And she increased her fornications; for she saw men portrayed upon the wall, the images of the Chaldeans portrayed with vermilion,
Ezekiel 23 tells the story of two sisters, Oholah and Oholibah. They stand for Samaria and Jerusalem, and God calls their unfaithfulness to Him adultery. In verse 14 Jerusalem goes one step further. No army forced her. A painting on a wall did it.
The names of the two sisters carry meaning, and the younger one learned nothing from watching the older.
Their symbolic names are given here: Oholah the elder, and Oholibah her sister. The first means "her own tent," the second, "my tent is in her."... The worship of Samaria was self-will — at best an imitation, but really independence from the LORD. In Jerusalem, the LORD Himself ordered the worship as His own appointment. Yet both were His... Was Jerusalem warned? Did the sight of Oholah do Oholibah any good? On the contrary, "she was more corrupt in her lust than she." The younger and more favoured sister followed the elder. She was even worse in the way she indulged her idolatry. She lusted after the sons of Assyria: "Then I saw that she was defiled, that they both took one way." Assyria was not enough. She wanted the Chaldeans and their idolatrous worship as well. And the sons of Babylon defiled her; but though they defiled her, her mind turned away from them. So it always is where the favour and the will of God are absent. Close contact with evil soon breeds disgust on both sides.
These pictures were not imaginary. Ancient cities really did decorate their walls this way.
In ancient Egypt the nearest thing to what we now call a picture is the coloured painting on the walls of temples and tombs. In Babylon, pictures on enamelled bricks decorated the walls. Ezekiel 23:14 seems to point to these.
She never met these men. A picture was enough, and she sent the invitation herself.
Once more Oholibah chooses the human school instead of the school of God. She learns nothing from His rod on her sister. She too goes after the attractive Assyrians. But she adds the Chaldeans to them, and their images soon carried her off. And these Chaldeans bring with them a power of evil that is more intense, less human, more supernatural. We learn this from more than the meaning of their name, which seems to be "demon-like"... Yet their mere images attract Oholibah, and they attract her at once: "As soon as she saw them she lusted after them and sent messengers to them in Chaldea."
The eye is still a door into the heart.
With the eye you can look at what is good or at what is evil. What you look at affects the heart. So avoid looking at improper sights. The psalmist prayed, "Turn away my eyes from looking at worthless things." He feared the effect. If the evil enters through the eye-gate, it has a clear passage to the heart. Eve, having looked at the forbidden tree, first desired it in her heart, and then took and ate the fruit. Scripture warns the young men in the family of God against the lust of the eyes (1 John 2:16). A large part of the pleasures of the world today consists of attractive pictures for the delight of the eye.
One writer draws a line from these pictures to what families wear today.
These are days when our young people feel a strong pull to wear strange, foreign clothing. But they will do well, and their parents will do well, to remember this. That strange clothing was part of the cause of the awful downfall of the kingdom of Judah... We understand these references better if we turn to Ezekiel 23:14-15.
He then goes further back, to the first days of Israel in the land.
A Babylonian garment spoiled the beginning of Israel's history in their own land (Joshua 7:21). How very strange that a Babylonian garment again brings that history to a close. Babylon speaks to us of the world... And the clothes our children wear are the badge and mark and proof of where their hearts belong. Do they belong to heaven, which should be their native air? Or to the world with its fashions and ways?
The Chaldeans she sent for did come. Later they came back against her.
When her day of lawless self-will is past, the day of the Lord finds all her former lovers gathered against her. The mustering has come now, the sons of Babylon heading the list with all the Chaldeans.
- Sight. Coloured figures on enamelled Babylonian brickwork were the trigger. An image caught her, not a person she had met.
- Desire. What the eye takes in, the heart wants; if evil enters through the eye-gate, it has a clear run to the heart.
- Invitation. She was not dragged away — she sent the messengers, choosing the human school over the school of God.
- Allegiance. Strange clothing, from the garment hidden at Israel's start to the fall of Judah, is the badge showing where the heart belongs.
