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Matthew Henry’s Complete Commentary
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Matthew Henry |
E Z E K I E L.
CHAP. XXIII.
This long chapter (as before
is a history of the apostasies of God’s people from him and the
aggravations of those apostasies under the similitude of corporal
whoredom and adultery. Here the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, the ten
tribes and the two, with their capital cities, Samaria and Jerusalem,
are considered distinctly. Here is,
I. The apostasy of Israel and Samaria from God
(ver. 1-8)
and their ruin for it,
II. The apostasy of Judah and Jerusalem from God
and sentence passed upon them, that they shall in like manner be
destroyed for it,
III. The joint wickedness of them both together
and the joint ruin of them both,
And all that is written for warning against the sins of idolatry, and
confidence in an arm of flesh, and sinful leagues and confederacies
with wicked people (which are the sins here meant by committing
whoredom), is that others may hear and fear, and not sin after the
similitude of the transgressions of Israel and Judah.
| The Sins of Samaria and Jerusalem. | B. C. 591. |
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1 The word of the LORD came again unto me, saying,
2 Son of man, there were two women, the daughters of one
mother:
3 And they committed whoredoms in Egypt; they committed
whoredoms in their youth: there were their breasts pressed, and
there they bruised the teats of their virginity.
4 And the names of them were Aholah the elder, and Aholibah
her sister: and they were mine, and they bare sons and daughters.
Thus were their names; Samaria is Aholah, and Jerusalem
Aholibah.
5 And Aholah played the harlot when she was mine; and she doted
on her lovers, on the Assyrians her neighbours,
6 Which were clothed with blue, captains and rulers, all of
them desirable young men, horsemen riding upon horses.
7 Thus she committed her whoredoms with them, with all them
that were the chosen men of Assyria, and with all on whom she
doted: with all their idols she defiled herself.
8 Neither left she her whoredoms brought from Egypt: for in
her youth they lay with her, and they bruised the breasts of her
virginity, and poured their whoredom upon her.
9 Wherefore I have delivered her into the hand of her lovers,
into the hand of the Assyrians, upon whom she doted.
10 These discovered her nakedness: they took her sons and her
daughters, and slew her with the sword: and she became famous
among women; for they had executed judgment upon her.
God had often spoken to Ezekiel, and by him to the people, to this
effect, but now his word comes again; for God speaks the
same thing once, yea, twice, yea, many a time, and all little
enough, and too little, for man perceives it not. Note, To
convince sinners of the evil of sin, and of their misery and danger by
reason of it, there is need of line upon line, so loth we are to
know the worst of ourselves. The sinners that are here to be exposed
are two women, two kingdoms, sister-kingdoms, Israel and Judah,
daughters of one mother, having been for a long time but one
people. Solomon’s kingdom was so large, so populous, that
immediately after his death it divided into two. Observe,
1. Their character when they were one
(v. 3):
They committed whoredoms in Egypt, for there they were guilty of
idolatry, as we read before,
The representing of those sins which are most provoking to God and most
ruining to a people by the sin of whoredom plainly intimates what an
exceedingly sinful sin uncleanness is, how offensive, how destructive.
Doubtless it is itself one of the worst of sins, for the worst of other
sins are compared to it here and often elsewhere, which should increase
our detestation and dread of all manner of fleshly lusts, all
appearances of them and approaches to them, as warring against the
soul, infatuating sinners, bewitching them, alienating their minds
from God and all that is good, debauching conscience, rendering them
odious in the eyes of the pure and holy God, and drowning them at last
in destruction and perdition.
2. Their names when they became two,
v. 4.
The kingdom of Israel is called the elder sister, because that
first made the breach, and separated from the family both of kings and
priests that God had appointed–the greater sister (so the word
is), for ten tribes belonged to that kingdom and only two to the other.
God says of them both, They were mine, for they were the seed of
Abraham his friend and of Jacob his chosen; they were in
covenant with God, and carried about with them the sign of their
circumcision, the seal of the covenant. They were mine; and
therefore their apostasy was the highest injustice. It was alienating
God’s property, it was the basest ingratitude to the best of
benefactors, and a perfidious treacherous violation of the most sacred
engagements. Note, Those who have been in profession the people of God,
but have revolted from him, have a great deal to answer for more than
those who never made any such profession. “They were mine; they
were espoused tome, and to me they bore sons and daughters;”
there were many among them that were devoted to God’s honour, and
employed in his service, and were the strength and beauty of these
kingdoms, as children are of the families they are born in. In this
parable Samaria and the kingdom of Israel shall bear the name of
Aholah–her own tabernacle, because the places of worship which
that kingdom had were of their own devising, their own choosing, and
the worship itself was their own invention; God never owned it. Her
tabernacle to herself (so some render it); “let her take it to
herself, and make her best of it.” Jerusalem and the kingdom of Judah
bear the name of Aholibah–my tabernacle is in her, because
their temple was the place which God himself had chosen
to put his name there. He acknowledged it to be his, and
honoured them with the tokens of his presence in it. Note, Of those
that stand in relation to God, and make profession of his name, some
have greater privileges and advantages than others; and, as those who
have greater are thereby rendered the more inexcusable if they revolt
from God, so those who have less will not thereby be rendered
inexcusable.
