Ezekiel 20:28

Eze 20:2-9 , in the wilderness, vv. 10-27, and in Canaan, Eze 20:28-32 . Notwithstanding which the Lord most graciously promises to restore them to their own land, after they should be purged from their dross, Eze 20:33-44 . The five last verses of this chapter ought to begin the next, as they are connected with the subject of that chapter, being a prophecy against Jerusalem, which lay to the south of Chaldea, where the prophet then was, and which here and elsewhere is represented under the emblem of a forest doomed to be destroyed by fire, Eze 20:45-49 . Verse 1 In the seventh year - Of the captivity of Jeconiah, (see Eze 8:1 ), and the seventh of the reign of Zedekiah. The fifth month, the tenth day - That is, according to Abp. Usher, Monday, August 27, A.M. 3411. Certain of the elders of Israel - What these came to inquire about is not known. They were doubtless hypocrites and deceivers, from the manner in which God commands the prophet to treat them. It seems to have been such a deputation of elders as those mentioned Eze 8:1 ; Eze 14:1 . Verse 3 I will not be inquired of by you - I will not hear you. I will have nothing to do with you. Verse 4 Wilt thou judge them - If thou wilt enter into any discussion with them, show them the abomination of their fathers. The whole chapter is a consecutive history of the unfaithfulness ingratitude, rebellion, and idolatry of the Jews, from the earliest times to that day; and vindicates the sentence which God had pronounced against them, and which he was about to execute more fully in delivering them and the city into the hands of the Chaldeans. Verse 5 I chose Israel - They did not choose me for their God, till I had chosen them to be my people. I lifted up mine hand - I bound myself in a covenant to them to continue to be their God, if they should be faithful, and continue to be my people. Among the Jews the juror lifted up his right hand to heaven; which explains Psa 144:8 : "Their right hand is a right hand of falsehood." This is a form used in England, Scotland, and Ireland. Verse 6 To bring them forth of the land of Egypt - When they had been long in a very disgraceful and oppressive bondage. A land that I had espied for them - God represents himself as having gone over different countries in order to find a comfortable residence for these people, whom he considered as his children. Flowing with milk and honey - These were the characteristics of a happy and fruitful country, producing without intense labor all the necessaries and comforts of life. Of the happiest state and happiest place, a fine poet gives the following description: - Ver erat aeternum, placidique tepentibus auris Mulcebant Zephyri natos sine semine flores. Mox etiam fruges tellus inarata ferebat: Nec renovatus ager gravidis canebat aristis. Flumina jam lactis, jam flumina nectaris ibant: Flavaque de viridi stillabant ilice mella. Ovid's Metam. lib. i., 107. On flowers unsown soft Zephyr spreads his wing, And time itself was one eternal spring; Ensuing years the yellow harvest crowned, The bearded blade sprang from the untilled ground, And laden unrenewed the fields were found. Floods were with milk, and floods with nectar filled, And honey from the sweating oaks distilled. In the flourishing state of Judea every mountain was cultivated as well as the valleys. Among the very rocks the vines grew luxuriantly. Verse 7 Cast ye away - the abominations - Put away all your idols; those incentives to idolatry that ye have looked on with delight. Verse 8 They did not - cast away - They continued attached to the idolatry of Egypt; so that, had I consulted my justice only, I should have consumed them even in Egypt itself. This is a circumstance that Moses has not mentioned, namely, their provoking God by their idolatry, after he had sent Moses and Aaron to them in Egypt. Verse 9 But I wrought for my name's sake - I bare with them and did not punish them, lest the heathen, who had known my promises made to them, might suppose that I had either broken them through some caprice, or was not able to fulfill them. Verse 10 I caused them to go forth - Though greatly oppressed and degraded, they were not willing to leave their house of bondage. I was obliged to force them away. Verse 11 I gave them my statutes - I showed them what they should do in order to be safe, comfortable, wise, and happy; and what they should avoid in order to be uninjured in body, mind, and possessions. Had they attended to these things, they should have lived by them. They would have been holy, healthy, and happy. Verse 12 I gave them my Sabbaths - The religious observance of the Sabbath was the first statute or command of God to men. This institution was a sign between God and them, to keep them in remembrance of the creation of the world, of the rest that he designed them in Canaan, and of the eternal inheritance among the saints in light. Of these things the Sabbath was a type and pledge. Verse 13 But the house of Israel rebelled - They acted in the wilderness just as they had done in Egypt; and he spared them there for the same reason. See Eze 20:9 . Verse 15 I lifted up my hand - Their provocations in the wilderness were so great, that I vowed never to bring them into the promised land. I did not consume them, but I disinherited them. See the note on Eze 20:5 (note). Verse 18 But I said unto their children - These I chose in