Ezekiel 20:18
 Ezekiel 20:18 
New International Version (©2011)
I said to their children in the wilderness, "Do not follow the statutes of your parents or keep their laws or defile yourselves with their idols.

New Living Translation (©2007)
"Then I warned their children not to follow in their parents' footsteps, defiling themselves with their idols.

English Standard Version (©2001)
“And I said to their children in the wilderness, Do not walk in the statutes of your fathers, nor keep their rules, nor defile yourselves with their idols.

New American Standard Bible (©1995)
"I said to their children in the wilderness, 'Do not walk in the statutes of your fathers or keep their ordinances or defile yourselves with their idols.

King James Bible (Cambridge Ed.)
But I said unto their children in the wilderness, Walk ye not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their judgments, nor defile yourselves with their idols:

Holman Christian Standard Bible (©2009)
Then I said to their children in the wilderness: Don't follow the statutes of your fathers, defile yourselves with their idols, or keep their ordinances.

International Standard Version (©2012)
I told their children in the wilderness, 'You are not to follow the statutes of your ancestors, observe their ordinances, or be defiled by their idols.

NET Bible (©2006)
"'But I said to their children in the wilderness, "Do not follow the practices of your fathers; do not observe their regulations, nor defile yourselves with their idols.

GOD'S WORD® Translation (©1995)
I said to their children in the desert, "Don't live by the laws of your ancestors. Don't obey their rules or dishonor yourselves with their disgusting idols.

King James 2000 Bible (©2003)
But I said unto their children in the wilderness, Walk you not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their judgments, nor defile yourselves with their idols:

American King James Version
But I said to their children in the wilderness, Walk you not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their judgments, nor defile yourselves with their idols:

American Standard Version
And I said unto their children in the wilderness, Walk ye not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their ordinances, nor defile yourselves with their idols.

Douay-Rheims Bible
And I said to their children in the wilderness: Walk not in the statutes of your fathers, and observe not their judgments, nor be ye defiled with their idols:

Darby Bible Translation
And I said unto their children in the wilderness, Walk not in the statutes of your fathers, neither keep their ordinances, nor defile yourselves with their idols.

English Revised Version
And I said unto their children in the wilderness, Walk ye not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their judgments, nor defile yourselves with their idols:

Webster's Bible Translation
But I said to their children in the wilderness, Walk ye not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their judgments, nor defile yourselves with their idols:

World English Bible
I said to their children in the wilderness, Don't walk in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their ordinances, nor defile yourselves with their idols.

Young's Literal Translation
And I say to their sons in the wilderness: In the statutes of your fathers ye walk not, And their judgments ye do not observe, And with their idols ye are not defiled.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

20:10-26. The history of Israel in the wilderness is referred to in the new Testament as well as in the Old, for warning. God did great things for them. He gave them the law, and revived the ancient keeping of the sabbath day. Sabbaths are privileges; they are signs of our being his people. If we do the duty of the day, we shall find, to our comfort, it is the Lord that makes us holy, that is, truly happy, here; and prepares us to be happy, that is, perfectly holy, hereafter. The Israelites rebelled, and were left to the judgments they brought upon themselves. God sometimes makes sin to be its own punishment, yet he is not the Author of sin: there needs no more to make men miserable, than to give them up to their own evil desires and passions.


Pulpit Commentary

Verse 18. - I said unto their children, etc. The words can refer to nothing but the great utterance of the Book of Deuteronomy as addressed to the children of those who had perished in the wilderness. That utterance also, it is implied, as indeed the Baal-peor history at the close of the forty years showed, fell on deaf ears. Then also there was, once again, in the inevitable anthropomorphic language, a change of purpose, from that of a rigorous judgment to the mercy which prevailed against it.


Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

But I said unto their children in the wilderness,.... Or, "then I said" (k); his judgments and statutes being neglected and despised by them, and good instructions and kind providences being of no use unto them, the Lord turns to their posterity while yet in the wilderness: what follows seems to refer to those directions, instructions, and exhortations given in the book of Deuteronomy by Moses, in the plains of Moab, a little before the children of Israel went over Jordan into the land of Canaan:

walk ye not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their judgments; they were not only not to imitate their parents in their open sins and transgressions of God's law; but they were not to follow them in the observance of such rules of worship, which were of their own devising, and they had formed into a law: this makes greatly against such who think it a very heinous sin to relinquish the religion of their ancestors, or that in which they were brought up; but if this does not appear to be according to the word of God, the statutes and judgments of our fathers should stand for nothing, yea, should be rejected:

nor defile yourselves with their idols; idolatry, as it is abominable to God, is defiling to men, and renders them loathsome to him; and it being what their fathers practised will not excuse them; for, as it was defiling to their fathers, it is no less so to their children.

(k) "postea dixi", Piscator.


Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

18. I said unto their children—being unwilling to speak any more to the fathers as being incorrigible.

Walk ye not in … statutes of … fathers—The traditions of the fathers are to be carefully weighed, not indiscriminately followed. He forbids the imitation of not only their gross sins, but even their plausible statutes [Calvin].


Ezekiel 20:18 Parallel Commentaries

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Rebellion in Egypt
16Because they despised my judgments, and walked not in my statutes, but polluted my sabbaths: for their heart went after their idols. 17Nevertheless my eye spared them from destroying them, neither did I make an end of them in the wilderness. 18But I said to their children in the wilderness, Walk you not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe their judgments, nor defile yourselves with their idols:

Numbers 14:31 As for your children that you said would be taken as plunder, I will bring them in to enjoy the land you have rejected.
Deuteronomy 4:3 You saw with your own eyes what the LORD did at Baal Peor. The LORD your God destroyed from among you everyone who followed the Baal of Peor,
Psalm 78:8 They would not be like their ancestors-- a stubborn and rebellious generation, whose hearts were not loyal to God, whose spirits were not faithful to him.
Psalm 106:39 They defiled themselves by what they did; by their deeds they prostituted themselves.
Jeremiah 11:10 They have returned to the sins of their ancestors, who refused to listen to my words. They have followed other gods to serve them. Both Israel and Judah have broken the covenant I made with their ancestors.
Ezekiel 2:3 He said: "Son of man, I am sending you to the Israelites, to a rebellious nation that has rebelled against me; they and their ancestors have been in revolt against me to this very day.
Ezekiel 18:19 "Yet you ask, 'Why does the son not share the guilt of his father?' Since the son has done what is just and right and has been careful to keep all my decrees, he will surely live.
Amos 2:4 This is what the LORD says: "For three sins of Judah, even for four, I will not relent. Because they have rejected the law of the LORD and have not kept his decrees, because they have been led astray by false gods, the gods their ancestors followed,
Zechariah 1:4 Do not be like your ancestors, to whom the earlier prophets proclaimed: This is what the LORD Almighty says: 'Turn from your evil ways and your evil practices.' But they would not listen or pay attention to me, declares the LORD.