John Calvin Commentary Ezekiel 16

This chapter contains very severe reproaches against the people of Judea who were left at Jerusalem. For although Ezekiel had been a leader to the Israelites and the Jewish exiles, God still wished for his assistance to benefit others. Therefore, the office which God had imposed upon His Prophet is now extended to the citizens of Jerusalem, whose abominations he is ordered to make manifest.

The manner is expressed later, when God shows the condition of that nation before He embraced it with His favor. But after recounting the benefits by which He had adorned the people, He reproves their ingratitude. He shows in many words, and by different figures, how detestable was their treachery in turning away, so far from God, after He had treated them so generously.

These things will now be treated in their own order. Regarding Ezekiel’s being ordered to lay bare to the Jews their abominations, we gather from this that people are often so blinded by their vices that they do not perceive what is sufficiently evident to everyone else. And we know that the people were quite drunk with pride, for they voluntarily blinded themselves by their own flatteries.

It is not surprising, then, that God orders them to bring their abominations into the open, so that they may at last realize they are sinners. And this passage is worthy of notice, since we often think such admonitions are superfluous until God drags us into the light and places our sins before our eyes.

Indeed, there is no one whose conscience does not reprove them, since God’s law is written on the hearts of all, and so we naturally distinguish between good and evil. But if we consider our great stupidity in concealing our faults, we will not wonder that the prophets uttered this command: to lay open our abominations to ourselves.

For not only is that self-knowledge of which I have spoken cold, but it is also shrouded in much darkness, so that one who is only partially conscious willingly grows hardened while indulging themselves. Again, we must remember that the Jews had to be confronted in this way, because they delighted in their own superstitions.

For the Prophet shows that their chief wickedness consisted in deserting God’s law, in prostituting themselves to idols, and in setting up adulterous worship like brothels. But in this they delighted, as we daily see in the papacy, where under this pretext the foulest idolatries are disguised, since they think themselves to be worshipping God by these means.

It is not surprising, then, if God here indirectly blames the stupidity and laziness of the Jews when He commands their abominations to be laid open, which are already sufficiently known to all. Afterwards, so that God may begin to show how improperly the people were behaving, He recalls them to the very origin or source of their race.

But we must notice that God speaks differently of the origin of the people. For sometimes He reminds them of Abraham’s condition before He had stretched forth His hand and dragged them, as it were, from the lowest regions into life, as it is said in the last chapter of Joshua: Your father Abraham was worshipping idols when God adopted him (Joshua 24:2–3).

But sometimes the beginning is reckoned from God’s covenant, when He chose Abraham and his descendants for Himself. In this passage, however, God marks the time from the period when the small group, by a wonderful increase, emerged as a nation, although they had been so wretchedly oppressed in Egypt. For the redemption of the people, which immediately followed, is sometimes called their birth.

So here God says that the Jews were born there when they increased so incredibly, though when oppressed by the Egyptian tyranny they had scarcely any place among the living. And what He says of the Jews applies equally to all the descendants of Abraham, for the condition of the ten tribes was the same as that of Judea.

But since the Prophet speaks to a people still surviving, he is silent about what he would have said if he had been commanded to deliver this mandate to the exiles and captives, as well as to the citizens of Jerusalem. Whatever its meaning, God here pronounces that the Jews sprang from the land of Canaan, from an Amorite father, and from a Hittite mother.

A question arises here: When God had adopted Abraham two hundred years previously, why was that covenant not taken into account? For God here seems not to magnify His own faithfulness and the constancy of His promise when He rejects the Jews as sprung from the Canaanites or Amorites. But this only shows what they were in themselves. For although He never departed from His purpose, and His election was never in vain, yet we must hold that, as far as the people were concerned, they are looked upon as profane Gentiles.

For we know how they corrupted themselves in Egypt. Since, then, they were so degenerate and so utterly unlike their fathers, it is not surprising if God says that they were sprung from Canaanites and Amorites. For by Hosea He says that they were all born of a harlot, and that the place of their birth was a brothel (Hosea 2:4).

This must be understood metaphorically, since here God does not chide the women who had been false to their husbands and had borne an adulterous offspring. Rather, He simply means that the Jews were unworthy of being called or considered Abraham’s seed.

Why so? For although God remained firm in His covenant, yet if we consider the character of the Jews, they had entirely cut themselves off by their faithlessness.

Since, then, they did not differ from the profane Gentiles, they are deservedly rejected with reproach and are called an offspring of Canaan, as in other places.

Therefore, we now understand the intention of the Prophet, or rather, of the Holy Spirit. For if God had only said that He would pity that race when reduced to extreme misery, it would not have been subjected to such severe and heavy reproof, as we shall see.