their fathers' stead; and to them I purposed to give the inheritance which their fathers by disobedience lost. Verse 22 I withdrew mine hand - I had just lifted it up to crush them as in a moment; for they also were idolatrous, and walked in the steps of their fathers. Verse 25 I gave them also statutes that were not good - What a foolish noise has been made about this verse by critics, believers and infidels! How is it that God can be said "to give a people statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they could not live?" I answer, in their sense of the words, God never gave any such, at any time, to any people. Let any man produce an example of this kind if he can; or show even the fragment of such a law, sanctioned by the Most High! The simple meaning of this place and all such places is, that when they had rebelled against the Lord, despised his statutes, and polluted his Sabbaths - in effect cast him off, and given themselves wholly to their idols, then he abandoned them, and they abandoned themselves to the customs and ordinances of the heathen. That this is the meaning of the words, requires no proof to them who are the least acquainted with the genius and idioms of the Hebrew language, in which God is a thousand times said to do, what in the course of his providence or justice he only permits to be done. Verse 26 I polluted them in their own gifts - I permitted them to pollute themselves by the offerings which they made to their idols. Causing their children to pass through the fire was one of those pollutions; but, did God ever give them a statute or judgment of this kind? No. He ever inveighs against such things, and they incur his heaviest displeasure and curse. See on Eze 20:31 (note). Verse 29 What is the high place - מה הבמה mah habbamah, "what is the high place?" What is it good for? Its being a high place shows it to be a place of idolatry. I called it במה bamah, to mark it with infamy; but ye continue to frequent it, even while it is called במה bamah, to the present day! Verse 31 Ye pollute yourselves - This shows the sense in which God says, Eze 20:26 , "I polluted them in their own gifts." They chose to pollute themselves, and I permitted them to do so. See on Eze 20:25 (note), Eze 20:26 (note). Verse 32 And that which cometh into your mind - Ye wish to be naturalized among idolaters, and make a part of such nations. But this shall not be at all; you shall be preserved as a distinct people. Ye shall not be permitted to mingle yourselves with the people of those countries: even they, idolaters as they are, will despise and reject you. Besides, I will change your place, restore your captivity; yet not in mercy, but in fury poured out; and reserve you for sorer evils, Eze 20:34 . Verse 35 I will bring you into the wilderness of the people - I will bring you out of your captivity, and bring you into your own land which you will find to be a wilderness, the consequence of your crimes. There will I plead with you - There I will be your king, and rule you with a sovereign rule; and the dispensations of my justice and mercy shall either end you or mend you. Verse 37 I will cause you to pass under the rod - This alludes to the custom of tithing the sheep. I take it from the rabbins. The sheep were all penned; and the shepherd stood at the door of the fold, where only one sheep could come out at once. He had in his hand a rod dipped in vermillion; and as they came out, he counted one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine; and as the tenth came out, he marked it with the rod, and said, "This is the tenth;" and that was set apart for the Lord. I wilt bring you into the bond of the covenant - You shall be placed under the same obligations as before, and acknowledge your selves bound; ye shall feel your obligation, and live according to its nature. Verse 38 I will purge out from among you the rebels - The incorrigibly wicked I will destroy; those who will not receive him whom I have appointed for this purpose as the Savior of Israel. And I will gather you who believe out of all the countries where you sojourn, and bring you into your own land; but those of you who will not believe - will not receive the Son of David to reign over you, shall never enter into the land of Israel, but die in your dispersions. This is what the contradicting and blaspheming Jews of the present day have to expect. And thus, both of you shall know that he is Jehovah, fulfilling his threatenings against the one, and his promises to the other. Verse 39 Go ye, serve ye every one his idols - Thus, God gave them statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they could not live, by thus permitting them to take their own way, serve their gods, and follow the maxims and rites of that abominable worship. Verse 40 For in mine holy mountain - The days shall come in which all true Israelites shall receive Him whom I have sent to be the true sacrifice for the life of the world; and shall bring to Jerusalem - the pure Christian Church, their offerings, which I will there accept, for they will give me thanks for my unspeakable gift. Verse 42 And ye shall know - Shall acknowledge that I am Jehovah. Verse 43 And there shall ye remember your ways - Ye shall be ashamed of your past conduct, and of your long opposition to the Gospel of your salvation. These promises may, in a certain limited sense, be applied to the