3. The treacherous departure of the kingdom of Israel from God
(v. 5):
Aholah played the harlot when she was mine. Though the ten
tribes had deserted the house of David, yet God owned them for
his still; though Jeroboam, in setting up the golden calves,
sinned, and made Israel to sin, yet, as long as they worshipped
the God of Israel only, though by images, he did not quite cast them
off. But they way of sin is down-hill. Aholah played the harlot,
brought in the worship of Baal
set up that other god, that dunghill-god, in competition with Jehovah
as a vile adulteress dotes on her lovers, because they are well
dressed and make a figure, because they are young and handsome
(v. 6),
clothed with blue, captains and rulers, desirable young men,
genteel, and that pass for men of honour, so she doted upon her
neighbours, particularly the Assyrians, who had extended their
conquests near them; she admired their idols and worshipped them,
admired the pomp of their courts and their military strength and
courted alliances with them upon any terms, as if her own God were not
sufficient to be depended upon. We find one of the kings of Israel
giving a thousand talents to the king of Assyria, to
engage him in his interests,
She doted on the chosen men of Assyria, as worthy to be trusted
and employed in the service of the state
(v. 7),
and on all their idols with which she defiled herself. Note,
Whatever creature we dote upon, pay homage to, and put a confidence in,
we make an idol of that creature; and whatever we make an idol of we
defile ourselves with. And now again the conviction looks back as far
as the original of their nation: Neither left she her whoredoms
which she brought from Egypt,
v. 8.
Their being idolaters in Egypt was a thing never to be forgotten–that
they should be in love with Egypt’s idols even when they were
continually in fear of Egypt’s tyrants and task-masters! But (as some
have observed) therefore, at that time, when Satan boasted of his
having walked through the earth as all his own, to disprove his
pretensions God did not say, Hast thou considered my people Israel
in Egypt? (for they had become idolaters, and were not to be
boasted of), but, Hast thou considered my servant Job in the land of
Uz? And this corrupt disposition in them, when they were first
formed into a people, is an emblem of that original corruption which is
born with us and is woven into our constitution, a strong bias towards
the world and the flesh, like that in the Israelites towards idolatry;
it was bred in the bone with them, and was charged upon them
long after, that they left not their whoredoms brought from
Egypt. It would never out of the flesh, though Egypt had
been a house of bondage to them. Thus the corrupt affections and
inclinations which we brought into the world with us we have not lost,
nor got clear of, but still retain them, though the iniquity we were
born in was the source of all the calamities which human life is liable
to.
4. The destruction of the kingdom of Israel for their apostasy from God
(v. 9, 10):
I have delivered her into the hand of her lovers. God first
justly gave her up to her lust (Ephraim is joined to idols, let him
alone), and then gave her up to her lovers. The neighbouring
nations, whose idolatries she had conformed to and whose friendship she
had confided in, and in both had affronted God, are now made use of as
the instruments of her destruction. The Assyrians, on whom she
doted, soon spied out the nakedness of the land, discovered
her blind side, on which to attack her, stripped her of all her
ornaments and all her defences, and so uncovered her, and
made her naked and bare, carried her sons and daughters
into captivity, slew her with the sword, and quite destroyed
that kingdom and put an end to it. We have the story at large
&c., where the cause of the ruin of that once flourishing kingdom by
the Assyrians is shown to be their forsaking the God of Israel,
fearing other gods, and walking in the statutes of the
heathen; it was for this that God was very angry with them and
removed them out of his sight,
v. 18.
And that the Assyrians, whom they had been so fond of, should be
employed in executing judgments upon them was very remarkable,
and shows how God, in a way of righteous judgment, often makes that a
scourge to sinners which they have inordinately set their hearts upon.
The devil will for ever be a tormentor to those impenitent sinners who
now hearken to him and comply with him as a tempter. Thus Samaria
became famous among women, or infamous rather; she
became a name (so the word is); not only she came to be the
subject of discourse, and much talked of, as the desolations of cities
and kingdoms fill the newspapers, but she was thus ruined for her
idolatries in terrorem–for warning to all people to take heed
of doing likewise; as the public execution of notorious malefactors
makes them such a name, such an ill name, as may serve to
frighten others from those wicked courses which have brought them to a
miserable and shameful end.
All Israel shall hear and fear.
| The Sins of Samaria and Jerusalem. | B. C. 591. |
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11 And when her sister Aholibah saw this, she was more
corrupt in her inordinate love than she, and in her whoredoms
more than her sister in her whoredoms.
12 She doted upon the Assyrians her neighbours, captains and
rulers clothed most gorgeously, horsemen riding upon horses, all
of them desirable young men.
13 Then I saw that she was defiled, that they took both one
way,
14 And that she increased her whoredoms: for when she saw men
portrayed upon the wall, the images of the Chaldeans portrayed
with vermilion,
15 Girded with girdles upon their loins, exceeding in dyed
attire upon their heads, all of them princes to look to, after
the manner of the Babylonians of Chaldea, the land of their
nativity:
16 And as soon as she saw them with her eyes, she doted upon
them, and sent messengers unto them into Chaldea.
17 And the Babylonians came to her into the bed of love, and
they defiled her with their whoredom, and she was polluted with
them, and her mind was alienated from them.
