EXEGETICAL NOTES.—The transgression of Jerusalem is followed by her punishment.
Ezekiel 23:23. “Pekod, and Shoa, and Koa.” “From the circumstance that these names occur in immediate connection with the Babylonians, the Chaldeans, and Assyrians, and further that Pekod is used by Jeremiah (Jeremiah 50:21) as a descriptive name of Babylon, it may be inferred that all three are to be so interpreted in this place. No such geographical names as Shoa and Koa occur either in sacred or profane writers. The former, however, signifying wealth or opulence, and the latter, princely, noble, are aptly descriptive of the state of Babylon in the days of her prosperity, as Pekod, is of her anticipated punishment.” (Henderson).
Ezekiel 23:24. “Buckler, and shield, and helmet.” These are all defensive armour. The Chaldeans had only to lay siege to the city and bide their time. God’s arrows would do the rest. “And they shall judge thee according to their judgments.” Israel was to be judged on the ground of natural justice. The unfaithful city was condemned by man for an offence against human law. Their judgments were brought about by God’s righteous law of retribution, though Nebuchadnezzar was the instrument raised up to administer it.
Ezekiel 23:25. “They shall take away thy nose and thine ears.” “What nose and ears are for a woman, that for a people is their military strength, the bloom of the nation. When this is annihilated, a people has lost its beauty. That the words must refer to this is shown by those immediately adjoining, and giving the explanation, “Thy remnant shall fall by the sword.” Zion has various forms of existence, and, therefore, a manifold remnant. The first remnant refers to the fighting men, who, so to speak, shall fall by the sword to the last man—the falling of the remnant pre-supposes the falling of all the rest; the second remnant refers to Zion as a city, the houses, all of which shall be destroyed by fire” (Hengstenberg). “Punishment by cutting off the nose and ears was inflicted for adultery, not only the Chaldeans, but also among the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans. It was, therefore, to represent that which adulterous Judah was to suffer under the image of such ignominious and cruel treatment. They were also to be stripped of what lewd females set most value upon—their rich dresses and costly jewels, by which they attract the notice of their paramours” (Ezekiel 23:26).—Henderson.
Ezekiel 23:27. “Thus will I make thy lewdness to cease from thee.” The punishment inflicted by the Chaldeans would be effectual in curing them of idolatry. After the captivity the Jews never fell again into this sin.
Ezekiel 23:29. “Shall take away all thy labour.” They were to be deprived of the fruits of their labours.“The nakedness of thy whoredoms shall be discovered.” “As long as all went well this nakedness was covered. The shamefulness of her conduct did not come to the light. In that which she suffers, what she has done will be manifest to all the world.”—Hengstenberg.
Ezekiel 23:32. “Thou shalt drink of thy sisters cup deep and large.” “This cup is the figure of the destiny. The mockery of large measure corresponds to the cup of wide compass, the greatness of the mockery to the greatness of the calamity, that called forth the mockery so much the more, the greater the pretensions of the Jews, who conducted themselves as the people to whom was secured the universal supremacy, who had always in their mouth the saying, ‘My enemies shall fall, but I shall tread on their high places.’ ”—(Hengstenberg). “By a change of metaphor the judgments to be inflicted upon Judah are represented as the contents of a cup which she was to drink. This metaphor is of frequent occurrence both in the Old and New Testaments (Psalms 75:8; Jeremiah 25:15; Revelation 14:10; Revelation 16:19; Revelation 18:6.) The force of the metaphor lies in the idea that the ingredients were nauseous and deleterious.Judah was to be treated as Israel had been, only more severely in proportion to the greater guilt she had contracted.—(Henderson).
Ezekiel 23:34. “And thou shalt break the sherds thereof, and pluck off thine own breasts.” This expresses most forcibly the desperation to which the Jews should be reduced, when compelled to undergo the extreme infliction of their punishment. By a bold hyperbole, not satisfied with having sucked out the last drop that was in the cup; they are represented as crunching the very sherds of it with their teeth, and tearing their breasts which they had prostituted in adultery” (Henderson). “The tearing of the breasts is placed beside the breaking of the sherds as if it were done by means of the sherd-fragments. Or it may have been done in frenzy by her own nails. We find a historical illustration of this in the treatment they gave Gedaliah, the Chaldean governor, for which they were compelled to suffer (Jeremiah 41.)” (Lange).
HOMILETICS
THE PUNISHMENT OF JERUSALEM
I. The people are to be punished by those with whom they sinned. “Behold I will raise up thy lovers against thee” (Ezekiel 23:22). Those with whom she had pleasurable sin, by a natural retribution become the instruments of her chastisement. Thus sinners are punished by means of other sinners. Whatever pleasures may have been found in sin when it was followed, the memory of it, at last, will bear a sting.
II. The people are to be punished in the ordinary course of human justice. “And they shall judge thee according to their judgments” (Ezekiel 23:24). They had offended against the sense of natural justice which was found among the nations. And they are punished by men for an offence against human law. Yet, though men were the instruments, they were punished by God. The punishment of sin in human society is natural, yet it is surely the moral law of God taking effect as far as is possible in this present life. “From the natural course of things, vicious actions are, to a great degree, actually punished as mischievous to society; and besides punishment actually inflicted upon this account, there is also the fear and apprehension of it in those persons whose crimes have rendered them obnoxious to it, in case of a discovery; this state of fear itself often a very considerable punishment. The natural fear and apprehension of it, too, which restrains from such crimes, is a declaration of Nature against them. It is necessary to the very being of society, that vices destructive to it should be punished as being so; the vices of falsehood, injustice, cruelty: which punishment therefore is as natural as society; and so is an instance of a kind of moral government, naturally established, and actually taking place. And, since the certain natural course of things is the conduct of Providence or the government of God, though carried on by the instrumentality of men; the observation here made amounts to this, that mankind find themselves placed by him in such circumstances, as that they are unavoidably accountable for their behaviour, and are often punished, and sometimes rewarded under his government, in the view of their being mischievous, or eminently beneficial to society. The Author of Nature has as truly directed that vicious actions, considered as mischievous to society, should be punished, and put mankind under a necessity of thus punishing them; as He has directed and necessitated us to preserve our lives by food” (Butler’s Analogy, Part I, Chap. III). The goodness and patience of God had failed to bring Jerusalem to repentance, and the people, therefore, were given up to punishment by means of man.
