Ezekiel 20:26

I polluted them--not directly; "but I judicially gave them up to pollute themselves." A just retribution for their "polluting My sabbaths" (Eze 20:24). This Eze 20:26 is explanatory of Eze 20:25. Their own sin I made their punishment.

caused to pass through the fire--FAIRBAIRN translates, "In their presenting (literally, 'the causing to pass over') all their first-born," namely, to the Lord; referring to the command (Exo 13:12, Margin, where the very same expression is used). The lustration of children by passing through the fire was a later abomination (Eze 20:31). The evil here spoken of was the admixture of heathenish practices with Jehovah's worship, which made Him regard all as "polluted." Here, "to the Lord" is omitted purposely, to imply, "They kept up the outward service indeed, but I did not own it as done unto Me, since it was mingled with such pollutions." But English Version is supported by the similar phraseology in Eze 20:31, see on Eze 20:31. They made all their children pass through the fire; but he names the first-born, in aggravation of their guilt; that is, "I had willed that the first-born should be redeemed as being Mine, but they imposed on themselves the cruel rites of offering them to Molech" (Deu 18:10).

might know . . . the Lord--that they may be compelled to know Me as a powerful Judge, since they were unwilling to know Me as a gracious Father.

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

Eze 20:26 And I polluted them in their own gifts, in that they caused to pass through [the fire] all that openeth the womb, that I might make them desolate, to the end that they might know that I [am] the LORD.

Ver. 26. And I polluted them in their own gifts,] i.e., I rejected both their persons and presents as unclean. So God would do our best performances (wherein there would not else be so much as truth and sincerity found), were they not wrought in us by the Holy Spirit, and perfumed with Christ’s sweet odours poured into them.

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.

20:26 The Israelites even gave their firstborn children as offerings to the god Molech. This exactly reversed the Exodus, which freed the Israelites, the Lord’s “firstborn son” (Exod 4:22), to offer pure worship in the Promised Land.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

I condemned those things, and counted them as abominable, which they thought had been excellent, and to have declared most zeal, Luke 16:15, for that which God required, as most excellent, that they gave to their idols.

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

Verse 26. I polluted them in their own gifts] I permitted them to pollute themselves by the offerings which they made to their idols. Causing their children to pass through the fire was one of those pollutions; but, did God ever give them a statute or judgment of this kind? No. He ever inveighs against such things, and they incur his heaviest displeasure and curse. See on Eze 20:31.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

There is no doubt that God here continues the same doctrine’ hence we gather that injurious laws were given to the people when they adopted various errors and worshipped idols of their own fabrication instead of God: hence it is added, I polluted them in their gifts. This, then, was added by the Prophet, lest the Jews should object that they had not altogether rejected the worship of God; for they mingled the ceremonies of the laws with the fictions of the Gentiles, as we saw before, and the Prophet will shortly repeat: in this way they thought they discharged their duty to God, though they added mixtures of their own. Here the Prophet meets them, and cuts off all occasion for turning aside, since they were polluted in their gifts, and nothing was pure or sincere when they thus corrupted God’s precepts by their comments. However, they daily offered their gifts, and professed to present them to the true God; yet they obtained no advantage, because God abominated mixtures of this kind, as we have previously said; for he cannot bear to be worshipped by the will of men, but wishes his children to be simply content with his commands. Now, we perceive the meaning of the Prophet — God pollutes them in their gifts; that is, renders their gifts polluting whenever they think that they discharge their duty; — but how? why, he says, when they cause whatever opens the womb to pass through. Here the Prophet touches on only one kind of superstition, but, by a figure of speech, he means all kinds, by which the Jews vitiated God’s pure worship; for this superstition was very detestable, to pass their sons through the fire, and to consecrate them to idols. But in this passage God speaks only of the first-born, so as greatly to exaggerate the crime: that ceremony was indeed general; but since God claimed the first-born as his own, and wished them to be redeemed at a fixed price, (Exodus 13:2, Exodus 22:29, and Exodus 34:19, 20,) and by this act wished the remembrance of their redemption to be kept up, since all the first-born of Israel, as well as of animals, had escaped, while those of the Egyptians perished, (Numbers 3:13, and Numbers 8:16,) was it not monstrous to pass through the fire, and to offer to idols those who were specially devoted and sacred to God? We see, then, that the Prophet does not speak in vain of the first-born.

