abominations, the abominable idols which she served and worshipped. This was the sin which provoked God to jealousy. 2. The violation of the first two commandments of the second table by the murder of their own innocent infants: The blood of thy children which thou didst give unto them. It is not strange if those that have cast off God and his fear break through the strongest and most sacred bonds of natural affection. Their sins are aggravated from the consideration, (1.) Of the dishonour they had thereby done to themselves: "Hereby thy filthiness was poured out; the uncleanness that was in thy heart was hereby discovered and brought to light, and thy nakedness was exposed to view, and thou wast thereby exposed to contempt." God is displeased with his professing people for shaming themselves by their sins. (2.) Their base ingratitude is another aggravation of their sins: "Thou hast not remembered the days of thy youth, and the kindness that was done thee then, when otherwise thou wouldst have perished," Eze 16:43. And, (3.) The vexation which their sins gave to God, whom they ought to have pleased: "Thou hast fretted me in all these things, not only angered me, but grieved me." It is a strange expression, and, one would think, enough to melt a heart of stone, that the great God, who cannot admit any uneasiness, is pleased to speak of the sins and follies of his professing people as fretting to him. Forty years long was I grieved with this generation.
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II. The sentence is passed in general: I will judge thee as women that break wedlock and shed blood are judged (Eze 16:38), and those two crimes were punished with death, with an ignominious death. "Thou hast shed blood, and therefore I will give thee blood; thou hast broken wedlock, and therefore I will give it thee, not only in justice, but in jealousy, not only as a righteous Judge, but as an injured and incensed husband, who will not spare in the day of vengeance," Pro 6:34, Pro 6:35. He will recompense their way upon their head, Eze 16:43. In all the judgments God executes upon sinners we must see their own way recompensed upon their head; they are dealt with not only as they deserved, but as they procured. It is the end which their sin, as a way, had a direct tendency to. More particularly, 1. This criminal must be (as is usually done with criminals) exposed to public shame, Eze 16:37. Malefactors are not executed privately, but are made a spectacle to the world. Care is here taken to bring spectators together: "All those whom thou hast loved, with whom thou hast taken pleasure, shall come to be witnesses of the execution, that they may take warning and prevent their own like ruin; and those also whom thou hast hated, who will insult over thee and triumph in thy fall." Both ways the calamities of Jerusalem will be aggravated, that they will be the grief of her friends and the joy of her foes. These shall not only be gathered around her, but gathered against her; even those with whom she took unlawful pleasure, with whom she contracted unlawful leagues, the Egyptians and Assyrians, shall now contribute to her ruin. As, when a man's ways please the Lord, he makes even his enemies to be at peace with him, so when a man's ways displease the Lord he makes even his friends to be at war with him; and justly makes those a scourge and a plague to sinners, and instruments of their destruction, who were their tempters, and with whom they were partakers in wickedness. Those whom they have suffered to strip them of their virtue shall see them stripped, and perhaps help to strip them, of all their other ornaments; to see the nakedness of the land will they come. It is added, to the same purport (Eze 16:41), I will execute judgments upon thee in the sight of many women; thou shalt be made an example of in terrorem - that others may see and fear and do no more presumptuously. 2. The criminal is condemned to die, for her sins are such as death is the wages of (Eze 16:40): They shall bring up a company (that is, a company shall be brought up) against thee, and they shall stone thee with stones, and thrust thee through with their swords; so great a death, so many deaths in one, is this adulteress adjudged to. When the walls of Jerusalem were battered down with stones shot against them, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem were put to the sword, then this sentence was executed in the letter of it. 3. The estate of the criminal is confiscated, and all that belonged to her destroyed with her (Eze 16:39): They shall throw down thy eminent place, and (Eze 16:41) they shall burn thy houses, as the habitations of bad women are destroyed, in detestation of their lewdness. Their high places, erected in honour of their idols, by which they thought to ingratiate themselves with their neighbours, shall be an offence to them, and even they shall break them down. It was long the complaint, even in some of the best reigns of the kings of Judah, that the high places were not taken away; but now the army of the Chaldeans, when they lay all waste, shall break them down. If iniquity be not taken away by the justice of the nation, it shall be taken away by the judgments of God upon the nation. 