restoration from the Babylonish captivity; but they must have their proper fulfillment when the Jews shall accept Jesus as their Savior, and in consequence be brought back from all their dispersions to their own land. Verse 46 Set thy face toward the south - Towards Judea, which lay south from Babylon, or Mesopotamia, where the prophet then dwelt. The forest of the south field - The city of Jerusalem, as full of inhabitants as the forest is of trees. Verse 47 I will kindle a fire - I will send war, "and it shall devour every green tree," the most eminent and substantial of the inhabitants; and every dry tree, the lowest and meanest also. The flaming flame shall not be quenched - The fierce ravages of Nebuchadnezzar and the Chaldeans shall not be stopped till the whole land is ruined. All faces from the south to the north shalt be burned - From the one end of the land to the other there shall be nothing but fear, dismay, terror, and confusion, occasioned by the wide-wasting violence of the Chaldeans. Judea lay in length from north to south. Verse 48 All flesh - All the people shall see that this war is a judgment of the Lord. It shall not be quenched - Till the whole land shall be utterly ruined. Verse 49 Ah Lord God - O my God, consider my situation; who will believe what I shall say? They put the evil day far from them. Doth he not speak parables? - הלא ממשל משלים הוא halo memashshel meshalim hu, "Is not he a maker of parables?" Is it not his custom to deal in enigmas? His figures are not to be understood; we should not trouble ourselves with them. We are not obliged to fathom his meaning; and perhaps after all it does not refer to us, or will not be accomplished in our time, if it even respect the land. Thus they turned aside what might have done them good, and rejected the counsel of God against themselves. By dividing the word with our neighbor we often lose the benefit both of threatenings and promises. They voluntarily shut their own eyes; and then God, in judgment, sealed them up in darkness. Introduction The prophet goes on to denounce the fate of Jerusalem and Judea; using signs of vehement grief, to denote the greatness of the calamity, Eze 21:2-7 . He then changes the emblem to that of a sharp and bright

27 Therefore, son of man, speak unto the house of Israel, and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God ; Yet in this your fathers have blasphemed me, in that they have committed a trespass against me. 28 For when I had brought them into the land, for the which I lifted up mine hand to give it to them, then they saw every high hill, and all the thick trees, and they offered there their sacrifices, and there they presented the provocation of their offering: there also they made their sweet savour, and poured out there their drink offerings. 29 Then I said unto them, What is the high place whereunto ye go? And the name thereof is called Bamah unto this day. 30 Wherefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord God ; Are ye polluted after the manner of your fathers? and commit ye whoredom after their abominations? 31 For when ye offer your gifts, when ye make your sons to pass through the fire, ye pollute yourselves with all your idols, even unto this day: and shall I be enquired of by you, O house of Israel? As I live, saith the Lord God , I will not be enquired of by you. 32 And that which cometh into your mind shall not be at all, that ye say, We will be as the heathen, as the families of the countries, to serve wood and stone. Here the prophet goes on with the story of their rebellions, for their further humiliation, and shows, I. That they had persisted in them after they were settled in the land of Canaan. Though God had so many times testified his displeasure against their wicked courses, "yet in this (that is, in the very same thing) your fathers have blasphemed me, continued to affront me, that they also have trespassed a trespass against me, " v. 27 . Note, It is a great aggravation of sin when men will not take warning by the mischievous consequences of sin in those that have gone before them: this is blaspheming God; it is speaking reproachfully of his judgments, as if they were of no significancy and were not worth regarding. 1. God had made good his promise: I brought them into the land that I had sworn to give them. Though their unbelief and disobedience had made the performance slow, and much retarded it, yet it did not make the promise of no effect. They were often very near being cut off in the wilderness, but a step between them and ruin, and yet they came to Canaan at last. Note, Even God's Israel get to heaven by hell-gates; so many are their transgressions, and so strong their corruptions, that it is a miracle of mercy they are happy at last; as hypocrites go to hell by heaven-gates. The righteous scarcely are saved. Per tot discrimina rerum tendimus ad cœlum—Ten thousand dangers fill the road to heaven. 