18 So she discovered her whoredoms, and discovered her
nakedness: then my mind was alienated from her, like as my mind
was alienated from her sister.
19 Yet she multiplied her whoredoms, in calling to remembrance
the days of her youth, wherein she had played the harlot in the
land of Egypt.
20 For she doted upon their paramours, whose flesh is as the
flesh of asses, and whose issue is like the issue of horses.
21 Thus thou calledst to remembrance the lewdness of thy youth,
in bruising thy teats by the Egyptians for the paps of thy youth.
The prophet Hosea, in his time, observed that the two tribes retained
their integrity, in a great measure, when the ten tribes had
apostatized
Ephraim indeed compasses me about with lies, but Judah yet rules
with God and is faithful with the saints; and this was justly
expected from them:
Though thou Israel play the harlot, yet let not Judah offend);
but this lasted not long. By some unhappy matches made between the
house of David and the house of Ahab the worship of Baal had been
brought into the kingdom of Judah, but had been by the reforming kings
worked out again; and at the time of the captivity of the ten tribes,
which was in the reign of Hezekiah, things were in a good posture: but
it lasted not long. In the reign of Manasseh, soon after the kingdom of
Judah had seen the destruction of the kingdom of Israel, they became
more corrupt than Israel had been in their inordinate love of idols,
Instead of being made better by the warning which that destruction gave
them, they were made worse by it, as if they were displeased because
the Lord had made that breach upon Israel, and for that reason
became disaffected to him and to his service. Instead of being made to
stand in awe of him as a jealous God, they therefore grew
strange to him, and liked those gods better that would admit of
partners with them. Note, Those may justly expect God’s judgments upon
themselves who do not take warning by his judgments upon others, who
see in others what is the end of sin and yet continue to make a light
matter of it. But it is bad indeed with those who are made worse by
that which should make them better, and have their lusts irritated and
exasperated by that which was designed to suppress and subdue them.
Jerusalem grew worse in her whoredoms than her sister Samaria
had been in her whoredoms. This was observed before
(ch. xvi. 51),
Neither has Samaria committed half of thy sins.
I. Jerusalem, that had been a faithful city, became a harlot,
Isa. i. 21.
She also doted upon the Assyrians
(v. 12),
joined in league with them, joined in worship with them, grew to be in
love with their captains and rulers, and cried them up as finer
and more accomplished gentlemen than any that ever the land of Israel
produced. “See how richly, how neatly, they are dressed, clothed
most gorgeously; how well they sit a horse; they are horsemen
riding on horses; how charmingly they look, all of them
desirable young men.” And thus they grew to affect every thing that
was foreign and to despise their own nation; and even the religion of
it was mean and homely, and not to be compared with the curiosity and
gaiety of the heathen temples. Thus she increased her whoredoms;
she fell in love, fell in league, with the Chaldeans. Hezekiah himself
was faulty this way when he was proud of the court which the king of
Babylon made to him and complimented his ambassadors with the sight of
all his treasures,
And the humour increased
(v. 14);
she doted upon the pictures of the Babylonian captains
(v. 15, 16),
joined in alliance with that kingdom, invited them to come and settle
in Jerusalem, that they might refine the genius of the Jewish nation
and make it more polite; nay, they sent for patterns of their images,
altars, and temples, and made use of them in their worship. Thus was
she polluted with her whoredoms
(v. 17),
and thereby she discovered her own whoredom
(v. 18),
her own strong inclination to idolatry. And when she had had enough of
the Chaldeans, and grew tired of them and disposed to break her league
with them, as Jehoiakim and Zedekiah did, her mind being alienated
from them, she courted the Egyptians, doted upon their
paramours
(v. 20),
would come into an alliance with them, and, to strengthen the alliance,
would join with them in their idolatries and then depend upon them to
be their protectors from all other nations; for so wise, so rich, so
strong, was the Egyptian nation, and came to such perfection in
idolatry, that there was no nation now which they could take such
satisfaction in as in Egypt. Thus they called to remembrance the
days of their youth
(v. 19),
the lewdness of their youth,
v. 21.
1. They pleased themselves with the remembrance of it. When they began
to set their affections upon Egypt, they encouraged themselves to put a
confidence in that kingdom, because of the old acquaintance they had
with it, as if they still retained the gust and relish of the leeks
and onions they ate there, or rather of the idolatrous worship they
learned there, and brought up with them thence. When they began an
acquaintance with Egypt they remembered how merrily their fathers
worshipped the golden calf, what music and dancing they had at that
sport, which they learned in Egypt; and they hoped they should now have
a fair pretence to come to that again. Thus she multiplied her
whoredoms, repeated her former whoredoms, and encouraged herself to
close with present temptations, by calling to remembrance the days
of her youth. Note, Those who, instead of reflecting upon their
former sins with sorrow and shame, reflect upon them with pleasure and
pride, contract new guilt thereby, strengthen their own corruptions,
and in effect bid defiance to repentance. This is returning with the
dog to his vomit.
