John Calvin Commentary Ezekiel 16:44-46

"Behold, every one that useth proverbs shall use [this] proverb against thee, saying, As is the mother, so is her daughter. Thou art the daughter of thy mother, that loatheth her husband and her children; and thou art the sister of thy sisters, who loathed their husbands and their children: your mother was a Hittite, and your father an Amorite. And thine elder sister is Samaria, that dwelleth at thy left hand, she and her daughters; and thy younger sister, that dwelleth at thy right hand, is Sodom and her daughters." — Ezekiel 16:44-46 (ASV)

Here the Prophet uses another form of speech, for he says that the Jews deserved to be subject to the taunting proverbs of those who delight in wickedness. The meaning is that they were worthy of extreme infamy, so that their disgrace was spread about in common sayings. This is one point. He now adds that proverbs of this kind were the Jews’ just deserts—the daughter is like her mother and sisters. Then he says, their mother was a Hittite, and their sisters Samaria and Sodom.

We must briefly treat these clauses in order. When the Prophet speaks of proverbs, he undoubtedly means what I have mentioned: namely, that the crimes of the nation deserved for their infamy to spread widely on the tongues of all. For there are many sins that are hidden, either through their being overlooked or their not seeming to be much noticed.

If anyone surpasses all others in cruelty, avarice, lust, and other vices, his disgrace will be notorious, and he will be pointed at by common proverbs. Therefore, Ezekiel dwells on the people’s wickedness, since they supply material for everyone to laugh at their expense. For he alludes to buffoons and wits, and those who are ingenious in creating common sayings.

The maker of proverbs shall utter this proverb against you: like mother like daughter. There is no doubt that they used this saying at that period, and it often happens that daughters’ faults are like their mothers’.

Indeed, daughters often degenerate from the best mothers. Matrons will be found who excel in the virtues of modesty, chastity, sobriety, and watchfulness, while their daughters are rash and proud, luxurious, lustful, and intemperate. But it usually happens that a mother has wicked daughters like herself; this happens less by nature than by education. For a woman of a perverse inclination will think that a stigma attaches to herself if her daughter is better than she is, and so she will wish to form her according to her own morals. Therefore, it happens that few daughters are found modest whose mothers are immodest, and few sober who have been brought up by drunkards.

Since experience, therefore, always taught the similarity between mothers and daughters, this proverb was consequently in the mouth of everyone. Proverbs, however, are not always true, but only generally; but God sometimes extends His pity so far that the daughter of a wicked woman is honorable and well-behaved.

But this is very rare; therefore, this proverbial saying cannot be rejected—like mother like daughter. It now follows: you are the daughter of your mother—that is, altogether like her. And this phrase is equally common among us, “You are your father’s son,” namely, you are like him in your sins.

Thus the Prophet means that the nation was like their mother, since it differed in nothing from the Canaanites and the Hittites. He also adds, sister and their daughters, as if he would gather the whole family. He says that Samaria is their elder sister, and Sodom their younger.

I do not know whether those who think that Samaria is called older than Jerusalem, because it revolted first from the worship of God, have sufficient grounds for their interpretation. For as we continue, we shall see that Samaria is compared with Sodom; and since Sodom is the worst, it is very naturally compared with it. For Jerusalem will afterwards be placed in the highest rank, because it had surpassed them all in enormity.

Samaria therefore is one of the sisters, and so is Sodom. These towns are called daughters, for we know that Sodom was not the only one destroyed by fire from heaven, since there were five cities (Genesis 10:19 and Genesis 19:25). We see, then, why those smaller nearby cities were called daughters of Sodom. As far as Samaria is concerned, it was the head of the kingdom of Israel; therefore, all the cities of the ten tribes were called its daughters.

With relation to the father, the Prophet says here more than he had ventured before. He says, their father was an Amorite, as if the Jews had sprung from profane nations and did not draw their origin from a holy parent. And the Prophet very often makes this objection, not that they were illegitimate or descended according to the flesh from the uncircumcised Gentiles, but because they were unworthy of their father Abraham, through being degenerate.

In summary, God here signifies that the parents of the Jews were not only profane nations but utterly reprobate—those whom God, for very just reasons, had ordered to be destroyed, since they had contaminated the earth with their crimes for far too long. He says that the Jews were like a daughter sprung from the most abandoned parents.

As to his saying that the mother as well as sisters had despised their husbands, this may seem absurd. But we know that in proverbs, parables, examples, and comparisons, not every detail should be insisted upon with the utmost precision. When Christ’s coming is said to be like a thief (Matthew 24:43–44), if anyone here desires to be overly clever and inquires how Christ is like a thief, that would be absurd.

And also in this place, when it is said, your mother has abandoned her husband and her sons, and your sisters have done the same. God simply means that both the mother and sisters of Jerusalem were impure and treacherous women—and cruel also, since they not only had violated the marriage pledge, thereby breaking through all chastity, but were also like ferocious beasts against their own sons (Luke 12:39–40; 1 Thessalonians 5:2).

He reproves the crime which we exposed yesterday: that of the Jews burning their own sons. In summary, he means to compare the Jews with the Canaanites, the Samaritans, and the Sodomites, in both treachery and cruelty. Therefore, they are first condemned for throwing away all modesty and conjugal fidelity, and next for forgetting all humanity.