- Judgment. The lovers she sent for came back gathered against her, with Babylon heading the list.
girded with girdles upon their loins, with flowing turbans on their heads, all of them captains in appearance, [after] the likeness of the children of Babylon, of Chaldea, the land of their nativity.
Ezekiel 23 tells the story of two sisters, Samaria and Jerusalem, pictured as unfaithful wives. Verse 15 stops on what Jerusalem was looking at: painted Babylonian officers, belted and turbaned. The question it raises is how a picture could capture a nation.
The chapter is a parable, and the names carry the argument. One writer traces the evil back to its root and explains what each sister stood for:
Here the holy city is compared with Samaria: two sisters born to one parent — the Jewish people; sisters in their idolatry too. The evil traces back to its first appearance. The idols that lured them in Egypt exposed them at last to Assyria and to Babylon… Their symbolic names are given here as Oholah the elder and Oholibah her sister; the first means "her own tent," the second, "my tent is in her."
The figures Jerusalem stared at were a real Babylonian art form. Not one of them was a man; each only had the appearance of an officer:
The walls in Babylon were decorated with pictures on glazed bricks. This seems to be what Ezekiel 23:14 points to.
The "flowing turbans" name a real piece of Babylonian dress. Older translations call it "dyed attire":
The word translated "dyed attire" in Ezekiel 23:15 means head-bands, tiaras and turbans of different colours.
Jerusalem did not stop at Assyria. She added Babylon, and that step marked a new stage down:
She too goes after the attractive Assyrians, but she adds the Chaldeans as well, and their images sweep her away at once. These Chaldeans… bring with them a power of evil that is more intense, less human, more supernatural… They had their own language and learning. They practised occult arts, and "wore a strange dress like the one seen on the gods and on deified men in Assyrian sculptures." On top of that, they were not descendants of Shem but of Cush, and belonged wholly to the darkness of that origin. Yet Oholibah is drawn at once; their mere images pull her in.
Jerusalem's ruin started with nothing more than a look. One writer draws out the warning for today:
With the eye you can look either at what is good or at what is evil, and the heart is affected in line with what it sees. So avoid looking at sights you should not see… If evil gets in through the gate of the eye, it has a clear road to the heart… A large part of the world's pleasures today is made up of attractive pictures for the eye to enjoy.
The belts and turbans of verse 15 are not a side detail. One writer reads Israel's whole history in the land through the foreign clothes that mark its opening and its close:
We saw that a Babylonian garment spoiled the start of Israel's history in their own land (Joshua 7:21). How very strange that a Babylonian garment also brings that history to a close. Babylon speaks to us of the world. It is the same place as Babel, meaning Confusion. If we bring the things of this world into the things of God, nothing can follow but confusion… The clothes our children wear are the badge and mark and proof of where their hearts belong — either to Heaven, which should be their native air, or to the world with its fashions and ways.
Her love for the painted Chaldeans did not last. The same chapter records both the desire and the disgust that followed:
Not content with Assyria, she longed for the Chaldeans and their idol worship. The sons of Babylon defiled her; but once they had defiled her, she turned away from them in her mind. It is always so where the favour and the will of God are missing. Closeness in evil soon turns into disgust on both sides.
In the end the same nations she chased turned against her:
When her day of lawless self-will is over, the day of the Lord finds all her former lovers gathered against her.
- Likeness. Babylonian officers in belts and coloured turbans, painted on glazed brick walls — an image, not a man.
- Look. Sight alone did it. What gets in through the eye has a clear road to the heart.
- Longing. Jerusalem wanted more than Assyria. She added the Chaldeans, whose evil was more intense, less human, more supernatural.
- Loyalty. Clothes show where the heart belongs. A Babylonian garment spoiled the start of Israel's history in the land, and a Babylonian garment closed it.
- Loathing. Closeness in evil soon turns to disgust on both sides. The lovers she chased gathered against her in the end.