Ezekiel 22:9

9 1There are men in you who slander to shed blood, and people in you 2who eat on the mountains; 3they commit lewdness in your midst.

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 Father and mother are treated with contempt in you; the sojourner suffers extortion in your midst; the fatherless and the widow are wronged in you.
8 You have despised my holy things and profaned my Sabbaths.
9 There are men in you who slander to shed blood, and people in you who eat on the mountains; they commit lewdness in your midst.
10 In you men uncover their fathers' nakedness; in you they violate women who are unclean in their menstrual impurity.
11 One commits abomination with his neighbor's wife; another lewdly defiles his daughter-in-law; another in you violates his sister, his father's daughter.

Cross References 3

  • 1. Leviticus 19:16; [1 Samuel 22:9-19]
  • 2. See Ezekiel 18:6
  • 3. Ezekiel 16:43
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.