2. They called it God’s remembrance, and provoked him to
remember it against them. God had said indeed that he would reckon
with them for the golden calf, that idol of Egypt
but such was his patience that he seemed to have forgotten it till
they, by their league now with the Egyptians against the Chaldeans,
did, as it were, put him in mind of it; and in the day when he
visits he will now, as he has said, visit for that. It is
very observable how this adulteress changes her lovers: she dotes first
on the Assyrians; then she thought the Chaldeans finer and courted
them; after a while her mind was alienated from them, and she thought
the Egyptians more powerful
(v. 20)
and she must contract an intimacy with them. This shows the folly,
(1.) Of fleshly lusts; when they are indulged they grow humoursome and
fickle, are soon surfeited but never satisfied; they must have variety,
and what is loved one day is loathed the next. Unius adulterium
matrimonium vocant–One adultery is called marriage, as Seneca
observes.
(2.) Of idolatry. Those who think one God too little will not think a
hundred sufficient, but will still be for trying more, as finding all
insufficient.
(3.) Of seeking to creatures for help; we go from one to another, but
are disappointed in them all, and can never rest till we have made the
God of Israel our help.
II. The faithful God justly gives a bill of divorce to this now
faithless city, that has become a harlot. His jealousy soon
discovered her lewdness
(v. 13):
I saw that she was defiled, that she was debauched, and saw
which way her inclination was, that the two sisters both took one
way, and that Jerusalem grew worse than Samaria. For, if we
stretch out our hand to a strange god, will not God search this
out? No doubt he will; and when he has found it can he be pleased
with it? No
(v. 18):
Then my mind was alienated from her, as it was from her sister.
How could the pure and holy God any longer take delight in such a lewd
generation? Note, Sin alienates God’s mind from the sinner, and justly,
for it is the alienation of the sinner’s mind from God; but woe, and a
thousand woes, to those from whom God’s mind is alienated; for whom he
turns from he will turn against.
| The Punishment of Jerusalem. | B. C. 591. |
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22 Therefore, O Aholibah, thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I
will raise up thy lovers against thee, from whom thy mind is
alienated, and I will bring them against thee on every side;
23 The Babylonians, and all the Chaldeans, Pekod, and Shoa, and
Koa, and all the Assyrians with them: all of them desirable
young men, captains and rulers, great lords and renowned, all of
them riding upon horses.
24 And they shall come against thee with chariots, waggons, and
wheels, and with an assembly of people, which shall set against
thee buckler and shield and helmet round about: and I will set
judgment before them, and they shall judge thee according to
their judgments.
25 And I will set my jealousy against thee, and they shall deal
furiously with thee: they shall take away thy nose and thine
ears; and thy remnant shall fall by the sword: they shall take
thy sons and thy daughters; and thy residue shall be devoured by
the fire.
26 They shall also strip thee out of thy clothes, and take away
thy fair jewels.
27 Thus will I make thy lewdness to cease from thee, and thy
whoredom brought from the land of Egypt: so that thou shalt not
lift up thine eyes unto them, nor remember Egypt any more.
28 For thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I will deliver thee
into the hand of them whom thou hatest, into the hand of them
from whom thy mind is alienated:
29 And they shall deal with thee hatefully, and shall take away
all thy labour, and shall leave thee naked and bare: and the
nakedness of thy whoredoms shall be discovered, both thy lewdness
and thy whoredoms.
30 I will do these things unto thee, because thou hast gone a
whoring after the heathen, and because thou art polluted with
their idols.
31 Thou hast walked in the way of thy sister; therefore will I
give her cup into thine hand.
32 Thus saith the Lord GOD; Thou shalt drink of thy sister’s
cup deep and large: thou shalt be laughed to scorn and had in
derision; it containeth much.
33 Thou shalt be filled with drunkenness and sorrow, with the
cup of astonishment and desolation, with the cup of thy sister
Samaria.
34 Thou shalt even drink it and suck it out, and thou shalt
break the sherds thereof, and pluck off thine own breasts: for I
have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD.
35 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Because thou hast
forgotten me, and cast me behind thy back, therefore bear thou
also thy lewdness and thy whoredoms.
Jerusalem stands indicted by the name of Aholibah, for that she,
as a false traitor to her sovereign Lord the God of heaven, not having
his fear before her eyes, but moved by the instigation of the devil,
had revolted from her allegiance to him, had compassed and imagined to
shake off his government, had kept up a correspondence had joined in
confederacy with his enemies, and the pretenders to a deity, in
contempt of his crown and dignity. To this indictment she has pleaded,
Not guilty: I am not polluted; I have not gone after Baalim. But
it is found against her by the notorious evidence of the fact, and she
stands convicted of it, nor has any thing material to offer why
judgment should not be given and execution awarded according to law.
In these verses, therefore, we have the sentence.
I. Her old confederates must be her executioners; and those whom she
had courted to be her leaders in sin are now to be employed as
instruments of her punishment
(v. 22):
“I will raise up thy lovers against thee, the Chaldeans, whom
formerly thou didst so much admire and covet an acquaintance with, but
from whom thy mind is since alienated and with whom thou hast
perfidiously broken covenant.” They are called thy lovers
(v. 22)
and yet
(v. 28)
those whom thou hatest. Note, It is common for sinful love soon
to turn into hatred; as Amnon’s to Tamar. Those of headstrong and
unreasonable passions are often very hot against those persons and
things that a little before they were as hot for. Fools run into
extremes; nay, and wise men may see cause to change their sentiments.
