EXEGETICAL NOTES.—Judah and Samaria are considered as joined together in their sin and punishment.
Ezekiel 23:37. “They have committed adultery, and blood is in their hands.” “The actual subject matter of these verses is closely connected with Ezekiel 23:16, more especially in the designation of the sins as adultery and bloodshed (compare Ezekiel 23:37 and Ezekiel 23:45 with Ezekiel 16:38). They committed adultery with the idols, thus placing the idols on a par with Jehovah as the husband of Israel (compare Jeremiah 3:8; Jeremiah 2:27. For the Moloch-worship compare Ezekiel 16:20-21, and Ezekiel 20:31”).—Keil.
Ezekiel 23:39. “Then they came the same day into My sanctuary to profane it.” “So callous and daring were the Jews in their idolatry that on the very day on which they had burned their children to Moloch in the valley of Gehenna, they hypocritically presented themselves as worshippers in the temple of Jehovah. Compare Jeremiah 7:9-10.” (Henderson). The profanation consisted, not simply in idol-worship considered by itself, but in worshipping the true God in connection with their idols. Thus they placed Jehovah on a par with Moloch.
Ezekiel 23:40. “Ye have sent for men to come from far.” The Heb. verb being in the imperfect tense shows that the action was continuous. Not that they merely sent once and again, but that they were wont to do so. “For whom thou didst wash thyself, paintedst thy eyes, and deckedst thyself with ornaments.” “They spread fine paint of a black colour on the eyelids so as to produce a black margin, and thus make the white of the eye look more beautiful and seducing. It is a custom still practised by Oriental females. Jerusalem is represented as so doing to entice her lovers. She left nothing untried by which this might be effected” (Henderson). “The eyelashes and eyebrows were stained with a powder, so as to make the glance of the eye more brilliant.”—Lange.
Ezekiel 23:41. “Satest upon a stately bed, and a table prepared before it.’ “She seated herself upon a cushion (not lay down upon a bed), and in front of this there was a table, spread with different kinds of food, upon which she placed incense and oil.”—(Keil.) “The board or table is furnished with meats and drinks. Eating and drinking play an important part in adultery, either in the usual or in the spiritual sense.”—(Hengstenberg). “Where-upon thou hast set Mine incense and Mine oil.” The force of this charge lies in the fact that she devoted the offerings which belonged to Jehovah to the gratification of her lovers. “Religious ceremonies are not here spoken of. We find ourselves in the region of political idolatry, which in the latest times of the people, from the days of Ahaz and Hezekiah, far outweighed that of religion. The corresponding reality consists in the rich gifts by which Judah endeavoured to purchase the favour of the heathen sovereigns (Isaiah 30:6).”—(Hengstenberg.) Some understand this passage as describing the lascivious worship of the Babylonish Mylitta. The wanton Israel is described as preparing herself for one of the high festivals of this goddess, and as abandoning herself to strangers like the young women of Babylon.
Ezekiel 23:42. “A voice of a multitude being at ease was with her.” They are at ease, in careless, undisturbed prosperity. “Sabeans from the Wilderness.” “Instead of receiving the warnings given them by the prophets, and humbling themselves on account of their idolatries, the inhabitants of Jerusalem indulged in rioting and drunkenness—bringing even the vulgar Arabs from the desert to keep them company.”—(Henderson.) The phrase “from the desert,” cannot indicate the home of these men, but simply the place from which they came to Judah, namely, from the desert of Syria and Arabia, which separated Palestine from Babylon. These peoples decorated the arms of the harlots with clasps, and their heads with splendid wreaths (crowns). The thought is simply that Samaria and Judah had attained to wealth and earthly glory through their intercourse with these nations; the very gifts with which, according to Ezekiel 16:11, &c., Jehovah Himself had adorned His people.”—(Keil)
Ezekiel 23:43. “Old in adulteries.” Lit. who was debilitated for adultery. “The Heb. word does not indicate the means by which the strength has been exhausted, but is an accusation of direction or reference, debilitated with regard to adultery, so as no longer to be capable of practising it.”—(Keil.) “Will they now commit whoredoms with her?” “Disgusting as was her character as an old adulteress, Jerusalem found those who encouraged her in her wickedness. Taken in connection with the next verse, the two sisters are again presented to view, though Aholibah is specially singled out, being the more guilty of the two.”—(Henderson.)