4. Thus both the sin and the sinners shall be abolished together, and an end put to both: Thou shalt cease from playing the harlot; there shall be no remainders of idolatry in the land, because the inhabitants shall be wholly extirpated, and they shall give no more hire because they shall have no more to give. Some that will not leave their sins live till their sins leave them. When all that with which they honoured their idols is taken from them they shall not give hire any more (Eze 16:41): "Then thou shalt not commit this lewdness of sacrificing thy children, which was a crime provoking above all thy abominations, for thy children shall all be cut off by the sword or carried into captivity, so that thou shalt have none to sacrifice," Eze 16:43. Or it may be meant of the reformation of those of them that escape and survive the punishment; they shall take warning, and shall do no more presumptuously. The captivity in Babylon made the people of Israel to cease for ever from playing the harlot; it effectually cured them of their inclination to idolatry. And then all shall be well, when this is the fruit, even the taking away of sin; then (Eze 16:42) my jealousy shall depart. I will be quiet, and no more angry. When we begin to be at war with sin God will be at peace with us; for he continues the affliction no longer than till it has done its work. When sin departs God's jealousy will soon depart, for he is never jealous but when we give him just cause to be so. Yet some understand this as a threatening of utter ruin, that God will make a full end and the fire of his anger shall burn as long as there is any fuel for it. His fury shall rest upon them, and not remove. Compare this with that doom of unbelievers, Joh 3:36. The wrath of God abideth on them. They shall drink the dregs of the cup, and then God will be no more angry, for he is eased of his adversaries (Isa 1:24), is satisfied in the abandoning of them, and therefore will be no more angry, because there are no more for his anger to fasten upon. They had fretted him, when judgment and mercy were contesting; but now he is quiet, as he will be in the eternal damnation of sinners, wherein he will be glorified, and therefore he will be satisfied.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv23–35 That thou hast also built unto thee an eminent…
That thou hast also built unto thee an eminent place,.... Or a "brothel" (k); and so the Septuagint version, "a whoring house"; not content to commit idolatry privately, they built a public place for idolatrous worship. The Targum renders it, "altar", The word has the signification of a pit or ditch; with which compare Pro 22:14;
and hast made thee an high place in every street; of Jerusalem, and other cities; it was usual to erect high places in streets, where altars were built, and idols set up to be worshipped: it denotes the public manner in which they committed idolatry, and the multitude of their idols; which shows their impudence and hardness of heart.
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(k) , Sept. "lupanar", V. L. "prostibulum", so some in Starckius.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv24, 25, 26, 30, 31, 34 In every street - Idol temples were in every…
In every street - Idol temples were in every street; both in Jerusalem and her cities.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv24, 26, 27 Verse 24. Thou hast also built unto thee an…
Verse 24. Thou hast also built unto thee an eminent place] גב gab, a stew or brothel; Vulg. lupanar; Septuag. οικημα πορνικον. So my old MS. Bible, a bordel house. "Thou hast builded thy stewes and bordell houses in every place." - Coverdale's Bible, 1535. Bordel is an Italian word: how it got so early into our language I know not. Our modern word brothel is a corruption of it. Diodati translates, Tu hai edificato un bordello, "Thou hast built a brothel." Houses of this kind were of a very ancient date.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv24, 27, 30 Eze 16:24-26. Thou hast also built thee an eminent…
Eze 16:24-26. Thou hast also built thee an eminent place in every street — Manasseh filled Jerusalem with idols, 2Ch 33:4-5; 2Ch 33:15; the altars of many of which were placed upon high or eminent places. At every head of the way — Not content with what was done in the streets of Jerusalem and other cities, thou hast erected thine altars in the country, wherever it was likely passengers would come. Thou hast also committed fornication with the Egyptians — While the Israelites sojourned in Egypt they learned to practise the Egyptian idolatries. From Josiah’s time the Jews were in strict confederacy with the Egyptians, and, to ingratiate themselves with them, practised their idolatries; and the worship of Tammuz, the idolatry they are upbraided with, chap. Eze 8:14, was derived from that country. Great of flesh — Who are naturally lusty and strong, and men of great stature. This expression seems to signify that the Israelites were allured by the riches and grandeur of Egypt to imitate their idolatries.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv23, 24, 26, 27, 28, 29, 31, 33, 35 After all ... - Besides these things, there was…
After all ... - Besides these things, there was the introduction of other idolatrous rites from the nations with whom Israel had contact.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv25, 26, 27, 28, 31, 34 Sign; altars of idols. (Haydock) --- She makes no…
Sign; altars of idols. (Haydock) --- She makes no secret of her apostacy. The Greeks and Romans marked the houses of prostitutes, that honest men might avoid them. "The deemed the profession of such a crime a sufficient punishment to repress impure women." (Tacitus, Annal.)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 35 woe, woe unto thee, &c.--This parenthetical exclamation has an…
woe, woe unto thee, &c.--This parenthetical exclamation has an awful effect coming like a lightning flash of judgment amidst the black clouds of Israel's guilt.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34 24. An eminent place — Rather, vaulted chamber, or…