That I should destroy thou, says he, and they should know that I am Jehovah. God here shows that he had proceeded gradually to the final vengeance; and for this reason the people were the more convicted of stupidity, since they never perceived God’s judgments manifest. If God had suddenly and impetuously issued his vengeance from heaven, men’s astonishment would not have been wonderful; but when he grants them space of time and a truce that they may weigh the matter at leisure, and admonishes them to repentance, not once only, but often; and then if they remain always the same and are not effected, they show themselves utterly desperate by this slothfulness, as the Prophet now asserts. But when he adds, that they may know that I am Jehovah, he means that as he was not acknowledged as a father by the Jews, he would be their judge, and compel them whether they would or not to feel the formidable nature of that power which they despised. Since we have treated this subject fully before, we now pass it by more lightly. Yet we must notice this, that God is recognized by the reprobate, since, when his fatherly goodness has been for a long time despised by them, he at length appears as a judge, and draws them against their will to his tribunal, and executes his vengeance, so that they cannot escape. It follows —

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.

(26) To pass through the fire.—The word “fire” here, as in Eze_16:21; Eze_23:37, is not in the original, but is rightly supplied from Eze_20:31. The custom referred to was probably that of consecrating their seed to Moloch, expressly forbidden in Lev_20:1-5. (Comp. also Act_7:43.) The causing children to pass through the fire continued a common sin even to the later days of the monarchy (2Ki_17:17; 2Ki_21:6).

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

26. might make them desolate] Or, destroy them; less probably: horrify them (ch. Eze_32:10). The train of thought is the same as that expressed in ch. Eze_14:9. The penalty of sin is further delusion and worse sin, the end of which is death. The last clause “to the end … Lord” is wanting in LXX.

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.

And one polluted them in their own gifts,.... Suffered them to defile themselves; or declared them to be, and treated them as polluted persons, in the gifts and sacrifices which they offered to idols, particularly their firstborn: as the next clause explains it:

in that they caused to pass though the fire all that openeth the womb; this very likely they did, when they sacrificed to Baalpeor, the same with Molech, Num 25:3;

that I might make them desolate; their families, by stripping them of their children, their firstborn, and strength:

to the end that they might know that I am the Lord; a righteous God, in punishing men for sin, in a way it deserves. Some interpret this, not of causing the firstborn to pass through fire to an idol; but of causing them to pass, or of setting them apart, to the Lord, according to the law in Exo 13:12; where the same word is used as here; and the sense is that God declared them to be impure in or with all their gifts, by commanding them to cause their firstborn to pass to him, which they were obliged to redeem; which sense is approved of by Gussetius (l); and so Abendana, taking the words to refer to both, gives this sense of them,

"I pronounced them impure, and removed them far from me, instead of sanctifying them; because they caused everyone that opens the womb to pass from me, whom I commanded to give to me for holiness, but they have given them to idolatry;''

rather, according to Braunius (m), the words may be understood of God's rejecting and causing the firstborn to pass from him, and not suffering them to offer gifts and sacrifices unto him; which may be meant by pronouncing them impure, or polluting them in their gifts; this was after the worship of the golden calf; when he took Aaron and his sons in their room.

(l) Ebr. Comment. p. 576, 939. (m) Selecta Sacra, l. 4. c. 11. p. 522.

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

I polluted them, &c. That is, I gave them up to such blindness, in punishment of their offences, as to pollute themselves with the blood of all their first-born, whom they offered up to their idols in compliance with their wicked devices. (Challoner) (Menochius) (Leviticus xviii. 21., and 4 Kings iii. ultra[last verse], and xxi. 6. (Calmet) --- Offered. Protestants, "caused to pass through the fire all," &c., chap. xvi. 21. --- For their. Protestants, "that I might make them desolate to the end, that," &c.

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).

Polluted them; either I permitted them to pollute themselves, or discovered that they had polluted themselves, or treated them with loathing and abhorrence, as polluted persons.

In their own gifts; either in their gifts which they pretended to bring to me, or rather in their sacrifices they offered to whom, or at least in what manner, they, not I, had chosen; or, which is most likely, gifts are here their first-born, which are more than other children accounted gifts.

Through the fire: see Eze 16:20,21. Most insufferable affront to God, to see those children inhumanly offered to the devil, which, in remembrance of his redeeming the fathers, were consecrated to God! Exo 13:2; and possibly this was first done when they offered to Baalpeor, Num 25:3.