Ezekiel 23:45. “The righteous men.” Men who had the right on their side. Such were the Chaldeans, who were the instruments of God’s righteous anger. “The Chaldeans are righteous according to their mission as ministers of the Divine vengeance. The heathen tyrant also, in Isaiah 49:24, is designated as righteous.”—(Hengstenberg.) “A moral comparison between the Chaldeans and the Jews is not intended, nor are prophets and righteous men among the people themselves to be imagined.”—(Lange.)
Ezekiel 23:46. “I will bring up a company upon them.” “Here the prophet is first addressed. What shall happen is, as it were, wrought by him, as the power which gave the prophecy produces also the fulfilment; in the prophecy also, ideally considered, the fulfilment is already present. The community denotes usually the congregation of Israel. As this has failed to do its duty, reacting against the crime, as once happened in the war against Benjamin (Judges 20), so stands here the community of the heathen, which God summons to execute His vengeance.”—(Hengstenberg.)
Ezekiel 23:48.“All women.” All the nations, to whom Israel would serve as a warning and deterring example.
Ezekiel 23:49. “They shall recompense your lewdness upon you.” “The punishment is announced to both the women, Israel and Judah, as still in the future, although Aholah (Samaria) had been overtaken by the judgment a considerable time before. The explanation of this is to be found in the allegory itself, in which both kingdoms are represented as being sisters of one mother; and it may also be defended on the ground that the approaching destruction of Jérusalem and the kingdom of Judah affected the remnants of the kingdom of the ten tribes, which were still to be found in Palestine; whilst, on the other hand, the judgment was not restricted to the destruction of the two kingdoms, but also embraced the latter judgments which fell upon the entire nation.”—(Keil).,
HOMILETICS
ANOTHER SUMMARY OF THE SINS AND PUNISHMENT OF JUDAH AND SAMARIA
I. Their Sins.
1. Idolatry. “With their idols have they committed adultery” (Ezekiel 23:37). Jehovah was to Israel as a husband. To serve other gods was to forsake and forfeit His favour and protection. It was a fearful crime, such as adultery would be in the judgment of all nations.
2. Cruelty. “Blood is in their hands.” They offered their children to the cruelties of Moloch worship. Idolatry leads to perverted and unnatural views of human duty and of the requirements of religion. Hence the cruelty of its rites.
3. Impurity. She sought to make herself attractive to her lovers, using every art to pander to her lust (Ezekiel 23:41-42). Israel made herself attractive to the surrounding nations, “For whom thou didst wash thyself, paintedst thy eyes, and deckedst thyself with ornaments.” They washed themselves before men, but were unclean before God—the way of hypocrites. Israel sought for occasions of sin. “Ye have sent for men” (Ezekiel 23:40). They tried to excite a jaded appetite (Ezekiel 23:43). They were old and worn out in the service of sin, but tried hard to awaken the impulses of it, to stir up the embers of a smouldering fire. Even in Christian lands, how many serve such impure and cruel gods and even use infamous arts to plunge into the lowest depths of iniquity! “He who serves Venus and Bacchus offers to them also his children.”—(Lange). And how many, also, become more shameless as they grow old in sin!
4. Profanity. They profaned the Sabbath and the sanctury (Ezekiel 23:38). They employed in the service of idolatry the “incense” and “oil,” God’s own property, which He had reserved for sacred uses (Exodus 30:23-33). More than this, they dared to combine the service of Jehovah with that of idols, thus adding to their sins the boldest and most wicked hypocracy. After they had indulged in the most cruel rites of idolatry, they came “in the same day” into God’s sanctuary to defile it. “To run from the harlot-house to God’s house, from murder to the place of prayer, from sin to sinning, is not pleasing to God.”—Lange.
II. Their punishment.
1. It would be felt to be just even by the heathen nation who inflicted it. “And the righteous men, they shall judge them.” (Ezekiel 23:45). The Chaldeans had right on their side. They were the righteous instruments of God to execute His vengeance. Even heathen nations looked upon perjury and breach of covenant as fearful crimes. (Ezekiel 17:15-16).
2. It would be a severe, and yet a most fitting punishment. (Ezekiel 23:46-47). The Judgment hour had come, and God’s army was ready. “They shall stone them with stones,”—the punishment of those who commit adultery and shed blood (John 8:5).
3. It would be effectual. The punishment would completely cure the evil (Ezekiel 23:48). It would be a warning example to all (Ezekiel 23:48). It would bring them to the true knowledge of God (Ezekiel 23:49). The whole of this chapter illustrates the words of St. Paul, that “the Law entered that the offence might abound” (Romans 5:20). It would seem as if the presence of God’s holy Law served to stir up the proud will of the chosen people to more desperate self-assertion. They sought those sinful alliances with the powers of the world, which seemed to have all the more attraction because they were forbidden. “Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.” (James 4:4).