24. An eminent place — Rather, vaulted chamber, or dome (R.V. and Kautzsch).
A high place in every street — The word used here and in the next verse is not the one usually rendered “high place.” It may mean a small shrine where lived the religious harlot, as was customary in the streets of foreign cities. With the preceding verse there is a passing from Canaanitish worship to that of foreign countries, the intimation being that Jerusalem gathered to itself all the various abominations of every land.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 34, 35 23. after all thy wickedness] The wickedness described in…
23. after all thy wickedness] The wickedness described in preceding verses as idolatries of Canaan; after this followed foreign idolatry. LXX. omits the words “woe, woe unto thee.”
23–34. Her infidelities with strangers from abroad, i.e. her alliances with idolatrous nations and adoption of their religious rites: Egypt (Eze_16:23-27), Assyria (Eze_16:28), and Chaldea (Eze_16:29 seq.). Hosea already stigmatized foreign alliances as whoredoms; it is not, however, so much the political aspect of these alliances as their religious consequences that Ezekiel reprobates. Such alliances were followed by the fashions and worship of the nations with which they were formed (Isa_2:5 seq.). Naturally also when Israel became subject to the great eastern empires, the overwhelming influence of these states, with their customs and religions, was widely felt. The gods which had given them universal empire were introduced and worshipped. There appears to have been a great invasion of foreign idolatry in Judah in the declining years of the state, and the kingdom sank to a level in this respect to which the North had never fallen.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv23, 24, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 33 (23) After all thy wickedness.—The sin and idolatry hitherto…
(23) After all thy wickedness.—The sin and idolatry hitherto described had been derived by Israel chiefly from the Canaanites, the old inhabitants of the land; but now. in accordance with what was said in Eze_16:15, the prophet goes on to speak of the other abundant idolatries adopted eagerly by the Israelites from foreign nations.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv23, 24, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 35 Woe unto thee, etc.! The interjectional parenthesis, half anathema…
Woe unto thee, etc.! The interjectional parenthesis, half anathema and half lamentation, looks forward rather than backward. Up to this point Ezekiel had dwelt on the forms of idolatry which were indigenous to Canaan and the nations in immediate contact with it. Now he enters on the later forms of evil which had been adopted from more distant nations. We pass from the time of Solomon to that of Ahaz and Manasseh.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv27, 30 I have stretched out My hand over thee, and…
Eze_16:27
I have stretched out My hand over thee, and have diminished thine ordinary food, and delivered thee unto the will of them that hate thee.
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The tyranny of Satan
To be delivered unto the will of them that hate us--this seems given as amongst the most oppressive of calamities--the judgment which God, after having long striven with the unrighteousness of a nation, selects from the stores of His retributive appointments. Suppose one person knew another to be his rancorous enemy, bent on doing him every kind of injury, and causing him every kind of pain; it may be that this enemy had left the kingdom and gone to foreign parts, so that it did not seem likely that he would again cross the path of the object of his bitter dislike. But the individual himself may be called to quit his home, and navigate distant seas; and he himself, falling amongst pirates, may find that, though life is spared, liberty is gone, and that he is to be sold as a slave on reaching the land. Who can tell the anguish of his soul? The endearing recollections of his native shores crowd thickly upon him; and he thinks that not only shall he never again meet the friends of his youth, but that he shall drag out the remainder of his days in subjection to some tyrant whose delight will be to torment. Yet perhaps not so! It is a galling thing that he--a freeborn man--should stand in the slave market, exposed for sale like a mere beast of burden; but it may be that, through this degradation, he shall recover all that he has lost. He therefore waits with trembling eagerness to know who his purchaser shall be. On a sudden his eye rests on his ancient enemy; he cannot be mistaken. He knows that form; it will not allow him to doubt. Oh! that he might hide himself! But in vain! His foe has purchased him; he has paid down the demanded price. Tell me! did the man till this moment feel himself utterly wretched? Now, the case would be much the same with a community or nation as with the individual. If a nation must yield to a foreign power, it would desire that it might not be to a power by which it had always been held in dislike, and with which it had often been at war. The galling thing would be, not merely that we were subdued, but that we were subdued by those to whom we knew ourselves to be objects of inveterate hatred, and