And therefore, as we should rejoice and weep as if we rejoiced not and
wept not, so we should love and hate as if we loved not and hated not.
Ita ama tanquam osurus–Love as one who may have cause to feel
aversion.
II. The execution to be done upon her is very terrible.
1. Her enemies shall come against her on every side
(v. 22),
those of the several nations that constituted the Chaldean army
(v. 23),
all of them great lords and renowned, whose pomp, and grandeur,
and splendid appearance made them look the more amiable when they came
as friends to protect and patronise Jerusalem, but the more formidable
when they came to chastise its treachery and aimed at no less than its
ruin.
(1.) They shall come with a great deal of military force
(v. 24),
with chariots and wagons furnished with all necessary provisions
for a camp, with arms and ammunition, bag and baggage, with a vast
army, and well armed.
(2.) They shall have justice on their side: “I will set judgment
before them” (they shall have right with them as well as might; for
the king of Babylon had just cause to make war upon the king of Judah,
because he had broken his league with him), “and therefore they
shall judge thee, not only according to God’s judgments, as the
instruments of his justice, to punish thee for the indignities done to
him, but according to their judgments, according to the law of
nations, to punish thee for thy perfidious dealings with them.”
(3.) They shall prosecute the war with a great deal of fury and
resentment. It being a war of revenge, they shall deal with thee
hatefully,
v. 29.
This will make the execution the more severe that their swords will be
dipped in poison. Thou hatest them, and they shall deal hatefully with
thee; those that hate will be hated and will be hatefully dealt with.
(4.) God himself will lead them on, and his anger shall be mingled with
theirs
(v. 25):
I will set my jealousy against thee; that shall kindle this
fire, and then they shall deal furiously with thee. If men deal
ever so hatefully, ever so furiously, with us, yet, if we have God on
our side, we need not fear them; they can do us no real hurt. But if
men deal furiously with us, and God set his jealousy against us too,
what will become of us?
2. The particulars of the sentence here passed upon this notorious
adulteress are,
(1.) That all she has shall be seized on. The clothes and the
fair jewels, with which she had endeavoured to recommend herself
to her lovers, these she shall be stripped of,
All those things that were the ornaments of their state shall be taken
away: “They shall take away all thy labour, all that thou hast
gotten by thy labour, and shall leave thee naked and bare,”
Both city and country shall be impoverished and all the wealth of both
swept away.
(2.) That her children shall go into captivity. “They shall take
thy sons and thy daughters, and make slaves of them
(v. 25);
for they are children of whoredoms, unworthy the dignities and
privileges of Israelites,”
(3.) That she shall be stigmatized and deformed: “They shall take
away thy nose and thy ears, shall mark thee for a harlot, and
render thee for ever odious,”
This intimates the many cruelties of the Chaldean soldiers towards the
Jews that fell into their hands, whom, it is probable, they used
barbarously. Some will have this to be understood figuratively; and by
the nose they think is meant the kingly dignity, and by the ears that
of the priesthood.
(4.) That she shall be exposed to shame: Thy lewdness and thy
whoredoms shall be discovered
(v. 29),
as, when a malefactor is punished, all his crimes are ripped up, and
repeated to his disgrace; what was secret then comes to light, and what
was done long since is then called to mind.
(5.) That she shall be quite cut off and ruined: “The remnant of
thy people that have escaped the famine and pestilence shall fall by
the sword; and the residue of thy houses that have not been
battered down about thy ears shall be devoured by the fire,”
And this shall be the end of Jerusalem.
III. Because she has trod in the steps of Samaria’s sins, she must
expect no other than Samaria’s fate. It is common, in giving judgment,
to have an eye to precedents; so has God in passing this sentence on
Jerusalem
(v. 31,
&c.): “Thou hast walked in the way of thy sister,
notwithstanding the warning thou hast had given thee, by the fatal
consequences of her wickedness; and therefore I will give her
cup, her portion of miseries, into thy hand, the cup of the
Lord’s fury, which will be to thee a cup of trembling.” Now,
1. This cup is said to be deep and large, and to contain
much
(v. 32),
abundance of God’s wrath and abundance of miseries, the fruits of that
wrath. It is such a cup as that which we read of,
The cup of divine vengeance holds a great deal, and so those will find
into whose hand it shall be put.
2. They shall be made to drink the very dregs of this cup, as the
wicked are said to do
(Ps. lxxv. 8):
“Thou shalt drink it and suck it out, not because it is
pleasant, but because it is forced upon thee
(v. 34);
thou shalt break the shreds thereof, and pluck off thy own
breasts, for indignation at the extreme bitterness of this cup,
being full of the fury of the Lord
(Isa. li. 20),
as men in great anguish tear their hair, and throw every thing from
them. Finding there is no remedy, but it must be drank (for I have
spoken it, saith the Lord God), thou shalt have no manner of
patience in the drinking of it.”
