Third and fourth abomination (Ezekiel 8:13-18)
EXEGETICAL NOTES.— Ezekiel 8:13-14. The seer is led from the secret chamber back to the point at which he had first approached to the precincts of the Temple (Ezekiel 8:3). He stands now at its northern entrance, not at the entrance to the inner court as in the former case, “and, behold, the women weeping for Tammuz were sitting there.” Whether they were without or within the Temple walls is not stated, but they were in the attitude of mourners. Jeremiah bears witness (Jeremiah 7:11; Jeremiah 44:17) to the activity of women at this period in the service of idolatry, though he does not mention their devotion to Tammuz. Nor is it mentioned anywhere else, and no satisfactory explanation has been given of it. Conjectures are abundant—often wide of the mark. They have too readily accepted this weeping and that of the Syrians, Greeks, &c., for Adonis, or the Egyptians for Osiris, as standing on the same ground. It might be no forceful objection against such comparison to say that the rites in those countries involved rejoicings as well as lamentations, and that they were accompanied with “unbridled license and excess.” But surely we may believe that if the women of Jerusalem indulged in the gross orgies common to Adoniac worship, Jeremiah was not the man to have shunned all reference to their wickedness. Whether the “Babylonian legend,” deciphered from an ancient tablet, and which tells of “a goddess, widow of Duzi, the ‘Son of Life,’ descending through the seven circles ‘of the land of invisibility,’ and reascending after various vicissitudes,” indicates the quarter from which the weeping for Tammuz was derived, is of no consequence as yet. “The Speaker’s Commentary,” while mentioning the legend, acknowledges that its purport and its influence are utterly obscure. The habit of the Jewish women, somehow or another, must have demoralised themselves and those related to them, and so was regarded as an “abomination.”
Ezekiel 8:15. The seer had to observe great abominations (Ezekiel 8:6), then great abominations they were doing (Ezekiel 8:13), and now greater abominations than these he had already seen. His view had gone from general idol-worship to secret worship among the magnates of Jerusalem, afterwards from open debasement of the women to utter defiance of God in the priestly portion of the Temple. The climax of evil in warfare is reached when the soldiers become rebels, when works of darkness are substituted for the whole attire of light.
Ezekiel 8:16. Again Ezekiel is taken further, to a point from which he can inspect the spot “between the porch and the altar,” a sacred place in the inner court where the priests gathered together apparently only in seasons of extraordinary interest, such as a national fast (Joel 2:17). On that hallowed ground he saw “as it were twenty-five men.” Fairbairn calls them men “of priestly rank, the princes of the sanctuary,” and considers the number was made up of the High Priest and the twenty-four heads of the courses of the priests which had been arranged by David. He takes them as representing “the whole priesthood.” Is it not better to regard the number, as the Seventy was, as a historical number, and intended to show nothing more than that the priesthood even was not wholly loyal to God? Consecrated for His worship in the place where He had chosen to put His name, they were seen “with their backs towards the temple of the Lord, and their faces to the east, and they worshipped the sun toward the east.” The worship of the sun, so common in many countries, had already been practised in Judea, and was put down in Josiah’s reforming reign (2 Kings 23:5; 2 Kings 23:11). It was too deeply rooted and too attractive to be overturned by a transient revival of purer worship; and here it is seen to have seduced the guardians of that worship.
Ezekiel 8:17. The scenes which had been unfolded in the seer’s vision were in palpable contrariety to the worship of the Lord, but the forms of apostasy he had observed were of little account, “a light thing to the house of Judah:” they would disregard God if they disregarded the rights of their brethren, “for they filled the land with violence, and returned,” i.e., gone back again and again to their evil doings, “to provoke me to anger, and,” something especially offensive is singled out for mention, “lo, they put the branch to their nose.” The explanations of this obscure phrase, which refer it to a rite of heathen worship in which a branch was carried in the hand, or raised to the mouth, do not agree with the words: Moreover, the context has left the sphere of religion for that of morals, and would suggest some action not directly religious—at any rate, some very gratuitous evil deed. But there is no tolerable accounting for the words, and the conclusion to which Fairbairn comes seems reasonable: “One would expect the clause to denote something that rendered their sinful ways peculiarly obnoxious to God, and nothing would more readily do this than feelings of fancied security and insolent scorn.” So he surmises that it must have reference to some insulting kind of proceedings. The result would be a correspondence between their conduct and the position which the Lord was driven to take—urgent prayers but no reply (Ezekiel 8:18). “I will show them the back, and not the face, in the day of their calamity” (Jeremiah 18:17).