who cherished against us deep-rooted antipathy. Now, whilst these may be thoroughly accurate illustrations of our text, they are not those which cause the passage to be surveyed under its most instructive aspects. The text, when separated from its local and temporary application, may justly be considered as describing the state to which the human race was reduced when, by the first rebellion against God, it severed the links which had heretofore associated the Creator and the creature. We all admit that through the apostasy of Adam, Satan acquired a dominion over the globe which he never could have held had our first parents remained firm in their allegiance, He became, in the language of St. Paul, The God of this world. If it were to be said of the Jews that God delivered them unto the will of them that hated them, it is easy to be said of man in general that God surrendered him to the hands of the devil. Though never let it be for a moment forgotten that whilst He thus allowed judgment to fall on sin, and caused the disobedient to eat of the fruit of their own ways, He was providing for the emancipation of our race--arranging that His blessed Son should be manifested for the express purpose of destroying the works of the devil. And you are yet to be told the worst feature in this our natural condition. Not only are we slaves, but they that hate us are they that rule over us. There can be nothing darker, if we may judge from the scattered touches of Scripture, than the character of apostate angels. Fallen from the very summit of created glory, their debasement seems to bear proportion with their original eminence; and they move to and fro burning with the fiercest animosity against God, and eager for nothing but to drag down others to share their sufferings and their shame. It may have been that it was hatred to man which first moved Satan to attempt his destruction. That haughty spirit, chafed by his defeat, and furious at his own exile from happiness, could not endure to look on the purities and felicities of Paradise. Man was innocent, and that made him hateful; man was happy, and he was therefore instinctively detested. And if we may speak of man as an object of hatred to Satan whilst he held fast his allegiance, what may we suppose him now--now that, seduced into apostasy, he hath been rescued by the interference of God manifest in the flesh? Was the lofty angel to be passed by and this inferior being taken note of? And was it to be the result of Satans machinations against the inmates of Paradise that a richer than that rich garden was to open to them all its loveliness, and a deeper than the happiness they then enjoyed be placed within reach as their everlasting portion? This surely were sufficient to account for a hatred the most intense and inveterate on the part of the devil toward man! Again, Satan must hate man, so that whosoever is the servant of this chief of fallen angels is accurately in the condition described in our text; and every one of you is that servant, on whom there has not passed the great moral change of conversion. Oh! that we could bring all that imagery which was furnished by the slave market, or the horrors of an invasion, and force those who are yet indifferent to religion to recognise in it a delineation of themselves! He who really feels that the devil is both his master and his enemy is not far from embracing Christ as his Redeemer and his friend. But it in no degree alters the fact of your being ruled by one who hates you that you are blind to your condition, and not even conscious of being ruled at all: it does but make that condition all the worse. Why, suppose that when the inveterate enemy has entered the slave market, and possessed himself of the wretched being who actually quails before his look;--suppose he should speak soothingly to his victim, easing his chains as he leads him away, promising him abundance and enjoyment, and all because he knows a generous friend of the poor captive is waiting on the road, and will be attracted by a cry of disquietude or a shriek of distress;--suppose this, and you suppose precisely the policy of Satan, who, if he can only prevent a man from feeling that uneasiness which would prompt an appeal to the Saviour, is quite content to defer the season for giving swing to all his malice and wreaking all his vengeance. But that season will come. It is little, it is nothing to say that imagination is utterly incompetent to the giving to such season its due measure of horror. We pretend not to lift the veil which shrouds from human gaze the future, with its direful retribution. But we may venture to say that in the brief description of our text is condensed whatever tongue can express, or thought compass, of the wretchedness which must be the portion of the lost. We do not attempt to carry the description further; we have adventured thus far only in hopes that the terrors of the future may scare some of those who, if they were this instant to die, must have these terrors for their own. Why shrink ye from our picture of the man sold to be a slave--a slave to his bitter enemy, who has long sought opportunity of indulging all the vengeance of a fierce and implacable nature? Wherefore are ye moved by this imagined wretchedness? Wherefore is the cheek pale, and wherefore the