Thus, God not only relates His kindness towards them, but at the same time shows from what state He had taken the Jews when He first aided them, and what their condition was when He deigned to draw them out of such great misery.

Moreover, since He was at hand to take them up, their redemption was founded on covenant. So they were led forth because God had promised Abraham four centuries before that He would be the liberator of the people.

So that they would not be ignorant of the favor by which God had bound Himself to Abraham, the Prophet confronts them. He pronounces them a seed of Canaan, having nothing in common with Abraham because, as far as they were concerned and according to common understanding, God’s promise was extinct and their adoption dead and buried.

Since they had acted so treacherously, they could no longer boast of being Abraham’s children. Therefore, He says, your habitations, that is, the place of their origin.

Jerome translates it “root,” but the word “birth” suits better, or native soil, or condition of birth: in the land of Canaan; and your father an Amorite and your mother a Hittite.

There were other tribes of Canaan, but two or three kinds are mentioned here to represent the whole.

Here the Prophet metaphorically describes that most miserable state in which God found the Jews. For we know that scarcely any nation was ever so cruelly and disgracefully oppressed. For when they were all driven to servile labor without reward, the edict was proclaimed that their males should be cut off (Exodus 1:16, 22).

No kind of disgrace was omitted, and their life was worse than a hundred deaths. This, then, is the reason why God says that the Jews were so cast forth on the face of the earth without any supply of the common necessities of life. He takes these figures from customary practice. It is usual to cut the umbilical cord of infants, for the umbilical cord provides them with nourishment in their mother’s womb. Both mother and child would perish unless a separation took place. If the umbilical cord were not tied, the child would perish, for all the blood flows through that organ, as the child received its sustenance through it. This is the midwife’s chief care as soon as the child is born: to cut away what must afterwards be properly attended to, and to bind up the part. As I have said, this is done with the greatest care, as the infant’s life depends upon it.

But God says, that the navel-string of the Jews is not cut off. Why so? Because they were cast, He says, on the surface of the earth; that is, they were deserted and exposed—using but a single word. He now adds, they were not washed with water: for we know how young infants require washing; and unless it is performed immediately, they will perish.

Hence He says, they were not washed with water. He adds that they were not washed to soften or refresh them, or to “prepare” them, as the common phrase is. For water softens and smooths the skin, though others translate the original word in the sense of causing it to shine; but we understand the Prophet’s meaning sufficiently. He afterwards adds, they were not rubbed with salt; for salt is sprinkled on the body of an infant to harden the flesh, while care must be taken not to make it too hard; and this moderate hardness is achieved by the sprinkling of salt.

The full meaning is that the Jews at their birth were cast out with such contempt that they were destitute of the necessary care which life requires. He adds, No eye pitied thee, so as to discharge any of these duties, and to show thee pity: and this is sufficiently evident. The Israelites would have been destroyed had no one had compassion on them, for they were in some sense buried in the land of Egypt. We know how cruel the conspiracy of the whole land was against them. No wonder, then, that God here relates that they were cast upon the surface of the land, so that no eye looked upon them and showed them pity. He adds, they were cast to the loathing of their life. He simply means that they were so despicable that they had no standing among men, for loathing of life means the same as rejection.

I have already explained the time to which the Prophet alludes, when the descendants of Abraham began to be tyrannically oppressed by the Egyptians. For God here assumes the character of a traveler when He says that He passed by. For He had said that the Jews and all the Israelites were like a girl cast out and deserted.

Now, therefore, the Prophet adds that this spectacle met God as He passed by: just as those who travel cast their eyes on either side, and if anything unusual occurs, they pay attention and consider it. Meanwhile, God declares that He was taking care of His people. And truly, the matter is sufficiently evident, since He seemed to have neglected those wretched ones, even while He had wonderfully assisted them.

For they might have perished a hundred times a day, and if He had not taken notice of them, they would not have dragged out their lives to the end. That celebrated sentence is well known: I have seen, I have seen, the affliction of My people. When He sent for Moses and commanded him to liberate the people, He prefaces it in this way: I have seen, I have seen (Exodus 3:7).

Hence, He had long ago seen, though He seemed to despise them by shutting His eyes. There is no doubt that the doubling of the word here means that God always watched for the safety of this desperate people, although He did not assist them directly. He now means the same thing when He says, that He passed by: I passed by, then, near you, and saw you defiled with blood.

That spectacle could not turn away God’s eyes, for whatever is contrary to nature excites horror. God therefore here shows how compassionate He was towards the people, because He was not horrified by that disgraceful foulness when He saw the infant so immersed in its own gore, without any shape.

