Wherefore I gave them also statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they should not live;
Wherefore I gave them also statutes ... not good - since they would not follow my statutes, that were good, "I gave them" their own (Ezekiel 20:18), and their fathers' statutes, "which were not good" - statutes spiritually corrupting, and finally, as the consequence, destroying them. Righteous retribution (Psalms 81:12; Hosea 8:11; Romans 1:24; 2 Thessalonians 2:11). Ezekiel 20:39 proves this view to be correct (cf. Isaiah 63:17). Thus on the plains of Moab (Numbers 25:1-18), in chastisement for the secret unfaithfulness to God in their hearts, He permitted Baal's worshippers to tempt them to idolatry (the ready success of the tempters, moreover, proving the inward unsoundness of the tempted), and this again ended necessarily in punitive judgments.