blood cold, as you fancy that you hear the clanking chain and the stifled cry, and behold the oppressor grinding down the captive? Wherefore is it? Because there is a consciousness which you cannot repress, of being in the power of one who hates you. This is supreme misery in itself, and such a finishing stroke to all others as leaves nothing for imagination to add. It is, indeed, to one who hates you that you are making yourselves slaves in following the course which the God of this world prescribes to the children of disobedience. That the devil hates you witness what he has already done to make mankind wretched. Witness a devastated earth; witness every grave; witness every tear. He was a murderer from the beginning; and to his foul machinations we owe all our woe. Oh! shall it then be that you will so live that, when you come to die, there will remain nothing but that you go down to the prison house of woe, to experience all the terribleness of the saying--a saying from which the most hardened amongst you instinctivley recoils when it is exhibited as brought to pass on earth;--the saying that when God has a vast vengeance to inflict, and a vast retribution to exact, He appoints for the guilty--what:--that they be delivered unto the evil of them that hate them? (H. Melvill, B. D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v35 ISRAEL’S PUNISHMENT WILL CORRESPOND WITH HER SINS. (Eze_16:35-42)
ISRAEL’S PUNISHMENT WILL CORRESPOND WITH HER SINS. (Eze_16:35-42)
EXEGETICAL NOTES.—Eze_16:35-36. “Because thy filthiness was poured out.” Heb. “Because thy brass has been lavished.” Brass is used here to signify money. Israel had spent the wealth which God had given her in the servise of idolatry. “That the Jews, at least those in the exile, as well as classic antiquity, had copper money, follows even from our passage, and is confirmed by Mat_10:9, Mar_12:41, where brass occurs directly for money. The paramours are, according to what follows, pre-eminently the world-powers themselves. Along with them are named the heathen gods, whose worship was a consequence of political dependence.—(Hengstenberg.) “And by the blood of thy children which thou didst give unto them.” They were also guilty of murder in sacrificing their children to Moloch (Eze_16:20.)
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Eze_16:37. “I will gather all thy lovers.” Chiefly those of Assyria and Babylon. “With all them that thou hast hated.” These were the surrounding nations who were always lying in wait for an occasion against Israel. God would gather friend and foe against Jerusalem and use them as instruments to execute His judgments. Israel is to be punished in kind. She had cultivated friendship with the heathen and partaken of their iniquities, and now she shall be given up altogether into their power. “I will even gather them round about against thee, and will discover thy nakedness unto them, that they may see all thy nakedness.” “The public judgment. First of all, the assembling of the lovers as witnesses. She who has dishonoured and brought herself to shame becomes now, by the interposition of God, to the one party an object of loathing, to the other an object of mockery. The last attraction, and what might still have been an object of regard, vanishes. Hävernick refers to the procedure in the case of a married woman suspected of adultery (Num_5:18).”—(Lange.)
Eze_16:38. “And I will judge thee, as women that break wedlock and shed blood are judged.” This is the explanation of the figurative language employed in the last verse. Israel was to be punished with the punishment of adulterers and murderers. “And I will give thee blood in fury and jealousy.” “Thou shalt be turned into blood, so that nothing but blood may be left of thee, and that the blood of fury and jealousy, as the working of the wrath and jealousy of God (compare Eze_16:42). To this end the heathen will destroy all the objects of idolatry, then take from the harlot both clothes and jewellery, and leave her naked, i.e. plunder Jerusalem and lay it waste, and, lastly, execute upon her the punishment of death by stoning and by sword; in other words, destroy both city and kingdom.”—(Keil.)
Eze_16:39. “And leave thee naked and bare.” “As thou wast before the Lord had mercy on thee (Eze_16:7). The unfaithful use of the gifts of God inevitably brings on their loss. God cannot be mocked.”—(Hengstenberg.)
Eze_16:40. “They shall also bring up a company against thee.” “This may be explained from the ancient mode of administering justice, according to which the popular assembly (Pro_5:14) sat in judgment on cases of adultery and capital crimes, and executed the sentence, as the law for stoning expressly enjoins (Lev_20:2; Num_15:36; Deu_22:21). But they are also applicable to the foes, who would march against Jerusalem” (Keil). “And they shall stone thee with stones.” The usual mode of capital punishment under the Mosaic law, and which was inflicted for the crimes of idolatry, adultery, and murder. This doom pronounced upon Jerusalem was accomplished literally, for she was “stoned” before she was burned (Jer_33:4). “With their swords.” Slaying with the sword was a mode of punishment adopted when there were many criminals to be put to death. It was also the doom of those who seduced men to apostacy (Deu_13:12-15).
