Ezekiel 20:29

Eze 20:29 Then I said unto them, What [is] the high place whereunto ye go? And the name thereof is called Bamah unto this day.

Ver. 29. And the name thereof is called Bamah,] i.e., A high place; a name good enough in itself, but, as used by them, as odious to all good hearts as a brothel house is to a chaste matron. She is the worse to pass by it, and spitteth at it. So should we in like case. {Exo 23:13 Psa 16:4 Hos 2:16-17 Zec 13:2 Deu 12:2}

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.

Which signifieth an high place, declaring that they vaunted themselves of their idolatry, and were not ashamed thereof, though God had commanded them expressly that they should have no altar lifted upon high by stairs, Exod. 20:26.

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

What is the high place whereunto ye go?--What is the meaning of this name? For My altar is not so called. What excellence do ye see in it, that ye go there, rather than to My temple, the only lawful place of sacrificing? The very name, "high place," convicts you of sinning, not from ignorance but perverse rebellion.

is called . . . unto this day--whereas this name ought to have been long since laid aside, along with the custom of sacrificing on high places which it represents, being borrowed from the heathen, who so called their places of sacrifice (the Greeks, for instance, called them by a cognate term, Bomoi), whereas I call mine Mizbeaach, "altar." The very name implies the place is not that sanctioned by Me, and therefore your sacrifices even to ME there (much more those you offer to idols) are only a "provocation" to Me (Eze 20:28; Deu 12:1-5). David and others, it is true, sacrificed to God on high places, but it was under exceptional circumstances, and before the altar was set up on Mount Moriah.

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

Verse 29. What is the high place] מה הבמה mah habbamah, "what is the high place?" What is it good for? Its being a high place shows it to be a place of idolatry. I called it במה bamah, to mark it with infamy; but ye continue to frequent it, even while it is called במה bamah, to the present day!

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

Although there is no ambiguity in the Prophet’s words, yet the sentence seems frigid, and interpreters, in my judgment, have not understood the Prophet’s meaning. It may seem spiritless, that God should ask, what is the high place? But it means that they were not deceived through ignorance, since he had often cautioned them against profaning the true and genuine worship, for he often endeavored to draw them back again when he saw them wandering after their own superstitions. Hence they are continually rebuked by the prophets; and their obstinacy is the more apparent, since, nevertheless, they followed their own perverseness. But because all these reproaches were useless, God here enlarges upon their crime, since they were deaf. I have said, therefore; that is, by means of prophets. For we know how constantly the prophets discharged their duty, by urging them to worship at one altar only. For this reason the people’s wickedness was greater; whence God says, What is this? and why do you so greatly desire your high places when they displease me, and you know my commands? your ears are deaf, and obstructed by wickedness. On the whole, he asks how could such madness seize upon them as to approach these high places, since he had pointed out a place where he was to be sought and invoked. My temple, says he, is neglected; meanwhile you run to high places, and yet it is known by the name of a high place. There is no mystery in this word; but God means that no reproaches or threats of his prophets could prevent the people from worshipping on these high places. He says, then, that the name was still used, since the same dignity and religious regard for them still flourished, when their remembrance ought to be utterly abolished. If God had only once pronounced that those high places were not approved by him, all ought to have changed their course instantly: he, exclaimed against them long and vehemently by his prophets, and yet the name “high places” was constantly in everybody’s mouth; it was famous among them, as if God ought to be sought there. Now therefore we see that the Jews were condemned for too much pride, because they not only failed to desert their high places when repeatedly admonished, but they perniciously wished to oppose those places to God’s sanctuary, although they were so many pollution’s. Hence we gather the condemnation of the people’s obstinate malice, since fathers handed down the name to their sons, so that through a continued posterity they opposed these high places to the only sanctuary of God. 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.

(29) Is called Bamah.—Bamah itself means high place. Some have fancied that the word is derived from the two words “go” and “where,” and therefore that it contains a play upon the question in the first part of the verse; but this etymology must be considered fanciful.

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

29. The word bamah, “high-place,” has no certain etymology, though often used and at an early period, e.g. in David’s elegy on Saul (2Sa_1:19), and in Moabite (Mesha’s inscrip.). The prophet here introduces a punning and contemptuous derivation of the word. Jehovah asks “what (mah) is the high place whereunto ye go (ba),” and the prophet seems to consider the word composed of these two syllables. Some have supposed that “go” has the sense of “go in,” and that the allusion is to the immoralities practised on the high places (Amo_2:7; Hos_4:13-14). This idea does not seem expressed in the words; neither is there much probability in the conjecture that the words are borrowed by Ezek. from some older prophet (Ew.).

