“Then I said of her who was worn out by adultery, ‘Now they will continue to use her for a whore, even her!’
Ezekiel 23 pictures Samaria and Jerusalem as two sisters, Oholah and Oholibah, who left God for the idols of the nations. Verse 43 finds the second sister old and worn out by her sin, and asks whether a life like that ever stops by itself.
The same heart at the end as at the start
The chapter looks back over her whole history, from her first unfaithfulness to her last.
J. N. DarbyIn Ezekiel 23 Jehovah shows why He is right to judge Jerusalem: her way of life was sinful and unfaithful. Her prostitution with the nations brought her early days to mind. The same conduct showed the same nature. She has ended as she began, because at heart she was the same.
What the adultery was
The chapter is not describing sexual sin among the people. It is describing the nation turning to other gods. It calls that turn "adultery" because of the bond the turn broke.
Walter ScottAdultery, or idolatry — "With their idols they have committed adultery" (Ezek. 23:37) — is the special sin charged against Israel long ago, because she was the married wife of Jehovah (Jer. 3:14; Isa. 54:1). For this God divorced her. But in His purpose and grace, Jehovah will restore Israel to the blessed relationship she had before. She will never lose it again, as long as the sun and moon last.
Worn out, and still at it
The woman of verse 43 is worn out. The life she chose is what aged her.
F. W. GrantThe picture is painted for us in a few brief touches. The senseless, immoral woman sits on a grand bed. In front of it stands a table set with the incense and the oil that belonged to the God she had forsaken. Around her are the voices of a loose crowd, given over completely. Even the Sabeans of the wilderness are brought in to join them — desert men who lived by robbery, as their name here may show. And all this comes when old age has clearly overtaken her, brought on early by her excesses.
A course that would never end on its own
The ESV states that men will keep using her; older translations read it as a question — will she still go on? Either way, nothing in her was going to stop it. And she was never only a victim of others.
F. W. GrantThe story is told again, briefly, with every detail that makes it worse. The wickedness keeps on, and seems as if it would go on to the end — like the scum of a pot in the next chapter, which nothing will ever clean... They had not simply been the victims of others. They had not merely been enticed by others. They themselves did the enticing. They worked to bring in men from far away who could only pollute them with their detestable practices. They dressed themselves in the ornaments God had given them, to welcome the very men who corrupted them!
Both sisters under one verdict
God is not the only one who condemns these sisters. Plain human justice reaches the same verdict, and the sister with more privilege carries the heavier sentence.
William KellyJudah was the favoured one, and her judgment should be even greater than Samaria's, because her guilt was greater. Those two women, Oholah and Oholibah, were thoroughly corrupt. Not God only, but righteous men should judge them as adulteresses, and as women who shed blood — because that is what they really were.
Why God lets her be stripped
If the woman will not stop, God will stop her. Commentators read the harshness of the chapter as having an aim beyond punishment.
F. W. GrantYet all this severity is on God's part not mere judgment. The effect, as He puts it here, is to end Oholibah's lewdness, and to make her turn with loathing from the things she once found attractive. One must come to oneself in order to come to God, and this is the process God was now bringing Israel through.
And the goal reaches further than Israel.
F. W. GrantGod and man are united together against them. But God's purpose in it is still to get rid, by whatever severe measures, of the wickedness which would otherwise never end... The end for Israel and for the nations alike is always that they shall know that He is the Lord Jehovah.
Summary
- Bond. Israel stood to God as a wife stands to her husband. That is why the chapter calls her idolatry adultery, and why God set her aside for it.
- Betrayal. She was no passive victim. She sent for her corrupters, and dressed for them in the ornaments God Himself had given her.
- Habit. Verse 43 catches her old and worn out. Her own excesses aged her, and the same loose crowd is still around her.
- Verdict. God judges both sisters together. Upright men would pass the same sentence, so no one can call it unfair.
- Mercy. The stripping aims past punishment: to end the sin, and to make her hate what she once loved. One must come to oneself before coming to God — and the end of it all is that she will know He is the Lord.