Ezekiel 22:9

9 In you there are men who say evil of others, causing death; in you they have taken the flesh with the blood for food; in your streets they have put evil designs into effect.

Ezekiel 22:9 Meaning and Commentary

Ezekiel 22:9

In thee are men that carry tales to shed blood
Innocent blood, as the Targum; such who go from house to house, as pedlars do, with their wares or spices, as the word F1 signifies; hence the Syriac version renders it "merchants"; and carry tales and lies of innocent persons, and stir up others against them to wrath and revenge, and shed their blood; or that go to the courts of judicature, and there accuse innocent persons, and bear false witness against them, to the taking away of their lives. The Septuagint and Arabic versions render it "thieves": who commonly are murderers: and in thee they eat upon the mountains; that is, there were such in Jerusalem who used to go to the mountains where idols were worshipped, and eat the things that were sacrificed to them; or partook of the feast made to the honour of them. So the Targum,

``in thee they served idols on the mountains:''
in the midst of thee they commit lewdness;
a general word for all manner of uncleanness, as adultery, fornication, incest of which some particulars follow.
FOOTNOTES:

F1 (lykr yvna) "homines mercaturae, [vel] aromatis"; so Ben Melech observes.

Ezekiel 22:9 In-Context

7 In you they have had no respect for father and mother; in you they have been cruel to the man from a strange land; in you they have done wrong to the child without a father and to the widow.
8 You have made little of my holy things, and have made my Sabbaths unclean.
9 In you there are men who say evil of others, causing death; in you they have taken the flesh with the blood for food; in your streets they have put evil designs into effect.
10 In you they have let the shame of their fathers be seen; in you they have done wrong to a woman at the time when she was unclean.
11 And in you one man has done what was disgusting with his neighbour's wife; and another has made his daughter-in-law unclean; and another has done wrong to his sister, his father's daughter.
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