2. They had broken his precept by their abominable idolatries. God had appointed them to destroy all the monuments of idolatry, that they might not be tempted to desert his sanctuary; but, instead of defacing them, they fell in love with them, and when they saw every high hill whence they had the most delightful prospects, and all the thick trees where they had the most delightful shades (the former to show forth their pompous idolatries, the latter to conceal their shameful ones), there they offered their sacrifices and made their sweet savour, which should have been presented upon God's altar only. There they presented the provocation of their offering ( v. 28 ), that is, their offerings, which, instead of pacifying God, or pleasing him, were highly provoking-sacrifices which, though costly, yet being misplaced, were an abomination to the Lord. 3. They obstinately persisted herein notwithstanding all the admonitions that were given them ( v. 29 ): " Then I told them, by my servants the prophets, told them where the high place was, to which they went; nay, I put them upon considering it, and asking their own consciences concerning it, by putting this question to them, Which is the high place whereunto you go? What do you find there so inviting that you will leave God's altars, where he requires your attendance, to frequent such places as he has forbidden you to worship in? Do you not know that those high places are of a heathenish extraction, and that the things which the Gentiles sacrificed they sacrificed to devils and not to God? Did not Moses tell you so? Deut. xxxii. 17 . And will you have fellowship with devils? What is that high place to which you go when you turn your back on God's altars? O foolish Israelites, who or what has bewitched you, that you will forsake the fountain of life for broken cisterns, that worship which God appoints, and will accept, for that which he forbids, which he abhors, and which he will punish?" And yet the name is called Bamah unto this day; they will have their way, let God and his prophets say what they please to the contrary. They are wedded to their high places; even in the best reigns those were not taken away; you could not prevail to take away the name of Bamah—the high place, out of their mouths, but still they would have that in the place of their worship. The sin and the sinner are with difficulty parted. II. That this generation, after they were unsettled, continued under the dominion of the same corrupt inclinations to idolatry, v. 30 . He must say to the present house of Israel, some of whose elders were now sitting before him, " Are you polluted after the manner of your fathers? After all that God has said against you by a succession of prophets, and done against you by a series of judgments, yet will you take no warning? Will you still be as bad as your fathers were, and commit the same abominations that they committed? I see you will; you are bent upon returning to the old abominations; you offer your gifts in the high places, and you make your sons to pass through the fire; either you actually do it or you do it in purpose and imagination, and so you continue idolaters to this day. " These elders seem now to have been projecting a coalition with the heathen; their hearts they will reserve for the God of Israel, but their knees they will be at liberty to bow to the gods of the nations among whom they live, that they may have the more respect and the fairer quarter among them. Now the prophet is here ordered to tell those who were forming this scheme, and were for compounding the matter between God and Baal, that they should have no comfort or benefit from either. 1. They should have no benefit by their consulting in private with the prophets of the Lord; for, because they were hearkening after idols, God would have nothing to do with them ( v. 31 ): As I live, saith the Lord God, I will not be enquired of by you. What he had said before ( v. 3 ), having largely shown how just it was, he here repeats, as that which he would abide by. Let them not think that they honoured him by their enquiries, nor expect an answer of peace from him, as long as they continued in love and league with their idols. Note, Those reap no benefit by their religion that are not entire and sincere in it; nor can we have any comfortable communion with God in ordinances of worship unless we be inward and upright with him therein. We make nothing of our profession if it be but a profession. Nay, 2. They should have no benefit from their conforming in public to the practice of their neighbours ( v. 32 ): " That which comes into your mind as a piece of refined politics in the present difficult juncture, and which you would be advised to for your own preservation, and that you may not by being singular expose yourselves to abuses, it shall not be at all, it shall turn to no account to you. You say, 'We will be as the heathen, we will join with them in worshipping their gods, though at the same time we do not believe them to be gods, but wood and stone, and then we should be taken as the families of the countries; they will not know, or in a little while will have forgotten, that we are Jews, and will allow us the same privileges with their own countrymen.' Tell them," says God, "that this project shall never prosper. Either their neighbours will not admit them to join with them in their worship, or, if they do, will think never the better, but the worse, of them for it, and will look upon them as dissemblers, and not fit to be trusted, who are thus false to their God, and put a cheat upon their neighbours." Note, There is nothing got by sinful compliances; and the carnal projects of hypocrites will stand them in no stead. It is only integrity and uprightness that will preserve men, and recommend them to God and man. The Sins of Israel. ( b. c. 592.) 33