Eze_16:41. “And execute judgments upon thee in the sight of many women.” “The many women are the many heathen nations, according to the description of Jerusalem or Israel as an unfaithful wife.”—(Keil.) “As it is the greatest punishment to an adulterous woman to be exposed in her sin before the eyes of other women; so will the severest portion of Israel’s punishment be, that it will stand exposed in its sin before the eyes of all other nations.”—(Klieforth.) Concerning the burning of the houses of Jerusalem with fire, see 2Ki_25:8-9. “And thou also shalt give no hire any more.” “Because thou wilt have no more lovers; wilt, on the whole, after the dissolution of thy national independence, be no more in a condition which admits of impure intercourse with the world-powers.”—(Hengstenberg.)
Eze_16:42. “So will I make my fury toward thee to rest, and my jealousy shall depart from thee.” “The jealousy ceases because it has found its satisfaction in their punishment, and exhausted itself therein, as the fire ceases when it has consumed its fuel.”—(Hengstenberg.) “The Divine justice comes to an end in its character of jealousy—in other words, as the injured faithfulness and love of Israel’s husband. The departing of the jealousy might, perhaps, by comparison with Isa_11:13, show grace in the background; but the connection with what follows requires rather a thought like Hos_2:4. Jehovah gives up the adulterous whorish wife.”—(Lange.)
HOMILETICS
THE PUNISHMENT OF APOSTACY
I. The loathsome nature of the sin is made manifest. The sin which the children of Israel had committed by their idolatry is called by its right name. It was the breaking of the sacred marriage-covenant into which God had entered with His people. All what whoredom and adultery is in the social state, all what filthiness is in the morals and manners of a people, such was their sin in the sight of God (Eze_16:38). Israel was guilty of unfaithfulness of the worst kind. God had given the nation the privileges of an espoused wife, but she sinned with many lovers, thus despising the great grace which had called her to such distinction and honour. God’s punishments sometimes begin by revealing our sin to us in all its real vileness. The very conviction of sin is a painful wound—the arrows of the Almighty within our spirit.
II. The very objects of sinful desire are turned into the instruments of punishment. “I will gather all thy lovers with whom thou hast taken pleasure, and all them that thou hast loved, with all them that thou hast hated; I will even gather them round about against thee, and will discover thy nakedness unto them, that they may see all thy nakedness” (Eze_16:37). Those who contributed to her sin shall be made the instruments of her punishment. Sinful love, sooner or later, changes into hate. The boon companions of the profligate turn out to be his bitterest enemies. They thus become a scourge in the hands of God to chastise him for his iniquity. There is no true honour amongst transgressors, for their life is founded upon a falsehood. And as God employed as a scourge for His people those who once were friends, He will also employ for chastisement those who were always enemies. “And with them that thou hast hated.” Those with whom the children of Israel sinned would make common cause with their enemies for their punishment.
III. The punishment will correspond with the sin.
1. In degree. They were to be punished as murderers and adulterers, for they had sinned “as women that break wedlock and shed blood” (Eze_16:38). Stoning was the punishment of adultery, and this threat was literally fulfilled upon Jerusalem, for she was stoned before she was burned (Jer_33:4). Their sin was great, and therefore their punishment, so great that even God’s fury is represented as being satisfied upon them, and quite brought to a pause (Eze_16:42). They could no further go in iniquity, and so God’s fury is represented as ceasing; by which we are to understand that it rested upon them. He left them to their fate. God can bring it about that we shall be able to sin no further.
2. In kind. Their sin was public, and so their shame and their judgment were public. Their sin was unfaithfulness towards God, and they are punished by the unfaithfulness of men. They cast God off, and men cast them off. That law which is true of individual man is true also of nations, that the very things which they sow they shall also reap.
(Eze_16:39-42)
1. God’s hatred is so great, against idolatry and idolators that He will not endure the places where they have used idolatrous worship. The places where they sinned must be destroyed, broken, utterly razed and ruined. Hezekiah is commended for four things; and the first is for removing the high places; then for breaking the images, cutting down the groves, and breaking the brazen serpent.
2. When we abuse the mercies of God, we give Him cause to take them away. They decked their high places with their garments (Eze_16:16); they made images of their jewels (Eze_16:17). Here God threatens to take away both the one and the other. He would give them into their hands who should rob them of their fair jewels, and strip them of all their clothes (Isa_42:22). “And leave thee naked and bare.” Before, in Eze_16:8, it is said, that God covered her nakedness. He found her naked, and now He would leave her naked and bare.