III. The people are to be punished by the violent taking away of that which led them into the snares of sin. “They shall deal furiously with thee: they shall take away thy nose and thine ears” (Ezekiel 23:25). “They shall also strip thee of thy clothes, and take away thy fair jewels” (Ezekiel 23:26). Personal attractions, beautiful garments, adornments and jewellery make lead women attractive, and lead them into snares. God will remove from His people, even by means of the wrath of a strange nation, all those things which tempted their hearts from Him. They had left their first and lawful love, and they are to have the punishment of adulterers.
IV. The punishment was to be terrible.
1. A complete exposure of their iniquity. “The nakedness of thy whoredoms shall be discovered both thy lewdness and thy whoredoms” (Ezekiel 23:29). Punishment exposes, Their moral loathesomeness would be laid bare before the sight of all.
2. The rich heritage of the past was to be wasted. “They shall deal with thee hatefully, and shall take away all thy labour” (Ezekiel 23:29). All the results of their labour in the past under the guidance of God. How often, among nations, is destroyed, as in a moment, the slow work of long ages,—the precious heritage of the past! “The city where David dwelt” (Isaiah 29:1), and all which in their history led up to David and from him, is doomed to be destroyed.
3. They would have to drink of a bitter cup. Their cup was to be “filled with drunkeness and sorrow,” the “cup of astonishment and desolation” (Ezekiel 23:33). And the very greatness of their sorrow, their abject humiliation would occasion derision among their enemies, “Thou shalt be laughed to scorn, and had in derision; it containeth much” (Ezekiel 23:32). The nations would look upon them swallowing the nauseous draught, and make merriment over their sorrow. They would have to drain this cup of sorrow to the last drop, “Thou shalt even drink of it and suck it out, and thou shalt break the sherds thereof” (Ezekiel 23:34).
4. They would be dricen to the frenzy of madness. “And pluck off thine own breasts” (Ezekiel 23:34). Jerusalem is represented as a woman seized with madness in her great suffering, who gnaws the very sherds of the earthen cup and tears out her own breasts. Her insatiable lust, which had gone to the length of mad desire, is now met by a punishment which is furious, and which drives her to madness. How often are sinners punished in those members of the body in which they have sinned!
V. This punishment would prove an effectual remedy for their sin. “Thus will I make thy lewdness to cease from thee, and thy whoredom brought from the land of Egypt” (Ezekiel 23:27). By the afflictions which they suffered in Babylon they were completely cured of idolatry. They never fell into that evil after the Captivity. This was an old-rooted sin, but it was entirely plucked from them. So God educates nations, and brings home to them, at last, the lessons of His providence and grace. And it is often necessary that, as with individual men, they should be educated through punishment. It took a long time to deliver Israel entirely from Egypt, their house of bondage. Their physical slavery was soon destroyed, but their spiritual slavery still held them to Egypt though many ages of their history.
1. God makes them instruments of woe and misery with whom we have sinned. The Babylonians, Chaldeans, the Assyrians, her lovers, were to be brought against her. Jerusalem had doted upon and trusted in them, and by them would God plague Jerusalem. She had often sinned by her confidence in Egypt (Isaiah 30:2; Isaiah 31:1); and God by the Egyptians scourged her (2 Chronicles 36:3). Parents dote upon their children, and oft God makes them rods to whip them, yea, clubs to break their hearts and bones.
2. When people go from God to false worship, and put confidence in arms of flesh, God will deal severely by them. God would put Aholihah into the Babylonian hands. He would set His jealousy against her, thrust her out of doors; and what then? The Babylonian would deal furiously with her, abuse her body, destroy her children, burn her habitation, strip her of her vestments and jewels, take away all she had gotten, lay open her shame, and do hatefully by her; she should be punished with the same punishments Aholah was.
3. Judgments and afflictions are cups which the Lord gives sinners to drink of, some more some less. Sometimes God’s judgments are called a “cup of trembling” (Isaiah 51:22); sometimes a “cup of fury” (Jeremiah 25:15), and sometimes “a cup of astonishment,” as here. And Aholibah had all these cups given her to drink; they were “deep, large,” containing much, and she was made to drink them all off, yea to the very dregs. As men fill up the measure of their sins, so God fills up the cups of His judgments. “Fill to her double” (Revelation 18:6). Babylon’s sins were come to the full, and the cup of the Lord’s fury was full.
4. Neglect and contempt of God, and His word, causes Him to execute judgment. “Because thou hast forgotten Me, and cast Me behind thy back.” Thou hast made Me bear thy sins, and thou shalt bear My punishments. As the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, so the forgetting of God is the beginning of folly and all evil. Then God is out of sight, behind the back; and what will not men do when no awe of God or His word is upon them? Then, like Abolibah, they will commit any lewdness. God had done much for Abolibah, dealt by her like a loving husband; but she slighted Him, went out a whoring from Him, did those things which greatly dishonoured Him, and so provoked Him to mind her that forgot Him. He fell upon her with His judgments, and destroyed her. And so will the Lord do by all that forget Him (Psalms 9:17). Whatever sins the nations commit, they are comprehended in their forgetting God, that is the root of all evil.—(Greenhill).