Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Repent, and turn yourselves from your idols; and turn away your faces from all your abominations.
Thus saith the Lord God; Repent, and turn yourselves from your idols. Though God so threatened the people for their idolatry (Ezekiel 14:5), yet He would rather they should avert the calamity by "repentance."
Turn yourselves. Calvin translates, 'turn others'-namely, the stranger proselytes in the land. As ye have been the advisers of others (see Ezekiel 14:7, "the stranger that sojourneth in Israel") to idolatry, so bestow at least as much pains in turning them to the truth-the surest proof of repentance. But the parallelism to Ezekiel 14:3-4 favours the English version; their sin was two-fold:
(1) "In their heart" or inner man.
(2) "Put before their face" - i:e., exhibited outwardly. So their repentance is generally expressed by "repent," and is then divided into --
(1) "Turn yourselves (inwardly) from your idols."
(2) "Turn away your faces (outwardly) from all your abominations."
It is not likely that an exhortation to convert others should come between the two affecting themselves.