Albert Barnes Commentary Ezekiel 8:14

"Then he brought me to the door of the gate of Jehovah`s house which was toward the north; and behold, there sat the women weeping for Tammuz." — Ezekiel 8:14 (ASV)

The seer is now brought back to the same gate as in Ezekiel 8:3.

It is not certain that this verse refers to any special act of Tammuz-worship. The month in which the vision was seen, the sixth month (September), was not the month of the Tammuz-rites. But there can be little doubt that such rites had been performed in Jerusalem. Women are mentioned as employed in the service of idols (Jeremiah 7:18).

There is some reason for believing that the weeping of women for Tammuz passed into Syria and Palestine from Babylonia, Tammuz being identified with Duv-zi, whose loss was lamented by the goddess Istar. The festival was identical with the Greek Adoniacs. The worship of Adonis had its headquarters at Byblos, where at certain periods of the year the stream, becoming stained by mountain floods, was popularly said to be red with the blood of Adonis.

From Byblos it spread widely over the east and was from there carried to Greece. The contact of Zedekiah with pagan nations (Jeremiah 32:3) may very well have led to the introduction of an idolatry that at this time was especially popular among the eastern nations.

This solemnity had a twofold character: first, that of mourning, in which the death of Adonis was bewailed with extravagant sorrow; and then, after a few days, the mourning gave place to wild rejoicings for his restoration to life.

This was a revival of nature-worship under another form—the death of Adonis symbolized the suspension of the productive powers of nature, which were in due time revived. Accordingly, the time of this festival was the summer solstice, when in the east nature seems to wither and die under the scorching heat of the sun, to burst forth again into life at the due season. At the same time, there was a connection between this and sun-worship, because the decline of the sun and the decline of nature could alike be represented by the death of Adonis.

The excitement accompanying these extravagances of alternate wailing and exultation was in complete accordance with the character of nature-worship, which for this reason was so popular in the east, especially with women, and inevitably led to unbridled license and excess. Such was, in Ezekiel’s day, one of the most detestable forms of idolatry.