Ezekiel 20:7

7 And I said to them, 1Cast away the detestable things 2your eyes feast on, every one of you, and do not defile yourselves with 3the idols of Egypt; 4I am the LORD your God.

Ezekiel 20:7 Meaning and Commentary

Ezekiel 20:7

Then I said unto them
Having promised and swore to do such great and good things for them; which must lay them under an obligation to regard what he should command them: promises and blessings of goodness are great incentives to duty, and lay under great obligation to it: cast ye away every man the abominations of his eyes;
which should be so, meaning idols; but which his eyes were taken with, and were lifted up unto, as his gods; though they ought to have been rejected with the utmost abhorrence, as abominable: and defile not yourselves with the idols of Egypt;
their "dunghill gods", as the word F6 signifies; which to worship, as it was an abomination to God, was defiling to themselves; yet these they were fond of, and prone to worship them; their eyes and their hearts were after them; and they needed such cautions and instructions as these, backed with the following strong reason against such idolatry: I [am] the Lord your God;
their Creator and Benefactor, their covenant God; the only Lord God, and whom only they ought to serve and worship; to whom they were under ten thousand obligations; and who was infinitely above all the idols of Egypt.


FOOTNOTES:

F6 (ylwlgb) "stercoreis diis", Junius & Tremellius, Polanus; "stercoribus", Piscator, Cocceius.

Ezekiel 20:7 In-Context

5 and say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD: On the day when I chose Israel, I swore to the offspring of the house of Jacob, making myself known to them in the land of Egypt; I swore to them, saying, I am the LORD your God.
6 On that day I swore to them that I would bring them out of the land of Egypt into a land that I had searched out for them, a land flowing with milk and honey, the most glorious of all lands.
7 And I said to them, Cast away the detestable things your eyes feast on, every one of you, and do not defile yourselves with the idols of Egypt; I am the LORD your God.
8 But they rebelled against me and were not willing to listen to me. None of them cast away the detestable things their eyes feasted on, nor did they forsake the idols of Egypt. "Then I said I would pour out my wrath upon them and spend my anger against them in the midst of the land of Egypt.
9 But I acted for the sake of my name, that it should not be profaned in the sight of the nations among whom they lived, in whose sight I made myself known to them in bringing them out of the land of Egypt.

Cross References 4

  • 1. [ver. 8; Ezekiel 18:31]
  • 2. [ver. 24]
  • 3. [ver. 18; Leviticus 18:3]
  • 4. ver. 19; See Exodus 20:2
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.