As to the following phrase, I said to you, He does not mean that He spoke openly so that the people heard His voice, but He announces what He had determined concerning the people. The expression, live in your blood, may indeed be taken contemptuously, as if God had grudged moving His hand, lest the very touch should prove contagious; for we do not willingly touch any putrid gore.

The words, live in your blood, may be thus explained, as at first God did not deign to take care of the people. But it is evident from the context that God here expresses the secret power by which the people were preserved, contrary to common expectations. For if we consider what has been previously said, the people surely would not have lived a single day unless they had received strength from this voice of God.

For if a newborn child is cast out, how can it bear the cold of the night? Surely it will instantly expire. And I have already said that death is prepared for infants unless their umbilical cord is cut. Since, therefore, a hundred deaths encompassed the people, they could never have remained alive had not the secret voice of God sustained them.

God, therefore, in commanding them to live, already shows that He was willingly and wonderfully preserving them amidst various kinds of death. As it is said in the 68th Psalm (Psalms 68:20), In His hands are the issues of death, so that death is converted into life, since He is the sovereign and lord of both.

But this phrase is doubled, since the people were afflicted in Egypt for no short period. If that tyranny had endured only a few years, they must have been consumed. But their slavery was protracted for many years, which is why that remarkable wonder occurred: that their remembrance and their name were not, as often happens in such circumstances, cut off.

We see then that God has reason enough to speak that sentence in which the safety of the people was included: live in your bloods, live in your bloods. The fact itself shows the people to have been preserved because it pleased God. The history that Moses relates in the book of Exodus is a mirror in which we may behold the living image of that life, which we have mentioned as drawing its whole vitality from the secret good pleasure of God.

Now the question is asked: why did God not openly and directly take up His people and treat them as kindly as He did during their youth? The reason is sufficiently clear: if the people had been freed at the very beginning, the memory of the benefit would have soon vanished, and God’s power would have been more obscure.

For we know that humans, unless thoroughly convinced of their own misery, never acknowledge that they have obtained safety through God’s pity.

The people, then, had to live in such a way as always to have death before their eyes—indeed, as if they were bound by the chains of death. It lived, then, in bloods, that is, in the tomb, like a carcass remaining in its own putridness, its life in the meantime lying hidden. So it happened to the descendants of Abraham.

Now, then, we understand God’s intention in not raising up the descendants of Abraham with grandeur from the beginning, but allowing them to drag out a miserable life and to be steeped in the very pollution of death.

Here, what I recently touched upon is now clearly expressed: that the people, in their extreme distress, were not only safe but also increased by God’s special favor. For if an infant, after being exposed, retains its life, it will still be a weak and undeveloped being. Therefore, God, by this circumstance, magnifies His favor, since the people increased as if they had been properly and attentively cared for, and as if no act of kindness had been omitted.

This is the meaning of the words they were increased. For though He looks to the propagation of Abraham’s family, yet the simile is to be observed, for the people are compared to a girl exposed in a field from her birth, and their growth took place when God increased them so incredibly, as we know.

And surely God’s blessing was great when they entered Egypt, 75 in number, and were many thousands when they left it (Acts 7:14; Exodus 12:37). For within 250 years, the family of Abraham was so multiplied that they amounted to 800,000 when God freed them. But since the Prophet speaks metaphorically when he says the people were increased, and, under the image of a tender girl, until they grew up to a proper age, he meanwhile shows that this was done only by the wonderful counsel and power of God.

I placed thee, he says. God claims for Himself the praise for this great multiplication and then strengthens what I have said, namely, that the people’s safety was included in that phrase live in bloods. Then he says, she came into ornament of ornaments. Here עדי, gnedi, cannot mean any occasional ornament, since it is added directly, thou wast naked and bare.

It follows then that it refers to personal comeliness. It means not only that the girl grew in tall stature but also in beauty of person. Therefore, elegance and loveliness are indicated here, as the context shows us. Thou camest then to excellent or exquisite beauty, for we know this to be the meaning of the genitive, signifying excellence.

He adds at the same time, thy breasts were made ready, for כון, kon, means to prepare, to strengthen; but as he is speaking of breasts, I have no doubt that he means them to have swelled as they ought to do. Thy breasts then were fashioned, that is, of the right size, as in marriageable girls.

Thy hair also grew long. Finally, the Prophet expresses so plainly what he could have said more concisely, because of the people’s dullness. Thy hair grew long, whilst thou wast naked and bare; that is, as yet you had no external adornment. You were like a marriageable girl—you had great beauty of person, a noble stature, and all parts of your body well-proportioned, but you had cause to be ashamed of your nakedness.