3. They shall be intoxicated by it, made sick, and be at their wits’
end, as men in drink are, staggering, and stumbling, and ready to fall
(v. 33):
Thou shalt be filled with drunkenness and sorrow. Note,
Drunkenness has sorrow attending it, to such a degree that the utmost
confusion and astonishment are here represented by it. Who would think
that that which is such a force upon nature, such a scandal to it,
which deprives men of their reason, disorders them to the last degree,
and is therefore expressive of the greatest misery, should yet be with
many a beloved sin, that they should damn their own souls to distemper
their own bodies? Who has woe and sorrow like them?
4. Being so intoxicated, they shall become, as drunkards deserve to be,
a laughing-stock to all about them
(v. 32):
Thou shalt be laughed to scorn and had in derision, as acting
ridiculously in every thing thou goest about. When God is about to ruin
a people he makes their judges fools and pours contempt on
their princes,
Job xii. 17, 21.
IV. In all this God will be justified, and by all this they will be
reformed; and so the issue even of this will be God’s glory and their
good.
1. They have been bad, very bad, and that justifies God in all that is
brought upon them
(v. 30):
I will do these things unto thee because thou hast gone a whoring
after the heathen, and
(v. 35)
because thou hast forgotten me and cast me behind thy back.
Note, Forgetfulness of God, and a contempt of him, of his eye upon us
and authority over us, are at the bottom of all our treacherous
adulterous departures from him. Therefore men wander after
idols, because they forget God, and their obligations to him;
nor could they look with so much desire and delight upon the baits of
sin if they did not first cast God behind their back, as not
worthy to be regarded. And those who put such an affront upon God, how
can they think but that it should turn upon themselves at last?
Therefore bear thou also thy lewdness and thy whoredoms; that
is, thou shalt suffer the punishment of them, and thou alone
must bear the blame. Men need no more to sink them than the
weight of their own sins; and those who will not part with their
lewdness and their whoredoms must bear them.
2. They shall be better, much better, and this fire, though consuming
to many, shall be refining to a remnant
(v. 27):
Thus will I make thy lewdness to cease from thee. The judgments
which were brought upon them by their sins parted between them and
their sins, and taught them at length to say, What have we to do any
more with idols? Observe,
(1.) How inveterate the disease was: Thy whoredoms were brought from
the land of Egypt. Their disposition to idolatry was early and
innate, their practice of it was ancient, and had gained a sort of
prescription by long usage.
(2.) How complete the cure was notwithstanding: “Though it has taken
root, yet it shall be made to cease, so that thou shalt not so much as
lift up thy eyes to the idols again, nor remember Egypt
with pleasure any more.” They shall avoid the occasions of this
sin, for they shall not so much as look upon an idol, lest their hearts
should unawares walk after their eyes. And they shall abandon
all inclinations to it: “They shall not remember Egypt; they
shall not retain any of that affection for idols which they had from
the very infancy of their nation.” They got it, through the corruption
of nature, in their bondage in Egypt, and lost it, through the grace of
God, in their captivity in Babylon, which this was the blessed fruit
of, even the taking away of sin, of that sin; so that
whereas, before the captivity, no nation (all things considered) was
more impetuously bent upon idols and idolatry than they were, after
that captivity no nation was more vehemently set against idols and
idolatry than they were, insomuch that at this day the image-worship
which is practised in the church of Rome confirms the Jews as much as
any thing in their prejudices against the Christian religion.
| Israel and Judah Accused; Judgments Predicted. | B. C. 591. |
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36 The LORD said moreover unto me; Son of man, wilt thou judge
Aholah and Aholibah? yea, declare unto them their abominations;
37 That they have committed adultery, and blood is in their
hands, and with their idols have they committed adultery, and
have also caused their sons, whom they bare unto me, to pass for
them through the fire, to devour them.
38 Moreover this they have done unto me: they have defiled my
sanctuary in the same day, and have profaned my sabbaths.
39 For when they had slain their children to their idols, then
they came the same day into my sanctuary to profane it; and, lo,
thus have they done in the midst of mine house.
40 And furthermore, that ye have sent for men to come from far,
unto whom a messenger was sent; and, lo, they came: for whom
thou didst wash thyself, paintedst thy eyes, and deckedst thyself
with ornaments,
41 And satest upon a stately bed, and a table prepared before
it, whereupon thou hast set mine incense and mine oil.
42 And a voice of a multitude being at ease was with her: and
with the men of the common sort were brought Sabeans from the
wilderness, which put bracelets upon their hands, and beautiful
crowns upon their heads.
43 Then said I unto her that was old in adulteries, Will they
now commit whoredoms with her, and she with them?
44 Yet they went in unto her, as they go in unto a woman that
playeth the harlot: so went they in unto Aholah and unto
Aholibah, the lewd women.
45 And the righteous men, they shall judge them after the
manner of adulteresses, and after the manner of women that shed
blood; because they are adulteresses, and blood is in their
hands.
46 For thus saith the Lord GOD; I will bring up a company upon
them, and will give them to be removed and spoiled.
47 And the company shall stone them with stones, and dispatch
them with their swords; they shall slay their sons and their
daughters, and burn up their houses with fire.
48 Thus will I cause lewdness to cease out of the land, that
all women may be taught not to do after your lewdness.
49 And they shall recompense your lewdness upon you, and ye
shall bear the sins of your idols: and ye shall know that I am
the Lord GOD.