The prophet’s view of the generation of the exodus differs from that of earlier prophets, e.g. Hos_9:10; Jer_2:2. The generation in the wilderness was probably not a homogeneous one, and the narratives which we possess represent its conduct as various at different times. Two views might be taken of it, and Ezek. as his manner is takes the severer view.

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.

Then I said unto them,.... By his prophets that he sent unto them:

what is the high place where, unto you go? what is the name of it? what is the use of it? to what end do you go there? is there not an altar built by my order and command to sacrifice upon is this high place better than that? does it answer a better end and purpose?

and the name thereof is called Bamah unto this day; or a high place. The Septuagint also leaves the word untranslated, and calls it Abama; and the Arabic version Abbana; so they called their altars after the Gentiles, by whom they are called nor were they ashamed of it, but persisted in so calling them, from the first use of them to the present time. These are often called, Bamah and Bamot in the books of Kings. Jarchi says it is a term of reproach, as if it was said, Bamah----in what is it to be accounted of?

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

Called high. Hebrew, "Bamah," (Haydock) out of contempt. (Calmet) --- The Jews were so much attached to the high places, that they called the altar of the Lord by the same name. Thus heretics are convicted by the very names they use, calling sacrifice service, &c. (Worthington)

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).

Then; when they were intent upon this horrid course of sin, God pleaded by his messengers, and prophets, and law, and some faithful priests, What mean you, that ye go to the high place? should you not go to the altar of God, and bring your sacrifices to the temple? Or what God better than Abraham’s do you expect there? What profit by attending upon those sacrifices offered daily? How often have you by such-like means poured contempt on God and his law!

Whereunto ye go; leaving my temple, and the service I prescribed, and in other places, unrequited, doing their supposed duties.

Bamah; high place: the very word tells them their wickedness, that they acted against the express will of God, and framed themselves to idolaters of the nation.

Unto this day; and this they did with obstinacy continue in to the days of Josiah, 2Ch 34:3. Thus far the narrative of their great wickednesses.

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

29. Bamah — Hebrews, “high place.” That there is intended here some contemptuous turn upon the word cannot be doubted. “What (mah) is the high place (bamah) whereunto ye go (ba)?” Such puns upon names — often given as serious explanations of their origin — are not uncommon in the contemporaneous literature of Babylonia and Egypt. (See, e.g., p. 9, author’s Egypt According to the Monuments.) If we had a better knowledge of the Canaanitish dictionary we would probably see a sharp point here which is now hidden from our dull eyes. The name Bamah must, as Adam Clarke saw, be a veiled name of infamy. So the Church of Rome made fun of Calvin, who was bald, by calling him “Calvinus Calcus,” meaning either Calvin the bald or Calvin the schismatic. Ewald and Smend see in the word “go,” or “go into,” a reference to the literal as well as the spiritual prostitution indulged in by the Baal worshipers (as used also in Gen_16:2; Gen_19:31, etc.).

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

What is the high place, etc.? Bamah, in the plural Bamoth, was the Hebrew for "high place." At first it was applied to the hill on which some local sanctuary stood (1Sa_9:12; 1Ki_3:4) but was gradually extended, after the building of the temple as the one appointed sanctuary, to other places which were looked upon as sacred, and which became the scenes of an idolatrous and forbidden worship. Ezekiel emphasizes his scorn by a conjectural derivation of the word, as if derived from the two words ba ("go") and mah ("whither"); or, perhaps, What comes? (comp. Exo_16:15 for a parallel derivation of the word marones ) Taking the words in their ordinary sense, they seem to express only a slight degree of contempt. "What, then, is the place to which you go? what is the "whither" to which it leads? But I incline (with Ewald and Smend) to see in the word "go into" the meaning which it has in Gen_16:2 and Gen_19:31, and elsewhere, as a euphemism for sexual union. So later the word "Bamah" becomes a witness that those who worship in the high place go there (as in ver. 30) to commit whoredom literally and spiritually. Its name showed that it was what I have called "a chapel of prostitution". (Eze_16:24, Eze_16:25)

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

What - What mean you that you go to the high place? What do you find so inviting there, that you will leave God's altar, where he requires your attendance, to frequent such places as he has forbidden you to worship in? Bamah - That is, the high place.

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

So its name was called Bamah A pejorative: i.e., of what (בַּמֶה) importance is it?

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.