John Calvin Commentary Ezekiel 20:43

"And there shall ye remember your ways, and all your doings, wherein ye have polluted yourselves; and ye shall loathe yourselves in your own sight for all your evils that ye have committed." — Ezekiel 20:43 (ASV)

Here God shows that He would eventually be favorable to His elect when they repented. Thus, He signifies that there was no other means of reconciliation than through repentance. And we must carefully note this, as I have previously mentioned. For we know how securely all people usually indulge themselves, nor are even the pious themselves affected with sufficiently serious grief when God invites them to the hope of safety and at the same time offers pardon.

Indeed, they greedily embrace what they hear, but meanwhile, they bury their sins. But God desires us to taste His goodness, so that the remembrance of our crimes will be bitter, and also so that everyone will judge himself in order to obtain pardon from Him. Now, therefore, we understand the Prophet’s intention.

We saw a similar passage in Jeremiah; this teaching occurs throughout the Prophets. There, He says, you shall remember me. The circumstance of place should be noted, because the Prophet means that after the elect have returned to God’s favor, and He will account them as true members of His Church, then they ought to be mindful of their former life and to repent of their sins.

It is as if He had said: As long as God afflicts you and you remain under the tyranny of the Gentiles in exile, the awareness of your evils will compel you to groan. Consequently, the remembrance of your sins should return.

This is because, whether you want to or not, their punishment will always be before your eyes; for otherwise, they would be easily persuaded that their sentence was merely usual and common.

But He shows them that the sons of God are to be mindful of their sins not only when they feel themselves chastised by Him and experience His hostility. They are also to be mindful when, received into favor and enjoying their inheritance, they live under God’s wings, and He cherishes them as His tender offspring.

Therefore, even when the faithful are treated so humanely by God, the Prophet shows that in this condition they still ought to be mindful of their sins. And all your works in which you have been polluted, He says.

He now shows for what purpose they were to be mindful. For the wicked are compelled to remember their sins when God, by forcibly turning their attention to them, makes them consider what they desire to bury in oblivion. But here it is said, you shall be confounded in your own sight.

Since the Hebrew word קוט, kot, means “to cut off,” many interpreters take it as “you shall be cut off.” This means you will judge yourselves worthy of destruction among those whom God will cut off and blot out from the earth. But this interpretation seems forced.

Since the same word sometimes means “to litigate” and “to become abominable,” I willingly accept this meaning: that they shall be abominable, or contemptible, in their own sight. That is, they will be so ashamed as to willingly and fully acknowledge themselves utterly disgraced.

Hence, Ezekiel means that the faithful should suffer voluntary disgrace, so that they may glorify God by the pure and genuine confession of their shame. If anyone prefers to interpret it as, “you shall be condemned or convinced,” that sense will suit well enough. However, I have already presented what seemed more straightforward.

For I said that this was the fruit of penitence. This fruit is seen when we are confounded before God and are vile and despicable in our own eyes. It is also seen when we not only allow ourselves to be condemned by others but also inwardly reflect upon our own disgrace, and so of our own accord prostrate ourselves before God.

This, then, is the fruit of penitence; this is true humility, flowing from genuine shame.