And the houses of Jerusalem
Where the common people dwelt: and the houses of the kings of Judah;
the palaces of the king, princes, and nobles of Judah, one as well as another: shall be defiled os Tophet;
as that was defiled with the bodies and bones of the slain, and with the faith of the city brought unto it; so the houses of great and small, high and low, should be defiled with the carcasses of the slain that should lie unburied there; their houses should be their graves, and they buried in the ruins of them: or, "the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Judah, which are defiled" F19, with the idolatries after mentioned, shall be as Tophet, places of slaughter: because of all the houses upon whose roofs they have burnt incense to
all the host of heaven;
the roofs of houses with the Jews were built flat; and, as they sometimes used them for prayer to the God of heaven, as Peter did, ( Acts 10:9 ) ; idolaters used them to burn incense on to the sun, moon, and stars; to which they were nearer, and of which they could have a clearer view upon the house tops, and therefore chose them for this purpose; and so common was this sort of idolatry, that it was practised upon most, if not all, the houses in Jerusalem; see ( Zephaniah 1:5 ) ; and have poured out drink offerings unto other gods;
besides the God of Israel; to Baal, and other Heathen deities.