3. When God hath showed much kindness to a people, and they have been ungrateful, He will reduce them to their former condition. God did much for Ephraim, yet he was ungrateful, forgot God, went out to other lovers (Hos_2:2-3). God had spread His skirt over this Jewish woman, clothed her with embroidered silk and fine linen, decked her with choice ornaments and jewels, put His comeliness upon her; but she abused all His bounty and love, proved ungrateful and whorish, and therefore He would put her into her first condition, strip her of all, and leave her naked. She came out of captivity, she should now go into captivity; she was cast out, and now she should be cast out again; she was poor, beggarly, and had nothing, and should be made so again.
4. When judgments are executed upon a backsliding people, then God is at rest and is satisfied. When this woman, this Jewish state, fell into the hands of enemies, was plundered and spoiled, and all her glory laid in the dust; then God caused His fury to rest, His jealousy to depart, then He was quiet, and angry no more. Before judgment be thoroughly executed, God is troubled and restless; but when it is done, He is pacified, comforted, as it is in Eze_5:13. Before Jonah had judgment passed upon him, there was a great wind, and a mighty tempest in the sea. The Lord’s anger was let out. But when Jonah was sent, and cast into the sea—justice done—it is said the sea ceased from her raging. The Lord first ceased from His fury, He was pacified, and manifested it by stilling of the seas. God would bring the Assyrians upon the Jews; and what then? “The indignation shall cease, and mine anger in their destruction” (Isa_10:25).—(Greenhill.)
This dire judgment is just; for Israel has not only forgotten God’s undeserved favour to her in her election, but has even surpassed both Samaria and Sodom in her abominations.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v35 The Punishment of the Lord Announced
The Punishment of the Lord Announced
v. 35. Wherefore, O harlot, hear the word of the Lord:
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v. 36. Thus saith the Lord God, the sovereign Ruler of the universe, Because thy filthiness was poured out, literally, "thy brass was emptied out," figurative of a free abandonment to filthy lewdness in spiritual adultery, and thy nakedness discovered, that is, uncovered, made known, through thy whoredoms with thy lovers, the various heathen nations with which she had allied herself, and with all the idols of thy abominations, and by the blood of the children which thou didst give unto them, v. 20:
v. 37. behold, therefore I will gather all thy lovers with whom thou hast taken pleasure, the very ones whom she had sought with shameless overtures, and all them that thou hast loved, with all them that thou hast hated, who would, of course, also gloat over her downfall; I will even gather them round about against thee, as witnesses, and will discover thy nakedness unto them that they may see all thy nakedness. By the punishment of God, Israel became an object of loathing to its former allies and an object of mockery to its enemies.
v. 38. And I will judge thee as women that break wedlock, the sentence pronounced upon adulteresses being carried out in her case, Lev 20:10; Deu 22:22 and [as those who] shed blood are judged, the latter sin being charged against Israel on account of the sacrifices to Moloch; and I will give thee blood in fury and jealousy, to be dissolved into blood as a consequence of such fury and jealousy.
v. 39. And I will also give thee into their hand, so that the former witnesses would be executors of the Lord’s sentence, and they shall throw down thine eminent place and shall break down thy high places, the temples and tire objects of idolatry; they shall strip thee also of thy clothes and shall take thy fair jewels, the articles of splendor with which she bedecked herself, and leave thee naked and bare, deprived of the honor and dignity which belonged to the people of God by virtue of their election to this position.
v. 40. They shall also bring up a company against thee, both witnesses and executioners, and they shall stone thee with stones, in keeping with the picture of the execution of an adulteress, and thrust thee through with their swords.
v. 41. And they shall burn thine houses with fire and execute judgments upon thee in the sight of many women; and I will cause thee to cease from playing the harlot, and thou also shalt give no hire any more.
v. 42. So will I make My fury toward thee to rest, being satisfied with the punishment meted out, and My jealousy, the jealous rage of a wronged husband, shall depart from thee, and I will be quiet and will be no more angry. Since His justice had exacted the full penalty in keeping with the measure of her guilt, He would rest in anticipation of its beneficial effects.
v. 43. Because thou hast not remembered the days of thy youth, with the blessings which the Lord poured out upon her at that time, but hast fretted Me in all these things, raging against Jehovah with her idolatrous behavior, behold, therefore I also will recompense thy way upon thine head, so that His punishment would bear down upon her like a heavy load, saith the Lord God; and thou shalt not commit this lewdness above all thine abominations, literally, "lest I commit the misdeed above all thy abominations," that is, if the Lord should permit the wickedness of Israel to continue unpunished, He Himself would add an abominable deed, since, by a false leniency, He would become guilty of the same wickedness, become a partaker in the idolatry of Israel.
