Ezekiel 23:25-27 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

I will set my jealousy against thee, &c. I will be against thee, as a jealous man is against his wife; and they shall deal furiously And they, as the executioners of my wrath, shall act toward thee as persons provoked to great fury. And they shall take away thy nose, &c. A punishment of adultery which rage sometimes dictated. As husbands in that case render those women deformed whose beauty hath been too pleasing to strangers, so shall the Chaldeans deface all the glories and ornaments of Jerusalem, and after they have slain and carried captive its inhabitants, shall set the city on fire, and reduce it to a heap of ashes. The mutilations mentioned in this verse were common among the Chaldeans. St. Jerome assures us, that they frequently cut off the nose and the ears of adulterers. And this was practised toward adulteresses in Egypt. They shall also strip thee, &c. As lewd, disgraced harlots and captives were used chap. Ezekiel 16:39. And take away thy fair jewels All thy rich, beautiful ornaments, which shall be a prey to the enemy. Thus will I make thy lewdness to cease “These severe judgments shall effectually deter thee from idolatry, and make thee abhor the least approaches toward it. Accordingly we find that after the captivity the Jews never returned to their former idolatrous practices.” Lowth. And thy whoredom brought from the land of Egypt Thy idolatries which thou broughtest with thee from Egypt, where thou didst first learn idolatry, and ever hast had an inclination to it.