1. Sinners make little or no conscience of horrible sins, or holy duties; they pass from one to the other immediately. When they had slain their children to their idols, that same day they came into the Sanctuary. From shedding of blood and sacrificing to idols, they step into the temple and worship of God. Had not their consciences been seared, they would have accused them and told them that they were unclean, not fit to meddle with holy things. But they go boldly and impudently into God’s presence. So Jeremiah tells us, they did steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, burn incense to Baal, walk after other gods, and then come presently and stand before Him in His house, and say: “We are delivered.” (Jeremiah 7:9-10.) They passed from wicked practices to holy duties, making no conscience of the one or the other.
2. The Lord takes notice how men draw near to Him in the duties of His worship. They thrust themselves into the temple worship and into the presence of God, as if they had been innocent and as acceptable to God as any. Men may deceive others and themselves, but they cannot deceive the Lord. He sees their spirits, and whether they come unprepared in the guilt of former or present sins.
3. Profaning of holy things is wronging God. “This have they done unto Me. Lo, thus have they done in the midst of Mine house.” God had instituted their worship, and had stamped holiness upon them; and therefore the defiling and profaning of them He counted the defiling and profaning of His name and of Himself. Three ways, especially, are holy things defiled, profaned:
(1.) When men come in their sins, without purging themselves. (St. James, James 4:8.) If men draw near to God without cleansing their hands, and purifying their hearts, God will not draw near them. He will not touch unclean things.
(2.) When we mingle aught of us therewith. Additions of human things are pollutions of divine things. When they brought aught into the Temple which God appointed not, then was God’s worship defiled. When Nadab and Abihu put strange fire into the censers, they defiled God’s worship and provoked Him to their destruction (Leviticus 10); and when they set their threshold with God’s threshold, they defiled His name and worship (Ezekiel 43:7-8).
3. When holy things are handled irreverently. The Bethshemites in a rude manner peeped into the ark and profaned it, which caused the Lord to smite them with sudden death (1 Samuel 6:19). Solomon gives counsel that men should keep their feet when they go into the house of God (Ecclesiastes 5:1). For if they look not well to their affections, they will play the fool, and profane those holy things, and procure a curse instead of a blessing.
4. Sinners will show great activity in drawing others to themselves and their wicked ways. These harlots sent to Assyria, to Egypt, and to others to come unto them. They trimmed and decked themselves, they spared not for any cost whereby they might please and satisfy them. Thus did the harlot (Proverbs 7). She perfumes her bed, trims up herself, goes forth, and diligently seeks, finds, and brings in the prey. Some compass sea and land to make proselytes. Shall wicked ones and wickedness be active, expensive to draw and ruin others, and shall not godly ones and godliness be as active and expensive to win and save sinners?
5. Those who are given to corporeal or spiritual uncleanness are seldom, recovered, but go on and grow old in those sins. These women had many reproofs and threatenings, but none prevailed (Ezekiel 23:44). Such sins are bewitching, and hold men captive. “None that go unto her return again” (Proverbs 2:19).
6. The Lord takes notice of sinners, as to the beginning, progress, and continuance of their sin. He observed when Aholah began her whoredoms, when the calves were set up at Dan and Bethel, how she grew up and grew old in adulteries. God’s eye goes along with sinners, from the beginning to the end.
7. God’s judgments are teaching things. He brought these judgments upon the two harlots, that all women might be taught thereby. Gideon by thorns and briars taught the men of Succoth (Judges 8:16). There is no judgment of God upon any city, nation, or people, but it speaks and teaches: “Hear ye the rod” (Micah 6:9); it hath a voice, a teaching voice.
1. It teaches all who are guilty of the same sins, and not visited with the same judgments to admire the goodness and long suffering of God towards them.
2. It teaches those who are guilty of such sins to repent and turn to the Lord, lest the Lord, being now in the way of judgment, should break out also upon them, and make them examples of His justice.
3. It teaches others to fear and to flee from such practices, as being such destructive judgments. When Samaria and Jerusalem shall be destroyed for their confidence in the arm of flesh, will not every other city learn what is the reward of wickedness, and fear to do the like?
8. God’s ways with sinners in judging them righteously brings them to acknowledge the equity of His dealing with them. When the just punishment of your lewdness and idolatry shall be upon you, “ye shall know that I am the Lord,” who observed all your ways, who waited long for your repentance, who have dealt justly with you in all the evils I have brought upon you; you cannot but justify Me, and condemn yourselves.—(Greenhill.)