v. 44. Behold, every one that useth proverbs shall use this proverb against thee, rightly applying it to the children of Israel, saying, As is the mother, so is her daughter, Jerusalem being considered here as the daughter of ancient heathenish Canaan.
v. 45. Thou art the mother’s daughter, that loatheth her husband and her children, rejecting the knowledge of the true God, just as the nations of Canaan had done, although He had still been known in their midst, as the example of Melchizedek shows; and thou art the sister of thy sisters, akin in guilt to Samaria and Sodom, which loathed their husbands and their children. Your mother was an Hittite and your father an Amorite, and they had all inherited the spiritual make-up of these heathen nations, partly due to the fact that they did not exterminate the heathen as the Lord had bidden them do.
v. 46. And thine elder sister is Samaria, so called because she was in a moral respect more nearly related to Judah, she and her daughters that dwell at thy left hand, to the north; and thy younger sister, the smaller and in many respects not so nearly related to Judah, that dwelleth at thy right hand, toward the south, is Sodom and her daughters, that is, Ammon and Moab with their towns.
v. 47. Yet hast thou not walked after their ways nor done after their abominations, not even being satisfied with the deeds of wickedness for which these cities were known; but, as if that were a very little thing, as if their idolatrous conduct were not sufficiently wicked, thou wast corrupted more than they in all thy ways, exceeding even the heathen in the measure of idolatry and the evils connected with idolatrous worship.
v. 48. As I live, saith the Lord God, in the most solemn oath which He could swear, Sodom, thy sister, hath not done, she nor her daughters, any of the smaller cities belonging to her city-state, as thou hast done, thou and thy daughters, the guilt of the heathen cities being less great than that of Jerusalem.
v. 49. Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, in these forms of transgression she excelled: pride, Cf Gen 18:21, fullness of bread, that is, more than an abundance of material wealth, and abundance of idleness, a security far removed from all anxiety, was in her and in her daughters, the result being a haughty arrogance; neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy, for that is the way of such as are puffed up with their prosperity.
v. 50. And they were haughty and committed abomination before Me, their transgression being so heinous as to call out to the Lord for punishment; therefore I took them away as I saw good, by the terrible catastrophe of the overthrow of their city. Yet Sodom was not as Wicked as Jerusalem had now become.
v. 51. Neither hath Samaria committed half of thy sins, it was, in fact, not particularly conspicuous in its heathenism after the time of Ahab; but thou hast multiplied thine abominations more than they and hast justified thy sisters in all thine abominations which thou hast done, making them actually appear righteous by comparison with her own wickedness.
v. 52. Thou also, which hast judged thy sisters, condemning them for their transgressions and, with hypocritical demeanor, considering herself better than they, bear thine own shame for thy sins that thou hast committed more abominable than they, being committed in spite of Jerusalem’s possession of the Law of God; they are more righteous than thou, namely, by way of comparison; yea, be thou confounded also and bear thy shame in that thou hast justified thy sisters, making them appear almost innocent in comparison with her own guilt. It is always a greater and deeper fall if people who have been in possession of the truth, who have enjoyed unusual advantages in the matter of God’s mercy, fall away from the path of righteousness than if those unacquainted with God’s holy will live in the sins which they have always followed, with little or no idea of the better way.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv23, 25, 27, 30, 32, 35 General Information:
General Information:
Yahweh continues to speak about Jerusalem as if the city were his unfaithful wife. The city represents the people who live there. (See: Metaphor and Metonymy)
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this is the Lord Yahweh's declaration
Yahweh speaks of himself by name to express the certainty of what he is declaring. See how you translated this in Ezekiel 5:11. AT: "this is what the Lord Yahweh has declared" or "this is what I, the Lord Yahweh, have declared" (See: First, Second, or Third Person)
you built yourself a vaulted chamber in every public place
Possible meanings are that she built a place where 1) she could worship her idols or 2) she could practice her prostitution.
translationWords
woe
Lord Yahweh
declare
evil
high place
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv23, 26, 35 16:23-25 Prophets commonly described idolatry in terms of adultery…
16:23-25 Prophets commonly described idolatry in terms of adultery (see Hos 2), but Ezekiel goes into much more detail than any other prophet. He depicts Jerusalem as not just foolish or misguided, but rotten to the core. Her adultery had taken place on every street corner, and she had an inexhaustible appetite for increasingly depraved entertainments.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.