Ezra 9:11

11 Which you gave to your servants the prophets, saying, The land into which you are going, to take it for a heritage, is an unclean land, because of the evil lives of the peoples of the land and their disgusting ways, which have made the land unclean from end to end.

Ezra 9:11 Meaning and Commentary

Ezra 9:11

Which thou hast commanded by thy servants the prophets
Moses, and Joshua, and others, see ( Deuteronomy 7:3 ) ( Joshua 23:12 ) ( Judges 2:2 )

saying, the land, unto which ye go to possess it;
meaning the land of Canaan:

is an unclean land with the filthiness of the people of the lands,
with their abominations, which have filled it from one end to another
with their uncleanness;
which is to be understood not of their idolatries only, but of their incestuous marriages, and impure copulations, on which account the Lord spewed out the old inhabitants of it; for which reason the Jews ought to have been careful not to have defiled it again by similar practices; see ( Leviticus 18:1-30 ) .

Ezra 9:11 In-Context

9 For we are servants; but our God has not been turned away from us in our prison, but has had mercy on us before the eyes of the kings of Persia, to give us new strength to put up again the house of our God and to make fair its waste places, and to give us a wall in Judah and Jerusalem.

10 And now, O our God, what are we to say after this? for we have not kept your laws,

11 Which you gave to your servants the prophets, saying, The land into which you are going, to take it for a heritage, is an unclean land, because of the evil lives of the peoples of the land and their disgusting ways, which have made the land unclean from end to end.

12 So now do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons or do anything for their peace or well-being for ever; so that you may be strong, living on the good of the land, and handing it on to your children for a heritage for ever.

13 And after everything which has come on us because of our evil-doing and our great sin, and seeing that the punishment which you, O God, have given us, is less than the measure of our sins, and that you have kept from death those of us who are here;