Ezekiel 22:15

And I will scatter thee among the heathen, and disperse thee in the countries, and will consume thy filthiness out of thee.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

22:1-16 The prophet is to judge the bloody city; the city of bloods. Jerusalem is so called, because of her crimes. The sins which Jerusalem stands charged with, are exceeding sinful. Murder, idolatry, disobedience to parents, oppression and extortion, profanation of the sabbath and holy things, seventh commandment sins, lewdness and adultery. Unmindfulness of God was at the bottom of all this wickedness. Sinners provoke God because they forget him. Jerusalem has filled the measure of her sins. Those who give up themselves to be ruled by their lusts, will justly be given up to be portioned by them. Those who resolve to be their own masters, let them expect no other happiness than their own hands can furnish; and a miserable portion it will prove.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Set apart for pollution - Or, "unclean by reason of impurity" Leviticus 12:2.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

15. consume thy filthiness out of thee—the object of God in scattering the Jews.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

I will scatter thee, as the wind scatters chaff, among the heathen, the worst of the Babylonish vassals.

And disperse thee in the countries; doubled for certainty of the thing.

Consume thy filthiness out of thee: some take it for a threat by a fire, that shall consume the filthy sinners, and the filthy sins will cease; or else, that by removing them out of Jerusalem into captivity, and reducing them to a very low condition, they should not any more commit, but for ever loathe, their wickedness: some take it for a promise of purging mercy to better them, i.e. the remnant of them, when the rest are destroyed and wasted.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And I will scatter thee among the Heathen, and disperse thee in the countries,.... Not only cause them to be carried captive to some one place, as Babylon; but to be scattered and dispersed throughout the various provinces of it, and in other nations, as chaff is by the winds; signifying hereby the power by which it would be done; their weakness, who would not be able to hinder it; and the uncomfortable condition they would be in:

and will consume thy filthiness out of thee; by destroying some filthy persons, and reforming others; by bringing them by means of those afflictions to a sense of their sins, and to forsake them; and so would be refined as silver from its dross in a furnace: it may have a particular reference to their idolatry, that filthy sin, which they were cured of, and purged from, by their captivity, and to which they returned no more.

Geneva Study Bible

And I will scatter thee among the nations, and disperse thee in the countries, and will consume thy {h} filthiness out of thee.

(h) I will thus take away the occasion of your wickedness.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

15. Cf. ch. Ezekiel 23:27-28, Ezekiel 36:25; Ezekiel 36:29.

Ezekiel 22:15

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The Lord is enraged at such abominable doings. He will interfere, and put an end to them by scattering Judah among the heathen. - Ezekiel 22:13. And, behold, I smite my hand because of thy gain which thou hast made, and over thy bloodguiltiness which is in the midst of thee. Ezekiel 22:14. Will thy heart indeed stand firm, or will thy hands be strong for the day when I shall deal with thee? I Jehovah have spoken it, and also do it. Ezekiel 22:15. I will scatter thee among the nations, and disperse thee in the lands, and will utterly remove thine uncleanness from thee. Ezekiel 22:16. And thou wilt be desecrated through thyself before the eyes of the nations, and know that I am Jehovah. - Ezekiel 22:13 is closely connected with the preceding verse. This serves to explain the fact that the only sins mentioned as exciting the wrath of God are covetousness and blood-guiltiness. הכּה , as 2 Kings 11:12 clearly shows, is a contracted expression for הכּה כּף אל (Ezekiel 21:19), and the smiting of the hands together is a gesture indicative of wrathful indignation. For the form דּמך, contracted from דּמיך, see the comm. on Ezekiel 16:45. - As Ezekiel 22:13 leads on to the threatening of judgment, so does Ezekiel 22:14 point in anticipation to the terrible nature of the judgment itself. The question, "will thy heart stand firm?" involves a warning against security. עמד is the opposite of נמס (cf. Ezekiel 21:12), as standing forms the antithesis to passing away (cf. Psalm 102:27). עשׂה אותך, as in Ezekiel 16:59 and Ezekiel 7:27. The Lord will scatter them (cf. Ezekiel 12:15; Ezekiel 20:23), and remove the uncleanness of sin, namely, by purifying the people in exile (cf. Isaiah 4:4). התם, from תּמם, to cause to cease, with מן, to take completely away. נחלתּ, Niphal of חלל fo lahpiN ,נחלתּ ., connected with לעיני גּוים, as in Ezekiel 20:9, not from נחל, as many of the commentators who follow the Septuagint and Vulgate suppose. בּך, not in te, in thyself, but through thee, i.e., through thy sinful conduct and its consequences.