Ezekiel 16:25

Eze 16:25 Thou hast built thy high place at every head of the way, and hast made thy beauty to be abhorred, and hast opened thy feet to every one that passed by, and multiplied thy whoredoms.

Ver. 25. And hast made thy beauty to be abhorred.] By being made so cheap and common. Sin is a reproach to any people, {Pro 14:34} idolatry especially. {1Pe 4:3}

And hast opened thy feet.] See on Eze 16:15.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Or, head.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

at every head of the way--in the most frequented places (Pro 9:14).

thy beauty . . . abhorred, . . . opened . . . feet to every one--The wanton advances were all on Israel's part; the idolatrous nations yielded to her nothing in return. She had yielded so much that, like a worn-out prostitute, her tempters became weary of her. When the Church lowers her testimony for God to the carnal tastes of the world, with a view to conciliation, she loses everything and gains nothing.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

He now adds, that he made their beauty to be abhorred. I have no doubt that the Prophet alludes to the filthiness of abandoned women; and even the Latins called them “worn out,” whose foulness arises from their utterly giving themselves up to every wickedness. The Prophet then says that the people were not only like an abandoned woman who engages in impure amours, but that their conduct was gross in the extreme; for though many gratify improper desires through intemperate lust, yet they fastidiously reject those foul and shameless females who are notorious for profligacy. The Prophet means, then, that the people had come to such a pitch of abomination, just as the most abandoned of the sex. He now adds, you have spread thy feet to every passer-by, and have multiplied thy fornications. This is taken also from the conduct of harlots and confirms what we have already explained, that the Jews indulged not only in one kind of idolatry, but were prone to all abominations, like females who beset the paths, and address all they meet, and not only so, but shamelessly spread their feet everywhere to entice admirers.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

25. thy high place] See Eze_16:24.

made … to be abhorred] This sense is doubtful; the word means to abominate, hence dishonour or disregard, or as we might say “prostitute thy beauty.”

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Thou hast also committed fornication with the Egyptians,.... By entering into leagues and alliances with them, and seeking to them for help and assistance against their enemies; from whose bondage they had formerly been delivered, and whose society they were cautioned against; and yet they forsook the Lord, and joined themselves to them by solemn covenant; and not only so, but fell into the worship of their idols, who were a people of all others the most superstitious, and given to idolatry; and many of their idolatrous rites and ceremonies were received and retained by the Jews, as the worshipping of Tammuz, and other idols:

thy neighbours, great of flesh: being their neighbours, and full of power and strength to assist them, they courted their friendship and alliance; and their idolatries being many and monstrous, were the more courted by them: the allusion is to women of shameless impudence and insatiable lust, who covet men, whose flesh is as the flesh of asses, and their issue as horses, Eze 23:20; flesh here signifies the privy parts of men; so Ben Melech;

and hast increased thy whoredoms, to provoke my anger; multiplied their idolatries, which they learned of the Egyptians, a people much given thereunto; and which were abominable and highly provoking to God, Pe1 4:3. The Targum is,

"thou hast increased thine idols.''

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Sign; altars of idols. (Haydock) --- She makes no secret of her apostacy. The Greeks and Romans marked the houses of prostitutes, that honest men might avoid them. "The deemed the profession of such a crime a sufficient punishment to repress impure women." (Tacitus, Annal.)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Not content with what was done in the city, she built her idol temples and shows in the country, in places where many ways or roads met, wheresoever it was likely passengers would come.

Hast made thy beauty to be abhorred, as the beauty of a shameless whore is abhorred by them to whom she offers herself. In her high places every passenger might meet his own god, and worship his own idol, and then satisfy his lust with lewd women, common as the street; and this made men abhor that beauty they would have admired, dressed in modesty, and dwelling retired.

Hast opened thy feet; a modest expressing of the most immodest practice of lewd and insatiable adulteresses and whores, which are ready for every comer, and tempt such as tempt not them, Eze 16:32,33.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

25. To every one that passed by — This unfaithful wife has become a common prostitute (see Eze_16:15; Eze_23:40). The religion which was her beauty has become abhorrent since it has been mixed with the vile practices and superstitions of every false cult. “This description is certainly not to our taste, but it must be remembered that Ezekiel’s object was to excite this very feeling of disgust.” — Smend.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

At every head of the way - Not content with what was done in the city, she built her idol temples in the country, wherever it was likely passengers would come.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

General Information:

Yahweh continues to speak about Jerusalem as if the city were his unfaithful wife. The city represents the people who live there. (See: Metaphor and Metonymy)

at the head of every road

Yahweh speaks of the beginning of a road as if it were its head. AT: "at the beginning of every road" (See: Metaphor)

translationWords

high place

desecrate

Egypt

lust

neighbor

anger

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

you spread your legs Since He compares her to a harlot, He speaks in terms of sexual activity, in which there is spreading of the legs, a cesmas in Old French, you spread wide apart.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.