And such was the condition of the people, since the Egyptians devised everything against them and conspired by all means for their destruction. We see then how God stretched out His hand not only for the people’s defense but also to deliver them from the tyranny of Pharaoh and of all Egypt. He indicates that the time of their redemption was near, because the people had increased and multiplied, just like a girl who had reached her twentieth year.

God now reproaches the Jews concerning His kindness towards them, since He had clothed them in splendid ornaments, and yet they afterwards cast themselves into the vilest lusts, as we shall see. But we must remember that the Prophet is now speaking of the time of their liberation. God says, however, that He passed by again and saw the state of the people — not that He had ever forgotten it.

For we know that even when He acts as if He does not see, and seems to shut His eyes and turn them from us, or even to sleep, yet He is always concerned for our safety. And we have already said that His present power was needed so that the people could prolong their lives, since if He had not breathed life into them, a hundred deaths would have immediately prevailed.

But it is quite common and customary to understand God’s manifest presence as an open declaration of His help. When God appears so openly to deliver us that it may be perceived by our senses, then He is said to look down upon us, to rise up, and to turn Himself towards us.

He passed by, then, near the people, namely, when He called Moses out of the desert and appointed him the minister of His favor (Exodus 3). He then saw His people and proved by this event that He had not utterly cast them away. I looked, then, and behold thy time, thy time of years.

Here God speaks in very human terms, yet in a way the people could understand. For He is depicted as a man struck with the beauty of a girl and offering her marriage. But God is not affected as men are, as we well know, so it is not according to His nature to love as young men do.

But such was the people’s stupidity that they could not be effectively taught unless the Prophet adapted Himself to their unrefined understanding. Also, the people had by no means been lovely if God had not embraced them with His kindness, so that His love depended on His good pleasure towards them.

So by the time of loves, we ought to understand the complete time of their redemption, for God had determined to bring the people out of Egypt when He pleased. This had been promised to Abraham, namely, that after four hundred years God would be their avenger (Genesis 15:13–14; Acts 7:6–7). We see, then, that the years were previously fixed in which God would redeem the people.

He now compares that union to a marriage. Hence, if God would bind His people to Himself by a marriage, He would also pledge Himself to conjugal fidelity. But I cannot proceed further — I must leave the rest until tomorrow.

Prayer:

Grant, Almighty God, since from our first origin we have been entirely accursed, so that we were entirely foul and polluted in Your sight, that we may be mindful of our condition, and acknowledge Your inestimable pity towards us, since You have condescended to draw us from the lowest state, and to adopt us among Your children. And may we so desire to spend our whole life in obedience to You, that we may at last enjoy that blessed glory to which You have called us, and which You have prepared for us in Your only-begotten Son. Amen.

[Exposition continues from previous day's lecture]

We began yesterday to explain another point that the Prophet discusses, namely, the liberation of the people. For that was the fitting time when God espoused them to Himself. He now adds, that He spread out the skirt of His garment to cover the foulness and disgrace of the people.

This spreading encompasses all the mighty deeds God exercised in freeing His people. For He then delivered them from all the reproaches with which they were shamefully and disgracefully treated in Egypt. Some think that it was a nuptial rite for a spouse or husband to cover the bride with his garment, but this is only a conjecture.

Hence I simply interpret it: the border of the garment was spread out when God vindicated His people from the reproaches by which they had been deformed. He afterwards adds, and I have sworn to thee, and come into covenant with thee. There is no doubt that this refers to the promulgation of the law.

For although God had long ago made a covenant with Abraham, and the adoption of the people was founded upon it, yet that favor, on the people’s part, had almost vanished, as I said yesterday; hence God declares that He had, so to speak, adopted the people anew. It was like the renewal of the covenant, when God bound the people to Himself by a fixed law and prescribed a fixed method of worship.

These, then, were the customary marriage rites. But God rightly declares that He had come into covenant, because He then joined the people to Himself. From this also come those words of praise from Moses: What nation is so illustrious under heaven, which has God so near them, as thy God approaches unto thee? You shall be to me a kingdom of priests; you shall be my inheritance (Deuteronomy 4:7; Exodus 19:6).

We should note the word swear as emphatic, for God magnifies His grace when He says that He swore. If we consider the majesty of God and what His people were, it is surely incredible that God should condescend so far as to swear like men who are accustomed to pledge their faith and to confirm it with an oath.

Now, therefore, we see the unique benefit expressed here with which God adorned His people when, at the giving of the law, He chose them as His own and appointed them to be a kingdom of priests.