HOMILETICS
EMOTIONAL WORSHIP (Ezekiel 8:14)
This abomination in worship is not described by Ezekiel, as it has been by many interpreters, as gross and licentious. And though, probably, it deserved such epithets, yet the one term which he employs, “weeping,” suggests a course that leads far from holiness and love. We see the dominance of the emotions in worship—
I. In sensuous procedure. Weeping at one time, shouting at another, processions and extravagant gestures, are specimens of the actions to which the indulged emotions prompt. That those manifestations might appear when any feeling is casually and strongly moved need not surprise; but that they should be made a regular part of the service throws doubt on their genuineness, and brands them as unworthy of the God who is Spirit and Truth. If the spirit of the prophets is subject to the prophets, why should not the emotions also be?
II. In the persons chiefly affected. More readily than men, women are stirred on the emotional side of their nature. Let that side be controlled so as to stand in due proportion to the other sides, and it will help to fill worship with the tone befitting One who is loved for His love. But when it is unduly fostered, when it is fascinated to extravagant assertion of itself, a deteriorating effect must follow. For then the influence of womanly emotion, which should keep clear our family life and purify it when muddied, not only loses its efficacy, but tends to render it turbid and malarious. Women stand in a perilous position when they allow free scope to their emotions in worship. They make it an offence to God, however devoted and continuous it may be.
III. In a wrong estimate of the objects. Legends which have no truth, or so scanty an item of it that prehistoric studies and mythological suggestions are needed to find it; imaginary evils; a morbid craving for some excitement to break into the idleness of life, or into the trials which seek for the relief of change, these “beguile women of her tears,” and draw into sentimental and fantastic expressions of devotion. True, the gross aspects of emotional worship may be little manifested in modern Christendom; but emotions still count for something in worship; and we do well to remind ourselves that however deeply we feel awe in what are called sacred or holy places, however moved by a dim religious light or music, by prayer or pathetic preaching, that the worship engendered from such feelings does no more in the perfect will of God than idol images or clouds of incense. We need truth to originate and regulate emotions.
“Let Christian women, instead of wasting in sickly and carnal sentimentality the tender and susceptible natures which God has given them, weep with them that weep, heal the bruises of the suffering members of the Church, and minister to those who need temporal or spiritual help. Let them, instead of weeping over fictitious tales of morbid love and carnal sorrows, consecrate their fine sensibilities to the active promotion of the glory of Him who is altogether lovely, and whose bitter sufferings for us should call forth our tears of gratitude and glowing love. Let them try to resemble Mary, who, in her devotion, when all others were gone, stood at the sepulchre of her crucified Lord weeping, and so had her tears dried up by the risen Saviour Himself.”—Fausset.
WILFUL WORSHIP (Ezekiel 8:16)
All forms of worship are not equally dishonouring to the only Lord. However foolish, corrupted, or exaggerated some of them may be, the climax in evil is assigned to that which springs from the determination of men to turn their backs upon Him who has revealed Himself to them. Their worship is—
I. Against knowledge. The spot at which the twenty-five men carried on their worship indicated a priestly office. Of that office it was said, “The priest’s lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth, for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts.” But here were men disowning their highest functions, doing despite to the law they were appointed to observe, who “loved darkness rather than the light,” and fell under the condemnation passed upon those who forsake their own mercies. It is hard on a father that he should be disobeyed by his child, and the hardest point of such disobedience is when it is done notwithstanding clear knowledge of his commands.
II. In desecration of the temple. Sun-worship would have been sinful anywhere; this had its aggravation in that it was conducted in the place where God’s honour dwelt. They provoked Him to His face. They deliberately polluted with their abominations that which He ordained to be holy. And though there be no such sacred place now, yet may we learn that if we take our self-pleasings in where we and others worship, we erect barriers between us and our Lord. We sin against Him and sin against our brethren.