After the ten tribes were carried into captivity, and that kingdom was
made quite desolate, the remains of it by degrees incorporated with the
kingdom of Judah, and gained a settlement (many of them) in Jerusalem;
so that the two sisters had in effect become one again;
and therefore, in these verses, the prophet takes those to task jointly
who were thus conjoined: “Wilt thou judge Aholah and Aholibah
together?
Wilt thou go about to frame an excuse for them? Thou seest the matter
is so bad as not to bear an excuse.” Or, rather, “Thou shalt now be
employed, in God’s name, to judge them,
ch. xx. 4.
The matter is rather worse than better since the union.”
I. Let them be made to see the sins they are guilty of: Declare unto
them openly and boldly their abominations.
1. They have been guilty of gross idolatry, here called adultery.
With their idols they have committed adultery
(v. 37),
have broken their marriage-covenant with God, have lusted after the
gratifications of a carnal sensual mind in the worship of God. This is
the first and worst of the abominations he is to charge them with.
2. They have committed the most barbarous murders, in sacrificing
their children to Moloch, a sin so unnatural that they deserve to hear
of it upon all occasions: Blood is in their hands, innocent
blood, the blood of their own children, which they have caused to
pass through the fire
(v. 37),
not that they might be dedicated to the idols, but that they might be
devoured, a sign that they loved their idols better than that which was
dearest to them in the world.
3. They have profaned the sacred things with which God had dignified
and distinguished them: This they have done unto me, this
indignity, this injury,
Every contempt put upon that which is holy reflects upon him who is the
fountain of holiness, and from a relation to whom whatever is called
holy has its denomination. God had set up his sanctuary among them,
but they defiled it, by making it a house of merchandise, a den of
thieves; nay, and much worse; there they set up their idols and
worshipped them, and there they shed the blood of God’s prophets. God
had revealed to them his holy sabbaths, but they profaned them, by
doing all manner of servile work therein, or perhaps by sports and
recreations on that day, not only practised, but allowed and encouraged
by authority. They defiled the sanctuary on the same day
that they profaned the sabbath. To defile the sanctuary was bad
enough on any day, but to do it on the sabbath day was an aggravation.
We commonly say, The better day the better deed; but here, the
better day the worse deed. God takes notice of the circumstances of sin
which add to the guilt. He shows
(v. 39)
what was their profanation both of the sanctuary and of the sabbath.
They slew their children, and sacrificed them to their
idols, to the great dishonour both of God and of human nature; and
then came, on the same day, their hands imbrued with the blood
of their children and their clothes stained with it, to attend in
God’s sanctuary, not to ask pardon for what they had done, but
to present themselves before him, as other Israelites did, expecting
acceptance with him, notwithstanding these villanies which they were
guilty of; as if God either did not know their wickedness or did not
hate it. Thus they profaned the sanctuary, as if that were a
protection to the worst of malefactors; for thus they did in the
midst of his house. Note, It is a profanation of God’s solemn
ordinances when those that are grossly and openly profane and vicious
impudently and impenitently so intrude upon the services and privileges
of them. Give not that which is holy unto dogs. Friend, how camest
thou in hither?
4. They have courted foreign alliances, been proud of them, and reposed
a confidence in them. This also is represented by the sin of adultery,
for it was a departure from God, not only to whom alone they
ought to pay their homage and not to idols, but in whom alone
they ought to put their trust, and not in creatures. Israel was a
peculiar people, must dwell alone and not be reckoned among
the nations; and they profane their crown, and lay their honour in
the dust, when they covet to be like them or in league with
them. But this they have now done; they have entered into strict
alliances with the Assyrians, Chaldeans, and Egyptians, the most
renowned and potent kingdoms at that time; but they scorned alliances
with the petty kingdoms and states that lay near them, which yet might
have been of more real service to them. Note, Affecting an acquaintance
and correspondence with great people has often been a snare to good
people. Let us see how Jerusalem courts her high allies, thinking
thereby to make herself considerable.
(1.) She privately requested that a public embassy might be sent to her
(v. 40):
You sent a messenger for men to come from far. It seems, then,
that the neighbours had no desire to come into a confederacy with
Jerusalem, but she thrust herself upon them, and sent under-hand to
desire them to court her: and, lo, they came. The wisest and
best may be drawn unavoidably into company and conversation with
profane and wicked people: but it is no sign either of wisdom or
goodness to covet an intimacy with such and to court it.
(2.) Great preparation was made for the reception of these foreign
ministers, for their public entry and public audience, which is
compared to the pains that an adulteress takes to make herself look
handsome. Jezebel-like, thou paintedst thy face and deckedst
thyself with ornaments,
v. 40.