To the end, & c.; to provoke God so to afflict, weaken, and waste by his judgment, till it should undeniably appear that God had by signal displeasure against them for their sins brought them to desolation.

Might know; be convinced, and forced to own, that the Lord is a mighty King in punishing those that might, but would not, have him a gracious King in governing and guiding them.

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

26. I polluted them in their own gifts — From these words certain expositors (Kuenen, Wellhausen, Smend, Toy, etc.) have drawn the conclusion that one of the statutes which were “not good,” and which Jehovah gave in the early days to Israel, was that of child sacrifice. Renan plainly says that Jehovah commanded this evil thing, “in order to avenge himself and punish the nation by prescribing detestable rites” (History, iii, p. 260). This suggestion is a horrible one, and is opposed not only to God’s righteousness and to all that we know of the Mosaic legislation, but is in direct contradiction to the explicit declaration of Jehovah himself (Jer_7:31; Jer_19:5; see also arguments of A. von Hoonacker and Kamphausen). Bertholet, with his customary confidence that Smend and Duhm are far greater authorities than Jeremiah or Ezekiel as to the moral conditions of their times and as to Hebrew history in general, bluntly affirms that these were human sacrifices to Jehovah; adding “and the fact that Jeremiah is of a different opinion is of no importance to the decision!” But the fact is that Jehovah never asked this heathenish gift of human blood (Num_18:15). The so-called sacrifice of Isaac was to teach the great truth that, unlike some heathen deities, Jehovah wanted only the devotion of the heart and preferred their living rather than their dead children. It is, indeed, somewhat doubtful whether this verse refers at all to human sacrifice. Dr. Konig believes that it has sole reference to the sin of the people in failing to obey the Levitical distinctions between clean and unclean animals in sacrifice (Religious History, 1885, p. 137, etc.). But granting that human sacrifice is referred to, which seems on the whole probable, there is no proof whatever that this was an original commandment of the God who said, “Thou shalt not kill,” and who was by nature “merciful and gracious.” Rather, in harmony with our interpretation of Eze_20:25, we conceive the meaning to be that, having given up the service of Jehovah for the service of idols, the people found (in accordance with God’s eternal decree) that with such service came self-degradation and doubled hardship. The man who chose lustful idol worship instead of the pure worship of a holy God became brutal as the gods he worshiped — and the idols required at his hands more awful sacrifices than Jehovah had ever asked. It was God’s ordainment that sin should be the punishment of sin, and that he who refused obedience to the good statutes of a good God should be controlled by the statutes of his own deities, which were “not good.” He who gave up faith in Jehovah and put Molech in his stead was soon called upon to offer his son as a burnt offering. This gift was never asked of him by Jehovah; rather, because of this gift did Jehovah count him “polluted,” literally, profane. (See Lev_18:21; Deu_12:31; Deu_18:10; compare also Orelli, in loco.)

Openeth — Or, first openeth.

That I might make them desolate — Or, amazed, or horrified (Eze_32:10). Jehovah’s purpose in permitting the people to go into these depths of bestiality was that they might be shocked into an appreciation of their own folly and sin and thus be led to repentance.

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

I polluted them through their own gifts. The noun includes all forms of blessing bestowed on Israel its corn and wine and oil, (see Eze_16:19, Eze_16:20) even its sons and daughters, the fruit of the womb, as well as the increase of the earth. (For the prevalence of Moloch worship, and for the phrase, "pass through," see notes on Eze_16:21) The sins were to bring desolation as their punishment, and then men would learn to know Jehovah as indeed he is.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Polluted - I permitted them to pollute themselves. Might know - Be forced to own, that the Lord is a mighty king in punishing those that would not have him a gracious king in governing them.

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

And I defiled them with their gifts Those gifts that I legislated for themto hallow for Me every firstborn—I delivered them into the hands of their temptation: to pass those firstborn to the Molech. Hence the statutes that are not good.

in order that I lay them desolate Heb. אֲשְּׁמֵם. I shall lay them desolate and destroy them. אֲשְּׁמֵם, is an expression of שְּׁמָמָה, desolation. Whoever explains it as an expression of אַשְּׁמָה, guilt, errs, because the ‘aleph’ is not part of the radical.

that they know when I will bring upon them the evil.

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.