III. In preference of the creature to the Creator. The altar was the spot on which God received the signs of homage due to Him. They turned their backs on it and insulted Him by rendering homage to the sun. The east was more to them than the threat or the promise of the God of their fathers; the seen more reverenced than the unseen; a dead object chosen rather than the living God. Thus they were guilty of treason, and under the awful ban of those who are without excuse! Alas! a similar procedure may be found still under the shadow of the Cross. “If we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth”—how could professing Christians regard these words as true if it were not for sad examples to illustrate them? How many preach for self or the world! How many enter into places of worship rather to be considered respectable, to please a patron, to acknowledge an unknown God, than to “rejoice in God through Jesus Christ the Lord!” Surely we all need to try our ways in worship, to realise the Light which is ever searching our services, not that it may find fault, but that it may show our faults, so that we shall repent of our errors and form a pure and steadfast regard to the Lord alone. Then, when we cease from the creature, we shall worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness, seeking not our own glory, but the glory of Him who is greatly to be feared and had in reverence.
RELIGION AND MORALITY (Ezekiel 8:17)
The “abominations” were meant to make a deep impression upon the seer as to the religious condition of his people in their own metropolis. But more was to be observed. The evils which were seen in the Temple were surpassed throughout the land; and he is asked to institute a comparison between worship and conduct, religion and morality. Among the elements which bring religion and morality into comparison are these—
I. They are distinguished from each other. Religion has reference to visible and invisible objects in which some kind of force is supposed to reside, and which are rarely men. When they are human beings, real or imaginary, they have ascribed to them certain attributes which separate them from ordinary men. Morality has reference to the men whom we think of, speak to, act with or on. This distinction, however, does not imply separation of the two spheres.
II. They are intimately associated. Religion and morality may be separated in thought; they cannot be in practice. This is not to be understood to say that a religious man cannot exist without some kind of moral conduct, or a moral man without some friendly or unfriendly attitude towards religion. It is to say that a man’s religious sentiments have always some influence upon his social actions, even if image or sun worship could be shown never to have let their rill of religious thought flow into the stream of moral requirements. It may be that a man who worships an idol, or says there is no God, is irreproachable in his morals. Allowing that there might be no question as to the reality of individual cases, yet are they rare. They are exceptions to the general rule that a high morality depends upon a true religion. This is manifest where the God of Israel, the only true God, is served or disobeyed. His religion is inextricably mingled up with morality. Whosoever gives due honour to the Lord God accepts every moral obligation. The love of God and the righteousness of God produce love and rectitude in all relations. And should it be said that His professed worshippers are often unfaithful, dishonourable, impure, self-seeking in regard to man, it can be replied that such persons do not possess the religion pure and undefiled before God and the Father. If they went out from it, they were not of it. They never knew Jesus the Holy One or His Father. They swell the instances which show that an irreligious class or nation must be, on the whole, immoral—a moral class or nation, on the whole, religious.
III. They are unfairly estimated. The bearing of the question put to the prophet defines not only a set of opinions which held that it was not an evil thing to resort to idol-worship, but also that it was even a lighter evil to commit flagrant injustice towards each other. Both religion and morality were under-estimated; and such a course implied that if a man kept up forms of worship, he might be a tyrant, a cheat, or seducer, and be at ease! Against the notion that morality is of less consequence than religion, this appeal to Ezekiel takes an unfaltering stand. It signifies that men who supposed that acts of worship allowed them liberty to set at nought the rights of the poor and needy provoked the Lord deeply. It signifies that by the former course they had put God far away, had removed the great restraint against wrong-doings, and in the latter sent violent dealings into every circle of social life in which they could press their selfish interest. It signifies that men who were more careful to pay their idolatrous worship than to do justly and love mercy were preparing for themselves a fearful doom. Whether religion is to be more highly valued than morality is a vain question. The doctrine of God our Saviour insists on their interfusion as parts of doing His will. When sects, churches, societies, speak lightly of a man’s bad conduct because he is a recognised member; when it is judged more expedient to bend the head or knees, to wave incense, to weep over fancies or pictures, to say the words of a creed, to make reverence towards the east, to have a form of godliness, than it is to keep evil thoughts down, or to do fairly to every man, or to live unspotted from the world; when there is an attempt to palliate covetousness, misrepresentations, unkindness, on the ground that they belong to the reign of “mere morality”—then the standard of God must be lifted up, “Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor railers, nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of God.” On the other hand, when it is maintained that religion is of no force to form a moral life; when palliation is made for worldly and unrighteous conduct on the ground that the doers make no profession of faith in the Christian’s God, then we must affirm that the religion of Christ is a religion of righteousness, and that they who make light of Him will go on in darkness, and so will reap the fruit of their own ways.