The king and princes made themselves new clothes, fitted up the rooms
of state, beautified the furniture, and made it look fresh. Thou
sattest upon a stately bed
(v. 41),
a stately throne; a table was prepared, whereon thou has set my oil
and my incense. This was either,
[1.] A feast for the ambassadors, a noble treat, agreeable to the other
preparations. There was incense to perfume the room and oil to anoint
their heads. Or,
[2.] An altar already furnished for the ambassadors’ use in the worship
of their idols, to let them know that the Israelites were not so
strait-laced but that they could allow foreigners the free exercise of
their religion among them, and furnish them with chapels, yea, and
complimented them so far as to join with them in their devotions;
though the law of their God was against it, yet they could easily
dispense with themselves to oblige a friend. The oil and incense God
calls his, not only because they were the gift of his
providence, but because they should have been offered at his altar,
which was an aggravation of their sin in serving idols and idolaters
with them. See
(3.) There was great joy at their coming, as if it were such a blessing
as never happened to Jerusalem before
(v. 42):
A voice of a multitude being at east was with her. The people
were very easy, for they thought themselves very safe and happy now
that they had such powerful allies; and therefore attended the
ambassadors with loud huzzas and acclamations of joy. A great
confluence of people there was to the court upon this occasion. The
men of the common sort were there to grace the solemnity, and to
increase the crowd; and with them were brought Sabeans from the
wilderness. The margin reads it drunkards from the
wilderness, that would drink healths to the prosperity of this
grand alliance, and force them upon others, and be most noisy in
shouting upon this occasion. Whoever they were, in honour of the
ambassadors they put bracelets upon their hands and beautiful crowns
upon their heads, which made the cavalcade appear very splendid.
(4.) God by his prophets warned them against making these dangerous
leagues with foreigners
(v. 43):
“Then said I unto her that was old in adulteries, that from the
first was fond of leagues with the heathen, of matching with their
families
(Judg. iii. 6),
and afterwards of making alliances with their kingdoms, and, though
often disappointed therein, would never be dissuaded from it (this was
the adultery she was old in), I said, Will they now commit whoredoms
with her and she with them? Surely experience and observation will
by this time have convinced both them and her that an alliance between
the nation of the Jews and a heathen nation can never be for the
advantage of either.” They are iron and clay, that will not mix,
nor will God bless such an alliance, or smile upon it. But, it seems,
her being old in these adulteries, instead of weaning her from them, as
one would expect, does but make her the more impudent and insatiable in
them; for, though she was thus admonished of the folly of it, yet
they went in unto her,
v. 44.
A bargain was soon clapped up, and a league made, first with this, and
then with the other, foreign state. Samaria did so, Jerusalem did so,
like lewd women. They could not rest satisfied in the embraces of God’s
laws and care, and the assurances of protection he gave them; they
could not think his covenant with them security enough. But they must
by treaties and leagues, politic ones (they thought) and
well-concerted, throw themselves into the arms of foreign princes, and
put their interests under their protection. Note, Those hearts go a
whoring from God that take a complacency in the pomp of the world and
put a confidence in its wealth, and in an arm of flesh,
Jer. xvii. 5.
II. Let them be made to foresee the judgments that are coming upon them
for these sins
(v. 45):
The righteous men, they shall judge them. Some make the
instruments of their destruction to be the righteous men that shall
judge them. The Assyrians that destroyed Samaria, the Chaldeans that
destroyed Jerusalem, those were comparatively righteous, had a sense of
justice between man and man and justly resented the treachery of the
Jewish nation; however, they executed God’s judgments, which, we are
sure, are all righteous. Others understand it of the prophets, whose
office it was, in God’s name, to judge them and pass sentence upon
them. Or we may take it as an appeal to all righteous men, to all that
have a sense of equity; they shall all judge concerning these cities,
and agree in their verdict, that forasmuch as they have been
notoriously guilty of adultery and murder, and the guilt is national,
therefore they ought to suffer the pains and penalties which by law are
inflicted upon women in their personal capacity that shed blood and are
adulteresses. Righteous men will say, “Why should bloody filthy cities
escape any better than bloody filthy persons? Judge, I pray
thee,”
This judgment being given by the righteous men, the righteous God will
award execution. See here,
1. What the execution will be,
The same as before,
&c. God will bring a company of enemies upon them, who
shall be made to serve his holy purposes even when they are serving
their own sinful appetites and passions. These enemies shall easily
prevail, for God will give them into their hands to be
removed and spoiled; this company shall stone them with
stones as malefactors, shall single them out and dispatch
them with their swords; and, as was sometimes done in severe
executions (witness that of Achan), they shall slay their children
and burn their houses.
2. What will be the effects of it.
(1.) Thus they shall suffer for their sins: Their lewdness shall be
recompensed upon them
(v. 49);
and they shall bear the sins of their idols,
v. 35, 49.
Thus God will assert the honour of his broken law and injured
government, and let the world know what a just and jealous God he is.
(2.) Thus they shall be broken off from their sins: I will cause
lewdness to cease out of the land,
v. 27, 48.
The destruction of God’s city, like the death of God’s saints, shall do
that for them which ordinances and providences before could not do; it
shall quite take away their sin, so that Jerusalem shall rise out of
its ashes a new lump, as gold comes out of the furnace purified from
its dross.
(3.) Thus other cities and nations will have fair warning given them to
keep themselves from idols. That all women may be taught not to do
after your lewdness. This is the end of the punishment of
malefactors, that they may be made examples to others, who will see
and fear. Smite the scorner and the simple will beware. The
judgments of God upon some are designed to teach others, and happy are
those who receive instruction from them not to tread in the steps of
sinners, lest they be taken in their snares; those who would be taught
this must know God is the Lord
(v. 49),
that he is the governor of the world, a God that judges in the earth,
and with whom there is no respect of persons.
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